The Sights of Kanye's One Year Birthday!!!

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For more pictures, click here

The Business: JerominaBabies!!!

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Picture courtsey of JerominaBabies

 She always said she wanted to open a business, in addition to her telecoms day job {superwoman} but it wasnt until she bought one of those "If You Likes" that the idea of which business was birthed! Click here to continue reading, click here

The fab Profashional and her Wardrobe Sale!

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TWP in Babushka. Photo credit: BellaNaija
She's young, she's a beauty {a certified hottie according to BellaNaija} and she's all brains! If the fact that she's also a lawyer does not give credence to her "smart" status, the idea of her wardrobe sale should be able to point all doubting thomases in the right direction!

When Adaku U. (a.k.a ThirdWorldProfashional) tweeted sometime last week that she was having a wardrobe sale, i was all kind of excited! And the clincher: every item was going for a token of N1,000. I couldnt wait for Sunday the 9th! Anyone that knows TWP will attest to the fact that she is a fashionista! I couldnt believe that most of her red/green/yellow carpet ensemble and accessories {some of which have been worn just once} were up for grabs....just like that! Some folks would say...and did say...why sell already-used items, even if they were being sold at ridiculously cheap prices? Why not give to charity? I would argue: how charitable can this get...a pair of brand new Gucci sandals or a Deola Sagoe polo shirt which usually retails for N15,000 now being given away for a token?!

Anyways, i wasn't the only person excited about this sale {i infected my friend Miranda with my excitement too}. It was originally scheduled for 12:00noon but by ten o'clock that a.m, there was a sizeable number of chics waiting outside the gates! Needless to say, by the time yours truly was able to make it to the sale, a large chunk of the fabulous spoils were gone! Bummer!!! No worries though since i had eyes only for the bags and accessories....and i did score some!

Some of my buys: a butterfly necklace and an Aldo clutch...pure leather!

We are who we are: Shopaholics!!!


Putting up ninety percent of her wardrobe up for sale was a brilliant move on the part of TWP. It couldn't have been an easy decision to make, i am sure....chics/women are natural borne hoarders! The wardrobe sale, however, was a win-win situation type thingy. The shoppers were thrilled they scored really fabulous items for less and TWP got handsomely paid to de-clutter her wardrobe!

Amaka and Adaku {TWP} 

I had a fun afternoon on Sunday the 9th....bargain shopping makes me really happy! Appreciations to Adaku (@VivrantThing) for having us and to Miranda (@jerominababies) for letting me drag her with me!

TWP inspired a lot of young fashionistas with this sale that i'm sure there would be a few more wardrobe sales in the nearest future. Watch this space or follow on Twitter (@Zitera) for updates. Love and light...x

House Help or Resident Evil?!

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Gone are the days when a woman was simply described as homemaker, her JD requiring her only to take care of the man a.k.a the breadwinner of the family and his numerous offsprings! Cooking and cleaning, washing and ironing, school runs and child{ren} welfare were all part of the package. With time, however, the dynamics of the home witnessed changes. For some reasons {either the woman got tired of being just a homemaker, craving more meaning and purpose out of life or the harsh economic realities of our times advised an extra pair of bread-winning hands}, the woman left the home and joined the work force and then employed the cooks, the housekeepers, the washermen, the childminders, the drivers, the nannies to take over her job responsibilities at the homefront. Life hasnt been same ever since!

I am a wife, a mother, a career woman, a banker, working in a fast-paced pressure-ridden cutthroat environment! I would love to stay home and play Catch with my son, watch Cbeebies with my daughter but i know i also want to give them the very best money can buy! And so, i choose to pursue money and pray that i still have the strength to share a little bit of my time with the children when i get home exhausted! School run and the care of the children, i leave in the hands of my driver and the househelp and in the hands of GOD!

The househelps and nannies, however, have become the bane of a career woman's very existence. The need for them is unavoidable unless one has family members who are willing to help out at the homefront. Growing up, our mothers had day jobs that took them out of the house but they never missed picking us up from school or coming home for lunch and they generally had working hours that have them leaving for home by 4:00pm at the most! Today, if the woman of the house makes it home by 7:00pm, her workplace must be five minutes away from the house! Since it would appear that the modern day career woman needs them more than they do her, these helps have taken to conducting themselves in whatever manner they deem fit. These people we are trusting {and paying handsomely too} to watch over our children while we are away are perpetrating all kinds of evil against the little ones they are supposed to be protecting in the first place:
  • Sharon got kidnapped, for ransom, from school by a trusted help whom had be catered for by her family even before Sharon was born. Who does that? How does one pay back some much good with such unadulterated evil?
  • Daisy* {from my earlier post} was rented out on a daily basis as a working tool, to those ever-begging women on the streets of Lagos while the nanny sits at home to enjoy the spoils of her mother's toils.
  • Glory's children {not her real name} were banned from drinking water by Her Royal Lowness, the househelp, because too much water causes them to wet their clothes and beddings and thereby creates more work for her! This one still shocks me....the kids could only drink water when their mother gets home from work and even then, they do so in hiding!
  • Ella, just recently, lost her life not as a result of pure negligence on the part of the help. She was drowned, her head held down in a bucket of water until she seized breathing, because the help couldnt get time off work over the christmas holidays! HOW EVIL????
The stories are unending, with each new one becoming even more atrocious than the last. Children are sexually molested by their minders; drug abuse reigns supreme...afterall, if the kids wouldn't give them time to watch AfricaMagic, a dose or two of Chlorpheniramine would do the trick. The heart-aches most women has been subjected to, are innumerable. A few days ago, i tweeted that i was on the verge of cursing my nanny, reason being that she left my house weeks ago and im yet to even speak with her {she is not taking my calls}. Now, i know anger was not the proper reaction to that act. I am more thankful to God for whatever calamity He must have prevented from befalling my children in her hands! If God does not watch a city....

At this point, im all for solutions to this issue of childminders, nannies and helps. Mind you, a good number of these people are actually Godsent. Our problems lie with the ones that are sent by anything but God. Must women have to choose between career and the family? Should offices subscribe to the practice of having 'mini' creches within the work premises? Will CCTV mounted at strategic places within the home allay the fears of parents with regards to ill treatment of their wards in the hands of the helps? When does a perfectly good help resort to evil doing and what {who} informs that decision? Are there signs to watch out for?

The evil that men do lives after them. In the cases of these ones, i am of the opinion that their evil should live with them and haunt them until the end of their unnatural lives. Today's children are supposed to be tomorrow's leaders. If their psyche gets distorted this early in life, what hope do we have for the future?

Private Schooling in Nigeria: The Case of Lead, Follow or Get Out of the Way?!

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Courtesy: Google Images

After the excitement and the extravagant show of wealth usually associated with the Christmas holidays, the month of January feels like a rude interruption, a jolt to the harsh reality of imminent financial responsibilities. Chief amongst these responsibilities is the payment of school fees....and the fees do NOT come cheap in this town Lagos!!!! As parents, we always look out for our children, trying to make the best decisions for their future. Academic reputation, school and class size, safety reputation, special programs, convenience, costs, religious and moral implication (in this order) are usually whats taken into consideration in choosing schools for these young impressionable kids.

With the deplorable state of our nation's educational sector, most parents are being forced to enrol their wards in private schools....schools initially percieved as meant for the elite. A colleague once said that the difference between the private schools and the government owned schools (i'm not sure which parameters we were using to make the comparison at that point...lol) is so enormous, one actually feels guilty having her child in a government school. I totally agree with her! Though expensive, the benefits are sometimes worth the sacrifice! The downside, however, cannot be ignored:

School was out July 2010 for the summer holidays! Mr A usually sends his kids to the UK for summer but as most pockets were still recovering from the effects of the credit crunch/recession, he figured the kids would have to skip summer that year. He figured wrong!!! For days after he conveyed his decision to the kids, he was on the recieving end of the worst kind of silent treatment! Reason: How can Daddy not sponsor this trip? How would they face their peers on school resumption with no Jhand or Yankie gist? Bottom line: Days later, kids were en route to the UK; Daddy had less 3M in his coffers!

Sometimes, the blame lie with us...the parents. The often un-acknowledged but oh-so-present rivalry amonsgt parents can sometimes have them enrolling their kids in schools way above their financial capabilities. For every Grange School, there is a Halifield School ( Halified is not cheap......but it is much more affordable); for every GreenSprings School, there is a ChrisLand! Quality of education is what should matter and if that can be obtained from a slighty cheaper school, then why make an investment that would weigh heavy on the pockets? Why enrol a ward in Our Saviours because "they said its the best school and Ade's children school there na" and come resumption time, you channel "Eze Onye Agwana m", stomping around the house like a wounded elephant, while also murmuring about "all these bills" that has to be paid!

In my opinion anyways, be it Meadow Halls or Seat of Wisdom, private schools are tres expensive in Lagos. Ironically, population explosion is, to some extent, being curtailed as the modern day Nigerian man aspires to have just those two kids he can give the very best he has to offer...cant say I blame him! Cutting one's coat according to material, as against size, comes into play!! A child would grow to be a productive, financially responsible and happy adult, in the right environment......not necessarily an expensive one!!

This post was inspired by my 'son', Uchenna "Bobo" Ndibe-Okoye!!!

...And 2011 Is Here!!!!

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2011 is finally here!!!!!!!!!! The feeling of having made it through 365 days of many unknown variables to a brand new year is beyond exhilarating! I was moved to tears, as were most people...i'm sure, as i watched the long hand of the clock meet with the short hand at 12 midnight....ushering in Twenty Eleven! Songs of praise, words of thanksgiving were rendered to Him who seats upon the Throne! WE ARRIVED ALIVE!!!

Today, however, should be a day of sober reflections. With the new year comes the opportunity to start anew.....out with the old that were of no value to us or humanity; in with the new that would make us better beings! It is the time to re-assess and re-strategise. It is time for the husband to forgive that erring wife; time for the wife to forgive and welcome home her cheating husband; time for that mother-in-law to realise that her son belongs to another woman now; time for that daughter-in-law to understand, respect and appreciate that the 'witch' gave her husband life! It is time for fathers to quit bribing their ways out of (and be more hands-on with) raising their offsprings!

The new year is here! It is time to stop blaming those in authority and pray for them instead, as one family (we cannot under-estimate the power of agreement prayers en masse...case in point, Sharon). It is time to abort our pregnancies of hate and deceit and hypocrisy; time to wake up our consciences to the inhuman act of looting resources made for the mass just so our children can fly business class to choice exotic locations for vacatons, while turning blind eyes and deaf ears to the cries of the poor living in squalor, with little or no food on their tables and no hope of healthcare!

It is time to GIVE rather than TAKE! In his song, Lucky Dube says that Blessed is the Hand that Giveth than the Hand that Taketh! It is time to give hope...in any little way we can. It is time to give our prayers...to our families, to our friends, to our colleagues, to the our country! IT IS TIME!!

As we celebrate, let us make 2011 count! Happy New Year!!!!