OF WARRI: WINE WOMEN AND SONGS

I love alcohol, I love women, and I love music. But these things that I love in Lagos, have become my undoing in Warri.

There are three hotels, two brothels and five beer parlours on my street at Iyara in Warri. Every evening, as soon as it is sundown, the competition starts. The race is of which beer parlour draws the most crowd of drinkers, and which hotel or brothel attracts the greatest patronage of a quick roll in the sack, and which individual turns the most trick.

Every groovy business evening is heyday for the beer parlours. They will all turn up the music so loud, many women will come, and the men too. Diverse music they play, Different booze will flow, and different women will strut their stuff, single girls constantly coming and pairing off with a boy or man. The noise gets so solid you could cut a slice of it out of the air; the booze will be so plentiful you could drown the sky in it, the fine girls too- you wouldn’t know which to pick to have a good time with, money- the main attraction- is always changing hand here in these watering holes.

I suffered greatly that first week I arrived. I had a hell of a time with the assault on my eardrums, the draining of my pocket, and the increased libido But I am coping now. Coping very well as I have blended into the system. My cousin Keme predicted rightly that I will cope. The confused erratic beat of my heart, and the spendaholism, and the spiking libido are all normalized now. Not that I can really take all the hard hitting noise, or the vampiric lucre-hungry sirenes, but I find it is bearable when I am part of it.

So here I am- the table before me littered with bottles (some half full, some half empty, others lying on their sides, drained of their liquor content.. Empty cans, full cans and half-drained cans of energy drinks (Warri people favour Bullet™ above Power Horse™, or Red Bull™. I do too) There is a hopeful besides me. My new friends and drinking mates- Newton, Patrick and cous Bibo have two chics hanging on to each of them, but I am cool with just one. I am a Lagos bobo so I got to do things a little differently to stand out from the crowd.

Talking about standing out. I have created an impression on the ladies here. Do you why? It is because the first chic I laid- Elizabeth she said was her name has spread story of our short time sexcapade. I had made sure she used the female condom I procured, and I also made sure I used the Gold Circle™ I had bought earlier that evening. But my greatest undoing was the emphasis on the use of condoms- both male and female condoms at the same time. All the fun and Love that could have been was lost to the squishy feel of artificiality. I wasn’t on my best. I did not trust a Warri Chic to be STD-free. But to have Faith (even if it is as small as a mustard seed) would have been the saving grace. I could have had a reserved for an exception in Warri Girls Dem. But my skepticism had the best of me. I couldn’t trust that one, though innocent she looked.

Tonight, if her price is right, I will lay this Sweet Thing- Success, she says her name is. I am so high- that is, the liquor is virtually overflowing out of my ears, the beat of the cacophonous music done spiked up my heartbeat, and my libido is over the roof. I need to chill down. Two more Heineken™ and one more Bullet™ and I am good to go.

I will greatly miss Waffi madness when I eventually leave for Lasgidi. But I must return home to Eko. Warri is my Home Town, but Eko Ile.