Most girls had regular boyfriends. It would sound ridiculous for a boy to be without a steady girlfriend. There are too many girls in number than the boys itching for the few available boys on campus. He also saw how ill-equipped and less emotionally independent the girls were. They relied more on their sexual and famine power to get the attention of their male colleagues. The girls were at war with each other. They tried to outplay each other to the available few boys. Sex seemed to be all that mattered in a boy-girl relationship. Why the mad rush on pre-marital sex? He had pondered many times. Waiting for something makes the value worth more because what is worth having is worth waiting for? Isn't sex worth waiting for?
The wrong orientation prevalent in the academic-social environment was not helping matters. It made things impossible for both sexes to find out exactly what they want out of such sensitive affairs. In Kelvin's own view, it was the girls who in most cases seem to receive cruel treatments at the hands of the boys. The boys change them as with clothes.
The wrong orientation prevalent in the academic-social environment was not helping matters. It made things impossible for both sexes to find out exactly what they want out of such sensitive affairs. In Kelvin's own view, it was the girls who in most cases seem to receive cruel treatments at the hands of the boys. The boys change them as with clothes.
"Boys think of most girls as a book appeals to the reader. If the cover doesn't appeal to the reader, they wouldn't bother to read the content." anonymous
Forty-one students were the tally number of the students living in his lodge building. Out of this number, twenty-five were females. Sixteen were males. The pre-degree students living in the said lodge were quite organized in doing things as a body. Each one was his brother's keeper. Misunderstandings were easily sorted out with a sense of humor. The disagreeing colleagues are made to reconsider their differences for the greater good of the community. On the academic and social level, there was that prayerful ambition for success. Even after so many years gone by, Kelvin still relishes the pleasurable memories of the playful serenity prevalent in the lodge. The heartwarming feelings of the students that took up residence in it were exceptional.
There were many things that he had enjoyed during the brief eight to nine months period of the pre-degree program. Among these was the unforgettable serenity of the surroundings of the community the campus was located. In spite of the obvious lack of basic amenities such as public power supply which was never felt despite the presence of the necessary infrastructures. Portable safe drinking water was void. The only source of water had been the small stream which wasn't all that safe for human consumption. Yet, that was the only source of water. When he first came to the area he soon took ill for typhoid fever. Not even the institution had the health facility to treat him. He had to travel back home to get treatment. Though there was an option of getting safe drinking water. To those who could afford it, bags of sachet of water were available for consumption.
The scenic view was that of beautiful hills and wet valleys. It was yet another reason why he admired the area. On so many occasions, en route to the stream to fetch water Kelvin had to stop at a vantage point to admire the sights before him. Each time he descends the hill to the stream, he absorbs the breathtaking sight of the surrounding hills. The thick presence of bushlands slowly grows into a forest as far as the eye can see.
From that vantage point, one could see the outline of the sunbaked earth. The bush tracks stood out clearly from the forest walls of bushlands. This stood on each side of the hills and on the other side on which he stood. The roads and bush tracts all seemingly emanating from a point at the top of the hill on each side. They descended with that steep thrust towards the stream below. The buildings capped and graced the top of the hills. These ran across more than a mile behind the shade of trees.
The possibility of having an aerial view of these beauties of the landscape-somewhere between the two hills also graced his thoughts. A picture of the memorable outcome will be indelible. He also imagined if he was the only person that admires the sight of nature. What an appreciative mind of the beauties endowed in those two hills. Any nature admirer from the other side of the hill would share his sentiments―beauty indeed they say is in the eyes of the beholder.
Kelvin knew he had daydreamed of buying the plot of land just close to the spot where he usually stops on his way to fetch water. He had erected a building in his imaginative mind that will be overlooking the valley and the surrounding hills. Indeed, no one would ever be denied these facts. The longing of being part-and-parcel of such scenic views or rather having a claim to it.
To add to the beauty of the landscape were the fruit trees. They were planted along with every nuke and cranny of the community and the political state in particular. The whole area―the political state of Anambra State was prone to severe erosions. The menacing gullies threaten the existence of its people and the landscapes themselves.
The fruit trees were cashew nuts which combine as a cash crop as well as a check to the looming reality of erosion. The cashew nut tree was such that it occupied some fields of thousands of hectares of land. It may be right to say that the cashew tree had taken over the landscape of the community. The tree in itself is self-propagating. One planted seed is required to turn a greater percentage of land into a forest of trees. One could spend a whole day plucking and enjoying the juiciness of the fruits when in season.
In his lodge, especially in the main boys' quarters. It became a regular routine that every of its member goes to the stream together. The stream was close to the lodge. Only a few walking distances away. It takes only a few minutes, yet it takes close to a few hours before they could make it back to their domicile lodge. Why? This is what usually should be on anyone's lips―the answers are not farfetched too. Their endless adventure to cashew fruit plucking. After having their fill in the bushes, with sacks of nylon bags to justify the rounds of cashew hunting. They would take the nylon-filled bags of cashew fruits back to the lodge. A stomach filled with cashew fruits to many was the lunch. Those who were not able to go for the cashew hunting will share from the bush spoil.
Kelvin relishes the periods in which the cashew trees were in season as it was a great boost to them. It was an advantage to the students, especially in the lodge. It came to serve as a lunch alternative to most of them who could not afford three square meals a day. Even those who could boast of three square meals could not resist the urge to join the bush hunt for the cashew nut juicy fruits. It helped to save most of their lunch money back into their always-lean pulse.
On a personal recall, Kelvin was among those who benefited more than anyone else. He did not find it funny. He loved fruits. It was among his delicacy. He had to be meticulous when it comes to money and has always been.
He knew too well that for the months in which these trees were in the season he made the best of it as he substituted it for his lunch most times. He wasn't the only one on the same page because most students were not shy to go for cashew fruit-bush-hunt. You will be surprised at the cache of fruits on each hunting expedition. When you see a tree shaking with its branches, do not presume it was the winds, birds, or monkeys. They are evidence of students dangling on the branches. Students climb the trees in the public view of fellow students.
It was a thing of pleasure to spend most afternoon periods after lectures on top of a cashew tree with ripe fruits dangling all around you.
Before long a club was born. A club for boys called the Cashew boys' club―a free admission club. You can only be a member if you're a lover of cashew fruits. Your regular presence is welcomed on the trees with your books in hand. Your books must accompany you as a mandatory requirement. Voluntary efforts encouraged each member to introduce new members to the club.
One favorite place of voluntary meeting was in front of the library. These are peculiar for Kelvin. He spends most of his time too in the library. Between his reading sessions, he would stroll out of the building to hang out on the trees with his colleagues. When the library had closed for the day, some lecture hall blocks had dozens of such trees. These were decorated with the endless yellowish and greenish color of the ripe and unripe fruits in their bunch.
The club lasted as long as the fruits and their season lasted. A spirit of comradeship soon developed among the members. It would not be a surprise if a member makes inquiries during the lectures period to ask whether the others would make it to the meeting as usual. The need to make plans ahead cannot be over-emphasized. Thus, the importance of passing information to the regular members was a necessity. At the meetings, the welfare of other members who were absent at the previous meetings was also made known to those who care to find out. At a point, the meeting point soon became a rallying ground for discussing important issues. The topic ranges from the fruits to polities, sports, education and whatever the latest in the news was. Trending news points in the dailies are always hot issues to deliberate upon. The library was always stocked with current daily news-making around the country.
The beautiful cool shades provided by the trees were another reason why the club attracted many members. All around these trees were wooden seats brought from the lecture classrooms to accommodate the teeming fans of the club. The timing for the club meeting was set and coincides with yet another activity that each member enjoys as well. When the sun might have gone down, everybody knows what time it is―time to have some fun. Time to play the master-of-all-sports―the football game.
Before the time comes by, most of the members would go home to their respective place of domicile to change into their appropriate dress of shorts. In so many cases, in other not to miss the first game selection, some who wore their boxers would immediately shed their clothes for the game. If you are not a lover of football games don't find this ridiculous. You never knew what it means to those who love it. For a football game on the spot, one should always be ready.
The funniest part of the activity of the club was the unending drama and jokes they made about each other. Members are always questioning each member on why he was always found reading his books under the cashew nut trees.
"These boys, I wonder what your parents would be thinking of. They would think you are married to your books here. Unknown to them you're only married to the cashew tree," Emeka would mock his fellow members.
"I don't blame you. Imagine someone who calls himself a serious student. You're pretending to read your books. Your eyes are always up the trees for a yellow fruit," Daniel replied.
"Hey, look at that fat one over there. I beg someone should help me with a stick to pluck it," Samuel called out.
"Let me pluck it for you, dear," Samson suggested as his eyes roved over the uppermost sections of the tree.
"Sorry dear, I don't need to trust a Monkey with a bunch of bananas," replied Samuel as he made his way up the tree.
"I wouldn't like to observe you committing suicide just because of that fruit at the fringe of the tree. Simple, let it be someone else to save you the pain of crashing to the ground," Samson chipped in with humor.
"Longer throat, don't forget that you should by now be having your lunch but you're up there in the tree," Samuel fired back.
When a member is absent for some time for any reason, seeing him again will elicit some interrogative questioning. It was a normal routine to pick on him.
"Hey Onwa, what do you think you are coming here to do, enhh?" Ifeanyi cried out on sighting the object of his attack, Onwa.
"Does that mean your parents had forgotten that you are in school to have sent you back empty-handed?" Nnamdi re-echoed it.
"Don't mind the guy. I saw him coming back yesterday with enough Ghana-must-go bags filled up with foodstuffs. When he brought out his wallet to pay the Okada man... he was a smelling-mint-of-hard-currency," Uchenna insinuated.
"You cashew boys, I' am aware that the number of the ripe fruits had remained the same since I left them. Let me warn every one of you that I've been counting all the ripe fruits from my hometown," Onwa replied. "I took count of them all,"
"Yes! Hurry boy, you never land from your travel, and your eyes don dey hot for trees, abi?" Peter quarried him hotly in pidgin English.
"Everything he thinks these days is cashew fruit all through. He will soon change his name to cashew fruit and not Onwa―the moon," that was Ikechukwu's voice as everyone laughed.
"Una no-go go eat better food for the house. Every morning cashew. Every afternoon cashew. Every night cashew, haba!" Onwa replied as he climbed the tree. "You," pointing at Marcus, "the way you dey carry book climb up the tree. Are you sure it's the book or cashew fruit you're after?"
"Never mind him, he pretends to be reading whereas he is documenting the number of ripe cashew nut fruit on the tree," Okonma added.
"Onwa, how far now? Wetin you carry come back for the boys?" Charles asked.
The newcomer Onwa deliberately avoided the question.
"I beg you let me be. Make I taste this ripe fruit first before I answer you," replied Onwa as he launched for a ripe fruit.
"Onwa don't tell us you didn't come back with anything. Or are you saying that your girlfriend had weed zapped everything," Samson added.
"You think I am the likes of Samuel. Who always account to his girlfriend every dime he receives from his guardians?" Onwa objected.
"You better fix up your mouth. Where did you sleep last night?" replied Samuel.
"Myself?" Onwa asked a rhetorical question. "Yes, was it not in your girls' room?"
"You must be joking,"
"Well, good a thing you talk what you know best. Let me tell you, you slept in your girls' lodge last night and your girls' room No. is D12. She answers Nkechi Akwarandu. Do you think no one saw you when you sneaked out early in the morning?"
It was obvious that the cashew fruit trees were a rallying point. Yet, it was a thing of surprise that not all members knew exactly where the other members are coming from. Most of the members rarely knew much about each other except on some occasions when something so sensitive happens. Or something that has to do with their respective place of domicile came into the front-line of discussion.
"Boy, e bi like say you are too close to my tails," Onwa replied saving face.
"So Onwa, you meant to say that you'd given everything you came back with to your girlfriend for keeps?" Samson pushed further.
"See that little girl hawking boiled groundnut. We wouldn't mind doing with that." Charles pointed out. He wasted no time calling the girl over.
"How much are you selling the groundnut?" Onwa immediately asked the young girl as he brought out wades of Naira notes. The action received loud applauds. He was hailed by all. They all have a way of making him feel high and willing to go a little further with his ego already inflated with pride.
"Onwa na you biko-kwa o," echoed Uchenna as he received his own package of the boiled groundnut in a nylon bag.
"You are the aka ekpuchi-onwa," (Meaning the moon that can never be obscured with palms) cried Ifeanyi.
It was not long; the club started receiving some female members. These girls got attracted to the club for the same reasons as were their male members. Some of them it turned out were the girlfriends of the male members. Since some of these girls are shy and could not climb, except for the few among them that dared the climbing phobia. It became the obligation of the male members to feed the female members by plucking the fruits for them.
Many bonds of relationships got broken as soon as they sprouted. These became possible after the curiosity and the fire in their loins had exhausted its heat. It was not a common sight to observe the expression of long faces on parties that were once aflame with each other now on odd terms. The victims of such relationships at most are the girls who end up more wounded at heart than they had envisaged.
In their unguarded bid for attention and acceptance from persons of the opposite sex, they offer themselves at a giveaway price. They soon discover to their utter dismay that they had only felled victims to the predatory sex-mongers of their male partners. It doesn't matter if it was a he or she either way they both were casualties of romance.
Kelvin's colleagues at the lodge considered him often as the bad boy in their midst. He was taken as being too conservative and not stirred by some of their objectionable fanfares which they indulge themselves in the name of having fun. In the case of such fanfares, he did not take pleasure in condemning whatever it is they were at. He takes a walk from their midst whenever he senses that things were no longer moving as planned. To be sincere, those fanfares were a minor occurrence compared to the other wholesome engagements. Nonetheless, they were enough to compromise him.
In spite of their different views about him, he was admired and respected by them. A good number of them understood each time he had to explain himself out―why he had excused himself from some activities which he did not feel comfortable with. Even at that, others were not convinced that he was normal. They see no reason why he opts to deprive himself of having some funs which in their view he deserved. He felt tempted to have a feel–of– the-fun not once or twice but many times. He found himself trapped in the carefree lifestyle prevalent on the campus and the lodge where he now lives. Yet, out of his inner struggle to keep virtuous―it was a heartbreaking fight. It was either he succumbs to the pressures or goes on torturing his mind against his fleshy feelings.
Kelvin knew he must keep chaste. He wants to keep chaste. Yes, that had been his decision which he was predetermined to uphold but not without a hard fight. He came close to breaking apart under pressure on several occasions. He was almost swept off his feet by the suggestive approach of his female colleagues though not in the lodge itself. Who would have known what he did? Who could have queried him if he had decided to lay any lascivious girl? Was he not man enough to live his life the way he wants it, yes, follow after his heart? He could have discovered how fun it would be to be in bed with any willing girl. Why would he be having this terrible feeling of losing out on something? Ordinary suggestive eye contact was enough to get a bedmate of the opposite sex. Could he afford to breach a contract with his conscience? Was he normal? Was he just afraid of being caught out and losing face at the end? If the opportunity presented itself in a secluded place where no one knew him would he still keep up with his stance? He would on several occasions found himself pondering over in his mind. But for his conscience, he rather dares not.
He had always believed that it was a man that takes the first step towards getting the attention of a woman. But he was wrong in many cases as he soon discovered that sometimes it's the girls that initiate the first step. Some are tactical in their approach. Others were not. That came as a surprise to him judging from his previous orientation and what the culture had laid before his society. He soon got over that as part of the ever-changing culture as we all try to acclimatize with the surprises of modern lifestyle as defined in high institutions.
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The First Time 
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