ODE TO MOLUE: GOODBYE TO MOLUE AND DANFO.

ODE TO MOLUE:

GOODBYE TO MOLUE

And DANFO

Nineteen hours a day,

seven days a week,

thirty days a month,

three hundred and sixty-five

days a year,

their quips rent the air;

their bon mot is repeated in

all neighborhood,

school children mimic those

voices,

hawkers learn their tricks.

Black-stripped-Yellow color

passenger buses,

Molue, Aluwe and Danfo

the loved the hated

privately-owned-

operated-passenger-bus

in the city of Lagos,

has a unique culture.

Culture known by

drivers, apprentices,

owners, rental groups,

officials in transportation and

public safety industry,

sub culture mostly practiced

on buses,

as they transport millions

commuters everyday around

Lagos;

a culture adopted in

motor parks across Lagos.

Culture of lousy talk,

culture of “yabis” or

abuse among passenger,

apprentice, and driver,

culture of hilarity and

amusement missing at homes,

substituted for by molue and

danfo in the city of Lagos

Laughter uncommon at theaters

molue gives to passengers on

board,

fun and humor absent in

comical books,

molue makes abundant on

everyday road trip;

entertainment unavailable

in theaters,

molue provides,

nonexistent cinema and film,

molue runs behind driver’s

cabin,

to thrill their passengers.

Ingenuity-quality found

among intellectuals and

inventors,

molue world exhibit easily,

unique language of trade,

jargons peculiar to Lagos

driving,

which may take years or

decades to develop,

molue has created from

daily experience.

Joy barely found in homes,

molue gives to passengers

everyday,

experience very uncommon

life,

you learn or hear on molue.

Molue-a multiplex theater-

operating multiple screens

within a single complex,

inside molue-peddler sells

on molue hawker hawks,

on molue swindler swindles,

on molue quack operates,

inside molue runaway kids

live,

molue a brothel for

seven-eleven,

molue-unrented apartment

for one-night-stand.

Molue-different things to

different people,

as your several decades

of ruling over Lagos roads

about to end,

what shall we say,

how shall we remember you?

By yellow color-you carry,

by routes you ply,

by culture you had created,

by economic contribution

to Lagos State and Nigeria,

by support from your associations

to political engineering,

by violence or civil strife,

by those strikes during political

and social upheavals,

by your carnivals on the streets of

Lagos,

by unannounced transport fare hike,

by street fight between apprentice

and commuter on “change or no change”

by several accidents on Lagos roads

because of carelessness.

Whichever way-Lagosians remember

You,

Molue, Aluwe, Danfo “o si’ ereeee”

You will always be in my MIND.