Secondary school for me was filled with lots of fun and trouble. I had the best of friends who had no qualms about getting on the flip side of what was right.
Now, please note that we were not trouble makers, not in the least. As a matter of fact, we were good students. At least average students because we read our books and tried to always make our grades. And we were always successful in that regard.
Seeing as it was a government school, there were a lot of things that the authorities turned a blind eye to.
Take for instance a group of us contributing money to buy food, cook it and eat it in school during break. Yes, we would gather enough money, about seven to ten of us. This money will be for foodstuff and kerosene. The person would buy the things from the market and prepare a delicious meal then bring it to school the next day. If there was any change when all was done, we left it for him.
This way we cooked jollof rice, beans, and bread, beans and garri, etc. There was even a time we bought garri and lots of milk, groundnut, and sugar which we drank completely. Around one yellow bucket of Ijebu garri, we finished the entire thing.
We were the talk of the class then, I remember how everyone used to watch us while we quarreled over who was heaping his spoons with garri. There were even some that were not part of us that came to take a spoon or two.
Those were the days indeed.
But these started happening during my SS2, the one time I really got into major trouble in school was in my SS1.
Like I said, I was basically an average student. I learned while the whole class was learning and I played when everyone was playing as well. Nothing special about me then. Maybe if I had been wiser, I would have chosen that day to pick up a book and read while my friends decided to make this insane decision.
And what was our offense? Gambling.
Yes, you heard me right.
It was actually something simple. We were betting on who could spell better among us. Back then, I was chosen to be the Boardman seeing as I was the writer among them. As if mastery of the English language comes from the womb.
Anyway, I was the one to pick words and have them spell them. It was usually between two people, and the first person to fail would lose the money. We were even working with dictionaries. I took the words from my head and then looked them up just to be sure. That way, I would not only pick out words that were impossible to spell.
It went well.
Like all gambling problems, it started well. We started betting twenty naira, and the winner won an extra twenty. Then, the money began to increase. To fifty naira and even a hundred naira. It got so big that even other classmates were beginning to bet on others.
You would hear things like, “I am betting fifty naira, Ken can spell more than Peter.”
The next thing we knew, it was becoming an interesting event everyone enjoyed watching. After closing, we would remain in school for a long time playing this, many of us making money while some lost. A lot. I was always the Boardman, and I was always restocking my mental supply of words to dish out.
To us, it was a more interesting form of the English Class. We were doing our own spelling bee, but instead of grades, we were getting paid. And when you fail, you don’t just get correction you actually lose money that would make you never forget the spelling of that word again.
But eventually, it had to end.
We were caught.
And the funny thing was that what exposed us was not that we fought or anything. There was no fight, all our winners and losers did it with dignity because it was a very transparent game. There was no bad blood between us.
What scattered everything was that we became too popular. Soon, people from other classes no longer wanted to go home, but stay back and watch us battle it out with words. It was like a rap battle, and they were always cheering when someone got the spelling correct.
Anyway, stories floated about and it got to the ears of our Vice-Principal. I believe that was the only reason we did not get expelled because if it had reached our Principal, my stay in that school would have ended prematurely.
We were all rounded up, both the competitors and I the Boardman. We tried to explain that what we were doing had academic value and was helping us learn more words. But she too explained that as far as money got involved, it canceled whatever good plans we had intended. Because others might decide to copy us and then they might not be so civil about how they go about their game. So they had to nip it in the bud.
We understood her logic and promised not to do it again.
But that did not stop her from sending us to the bush for three days. We had to cut elephant grass under the hot sun day after day, missing classes and even break. We would come to school like others, mark attendance and then report to duty on the school field.
By the time we were done serving our punishment, no one was talking about our contest anymore. The entire school had seen what happened to those that took part in it. They had used us as scapegoats. But we got to remain in the school because our Principal was a no-nonsense man and if the news had so much as crossed his path. That would have been the end.
Spelling competition lost its attraction to us, seeing as the motivation was no longer there.
That was how it was for the rest of the term.
But by the next term, when our school began to take part in the inter-school spelling competitions and debates, guess who they called.
Not me though… I was just the Boardman remember? They picked the guys who had done the actual spelling. I guess my Vice-Principal did not get the memo that I was a writer.
My bad.
Thank you for reading, till we meet in the next post.
This post was inspired by the first topic for this week which is Back To High School. Feel free to participate in it, it's fun!