PPA (Place of Primary Assignment) – PART 2

PPA (Place of Primary Assignment) – PART 2

Photocredit: Chef's phone

Chef, IP (who I’d call IP for the sake of the blog) and I were so disappointed and we decided to take a stroll in the hopes of finding a guesthouse to stay for a few days; you see we had to report to the school the next day and then get accepted or rejected and report back to the L.G.I for documentation and all and finally proceed home since schools were on break. We found a guest house which was not really what you’d call a guest house but in that village (settlement) it was the best thing we could find; there was a bed, a fan and a table, a bathroom (those local ones that have a shower and toilet so while you’re bathing you’re pouring water on the toilet seat) and well there was a water system apart from that the guest house was just crap. It cost ₦2000 for a night at the guest house and that was a plus. So we told the caretaker at the guest house that we would be back and we left get food as were hungry. We found a place to get food but the ambience and the food was nothing to write home about. I am such a big fan of great customer service and the service there was crap; no one attended to us for a while we had to shout and well speak Yoruba most of the time (Chef speaks Yoruba really well because his mum is Yoruba and that helped/is still helping us this NYSC period). The building was like a wooden hut and just a really small place with the firewood and pots and a few benches. We sat down to wait for the food and it was so horrible because the whole while goats, dogs and chickens were running around. They kept going under the benches and I had to raise my leg up because I was so scared; I like animals and all but I am so freaking scared of them. It was so uncomfortable eating with my legs up on the bench and the food wasn’t great either but we had no choice so we just ate as fast as we could so we could leave quickly. We were about to leave when the Vice-Principal came to the ‘food joint’ and he said they had been looking for us because we had been out a while and we had said we wouldn’t be long we just wanted to take a stroll.

Anyways, we got back to the corpers’ lodge and we met Corper S. and Luchi who were angry that we left and we didn’t come back sooner, they had also prepared a meal since it was our first day and they knew we had no means to cook. We apologized but I guess it didn’t really help that we also left right after the apology to go sleep in the guesthouse. I persuaded Chef to ask IP to come with us (I wasn’t sure if he wanted to spend money) because I felt that if Chef and I left it would be a lot of attention and look like we just wanted to be alone to get physical. IP ended up following us and we all shared a room that night.  Chef and I reflected on the day (and shared a real kiss for the first time) and he had option to call a family friend to get him reposted and so we decided to talk and do what was best for us. I told him it was fine to go even though I honestly didn’t want him to leave as I had only survived that day because we were a team. I wasn’t  sure about leaving, I wasn’t ready for the stress of reposting, I love a challenge and I was starting a business venture that would require my time and I thought at least being in the village means I would be free from the hustle and bustle and have time to focus on my business. Chef decided that he would stay with me (bless him!) and so he called and told the family friend not to bother about his reposting and so it was decided that we would stay. As, I stated in a previous blog post that’s why  we or rather I can’t leave now because after he made a sacrifice to stay, I feel it would be unfair of me. Well, we decided to call it a night as we had a busy and long day the next day; we had to get to school and then local government for proper documentation.

The next morning, we got up early to get to the school on time but our efforts proved fruitless as we had to wait forever to get a bike to the school; the weird thing about the settlement/village is that unlike other places were bike men are hustling to get customers, they just sit and wait for you to approach and sometimes they even decide that they don’t feel going anywhere.  We finally got a bike and headed to the school, on getting to the school we met the Principal who talked with us and joyfully accepted us to the school (like he had a choice…LOL). We were told that they had only 7 staff and they also didn’t have teachers for some subjects especially English Language??? (What exactly were they doing in school?) They took notes of subjects we could possibly teach with our educational background; Chef for English, IP for Mathematics and I for Accounting (Commerce) or Business Studies. We caught a glimpse of the classrooms which weren’t in the best state, the students were outside playing when we arrived and most of them were barefooted, their uniforms were torn, they were wearing dirty t-shirts or looked haggard (I’m not judging them and I have gotten quite close to some of them and it’s not actually about their condition or status is just that they don’t care mainly because that’s how they “roll” in the village). We met some other staff and we also dropped our details with the school.

P.S: I am home for a short while as the school is currently on break. I was in Lagos for a while and now I am back to my parent’s house. I have a very interesting blog post from my time in Lagos…stay tuned for that.

I thought a few people might also enjoy my playlist, I listen to any kind of music but yeah I would admit that a lot of times I am about the vocals. Anyways, here is what I was listening to while typing this:

Can’t Help Falling in Love with you – Jena Irene (American Idol Cover); such a great song by Elvis Presley, When a man loves a woman – Joshua Ledet (American Idol Cover), Street Credibility – 9ice ft 2face

Yours in Service,                                                                                                                          Corp Girl

PPA (Place of Primary Assignment) – PART 1

 The football field at my PPA; Photocredit: Chef's phone

After 3 weeks in CAMP, it was finally time to leave camp and report to our respective PPA’s. PPA simply means Place of Primary Assignment and it is where you serve the country for the remainder of the service year. It is usually government establishments such as government schools, government offices and government hospitals although in recent times private companies have requested and had corpers sent to them. So on this fateful last day of camp, here I am waiting for all the ceremonies to be over so I could get my letter of posting, I was eager and so full of hope that I would be posted to the state capital or at least somewhere great. We had to pack our luggage out of the hall very early that morning and Chef and I had met up earlier that morning to discuss our posting and we were very hopeful. Chef was part of the closing parade which was quite fun (well apart from the people that fainted standing under the hot sun) and immediately after that we met up to go and take our posting letter. The letter was distributed by state code number and we were divided into groups which was so sad as you see Chef and I had thought we would take ours at the same time since we were in the same platoon (also our state codes were almost the same with the exception of one number). Anyways, we were on separate lines but we agreed to get our letters and tell each other were we had been posted to at the same time. I got my letter and saw that I had been sent to this village and I was sad and ashamed to tell Chef anyways I walked up to him and he was reluctant to tell me where he had been posted to. He snatched my posting letter and gave me his and we saw it was the same local government and same school and we hugged each other as we had found joy in the midst of disappointment. Anyways, we said our goodbyes to our friends and made enquiries about our PPA. Transportation was provided for corpers to our respective local government and we found the bus to our local government and bid farewell to camp after 3 weeks and we were ready for the next phase. 

Our local government was about 40mins from the camp and the journey there had us feeling less optimistic as most of the places we had passed were mostly bushes or rural and remote areas. We also discovered that the local government did not have any bank so anytime we needed money or needed to conduct any bank transaction we would have to travel back to the town where the camp was located which is a 40mins journey. The local government has about 7 settlements and the local government headquarters was in the same settlement as my PPA which was our first stop as we had to meet the Local Government Inspector (L.G.I), get briefed and get to our various settlements. We met with the L.G.I and our executives and we were informed by the L.G.I that he would have to reshuffle us according to the needs of the schools in the various settlements. Sadly, I was moved to another settlement but on the bright side Chef had once again ended up with me; same settlement and same school.  The sad part was that we were farther away from civilization and the journey to the bank would now take about an hour. We were given a new letter of reposting and we proceeded to our various settlements; the vice-principal of the school I had been posted to was there to pick us up and take us to the settlement. It was another 30minutes drive from the headquarters and we (there were 3 of us) finally got the settlement. We arrived at the corpers’ lodge and it was an eyesore; the wall was unpainted and had scribbling on it, there was no toilet (well there was a pit you could use as a toilet), no water system (you had to fetch water from a monopump at the centre of the town), in fact the rooms were looking empty with the absence of a welcoming bed just one haggard looking mattress (which for the life of me I’d prefer to call a flat foam). The corpers’ lodge was already been occupied by 3 people; the CDS chairman who came to pick us up; Corper S., Luchi and a third person; Corper A. who wasn’t around. The first two were from Batch A and the last person was in the same batch with us but stream 1.

P.S: I’d be going home soon but I’d still keep blogging. As of now, we haven’t had power (light) for almost a week now, the fuel scarcity in the country has made it almost impossible to buy fuel (petrol) and we ran out of water as usual. Chef and I just bought a litre of petrol for ₦400; well it was black market (illegal sales). Last week was crazy it rained heavily and the roof was leaking and it was even dropping on the bed, the mosquitoes are another serious issue and I always feel like they bit me more. Well, I discovered that I was right about my feeling; I learnt that some of us are mosquito magnets and mosquitoes bite us more than other people.

I thought a few people might also enjoy my playlist, I listen to any kind of music but yeah I would admit that a lot of times I am about the vocals. Anyways, here is what I was listening to while typing this:

When you tell me that you love me – Westlife ft Diana Ross, Who you are – Jessie J, Yesterday – Toni Braxton, Your Side of The Bed – Trey Songz, Stuttering – Jasmine Sullivian, Superwoman – Karyn White, The Reason – Hoobastank, That’s where you find love – Westlife, Thank God I found you - 98⁰/Joe/Mariah Carey, Hallelujah – Alexandra Burke, Imagine Me – Kirk Franklin