When I was a Basketballer

Kaduna Times🏀🏀🏀

Sports is one aspect I am very sure that God did not call me to, I don’t even doubt it.

My best girl chuckled when I said this on the other end of the phone.

The last time I ran a race and was successful at it was in Primary 4 if I am not wrong.

Every other race attempt in Secondary school was very unproductive and the truth is…. I wasn't fat, I just had (and still have) this seemingly huge body physique. I don't know what about that hinders me from running.

But for my mum’s knee that aches her occasionally now, she used to run races at my school’s inter-house sport back then when they called for parents' race and she always came out remarkably well (between 1st to 3rd) there was only one time one agbaya parent pushed her and she fell

Apart from age creeping in now, my mum used to be the athletic purrr of the family. Yes! Family! Me and my brother are quite rigid😭. Maybe my Father had some sportiness in him though…. Just maybe because he worked with the marine.

While I may not have been able to run, let me tell you about the time I was a Basketball player.😌

Sometime in Senior Secondary School, there was an upcoming national sports competition (I attended Air Force for Senior Secondary so this was a competition involving all the secondary schools in Nigeria). Before then, I think I had just generally developed an interest in Basketball as a sport.

Preparations were being made for the competition, and the school began to select students who had strengths in various sports categories like a dream, that was how they chose your girl to be one of the basketball players (I must have displayed some basketball steeze I guess😂). At the initial stage, the decision wasn’t final, so there was still room for elimination if you didn't perform well.

The competition was to be in Kaduna and we were to go by air, (this was a big opportunity for me), friends, that’s how I began to channel the inner Kobe Bryant in me😭I will not go ke???

I can't remember how many of us were playing B-ball, both for the male and female category but sooner than we knew, we had started going to the Basketball court in the base to practice with the assistance of our teachers a few of them who were also sportsmen.

We started with the basics, learning how to bounce the ball while guarding it with your other hand…. And the other things important…. For a left user, I think I tried to bounce the ball the other way around but I was quite good. Lol😂so I thought.

Each day drew us closer to the final day we were to go. Guys! You won't believe my school had 57 representatives that year! This was in 2019! The very year before the lockdown, if I remember clearly, it was in December cause I know I almost spent Christmas in Kaduna.

Finally, the day of departure came, and we were onboarded on a cargo plane, the name is as clear as day in my head CHARLIE 130 HERCULES, the abbreviation for it was C130 (C one-thirty, that’s how we call it).

Let me tell you a bit about the plane experience before we go back to my basketball story

The plane as I mentioned earlier was a cargo plane, we were not the only Air Force school leaving from Lagos, there was also AFSS Ikeja, so they merged us, all together we were over a hundred students that were onboarded. And honestly, that was great stuff to achieve.

Do you know what it takes for parents to release their children and have them fly by air for a competition that they weren't certain of winning?

I give all the parents who let their children go big ups for real including my mum.

Back to plane experience

Bags of rice and some other foodstuff were loaded onto the plane, and omo mehn, C130 has no real seats😂 it's a warplane, and the seats are like joined ropes, let me see if I can find a picture to attach so you understand.

Yes!

I found it! So this was what we sat on and guess what guys?? Because we were many some people had to sit on the bags of rice… yes! You read correctly😂😂.

I thought that was all the drama that I would see until it was time to put in our luggage…. Some things you may read will sound unbelievable but believe me, they truly happened.

When our teachers and the soldiers that were present at the airport had finished putting in our luggage, the plane could not close😭😭😭like they were trying to shut it and it wouldn't shut.

So they had to start asking us to lap ourselves 😭😭in a plane!!! In an actual plane😭 we lapped ooo, he that was tiny sat on the legs of he who had flesh. They didn't ask me to lap anybody but I was very close to the bag of rice (more like I was partly seated on it).

After a few lappings and reshuffling of luggage, C130 finally closed and our flight to Kaduna began.

Being my first time on a plane (after USA embassy denied me visa twice as a child, very wicked humans, I remember shining my teeth for that yeye white man…. *Hisses in my destiny is not in your hands).

So as I was saying, being my first time on a plane, my head was doing via via, I felt a bit dizzy at first but I was still “mummy” to two other of my girls who rested their heads on my lap almost all through the flight one of whom is late now (may her soul rest in peace)

They had told us that the C130 makes a lot of noise and so were to come with earbuds and they didn't lie.

We got to Kaduna and friends, that place was as cold as what I didn't understand.

We’ll talk about Kaduna another day, Basketball is the focus for today.

Back to me being a basketballer

We got to Kaduna and continued our prepping for our B-ball game, my school AFSS Shasha was the last Air Force school to be created so there were a lot of guys from other schools who wanted to relate with us (maybe it was Delulu sha😭)

One of the boys from Air Force Ikeja was shooting me glances, God! Such a distracted boy…. I can't remember what sport he was playing but I know he also got injured cause we met at the ambulance.

I know you are wondering, “What were you doing in an ambulance?”…. Don't worry read on. 😂

Each school had a particular colour of customized tracksuits ours was Navy blue but I will never forget AFSS Jos that had white tracksuits, Kaduna was cold and widely dusty, how were they maintaining steeze??😭because it was always clean!😭

Those guys had the best sportsmen too, their athletes gave our best runner “Ajah Daniel” a 100-meter gap in a relay race.

The day of our game came and we were to play against Uyo Girls (Akwa-Ibom - Uyo), our B-ball outfit was giving for real, I had worn a fitted long sleeve underneath my armless vest as did some others (for more steeze😌) Uyo girls had something like purple and pink, it was not fine sha. Sorry not sorry😂

I’m sorry if you are from Akwa-Ibom too🥲

We were playing on the field, my inner Kobe Bryant fully at work (by the way women's basketball can be really chaotic 😭don’t say I didn't warn you. I can't remember what the measures and rules were but that was chaos)

The ball was coming towards me and this tall slim Uyo girl, the two of us were aiming for it, one person had to catch it, and it had to be me, we were both trying to block ourselves and the next thing I knew, I was on the floor screaming in pain and shouting that nobody should touch me.

The girl from Uyo had hit me hard with her hip in trying to get the ball first. She was taller than me sooo

My left knee was fractured, one of the soldiers from my school came to lift me from the ground and began to assist me towards the ambulance that was already on standby.

The game paused, and all my team members were worried, I must have cried, I don't trust myself not to.

I was taken to the ambulance and my leg had to be massaged. The skin around my knee swole and even after the hot spray and massaging I was still limping.

While at the ambulance the distracted boy was also there, for him, I think it was his arm but while the attendant at the ambulance massaged my knee and leg temporarily ignoring my screams, I would stylishly glance at him to see his expression, whether it was my pain or his pain he was feeling I don't know because he looked like he actually felt my pain😭again…. DELULU!

I couldn't play anymore, and we didn't win, I spent my remaining days in Kaduna limping and relying on my friends to help me out with stuff, the cold made the pain a little more intense….

And the rest is history 😂

On getting back to Lagos, everyone was so proud of me! As soon as we approached Lagos, the heat welcomed us. We just knew! Even though we were in an aircraft, Lagos had a sign in the cloud.

My Uncle who was an actual basketballer got me a basketball afterwards, he was so glad to hear that I was practising and kept asking about my progress, I'm sorry I didn't pick up the career Uncle😭, let me check for a picture of my Uncle so you believe me.

Olasumbo Atoyebi.

He’s on Google. You can read about his time playing basketball there.

If you had asked me why I may have wanted to have a career in Basketball in SS1 at that time, I would have mentioned “Uncle Ola”, he inspired me! He did!

Let me add an extra photo so you know he’s really tall

The full details of my time in Kaduna are quite lengthy but let me leave you with this word and bring today's mail to a close.

You never know what you can truly do until you try! God wants to trust us with so much more than we are ready to receive, but if we don't take that step of faith, take that bold move, and obey that seemingly ambiguous instruction, how then do we unveil how much more has been deposited in us?

There is more to what God wants to use you for than you will ever know. And there are tremendous rewards when we yield!

Like Peter, launch out your net!

Launch it out fully and let it begin to break with the catch.

The fish will all be yours only if you take that bold step to first launch out your net.

”for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.“

‭‭Philippians‬ ‭2‬:‭13‬ ‭NKJV‬‬

PS: I feel pretty nostalgic

Till next week fam

I love you all

TFA💜✨