4. First Day in AFMS part 3

So… here we go, I first carried my mattress, buckets etc up-school, we were shown to a room where there were other new JS1 boys, I was given a locker where I kept my things, and a bed where I put my mattress and blanket, I went back down school to get my box, I was almost in my hostel, gently rolling my box on the road, there were 2 pavements to the sides of the road, the pavements were smoother than the road, and I decided to climb one of the pavements to make it easier for me to roll my box.

It was dark already and the road was deserted, but not long after climbing the pavement, I saw a guy also walking down the pavement and when he got to me he asked why I was on the pavement, I didn’t give an answer because it sounded like a pretty stupid question to me, well, the result of that was 2 very sound and heavy knocks, the 2 points of the knock on my head got swollen immediately ( I later got to know those swollen bumps on the head are called ‘contours’, usually gotten from knocks with fingers, swagger sticks etc, infact it was almost impossible as a JS1 boy in AFMS to have a smooth head without contours), I started crying and got down from the pavement (I later learnt pavements were strictly reserved for the most senior boys in school which were the SS3 boys).

I got to my room, meeting the other playful boys who just finished primary school soon made me forget the pains from the contours on my head, we were laughing, gisting, playing and shouting like we would in our various primary schools, someone came in, he was wearing his brown housewear trousers and a black singlet, he looked gentle and simple, like he couldn’t hurt a fly, he asked why we were making noise, nobody answered, he then asked them to point someone who was making noise out, I was the unlucky culprit, he used the butt of the torchlight he was holding on my head, another contour immediately surfaced, I later learnt his name was Aaron Igono, he was in SS3 and was my squadron junior NCO, he left the room and my head was banging, a serious headache, the head was now swollen on 3 different spots, I retired to my bed and started crying and saying ‘I want to go home’, ‘I want to see my mummy’, ‘I don’t like this school, I want to go homeeeeeeeeee’, one of the new JS1 boys, Emem Enoh, tried to console me, he was apparently scared too, but he said I should not worry we will be fine.

After a while I decided to stop crying and go look for Deji Adetoro, at least he will be able to help me understand why I had been hit so hard twice, I stepped out of our room and saw two boys standing there, I walked to them and asked if they knew any Deji Adetoro, I got the shock of my life... ‘Ehn, he just called Deji by name’ and the two of them rushed me with kicks, blows and knocks’, I later got to know they were JS2 boys like Deji, they were having juniors for the first time and were ready to unleash all the frustrations of their JS1 years on you, my offence was that I did not say ‘senior Deji’, well, I crept back into my bed and resumed crying, they apparently went to inform Deji that a JS1 boy was looking for him, he immediately knew it was me and came down to our room, he asked me to stop crying, told me it will be okay, told me of how he also suffered at first, he promised me I would soon know how to stay out trouble, he said they shouldn’t have touched me because we are normally supposed to have 2 weeks of grace within which nobody can touch you and you are expected to learn the normal things to keep out of trouble, I later learnt the 2 weeks of grace was only in theory, it never did quite exist, he brought me a bottle of guava juice to drink, I drank the guava juice and dozed off, I think he sat by the bed until I slept off. That was the end of my eventful first day in AFMS, I woke up in the morning, I was still here… in this hell hole… the first day of the next 6 years had just gone by, welcome to Day 2 in AFMS.