"ÀRÓDAN"

A bubbly young girl runs into the hairdressing shop I was making my hair at and breathlessly with short laugh breaks she said

"mummy mi ni ki gba arodan wa" (my mom asked me to collect arodan)

Everyone in the shop laughed knowingly, at some point in the lives of everyone there, they had been sent on such errand.

The hairdresser hands her a brush and told her to wait for her since she was busy.

Even while the young child was standing, she was still not calm. She searched for nothing in particular, opened up draws and raised up chairs, you can tell why exactly she got sent to bring the arodan.

Arodan is something Yoruba people always asked children who are too energetic to go and get from neighbours or friends. In reality, there's no material thing that is called arodan. It is an idea to keep the child busy elsewhere or to keep them grounded in the house of a strict neighbour or a feared one.

If you have been sent to collect the arodan, you are either troublesome or too nosy. As a child, I never was sent to collect it- not because I wasn't stubborn but because I knew my place. If my mom needed her privacy, her eyes were communication experts. But many times, unsuspecting children have been sent to our house. You get sent countless times before you realise that it was all a scam, for many young children, that is their first introduction to fraud.

I like how despite the gross assimilation of western culture that we have been experiencing since previous years, some are still fanning the flame of our indigenous traditions. It gladdens my heart.

This is my last publication for this year. Though I have been inconsistent, I didn't want to leave the year without sharing something again on this space.

Adiós my friends!

So long and "see" you again in the next year.