Absolute bee’s knees, The Queen’s Gambit. Fictitious yet compelling. The brilliance of the scripting was you didn’t have to know how to play chess to enjoy the series. It was about chess but not only about chess. Because I played a little chess as an undergraduate, I enjoyed The Queen’s Gambit more. Playing chess made me look smart. And …
I love movies and the big screen. I don’t mind sequels but don’t have the patience for series. I never saw an episode of Prison Break. Nor know jack about Jack Bauer. Same for House of Cards, Breaking Bad, Empire, Game of Thrones or Money Heist. Yea, I’m that guy. But two friends persuaded me to watch The Crown. …
A couple of weeks back, I wrote a piece on the absence of comparative advertising in Nigeria. You can read the piece here. A debate ensured on a WhatsApp group on the subject. Several people believe brands in Nigeria do in fact run comparative advertising. The advertising below was cited as an example. Well, intelligent people of WhatsAppville, hear …
So, it is that time of the year and I was rummaging on the Tesco website for some Christmas feasting ideas. I don’t know about you, but I’m sick and tired of eating jollof rice and fried rice at Christmas. The birthday of my Lord and Saviour is too important for such trite fare. Oyinbo people know how to throw …
Dudes and dudettes of Nigeriana, hearken to my voice! I see flashing clouds and hear the rumbling of thunder. Signs of new rain. And my nostrils doth pick up the sweet scent of dainty flowers sprouting all over the land. What wondrous change afoot! But we must be careful not to pluck the flowers to make zobo.
What is it about a hairstyle, torn jeans and youth that makes a dude delinquent, a crook or a con? I’ll tell you what it is. It is because we distrust people who are different from us. People who don’t dress as we do, talk like we do or incline their ears to our wisdom. It is not a problem …
“What is called Western Civilization is in an advanced state of decomposition, and another Dark Ages will soon be upon us, if, indeed, it has not already begun. With the Media, especially television, governing all our lives, as they indubitably do, it is easily imaginable that this might happen without our noticing…by accustoming us to the gradual deterioration of our …
How many times have you been told “you can be anything you want to be”? Or that “if you can dream it, you can be it”? You may have told someone too. Well, allow me to burst your bubble; you can’t be anything you want to be. You can only be anything you’ve got the talent to be. Let me …
Here I am again thinking about an iPhone. The iPhone 12. I thought I was off that Apple grass. My last iPhone was the 6S. I used it till mid-2018 when I switched to the Samsung S9. Not too shabby, the S9. Good form and function. It’s my only phone at the moment. But I didn’t switch to the S9 …
There are those who swear that the greatest human invention is writing. That is nonsense. It is tobacco. So I believed when I smoked. I’ve been clean nine years now. But I smoked for seventeen years before quitting. I know that is scarcely deserving of any recognition considering a friend’s grandpa smoked till his nineties. He died on his bed …
Derek Chauvin is likely the most popular cop in the world. He will consider himself unlucky. He was not the first white cop to kill an unarmed black man. Yet his name is the one on everyone’s lips. The reason why the country is ablaze. He will curse Gregory and Travis McMichael for killing Ahmaud Arbery. He will swear at …
“Psst…have you heard? 5G tech caused Covid-19! It’s a ploy by the New World Order to get us chipped. Remember 666? The mark of the beast? That’s the end game!” “Psst…the 2004 tsunami was caused by a secret underwater nuclear test by India. US and Israel scientists were involved. “Psst…Diana was killed by the MI6 on instruction of Her …
Lust of the eye. Pride of life. Instant gratification. A marketer’s best friend. We love that you have them. We tell you it’s OK to have them. To sate them. After all, you only live once. Humans have had those predispositions since Mrs Adams bit on that fruit. I imagine how the serpent hustled her. Serpent: Yo sweetness, let me …
Oh, for goodness sake, here comes this retard talking about death in January! We’ve just danced, sang and wined into a new year and this Dufus has to remind everyone we’ll check into the wooden Waldorf one day. Idiot! I shall not die but live to testify of the goodness of the Lord! Well, I can’t help myself, can …
After leaving New York, I visited Atlanta, Houston and Dallas. I have homeboys in those cities and looked forward to some R&R. My base on the trip was Houston. I had planned on visiting the Johnson Space Center in Houston, it being the 50th anniversary of mankind’s visit to the moon. But I was sidetracked by a few Naija owambes. …
So, right. To Uncle Sam. After junketing through Europe, I flitted across the Atlantic to Gotham. The first city on my US jaunt. Few cities are as iconic as New York. When you think of America, you might actually be thinking about New York. Yellow taxis. Lady Liberty. NYPD. Manhattan. Hustle. The American Dream. But New York is more than …
Sometime in 2018, I watched CNN’s Christiane Amanpour interview Ronen Bergman on his book, Rise and Kill First: The Secret History of Israel’s Targeted Assassinations. In the interview, Bergman talked about how the Mossad, the Shin Bet (Israel’s internal security organ) and AMAN (Israel’s military intelligence) went about aiding perceived enemies of Israel cash in their chips early. Bergman explained …
So, let’s talk about Amsterdam. If you are reading this blogpost, chances are you probably read the earlier post that led to it. However, if you didn’t or haven’t, it might be a good idea to. The link is here. Amsterdam was the first port of call on my European jaunt. I had never been to the city although I’d …
So, here I am. Berlin. The second city on my European jaunt. The first was Amsterdam. You can read about that here. It feels ridiculous to wake up at 6:00 am to catch a train when you are on a vacation. But that’s what I needed to do if I was to catch my 7:00 am train to Berlin. On …
So Munich was the third city I was visiting on my 9-day, 5-city Holocaust jaunt. You can read about my visit to Berlin here and the visit to Amsterdam here. My chariot from Berlin to Munich was once again the ultra-fast ICE Sprinter service. Just like the train service from Amsterdam to Berlin, you simply get on the train without …
So, on to Central Europe. To Budapest. Just so you know, Hungarians hate it when you refer to Hungary as being in Eastern Europe. They are in C-E-N-T-R-A-L-E-U-R-O-P-E! My train from Munich to Budapest was the Euronight sleeper train Kalman Imre. It leaves Munich Hbf at 23:00pm to arrive at Budapest Keleti station at about 8:00 am. I’d booked a berth in …
On to the last leg of my Holocaust jaunt. To Krakow, Poland. If this is the first post you are reading about my European jaunt, it might be worthwhile to read why I embarked on this 9-day, 5-city tour. You’ll find that here. You may then follow up with accounts of my trips to Amsterdam, Berlin, Munich and Budapest. Done with Budapest, I chose to take …
There is so much incompetence in high places it beggars belief. I mean, how difficult can it be beating Liverpool? Barcelona had only one job to do. Not two or even a one and a half job. Just one. Beat Liverpool and get the life-long adulation of Jide.
I joined the Marvel fanboy horde and went to see Avengers: Endgame. I’ll talk about the movie itself in a second. But let’s linger a bit on the influence of America and Hollywood on our minds.
So, I went about some shutterbug business over the weekend. This photography hobby has taken over me like a fake aladura spirit. I’m smitten. I put on my camera backpack and went to Makoko.
Maths is a fraud. Centuries of exaltation and glorification are misplaced. Or why has a discipline that underpins all calculations been unable to come up with the formula for success? The equation to be oprah-rich? What’s the use of Chaos Theory, Euler’s Polyhedra Formula or the Fibonacci Sequence if it can’t tell you how to get some moolah into your …
Old age is not something I worry about a lot. Not because I have a pot of gold squirrelled away somewhere. My pot of gold is at the end of the rainbow. I know it’s there. All I have to do is beat everyone to the rainbow and dispossess the leprechaun guarding the pot. Hang on a second! I’ve just …
Howdy good folks! Trust January hasn’t met you in penury. Oh, I like the sound of that! ‘January and penury.’ “ Save ye for the days to come lest reproach come upon thee like penury in January.” It’s a corny rhyme but I don’t care. It came in the moment, a gift from the Muse. I expect the expression to …
On my way home yesterday, I was listening to Classic FM. I heard, a rather preposterous report: an epidemic of female underpants theft in Nigeria. Grand theft of what we call pata or p-a-i-n-t in Yoruba. Yup. Female pants are being purloined, shanghaied, abducted and misappropriated all over the land. This making away with underpants are sometimes surreptitious. At …
What do you know, it’s the last day of 2018! How time flies. If you are not in prison, that is. Many good things happened to me this year. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, I made my first Creamy Shrimp Alfredo Pasta and I saw BlacKKlansman. Yes, it’s been a good year.
Behavioural scientists will have us know that the faculties that distinguish us from animals are capabilities such as reason, morality, inquiry, religion, aesthetics, aspiration, imagination, creativity, self-awareness, or self-reflection. All that is great. But they are missing one essential faculty: stupidity. That’s right. Stupidity.
A while back, a friend who lived outside the country told me he had met someone who knew me and worked with me in some capacity. He told me this chap had remarked about me: “Jide was a brilliant guy. A good person. But he was sometimes difficult to work with.” Remember the movie Ghosts of Girlfriends Past? Where the sins of …
They just had to do it, didn’t they? It’s in their blood, in their essence. To challenge. To inspire. To dare. It’s not a Nike ad if it pull punches. I’m talking about Nike’s recent ad commemorating the thirtieth anniversary of the Just Do It campaign. The ad headlined by Colin Kaepernick.
So, Google released the most searched terms in Nigeria for half year 2018. The list made for a distressing read. See for yourself:
Boda Moses is a goal, You know Iwobi no dey joke, Make we bet, Tear your shirt, See, Mr Referee say is a goal, Super Eagles is a winner, Coca-Cola is a goal, Omo Naija is a ginger, Jersey wan o ma le to. If Pepsi thought it could steal Coke’s thunder, its blood sugar must be low. Coke …
The Pepsi Naija All The Way spot is the shiznit! Check it out below: Neat, isn’t it? It’s trendy, bouncy and pumps you up. Makes you want to believe in Nigeria again. The spot reminded us of one of the reasons we are Nigerians: bagful of self-belief and swag. Well, yea, the Naija spirit also sometimes turn into snakes and …
Recently, a few Nigerian advertising agencies won ‘big’ at the African Cristal Festival in Marrakech, Morocco. Nigeria’s Noah’s Ark won ‘Agency of The Year’. X3M Ideas, DDB Lagos and Insight Publicis all had a decent showing too. There have been a lot of congratulations and reportage across the media. There have also been questions about the prestige and worth of …
The MTN ‘Blind Bride’ and the Guinness ‘Goodluck Obieze’ TV spots are the two best spots I have seen this year. They struck a cord.
Ah! What indescribable joy to rain on Manchester City’s party yesterday. The cheek! Fixing to be crowned champions via a derby win. Not on your life, Pep! Even Liverpool dare not be that impudent! Torturously, City will still win the league. Their third in seven seasons. A galling state of affair. I blame filthy lucre. It’s what happens when you …
I don’t fancy myself a serious writer. However, if there is one writer that has had the most profound influence on my rather facetious writing, it is Wole Soyinka. Of course, Kongi will probably be horrified at my farcical writing, but I don’t care. I love the man. We share the same birthday. And true love lasts a lifetime.
In the wake of the Facebook-Cambridge Analytica data privacy scandal, I have thought about how much of my personal data is out there. Data waiting to be harvested by some sick psychologist or ethnographer and deployed to warping my mind. I like to think that I have an iron-clad mind. But at the rate I give in to pepperoni pizza, …
Jimmy Kimmel in his opening monologue at the 90th Academy Awards remarked: “…and thanks to Guillermo, we will always remember this year as the year men screwed up so badly women started dating fish.” He was, of course, referring to Guillermo del Toro and The Shape of Water. Guillermo later won the prestigious achievement in Directing for same movie which also …
I’m absolutely delighted with Black Panther. But I’m not getting carried away with the gushing about Wakanda. Look, there’s no way Nigeria and many African countries are going to turn into a Wakanda very soon. Not with reptiles and apes stashing away money. By the way, that’s some real Snake In The Monkey’s Shadow stuff.
There’s only one reason man eats fish. We eat fish because we can. Fishes are dumb and we are smart. We are at the top of the food chain and we take whatever we want. I therefore don’t take kindly to anyone who tries to rearrange this balance. Boston Dynamics may think it’s a cool company. But I’ll tell you …
Come June (or thereabouts), beer drinkers in Nigeria will have a new brewski to add to their repertoire: “This is the famous Budweiser beer. We know of no brand produced by any other brewer which costs so much to brew and age. Our exclusive Beechwood Aging produces a taste, a smoothness and a drinkability you will find in no …
Aside from his use of an obscene term, I really do not understand the rage on the continent when President Trump referred to our beloved patch as ‘shithole countries.’ Emmanuel Macron yesterday said he shares the outrage of Africans on the disparagement by President Trump. Oh please! If by ‘shithole countries’ the man meant countries groaning under the weight of …
I have always suspected that I was special but didn’t know exactly how. Now, I have a fair idea. Boy, am I one cool glass of water! Now, don’t be hating. Turns out every human being is special too. That includes you. Yup. You are just as cool a glass of water as I am. Only I am a chalice …
It’s barely four days into the new year and I’m already calling it quits with a New Year resolution. That’s a full month ahead of the time researchers say most people abandon their New Year resolutions. Great to start the year breaking records. Going to be an awesome year.
You meant to send a “thank you” letter to Santa for the cheer he brings to kids but due to a typo send it to Satan. That’s right, to Lucifer. The Adversary. No one could have predicted what happened next. Satan begins to develop warm feelings. I say not a chance in hell! Anomaly London created that dark humour in …
The Super Eagles have qualified for the 2018 World Cup in Russia (Whoop, Whoop!) Already, the Nigeria Football Federation has four major partners: Aiteo, TGI Group, PayPorte.com and Zenith Bank. TGI Group (owners of Chi Limited/Hollandia) will be the ‘Official Food Partner’ of the NFF, PayPorte is ‘Official Online Store Partner’ (exclusive e-commerce retailer of Super Eagles jerseys) and Zenith …
