Memories of Our Journey to Ilorin

By Abdul Mutallib Muktar

The nausea to vomit about our journey to Ilorin has been disturbing me since the very day we landed in Zaria. I reached the point where I could no longer withstand the nausea. And here I am vomiting all I had swallowed into my stomach during the journey.

But in writing about something like this, the writer is always faced with difficulty as to the specific part of the experience to write. If some parts are to be unnarrated because of the fear not to bore the readers, then the writer would be tagged a partial writer as virtually every part of the journey is worth-writing about. For this reason, the tale should be better long but right than brief but sketchy. In fact, the length of the tale will be disregarded by those who begin to read about it with keen interest as the plot holds the reader stuck to the screen.

It was early in the morning on Wednesday, 24th July, 2019, that our journey began from the Faculty of Law, ABU Zaria to the ancient city of Ilorin for the 15th NAMLAS (National Association of Muslim Law Students) Seminar at Al-Hikma University. The memory still remains fresh in mind that it was the ABU's PTF's long bus that conveyed more than fifty students of our faculty. We left Zaria happily and successfully under the lively leadership of our Wakeel, Ibrahim Kabo.

The traveller's supplication was said by Mal. Nazir while we repeated after him. Then our MC, the boisterous Abu Qauqal collected the microphone where the distinguished ladies and gentlemen of the bus began introducing themselves. If not because of how the car bounced on potholed road, I would have assumed I was in the class. I could clearly read happiness on the faces of everyone in the bus as if we were going for a pilgrimage. That's part of the reason I quickly composed an entertaining poem after been reminded to do so by a friend about the journey so far then, which made our purely whitish teeth more countable. Though we stopped at a park close to an over-head bridge before Suleja, but that was for us to have a serious communication with our stomach.

The journey continued with everyone's face free without wrinkles. The rainy season had made the weather temperate; looking through the windows kept one in complete appreciation of the greenish nature which told of the agricultural blessing of Nigeria. That was how we safely arrived Minna City Gate around 3:00pm not because that was our destination but for the failure of our PTF's bus. As I wrote in one of the poems, the bus was visited by the fever of old age and it was hospitalized there. While waiting for its treatment, we prayed and ate. Our gentlemen and ladies could be seen buying soft drinks and table water as well as other related things as our pockets were still alive then. The treatment was physically concluded after 7:00pm and all of us got back. I will not forget that place and the time because something miraculous had happened to me. It left me with a mouth widely open in surprise. That's personal, so I will not narrate it here. The journey continued through the city of Minna.

In Sabon Daga, some kilometers away from Minna, our PTF's bus was still revisited by fever. That's around 9:30pm. We waited for the illness of our bus to be treated again for almost an hour or more while some of us had found some places to sleep as no certainty for any specific time to finish the treatment. But we woke them up and the journey continued through the night devoid of the moon and the stars. Just an hour later, the bus was silent; upon looking behind and the front, almost everyone had put his and her head down to respond to the call of the night. We fell asleep while sitting, our heads were busy swinging as if the muscles through our necks had slackened.

Half-asleep and half-awake we arrived at Makwa; at a filling station we stopped around 3:00am looking for a vulcanizer. We waited up to 4:30am but the volcanizer could not work that time of the night and we proceeded with the journey on a low speed. To many of us, that's the first time we spent a whole night on a journey. To me, I had never even spent five hours on a journey. There was a place we stopped after the dusk began giving place to the dawn, few prayed on the road there but majority of us waited till our arrival at Al-Hikma, Ilorin, Kwara State by 7:20am. From cockcrow in Zaria to another cockcrow in Ilorin.

We took our luggage inside the hostel of the Law students, observed the Subhi prayer and the management of NAMLAS served us cups of what could be better described more as watery tea than milky. We were supposed to pay what we owed to the previous night after our bath but restlessly proceeded to the Day One's programmes at the Main Campus.

Immediately after the scintillating speeches by some dignitaries including professor Abiodun, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), we left for the palace of the Emir of Ilorin to pay our homage to His Royal Highness, Alh. Dr. Ibrahim Sulu Gambari. We so much appreciated the human intellect employed in building the palace for it is just marvelous. That's what kept our cameras restlessly flashing in the palace. The generous emir warmly welcomed us and honourably bided farewell to us. We then set for our accommodation.

The following day was characterized by competitions such as moot competition, one of the most popular and regular competitions for Law students in an unreal court, then Qur'anic recitation competition as well as sport. ABU Zaria won the moot competition at the final round against Osun State University with superb exhibition of advocacy. We again won some categories of the Qur'anic recitation as, still, the melliflous voices of our Quranic reciters keep resonating in my ears, taking me back to the hall of the event. In the sport we were knocked out.

By 8:30pm in the same day, we set for the dinner at Main Campus, Al-Hikma University. It was awesome as the dinner was a congregation of students from various universities. There I presented a poem before the large gathering about a lady whom I could not tell exactly, titled 'Look at Her'. Though I was flooded by questions from a lot of people about 'her'. That's a different issue, let my pen not go down to the shoulders of the road.

Our certificates of award were gladly presented to us and our battalion stormed the podium with multi-lingual praises and hailing of ABU, Zaria. The dinner came to an end and got conveyed back to the faculty of law mid-night.

Day Three was an excursion to the great Owu Fall. Every student from all the universities in attendance dressed specially for it came to our notice that there would be hiking. The waterfall was very far from Ilorin though still in Kwara State; we spent more than three hours on the way. That's not the end; our buses could no longer move forward because of the slopes of the bush. As a result, we all alighted and began the amazing hiking which consumed our time and exhausted our energy. Upon arriving at Owu Fall through the heart of the bush, I saw honest wonder. At first, I thought the water was falling from the sky until I raised up my head and saw an astonishing nature. I could not but jumped into the cold water of such seraphic nature. Not so long later, we returned to the buses with the least energy in us penetrating back through the bushes. We safely returned to Al-Hikma though little dispute and quarrel resulted from the problem of communication gap that night.

At around 5:00am the following day, we packed our luggage and boarded the PTF's bus for our journey back. It was not up to two hours when on the way someone saw a smoke curling up and he doubtfully said, "something like a fire". In a blink of an eye, everyone was struggling to run out. It was not actually a fire and the smoke was just a thick exhaust that showed the bus was yet again sick. All of us were out and the place was on the outskirts. We began suggesting, de-suggesting, re-suggesting, deciding and redeciding about the next course of action. We finally, though reluctantly, agreed to seek for the help of a mechanic. As such, we returned back to a small town called Bode Sa'adu in Moro L.G.A. of Kwara State which we just passed for security purpose and securing the help of a mechanic. There we took our breakfast while waiting for the magic of the mechanic. Shockingly, the mechanic said the bus could not be fixed immediately until 5:00pm. We were shattered; bold letters of of disappointment could be read on our innocent faces.

We all scattered to different places in the small town whose inhabitants are mostly Yoruba. By 10:30am, some of my friends and I were told about a river not far from the place our bus was disappointingly parked. We rushed there and found some Yoruba girls washing and swimming. A voice from inside us told us that this river could wash our disappointment and so we jumped and swam like little children.

Our humble Wakeel was so much disturbed and thus, called the management of ABU, Zaria but the response was somewhat vague. And he rang Professor M. B. Uthman and explained to him about the trial and tribulations of our journey. There and then he cooled us down and sent some money as his first step of assistance to us. Though, as it was said, the management wanted to send us a bus that brought some students to Abuja but our driver gave words of certainty that the bus would work well if fixed. This stopped the Abuja's bus from coming.

By 5:00pm, the bus was not fixed and that we had to spend the night in Bode Sa'adu. I laughed when some of us who could not buy food by the roadside while coming from Zaria comfortably ate same food at that place. Now, our pockets were unconscious. We no longer cared to buy soft drinks, sachet water sufficed. We spent the night in a mosque at Bode Sa'adu. What an experience! The memory is still fresh of a call to Subhi (dawn) prayer in a typical Yoruba accent which woke us from our sweet slumber on the mats of the mosque without pillows and bedsheets.

A breakfast of 'koko' was prepared by some gentlemen of  the journey and we bought bean cakes. It was not very long after breakfast when the bus was said to be well again. We returned and the journey continued. The driver was on a high speed and all of us clapping and laughing that the bus was now fit and proper for the journey. But I said in mind that the sickness of old age has no permanent medicine. The break at a point could not be applied by the driver. Lord of mercy intervened.

Some kilometres to Bida, the bus completely stopped. We were stranded in a bush around 3:00pm. We were told that another bus was coming to convey us from Zaria. How could we send out the disappointment from our hearts? We remembered all the sort of games in our childhood days and played them. We divided ourselves based on the game one was interested in. Oh my God! It was seriously funny when one saw us. By 5-5:30pm, we got reminded that it was a bush we got stranded. A voice told us that Bida was not far from there; as such, we left our PTF's bus and began trekking. Our restless Wakeel, the leader of the journey, rang Prof. M. B. Uthman again and explained to him the predicament of the 15th ABU's NAMLAS battalion. The professor talked to the management of Federal Polytechnic, Bida to send us a bus that would convey us from the bush to Bida. So was exactly done. We spent the night in that polytechnic and were fed by the same professor. By 11:30 or so, the bus from ABU, Zaria arrived Bida.

Very early the following day, before we even observed the dawn prayer, the journey continued in a vibrant bus now. We stopped at one village, prayed there and proceeded with the trip. The professor fed us again that very day and I said inwardly that the generous professor was a father to all; his generosity was worthy of emulation by all. We landed in Zaria few minutes after the clock ticked 5:00pm.

That's the tale of our journey; a narration of funny memories, a story of sweet moments, a tale of bitter experience and events thrown to us by the hands of fate which we accepted with the hands of faith. I wrote this for the sake of history because human memory is fallible; time may come when we will be unable to remember some moments and happenings of the journey. And to those who are curious to be told about the journey, this narration is a delicious food that will satisfy your curiosity to the brim.

Abdul Mutallib Muktar
08169722632
abdulmutallib.muktar@gmail.com