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Written by his sister, Amarachi
”Floreat colleagium shall our motto be…..
Hail the Navy secondary School………..
Here we are, joined together as we sing our anthem…”
The house was always agog as we all sang our school anthem loudly in order to prove to the other how sweeter our anthems sounded.
Whilst Chiemeka, Kelechi and I were sympathetic towards each other as we went to the same school (different locations), there remained a lone voice in the wilderness who from inception was always different from the rest of the clan! How we enjoyed the usual banter as we argued whether Navy school was better than Kings College.
It was difficult to convince us why Kings College Lagos was a better school than NNSS Ojo and NNSS PH, or how FUTO was better than NAU, Awka or how Bauchi was better than Lagos. Does he really need to sweat to convince us at this stage that Texas is better than Lagos? Not with all the recent fuel hike. lol! Anyway, that remains a story for another day.
I miss those fights growing up, when after playing games with KC and they started their small quarrel, he would hold KC and say, “Give me my shirt, give me my knicker”. These are things he must have dashed him months before because he had outgrown them. Is it when he locked Chiemeka in the room when they were quarrelling and was laughing at her from the balcony? Is it when he would always demand complete respect from KC minutes after insulting Chiemeka? Is it when he used money for his exercise book to buy mango and mummy threatened him that it was the end of school for him? She wrote a letter to his teacher to that effect which Chiemeka intercepted quickly. Hahaha! It speaks of how we watch out for each other.
In all this, he was always loving and caring, having our backs and would take the fall for us without complaining. On one occasion, mummy banned us from playing table tennis. She drove in and saw himself, Kelechi and Chiemeka playing. Though Chiemeka wasn’t around when it was banned, she was informed, but Chidi insisted that she wasn’t around, and she got saved. Kelechi and himself took the fall that day.
If we remember the scene in the Nigerian movie, ‘Rattle Snake’ where Ahana gave his younger sister a portion of his food and went hungry because her own was not enough, that scenario describes completely who Chidi is, save the other terrible character of Ahana. Laughs!
It is quite difficult to describe Chidi as he portrays different personalities to different people. The environment or the people involved determines how he relates. He can be talkative this minute, and the next you would not hear a sound from him. You can tell someone that “Chidi is very quiet” and he meets that same person and ‘falls your hand’. It would seem as though you do not know your brother. This is because he will display the talking part of himself. He may then meet another set of your friends and after the usual exchange of pleasantries, he would be loudly silent. As in the type of silence that is deafening!
It was very annoying when we were growing up because we always loved to do things together. One moment Chidi can bond and join us in our usual funny displays or talks. Another time, he recoils back to himself and acts like he is not interested yet he will still be taking note of all that is said. For example, we usually had different funny ‘Anyalechi phrases’. Chidi can act like he never knows some of them, but you would later hear him use them silently. We would learn songs and dance steps together and he would just ignore us, but later we would catch him secretly singing the songs or dancing to the beats. We would scream, Chidi!!. I can boldly and confidently say that it is only his wife, Nene Anyalechi, who knows all the many sides there are to this our ‘Egbon’.
I have always looked up to, believed in, and admired Chidi. Even when I saved up money every day in primary school and used him as my piggy bank. He chopped my money in Kings College, under the guise that the money got missing, or the time he accused me of walking by and spoiling his birdcage, or when he promised me that I should just pass UME and he would make sure I get admission in OAU. I still believed, even though I still wonder about the basis of my belief, when I did not even fill in OAU as my first or second choice, neither was he a student of OAU nor the VC’s son.
I believed because he had always specially cared about me. I still remember the gift he bought for me on my 10th birthday or how he saved up money out of his meager IT salary of N8,000 a month to buy me my first sim card which cost N6,500. Should I write of his time as a first-year student of FUTO, and how he journeyed down to Port-Harcourt to pay me a visit on a non-visiting day? Ask any boarder or student of NNSSPH, the overwhelming joy of being told, “They are calling you at the gate.”
Chidi has always been industrious and ambitious. I remember when he was doing his IT at The Sun Publishing Limited. He refused to limit himself to his scheduled assignments but sought out ways to have additional income which included engaging in some very onerous tasks. One of them included offloading newsprint from heavy-duty vehicles. This job entailed working overnight on many occasions and he would do his normal 8-5 work and then offload throughout the night and still work the next day. I remember the new pair of suits and shoes he bought for me from the proceeds of this additional income.
He became the first person in his office to learn how to drive the forklift, which was needed for offloading purposes. Not only did he learn, but taught other members of the staff how to drive it. This act saved the company the funds that were used to pay the outsourced forklift drivers before that time. He worked so hard that he would go under machines and be sweating it out doing one repair or the other which was outside his job description not minding that he is an “Engineer” from the acclaimed, “Great FUTO”. Laughs…
This act of humility endeared him to many people, especially the Technical Director of the company, who told him that he would forever have a job at The Sun if he decided to return there after NYSC.
To Be Continued…
For further comment, Please contact: Osondu Anyalechi: 0909 041 9057; [email protected]
