I stood at the door of a shrine.
I wondered, “How much would you pay to see your future?”
I feel like the question of wanting to see your future is one that’s very easy to answer. The answer to the question should always be ‘Yes’ because why won’t I want to see when I finally become a billionaire that takes a trip to Ibiza every other day?
Wouldn’t you agree?
But then, when I asked a couple of friends, they all had really different ways of thinking about it.
“What if the future you see is you doing bambiala on the street with one broken plate?”. Lagbaja was never the optimistic type so I don’t blame him for thinking like this. He’s the type of person that will give you a thousand and one reasons a thing will not work before even trying to do it.
“Or you look 10 years in the future and it’s just blackness because you didn’t live that long.” Eniola was even worse minded…. I think I need to change my circle of friends.
We were all talking in hypotheticals because I nearly had the opportunity to do it. To see what my life would be like. Or at least, have an idea of it.
Earlier this year, a friend and I took a trip to Olumo rock in Abeokuta. It was pretty much what you would expect from a Nigerian tourism site; unkept, felt like it was lacking and abandoned, but still interesting when you hear the stories behind it.
And the story behind the rock is that it was home and refuge to the Egba people. Pretty much a safe haven for them and a land they and many generations of traditional worshippers after them lived in.
I’ve seen these people dressed in white before, but they always felt so distant and unreal because they always felt so harmless in real life, completely different from what we used to watch on ‘Agbara nla’ (AYAMATANGA… you kids might not get the reference lmao, but I digress.)
These women (and man) dressed in white didn’t seem harmless either, but the air felt different in their natural home with the dried blood on the curtains and hush yet thick yoruba they spoke as my guy and I walked beside them. Now that I think about it, e fit be incantation sha, because when they started whispering, the tour guide started walking us to another room that was also hidden with a white curtain, talking about ‘queen mother’ and how we could meet her if we wanted.
It sounded tempting, the guide mentioned consultations and the chance to see her for a spiritual reading and all that which is exactly why the question popped up.
Almost like my friend could read my mind, he looked at me and said ‘No’.
Bro as how na? people would pay money to know if the price of Bitcoin will still go up this year or if they have village people after them at home or some other random bullshit like that.
I’m a christian but it can’t be bad to want to know how things work in other religions right? I’m not the most devout christian you would find so I’ve never ‘fallen in the spirit’ and ‘spoken in tongues’ so maybe this would have been my chance…right?
When Africa Magic Yoruba and Igbo were still things, I watched wealthy business men go into rooms that were covered with the white curtains and had all their problems solved and their future told to them (albeit it was typically negative, but still).
I personally wouldn’t pay to go in there because true true, what if they tell me something horrible like ‘You would die by falling from a high place’…while I’m at the top of Olumo rock. Madness. Plus, if you hear what your future holds, then what? Sit back and relax? Work your ass off? Cry? I don’t know.
Maybe not knowing what’s at the end isn’t so bad to be honest.…but I’m still very curious.
It’s 1:15 on a Sunday morning, and I had a decent rather uneventful Saturday. My mother has started pestering me to bring a wife, but my babe is shy….story for another day I guess. Either way, you should listen to Frank Ocean today.
Also, my favourite podcast is ending today…they release their last episode by 8am I think. You should consider giving the Road to 30 Podcast a listen…maybe comment ‘Louis sent you’ on the final episode or something. Enjoy!