APAJUKUN: THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED

 I once read about how Mansa Musa began to revitalize cities in his kingdom immediately after his return from pilgrimage to Mecca. 

This trip opened his eyes to see how advanced the outside world was and how backward he and his people were. 

With so much wealth that could only be likened to that of the biblical King Solomon, Mansa Musa didn't know it all until he ventured out of his Kingdom, and upon his return, he built one of the best Islamic Universities in the world, at that time, in Timbuktu. Not forgetting the world-class mosques he built that attracted tourists to travel over just to admire. 

So did Lee Kwan Yew and Sheikh Al Maktoum, the geniuses behind the success stories of Singapore and UAE respectively. 

After the Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, the Japanese government didn't wait for the dust to finish settling when it sent young students on scholarship to study in the same West that had just bombed them. Today, they are the largest car manufacturers in the world because they recognized early on that the world didn't revolve around their extremely rich culture and traditional way of doing things. 

Our ancestors never seemed to encourage the hunger for any knowledge that was alien to our culture. 

They didn't travel outside their enclave to behold how the world was transforming hence our lack of any remarkable advancement and the desire to embark on a wild quest for knowledge hunting. 

To a Wapan person, Wukari is his/her Holyland and must appear to compete with Donga's Chamba man whose only goal may be to laugh at the Kuteb man from Takum whose city lies in ruins as a result of some avoidable crises. 

We see ourselves as enemies or adversaries instead of brothers who are chasing the growth and development of the entire area. 

I've seen idiotic articles attempting to make jest of another place because one place has more Federal institutions than the others. How shallow and stupid can we be to even conceive such imbecilic thoughts? 

I once joined a group of stupid kids who sang and danced through the streets of Wukari shouting that Takum has Gen. TY Danjuma and we also have Barr. Baba Adi. To our foolish minds at that time, we were enemies who must never agree on anything. 

Our various villages are the only places we know and do not even have the desire to travel to and know about the next village because we've already been brainwashed to believe that they are useless people who do not mean us well. 

And if we do not embark on such journeys, how do we know that the world has moved on and we've been left behind? 

If Mansa Misa never left Mali, all his wealth would have been useless to his people without education and the civilization he imported. 

Education does not end within the four walls of a classroom, sometimes we need to take the bold step to leave the comfort of our homes, travel outside our villages, and learn something new. 

An enlightened mind would never be as petty and empty enough to harbor the kinds of thoughts we conceive against one another. 

The antidote to Wukari's lack of stability could be found in a village near Lissam, and the answer to Donga's lack of growth and unity could be somewhere in Takum. 

Why can't we just agree to prosper together instead of always seeking ways to tear each other down? 

Maybe when I know more about the Chamba, Kuteb, Ichen, Tiv, or Idoma, I will see the similarities in our ways of life and accept them as brothers so we can, together, begin to build a new civilization to be applauded by posterity, regardless of our misconstrued history. 

That's when a Kuteb man will feel the need to construct a state-of-the-art private school/hospital in Donga and a Chamba man can boldly build the road between Takum and Ussa because we have finally realized the importance of developing one another. 

The one who has not traveled for enlightenment would never understand the importance of unity, peace, and prosperity and is condemned to perish in penury. 

May we outgrow this village mentality of hating one another into destroying ourselves for an enmity that was forged by the already dead. Amen!!! 

©JBZ_2023