African Anthem

lol... many of us don't know what they are singing about since it's a mixture of French and their native language (they are from Cote d'Iviore) but it's not an African party/club if they haven't played this song like 5 times by the end of the night :D I'm not even sure how it became a huge hit, sef.

But anyhoo, apparently the chorus is along the lines of:

"Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me."


Premier Gaou

Another P square

So Paul and Peter... lol, their names always crack me up! They actually sang the nursery rhyme in a song:

2 blackbirds sitting on a wall
One named Peter and one named Paul

lol... Naija parents can be cruel. Haba. Anyhoo, so this song is about a best friend getting with the girlfriend. lol. But no need to cry, sha. Just take it as life :D

Excited!!!

Hahaha... lol. I'm now actually excited about writing M:MHM!! I've finally gotten past all the boring, gimmicky parts and now I'm about to get to the good parts i.e. the spending time together/getting to know eachother parts. :love:

Plus I just added a new element to the Soo Hyun storyline. It's funny how it developed... I started to write the scene that I'd planned and suddenly this other thing just came to mind and I started smiling. I'm really excited! I'm too lazy to update my outline but I'd better figure out where to put everything. Gosh, I hate coming up with names!

About this story, I don't know if I should have a PM list but you know what? I'm cool with having few readers for this story because I really like it! And I'm not discouraged because I definitely want to finish it. I think I might end up enjoying this more than WFF. It still remains to be seen. Because I like it so much, I might end up doing daily updates.

I'll probably PM people (who asked) from WFF, after I've finished this story. I'm so loving the improved Soo Hyun storyline that I hope it doesn't end up being better than the Da Hae story since that's the A-plot. We'll see!

I'm giddy! hahaha

Paul Play

Those retards at youtube have started deleting accounts. *rolleyes* Why delete Naija music videos? I am sure no one contacted them. Odes.

From Yoruba Gospel singer to R&B singer. He's got the voice so it works... he does look kinda old for this but it's still cool 'cos the songs are nice.

Angel of My Life




Forever

I've never heard of this guy...

... but I like this song. And the guy is kind of cute... or maybe na old age dey cause am :D. African lady o, you dey make me kolo o...Fine lady no be so...


Shake it

Example of a crappy song with a great chorus

I mean, the chorus is just awesome. The way the guy sings it with so much passion, his voice, the music, everything is great. But the rest of the song. ARGH. What the hell? The R&B/English parts are really shitty. But the Yoruba parts are awesome. This is a lesson that the Traditional/Contemporary mix can't be done by everyone. My opinion, of course. Some people love this song, but I find the R&B parts embarrassing.

Iyawo Asiko

If have this sneaking suspicion that my new story sucks... :(

lol... I don't know. I attempted to start writing Chapter 4 but I felt bored. Maybe it's because I updated two days in a row... I think I'll just chill today and not write any more. Maybe I'll love my characters tomorrow. I am sick of this intro though :( I want to get to the cute parts ASAP!

But speaking of cuteness...

I love this song (even though it's a rip off of "The closer I get to you" by Roberta Flack). I actually rented this DVD just for this song :D

Bolo Na Tum Zara

Bolo Na Tum Zara

And this song always makes me think of another song from a movie starring Dia Mirza. I do love it too.

Zara Zara

Zara Zara (RHTDM)

Then another Zara song comes to mind. Maybe all songs with the word "Zara" rock!! :D

Sun Zara. But I do love pretty much all songs sung by Sonu Nigam

Sun Zara

Yay, I've finally updated!

Gone over the hurdle and I hope it will all be smooth sailing from now on. Chapter 2 of M:MHM is done. Now I can enjoy one of my fav Bollywood songs from Tum Bin (an extremely underrated film).

Chhoti Chhoti Raatein

Hahaha... actors singing

I think this if from when all those Nollywood actors got banned (I might be wrong). Many of them started singing (Genevieve, Omotola etc) but this is a gospel song with some of them.

Men, some need singing lessons. And it looks like Stella Damasus thinks she's got more talent than she really has. But they are looking good, sha.

My fantasy cast for Wrong Foot First

I'm totally spazzing about Hana Kimi so my fantasy cast has changed. After I saw Snow Queen, my cast was:

Hyun Bin as Ji Tae
Song Hye Gyo as Hee Soo.

The rest of the cast was yet to be determined :D

Now it's:

Tang Yu Zhe as Ji Tae
Song Hye Gyo (or some other pretty actress) as Hee Soo
Wu Chun as Ki Won.

I do realize that there might be a language issue with the new cast but I really don't know that many Taiwanese actresses and I don't think Ariel or Ella would be good as Hee Soo. Rainie is a pretty actress but I'm not quite sure she can do Hee Soo justice. Haha... maybe one of the friends from ISWAK - the one with the afro.

All in all, it's just a fangirl's fantasy but Chun and Yu Zhe are just so pretty...

Love is no picnic

So I haven't written jack. I just wasted my evening on youtube :(

Anyhoo, the female version of So Sick. I love it.

Speaking of 2face

I really should listen to his new album o... I've had it for a minute now. So while doing my youtube thing, I came across a fanmade video to a heartfelt song off this new album called See Me O. I wonder if he's singing this to his old groupmates from Plantashun Boiz. Faze already sang an awesome song called Faze again about their break up. Sad...

2face, you yab o!

I absolutely loved 2face's first album and Ole was my favorite track on it. So he got HUGE with his African Queen song so I guess he just decided to make a video for Ole. This was obviously made recently - probably after he'd released his second album. Okay, whatever. But why in the world did he have to make such a crappy and boring video? I'm pissed! No video is better than this - it spoils the song a bit :(

And to think I fangirled for him 2 years ago (he was so cute in the Nfana Ibaga song, though)

Procrastinating

So instead of writing the next chapter, I'm procrastinating by watching youtube videos.

Anyhoo, so the new episode of Heroes rocked! Finally things are happening and Peter looked so hot being pissed off and not his usual dopey self. Simone provided eye candy for the fellas but she really didn't so much so I'm not really sad to see her go. Not to be an American... but how come both of the characters that left this week (Simone and Ando) were "minorities?" Hmm...

And speaking of T.V., I completely forgot to tape All About Eve and now I've missed the final episode of the series. GRRR. It's a good thing I managed to watch clips on youtube. But only like 5 mins. I hope AZN puts it back on their site.

P-square

So for some reason, I've really been into my Naija music this week and am obsessed with watching all the videos on youtube.

P-square is a duo made up of twins called Peter and Paul... lol I actually have both of their albums but never really listened to them because I really was not a fan of their hit Senorita and in Last Night, they sound like they are trying too hard. But I'm loving some of their songs! This is a hot dance song called Bizzy Body where basically the girl is basically telling the guy that if she puts it on him, he'd "lose control."



I really like this one called Temptation. It's basically an involved guy telling a chick that even though he's got a girl, he's so into her. lol



Another nice one... especially for the lyrics. It's called, Say your love and it's a guy lamenting about dating a liar. And the most hilarious lyrics (depidginized) are, "Everytime I'm with you, I feel like you're a witch. Get out of my sight!"

Short story written for February

In 2005, I was asked to write a story about Black History Month or Valentine's Day. This is the story (unedited) that finally made it into the online magazine. The edited version is on the site.

“Only lazy people take MLK day off. Martin Luther King had a dream and how is taking the day off realizing that dream? Everyone who took the day off is just lazy. Unless your employer asked you to take the day off… otherwise, you should be ashamed of yourself. Oh, who am I kidding? I’m just hating because nobody is here and I was too stupid to take the day off myself. But--”

“Wendy Williams be tripping sometimes,” Toni said as she handed me a plate. I rinsed it off then placed it on the conveyor belt that led to the commercial dishwasher. “But seriously,” she continued, “how come we don’t get the day off? Everybody else does.”

My husband doesn’t, I didn’t add. Instead, I smiled and just rinsed off another plate. The kitchen of one of Washington D.C.’s top restaurants had been my home every weekday afternoon for five months and I’d only just begun to feel a little comfortable in it.

“Could you hand me that towel?” Toni asked Carlos, the new busboy as he dropped a tray piled with dirty plates on the cart next to her. Her dark knuckles bent as her plump fingers took hold of it and wiped the sweat off her forehead. “But Wendy is right,” she continued as she pulled a tray off the cart and emptied out all the plates. She carelessly dumped the plates on the surface in front of her then threw the tray on the already tall stack. “Don’t you think so?” she asked, handing me yet another plate.

I shrugged. Sometimes the radio host made sense and other times she didn’t. Today, it just seemed like she needed to rant and frankly speaking I couldn’t care less. As far as I was concerned, her show helped take our minds off our mindless tasks but I never really took her seriously. I rinsed the plate off and sent it to the dishwasher.

Toni rolled her eyes and pulled out another tray. “Well, I think she is. Dr. King died for us and what are we doing? Washing dishes. I need to be like Cassandra,” she said, referring to the petite Chef’s Assistant who was already prepping the vegetables for dinner. “Hey, don’t forget us when you graduate and start stomping with the big dogs.”

Cassandra smiled back at her and said, “It’s only an Associate’s, and no, I won’t forget you. Maybe, I’ll hire you to wash the dishes at one of the dinner parties I host to entertain the Ambassador to England,” she teased.

Toni responded by throwing her towel at her, then she looked at me. “What about you, Nikay,” she said, mispronouncing my name as usual. “Any plans to go back to school?”

I shook my head without looking up and just concentrated on putting a bowl on the conveyor belt. I told myself that I didn’t tell my co-workers that I already had a Master’s degree because I didn’t want to brag. But in all honesty, I think part of me was ashamed that even with all the time and energy I’d devoted to it, a Nigerian degree wasn’t worth the reinforced paper it was printed on. Besides, it was pointless telling them, after all, as far as American employers were concerned, I might as well only have a GED. “I think I’ve had enough of school,” I told her.

She grunted and pulled the last tray off the cart. “Well, you need to get your own piece of ‘The Dream’. You know about Martin Luther King, don’t you?”

I had to use every bit of energy left in me to keep from smirking. “Yes, I do.” It was amazing how uninformed many people thought Africans were. As part of our education, in addition to learning about our heroes, we also learned about important figures in other parts of the world.

“Okay,” she said, nodding and using the uppity voice she reserved for the times she schooled us, “so you know he died for us. Regardless of which part of the world you’re from, if you’ve got this skin,” she said, patting the back of her palm, “Dr. King died because he was trying to make your life better. We can’t let him die in vain, you know – we have to live the dream.”

“What dream?” I said under my breath as I watched her pick the stack of trays up and hand them to me one after the other. If getting an education was part of that dream, I wanted no part of it. An education hadn’t made the officials at the American embassy in Lagos treat me with even the smallest bit of respect or shorten the two years it had taken them to permit me to live with my husband… even though he’s a citizen. It certainly hadn’t helped me find a job or even stopped interviewers from pretending not to understand me when I spoke to them. In fact, if I hadn’t taken my education off my resume, I doubted I would have had the great honor of washing dishes with her this very afternoon. As far as I could see, the American dream wasn’t open to everyone – especially not dark-skinned women from the southern part of Nigeria.


* * *


I took my jacket off then pulled a sweater out of my closet. Ike had a few months left on his Residency so for a few months, we had to keep our electric bill low. The rent had come with free gas and water but when I learned that both the stove and heat were electric, I realized that D.C. wasn’t so different from Enugu.

I opened the fridge and pulled out the whole chicken that I hoped had thawed overnight. I pressed the flesh and saw that it was still a little solid so I threw it in the sink and ran hot water over it. I left the tap on as I pulled out the vegetables needed for Jollof rice and started chopping them.

After my tomatoes, pepper and onions were blended, I turned the tap off and put my chicken on the chopping board. Just as I was about to scream after realizing that my chicken had thawed so much that it was going to be very difficult to cut its flesh, I felt a strong arm slide over my tummy. I exhaled and let myself relax in his arms.

“You’re cold. Why didn’t you put the heater on?” He rubbed the back of my left hand to warm me up. “How was your day?” he asked, kissing my cheek.

I turned around. “Like always. Yours?”

He rattled off about a patient till I put my palm over his mouth and stopped him mid-sentence. “You can tell me later. First you have to do me a favor.”

His face fell. “Nikky, I’m tired.”

I pouted. “Please?”

“What?”

I turned back and picked up the chopping board. “Could you help me cut this?”

“Nike!” he shouted from behind me. “I just got back from work. I need to rest.”

“Rest later… or there’ll be no food for dinner.”

I ran out of the kitchen before he could say anything else, picking up his jacket and bag on the way. One great thing about marriage, I thought as I walked into our bedroom, was it was always nice to have someone around to push all the difficult tasks on.


***

Ike sat on the couch but leaned on its arm so that he could work at balancing his checkbook. He picked up the calculator and punched some numbers in. “This girl, your head is heavy, o” he commented, moving his legs.

“Ike, stop moving, now. You want to give me a headache?”

“Did I tell you to put your head on my lap? Is my lap a pillow? If I want to scratch my leg, I should not scratch?”

“Abeg, jo,” I said, readjusting my head so that I could get more comfortable, “just stay still. See? You just made me miss what this Super Nanny said. I don’t even understand why they haven’t slapped these yeye children yet. America, sef.”

A few minutes later he said, “Well it looks like in two months, we’ll be able to get you a car.”
I hissed. “When did I ask for a car? Besides, where are you getting the money from?” I turned my head over and looked at him.

He lightly stroked my chin with his fingers. “Shebi we are saving?”

“And you’re still sending money to your parents?”

“Have they called recently?”

I shook my head.

“So I guess that means the answer is, “Yes.”

I rolled my eyes and turned my face back to the television screen. “I’m sure we could use the money for something else.”

“Yes, we can, but you think I like hearing my wife talk about all the drunk and smelly men she has to sit next to every day?”

“Are you minding me? I can manage, jere – we can save it for something else.”

He moved his legs and pulled my head, making me sit up and look at him. He picked the remote control up and pressed the ‘mute’ button. “Every Saturday night I can’t pick you up from the restaurant is a night I spend worried. At least it’ll be safer if you have a car,” he said, looking intently into my eyes, “abi?”

I laughed and shook my head. His ‘serious face’ always cracked me up. I laid my head back on his lap and thought of how every single thing he did showed how much he cared about me.

“What’s funny?” he asked, taking a sip of the water I’d poured for him.

“Nothing,” I replied. It was funny – we might not live Martin Luther King’s dream, the American dream or even the life I’d imagined for the two years I’d waited for him, but living with Ike in our tiny Washington, D.C. apartment was a dream I wasn’t ready to be awoken from.

Getting back into writing

It really is hard getting back to writing when you haven't done it for a while. I really did enjoy being part of the O.C. fanfic community especially as I produced so much work in such a short time period.

But now that I've left, I can see the detriments of being a fanfiction writer. For one, I got used to writing with an established relationship in place so I could just get into my story without having to write all the boring parts. But now that I'm getting back to Original Fiction, the first few chapters just seem so torturous. Oh, and coming up with names is such a pain. GRR.

Also, while writing Femi's Diary, I never expected to get replies. I did get readers who signed my guestbook and sent emails but there was no expectation. With fanfiction, you get so used to receiving reviews that now, it's hard to write without having readers.

Well, so I've just started to write my third story on Soompi (where I'm a n00b) and it's definitely been an experience. For starters, I am writing about Asian characters and the fanfiction section is so huge that it's hard to get noticed. Plus I don't write Real Person Fic nor create posters and all that. Now, I just have to figure out a way to keep writing despite getting just a little amount of attention. After all, I am glad to have two completed stories to my name. I just have to find a way of writing without obsessively checking to see if anyone's replied.

My Sam Soon sequel had a few loyal readers which was great. And on some other site, I randomly found a recommendation from someone I didn't even know was a reader. lol, I find joy in the littlest things.

Wrong Foot First technically did worse than Finding A Bridge especially at the beginning where I had to beg for comments but by the time I'd finished, I did receive quite a few responses. I am proud of this story and glad I finished it.

Now I just have to find a way of getting through the first 5 chapters of my new story so that I can get to the good stuff. Dang, writing aint easy!

Songs I am feeling right now.

Olo Mi

It's an oldie (2006 :D) but goodie. Such a romantic song.




Why Me

lol... D'banj had a one night stand that apparently was so good for his partner and now she's trying to get her hooks in him. But D'banj is not having it :D

Pruning all my work

I literally have all my work scattered around the internet so I decided to put links to everything here. I'm also sick of trying to remember all my different blog names and passwords.