A Poetic Christmas with Taban Lo Liyong and Obu Udeozo

This morning I dashed off from the office to do "Christmas card delivery" at Bookshop House, Marina. (Cards for my lawyer uncle whose chambers is on the 8th floor, and my grandmother).

Stupid building had a refugee-camp queue for the lift. Nigeria has its wonders, which wonder itself has no knowledge of! After a few minutes of waiting for godot's lift to arrive and belly us up into the building, I decided to "step" up. 8 floors.

You should have "seen" the pain that radiated from my waist upwards as my nimble feet gobbled the concrete! The staircase was tucked away in one corner of the building, and, if you're a fan of the TV series 24, all sorts of conspiracy theories and lurking shadows and disguised cleaning-personnel begin to pop up in your mind and around the corners of the staircase.

Suddenly, I was on the eight floor. Uncle not in office. Dropped the cards, and began the descent. Much easier. Lost my way briefly.

On the ground floor of the Bookshop House is the CSS Bookshop -- I'll be damned if that isn't why the building is called Bookshop House!

I decided to step inside - in case I never told you, bookshop haunting is one of my top 5 hobbies (University ofIbadan bookshop and Booksellers anytime I'm in Ibadan, Numetro in Lagos, the secondhand b/store at Yaba busstop etc etc).

When I emerged onto the hustle and honking of the Marina, about twenty minutes later, I had added to my library 3 books - all collections of poetry:

1) Stimulus and Other Poems by Obu Udeozo (FAB Educational Books, Jos, 1993)

2) Excursions by Obu Udeozo (FAB Educational Books, Jos, 1993)

3) Homage to Onyame by Taban Lo Liyong (Malthouse Press, Lagos, 1997)