They are delectable, elegant and stunning, naturally in varying
degrees...this based on the amount of natural beauty allotted each by
God Almighty and the much...or less that they could garner from their
own respective mothers to which undeniably and objectively, Mom holds
sway.
All fast thinkers, good in varying proportion with anecdotes,
metaphors and sarcasm, strong women, amazons in their own right, amazing
mothers with a unifying title...MRS ADAGIRI...Meet the Adagiri Wives.
For the #Kuwda uninitiated, that is, a newbie fan, this is a basic
intro. to the kind of women my late Dad and his 12 brothers married thus
with this number of strong-willed women in one room naturally comes
with it, a whole lot of drama! Their late mother-in-law and original
Matriarch of the Adagiri family knew this and being a strong woman
herself, knowing this about the women, used that information to play
the thirteen women like a game of chess, turning them against each other
and stirring in them, a sense of intense competition and a common fear
for her. Of course everything went pretty well for the original
Matriarch with one glitch...Mom...she was the rebel, the one who dared
their monster-in-law and challenged her at different occasions and when
Dad had died and she was hounding Mom along with rest of the extended
family, rather than wail and bemoan her fate, she had had the audacity
to square up to a most feared woman in our immediate community.
Thus,
the other wives thinking Mom must be some kind of super woman, would
pitch sides with whoever seems to be having the upper hand whenever it
was convenient. Long story short, the Matriarch has long passed on and
her daughter, the new Matriarch who had inherited the long standing feud
between Mom and her mom hope to keep the flame burning and Mom is
clearly perturbed in the least but lately, it seems as though something
has changed and we are to find out.
After the very annoying outing at
our cousin's wedding in ADAGIRI NUPTIAL , given how disappointed
everyone were with the planning et al, this weirdly brought Mom and the
new Matriarch closer when we all gathered at our family country home for
the annual family reunion.
72 HOURS EARLIER- It was a cold night, I
couldn't sleep, I was ecstatic, it was 11:45 pm and at the stroke of
midnight, it will be my birthday, so I stayed awake, awaiting flood of
text messages, calls, etc from friends and acquaintances! The rest of my
family were sound asleep. At midnight, no one called or texted, I was
shocked because I felt let down by people who should know...if everyone
forgot my birthday, my best friend shouldn't. Arranging my duvet to
prepare myself to sleep by a quarter past midnight, his text came in and
couple of other texts messages plus messages on Facebook, it made me
smile. By morning, my family just wished me a happy birthday and we had a
hearty breakfast where Mom then announced over food the date for the
annual family reunion with Hamz quickly interjecting, saying he has
plans and the family won't miss him if he doesn't attend as Mom's eyes
went saucers in shock, shaking her head slowly in protest, she cut him
short, telling him she doesn't like attending the reunions either but
every son of the family has to attend and for security reasons, every
mother accompanies their son so he has to go and whatever plans he had
has to be cancelled or rescheduled. As the day progressed and my bothers
took me out to fete me for my birthday, sponsored by Shalewa to
obviously work my way into my heart and have an ally in me, Mom got
dressed up to go visit her islamic marabouts just to make findings about
our intended trip to the annual reunion to ensure all will be well. She
was told to carry out some little acts of charity just to ward off
trouble which she did.
By evening, tired from our birthday hangout, Mom
understood and suggested we all eat out so we went to eat at a nearby
restaurant, she kept asking us to get our things ready to travel in
2days. The next day, while in my room folding my neatly ironed clothes
into my traveling bag for the trip, my phone made a chat beep so I
picked it up to see who it was and thus take a short break, it was one
of my paternal cousins Qamas and he wanted to let me know he'd just
stumbled upon my blog and had shown his mom who read through some posts
and thought I must be foolish to not just talk about our immediate
family on blog but also the rest of the family to entertain the world,
asking who the hell do I think I am to do that and would definitely be
bringing up the issue at the reunion...
"This stupidity has to stop and
remind me never to take selfies with you again lest you post on your
blog"
He ended. Intuitively, I held my neck when I almost chocked as I
gasped in horror at what he wrote, who the hell is this idiot to have
the nerve to tell me what and what not to do and since when did his
opinion or that of his scallywag mother...(ok my apologies...scratch
that), mattered? I thought to myself angrily, I was enraged I couldn't
immediately come up with a perfect clapback, so unusual of me it hurt.
Hamz walked into the room just in time and I handed him my phone,
"Your
useless fat cousin send me that...can you just believe your eyes? I'd
better not attend this year's reunion lest the country home goes up in
flames from what would be an epic fight and I'd be arrested for arson"
I
spit with seething venom, Hamz raised his eyes from his phone to me,
held his side as he roared with laughter, I was quite embarrassed,
"This
isn't funny bro, it isn't",
He slowly mellowed down, flicked a tear
away from his eye then told me not to loose my cool,
"...Trust me, he
and his mom actually wants to be discussed on the blog, that's what I
feel about all this and what better way than to get under your skin to
get you all irked up and also to see how you will portray them. I think
the Adagiri family are all aware of your blog and find it quite amusing,
crazy, yes but entertaining and everyone wants to have their debut on
the blog. I think our family drama is next to the Kardashians and the
most intriguing in Nigeria and they find it quite thrilling and a source
of family memoir so Maj, mention them you will''.
The rest of the day
went pretty fast and the next day, we prayed as Karl kicked start the
ignition on our way to the annual Adagiri reunion. The drive down was
quite smooth up until Mom asked Karl to stop so as to buy some local
spices including locust beans whose strong smell quickly polluted the
air in the car leading to angry protestations from my brothers much to
me and Mom's amusement, doubling over, reeling with laughter. They
turned down the car windows to let in gust of wind and kept chasing away
imaginary flies, Mom didn't budge, Karl kept grumbling about feeling
tortured and would rather walk, again she didn't care. Soon all got use
to the smell and even Hamz soon dozed off.
Arriving at our country home,
we met some of our cousins, grand aunties and other relatives who had
arrived before us, we exchanged pleasantries as I kept scanning the room
for Qamas and his mom and found out they hadn't arrived. Mom and some
of her sisters-in-law joked about grooming the new brides married into
the family on being Mrs Adagiris, as one sister-in-law replied jocularly
about being a new dawn in the family as their monster-in-law was dead
which generated a loud raucous giggle but Mom subtly smiled and said it
wasn't such a nice joke. The new Matriarch of the family who had
overheard them angrily stormed into the sitting room to collectively
insult all the women about making fun of her mother's death,
"...I'm so
ashamed of all of you, regardless of what my mother might have done or
not done, she gave you the sons whom you married and put babies into all
of you, how dare you...after all you're all mothers with sons and some
of you, mothers-in-law already"
Mom calmly spoke up, saying it was a bad
joke yes but nonetheless, the women just needed to make light of the
ordeal they went through in the hands of her mother.
"...You're also a
wife, a mother and a mother-in-law, you'll agree with me your mother
wasn't the nicest of mothers-in-law"
She gave Mom a look so cruel and
demeaning but Mom kept a straight face, not caring a hoot about her, the
new Matriarch then walked away. When all the family members had arrived
and I intentionally ignored Qamas and his mom, the family proceeded to
have dinner on their expansive dining table. My brothers and I's
respective phones beeped with text messages from Mom asking us to pray
in our hearts fervently before eating! Since the cooks are catering to a
large number of family members, every family is expected to write in
before arriving a list of food they are allergic to, if they are on a
diet or medically on some type of tailored nutrition so they know how to
cook for each person and naturally, some try to send it lists of exotic
food they've now been placed on by their doctors, lol. Of course this
is overlooked, and only allergies are noted. So my brothers and I,
getting the memo, prayed before eating.
Soon afterwards, the Matriarch
called up Mom to have a private talk as everyone disperse to their rooms
and some cousins catching up in the common room watching the English
premiership. Everyone looked on as Mom and the new Matriarch made
gesticulations as they gisted and occasionally giggled, I scanned the
faces of Mom's sisters-in-law and it made them highly uncomfortable. Mom
didn't divulge much after she came into the room and by the next day,
Mom was sitted next to the new Matriarch on the table, apparently, they
got on a good note after the wedding of my cousin and the new Matriarch
is apparently trying to find an ally after she almost got toppled over
by the gang of sisters-in-law who didn't respect her decisions much and
she feared she might be loosing her grip on the women and how best to
keep the women in sync but by finding an ally in the rebel of the
sisters-in-law.
Deliberations were made by the third day on a lot of
issues concerning the family and still, Mom didn't say anything as
regards her new blooming friendship between her and the new Matriarch
and this upset her sisters-in-law so during one of such family
discussions where they couldn't all reach an agreement, Qamas' mother
angrily fired at Mom about her rather queasy suggestions which she
always expects everyone to take on but they won't, Mom felt irritated
and demanded to know what that meant, she said she doesn't have time to
explain, things soon got a bit heated between the women until Qamas'
mother fired about the family being sabotaged by her son Majeed, Mom
gasped and asked what she meant, she went on saying I run a blog where I
discuss the family and I was summoned, in my heart, I knew trouble has
just being unleashed so I glanced at Hamz and he stood up and walked
slowly behind me.
When I arrived at the gathering, Mom asked me what
blog was it was I was running that exposed the family and I explained
the blog, saying I spoke primarily about my immediate family and
besides, there was no images of anyone outside my immediate family. Hamz
stepped in and also defended me, saying more often than not, the events
on the blog has been watered down a lot so no one is in trouble. I was
dismissed and I left with Hamz back to the common room where I pretended
to be on a call, telling my supposed "friend" how some familial villain
has tried to take me down but God put them to shame, Hamz would
occasionally bop with laughter. Next day, as the family draw
conclusions on deliberations, things escalated as everyone tried to
ensure their voice was heard. Things got horribly wrong as voices were
raised and everyone dispersed from the home angrily. This is just the
beginning.
KEEP UP!
WOW what a finale..it never ends..great job this season maj
ReplyDelete-Lyndsay Fairweather, England
you used the housewives of atlanta as your pic? lol
ReplyDeleteGreat finale...on point of drama..what happens next? whew
ReplyDelete-VAUGHAN, PH
Maj and drama, lol, i think the extended family kind of like to know the narrative according to maj and try to get on without asking to get on
ReplyDelete-Mariah, sydney
Not a shabby season me thinks
ReplyDelete-Lourdes, USA
you did it maj...proud
ReplyDeletegreat piece, the women are such drama and mom should be careful with dining with the devil, sometimes the angel u dont know bbeats the devil u know
ReplyDelete-Mercy, lagos
didnt quite get me all excited as i thought
ReplyDelete-Carlos
lovely
ReplyDeletewaiting on next season
ReplyDeleteweldone maj
ReplyDeleteWhew! What a grand finale! Thumbs up Maj.
ReplyDelete-Ibrahim, Ilorin