There’s a mandatory pattern to be followed in my profession;
Bachelor of medical laboratory science - Internship - national youth service corp - full time worker.
Since I have my BMLS checked, the next thing is my compulsory one year internship program.
Fortunately, I got my appointment call from the HR office a few weeks after my interview to resume work as an intern. I knew I had to travel down to Ondo again but this time, it is to stay for at least six months.
Since the teaching hospital has branches across two cities, I together with other interns would have to rotate through all the branches which makes it six months training in one city and the other six months in the other city.
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The next undeniable thing was to find accommodation for the time I’ll be spending at the first location.
It couldn’t be cornered. My parents wouldn’t leave their busy schedules to come down all the way from the capital city to do house hunting for a grown child.
However, looking for vacant houses around the university teaching hospital is harder than trying to keep a delicious beef in the mouth without swallowing it quickly, not to even talk about getting the house for six months only.
Most landlords want to get a year worth payment for their houses and that is exactly what wouldn’t work for me.
Shoutout to the old days when my parents did house hunting when I entered university. I didn’t get enough reasons to ever move out of the house till I graduated so I never did any house hunting thing throughout.
I tagged with one of my guy friends whom we shared the same view and had the same goal in mind.
We were both newly appointed interns with the goal of getting a house for six months only. Most importantly, two bedroom flats - my friend in one room and my sweet self in the other room, with close distance to the workplace, running water, and good power supply.
I really wanted to stay alone but my parents gave their speculations about where they’d love me to stay.
“Find a person that you can share a house with so that you can pay for the house as a team” my father said over the phone.
“I don’t want to stay in the same room with anybody but I can find a two bedroom do that each person will have a room to them self” I replied and he objected
It led to some misunderstanding.
I eventually agreed to his choice but what I’d do seated pretty in my mind.
Although I had shared a whole house including a room with a person throughout my five years in the university and had survived it, I just didn’t want to live like that again.
I wanted to build and enjoy my alone time.
However, I found a few two bedroom flats around but apart from the outrageous rent prices, my parents objected strongly that I should find a roommate. Anyways, MY PARENTS: 500 vs ME:0.
I later spoke with my friend about the tight spot that I’m in and he advised that I try to convince them more.
The whole house sharing thing got really heated between my parents and me inclusive and I got really frustrated and confused. Well, I gave up on house hunting but my friend didn’t, he kept the fire burning for the two of us
Okay fine, I wanted to lie before that my housemate would be a girl but at that instance, I thought to myself that this is a sign that I shouldn’t go through with it.
Mind you, I didn’t want to stay with a man for the fun of it, it was out of desperation.
All the female folks decided to stay alone and I was the only one that my parents wanted to have a housemate/roommate at least so it was only a guy that was readily available at that moment and since it’s needed at a rush hour, why now?
We’re even friends from school so why not again?
However, I changed my mind that I was not looking for a two bedroom apartment again, I want a single house where I can live alone, on my own and away from the evil cold world. In addition, the guy isn’t even my boyfriend so why fight for “roommate ship”?
If I wanna do this fight thing with my parents, then it should be over something worthy
Anyways, fighting my own parents isn’t something to be proud of but I needed to stand my own ground “for once” at least.
At the end of the day, I went back home to my Adesope’s house to relax after doing something close to marathon walking through the day, more like “Ondo house hunting walk-a-thon”
Adesope was my former roommate who has accommodated me from the day I arrived in Ondo for this house hunting thing. I planned to stay with her for a week. Hopefully I get a house before the week elapses.
Although she doesn’t mind if I stay with her forever but personally, I didn’t wanna be a leech in human clothing.
That night, I called my mama to explain my long day and the results I got from it. How would I describe that day? Long, tiring, frustrating but looking progressive.
9 am sharp the second day, I called my friend again to continue our house hunting. We met later at his place and we began walking from street to street, looking out for vacancies with our speculations and at some point around 3 pm, we decided to give up and move out of that vicinity.
So we took a bike to the nearest main junction. From there, another walking session began in search of houses. We actually did find houses but they were not so okay so we didn’t consider them.
We later branched at one of our guy’s houses near the main junction to say hello. From hello to feeling at home and he also brought snacks for us, even put on the generator for us and we enjoyed TV till late at night.
My friend and I decided to forget our sorrows by engaging our taste buds. We went out and grabbed roadside “akara” (bean cake) and bread and sachet water.
We headed to our separate homes after eating the food.
The next day, we went to a far away place to check for vacant houses, we did the inspections and the most annoying thing was that we were told to pay for the inspection.
Oh this man, don’t add to my frustration
Why didn’t he even say it at first ?
He just have a mind to scam us
No wonder the door to the house is broken
The house was actually too far
They didn’t even keep the place clean
Bla bla bla
I had over a thousand complaints about the house.
So, why should I pay for suffering? I’d rather add little change to the inspection fee and order smoky hot jollof rice and big peppered chicken from Papilz foods and even step it down with a cold orange juice. By doing that, I’ll feel extremely fulfilled.
However, guess who escaped paying for some damn house inspection. Credit to my smart friend for being a good drama character.
“We don’t have our phones here to do transfers”
“You could have told us when we called you on the phone”
“Why tell us after we’ve inspected the house?”
“Okay, this is what we’ll do..
“.. we’ll send the money immediately we get home”
“ we actually love the place and we’ll consider taking it too”
Boom, that was all. We left and didn’t look back.
It’s been three days of house hunting. I knew it within me that I’d lost weight. I could feel it.
I called my parents again and explained the progress to them.
As I trekked home that day with my friend, we saw a random house with “a room and parlor self-contained for rent” “ a room self-contained for rent” written boldly on the wall of the first building.
“Fikayo, check this”
I tapped him to draw his attention.
“Let’s check this place” “ it’s like there are really vacancies here”
We asked the occupants in the other houses and confirmed that there are really vacancies there.
The happiness that emerged from the inside of me was unquantifiable. The most interesting thing was that it’s trekkable from the workplace.
Almost immediately, we contacted the landlord and he decided to give the house to us for six months as well.
There were two self-contained apartments in the compound. We priced both and agreed at a reasonably nice rent price that benefited both parties.
My friend paid for his apartment that night and there was me who still had to explain the whole thing to my parents several times and at the end of the whole explanation, I got a big NO.
Why?
Just because I’d be staying alone.
I even tried to explain how interesting the environment is and how I have many neighbors but all to no avail.
I felt a great unexplainable pain in my heart that I cried a lot to free my mind a little from the piled frustration.
I gave up explaining and searching eventually because I didn’t think I’d be able to do the house hunting thing alone, not even now that my friend has secured a place for himself.
I went back to Adesope’s house later that night and went to bed sad.
Furthermore, my parents and I had a virtual heart and heart discussion the next day with my mind hell bent on “ there’s nowhere I could possibly find a roommate at this time”. Most female interns stayed in their various apartments alone and no one was willing to share their room with another person.
My brother also had to come into the picture to convince my dad to let me handle that on my own.
Finally, he agreed and he paid the rent fee.
The next week, my stuff arrived from home and I did the cleaning, setting up and living in the house.
Thank you for reading my house hunting - objections story.