Age of Worry

grown up too fast

I remember Gary Coleman’s character, Arnold, in Different Strokes once said “I don’t want to grow up...”.  A line that has stuck with me over decades, albeit for no particular reason.  Recently I have been affectionately nicknamed Peter Pan and it has got me thinking... “Is my generation in the Age of Worry John Mayer beautifully sung about?”

Am I, like Peter Pan, refusing to grow up, metaphorically, of course?  I mean, I am constantly trying to figure out the world as it changes every day; lovers turn to bitter enemies, friends to foes, partners face-off in ugly lawsuits.  It is indeed a dangerous and scary world out there.  I remember once overhearing a train conversation when a young man said “I don’t want to get married cuz I don’t want to get divorced...” and that was shocking.  He was worrying about an ending before even starting the journey.  I recently read an article about some traits of unhappy people and the common thread with most of the traits was the burden of worrying.  Unhappy people worry a lot and in most cases unnecessarily.

This generation, in my opinion, is constantly paranoid.  The degrees of paranoia vary but we are worried about everything.  Our worries send us to bed and ironically our worries wake us up and chase us out of our houses.  Our worries make us apply for loans we can ill afford to repay, mortgages we avoid to look at and so on.  Our worries send children to school for and ‘education’ we fear may corrupt their views on the world but do so nonetheless for fear of them being left behind in this factory conveyor belt called life.  Our worries keep us in relationships long after their expiry dates afraid of being ‘alone’ and being happy with just that.  Worrying we will be broke and downtrodden, we apply for jobs we wished never existed  but we turn up anyway worried to be reprimanded and sacked.

On a wider community level we worry about the ozone layer, climate change, wars, diseases, hunger, poverty, slavery, sexism, racism, child trafficking, deforestation, animal rights, human and now I’m literally afraid if I continue listing I would have added a new worry on your ‘list of worries’ so I’ll stop with the listing; but you can imagine that our waking moments must be spent in mental rooms choking on the fumes of worry and paranoia.

In all fairness to this generation we have inherited some of the worries from our parents.  They worried about what kind of members of society they’d be raising and channeled us towards paths they deemed fit and development and we in turn will certainly pick the baton and continue the vicious cycle of worry.  We will worry for our own offspring; we would worry about cloud storage accounts being hacked, about religious extremists, revenge porn, the effects of social media on physical human interaction and our children’s safeties online, the incurable diseases of HIV/AIDS, cancer and Ebola.

In spite of this scary storm of despair, let’s look less at the things we can’t help and focus on the things we can help in the here and now; the sun, the birds and trees; the faces and smiles of children and our loved ones.  We can chose to spend more time in the present.

Worry less...

Adieu!

Virtual Pub- to be free

After my last post, I'm kinda buzzing from the euphoria of writing again and fuelled by mango-infused green tea and chat with a friend I almost instantaneously wrote this... enjoy!

Virtual Pub- 

to be free

I yearn for evenings and weekends,
when my circle of friends can-
gather around our virtual pub circle of life,
After their days at university lectures,
college halls and bread-winning jobs,
And indulge in intellectually stimulating discourse,
behind their touchscreens and keyboards.
Touching on valid points and smirking lines of-
touché when a rebuttal of wit is made.
Sitting upon our virtual pub stools, and around-
the round table, spilled with endless beers of information.
We bite on crackers of knowledge, chewing nuts of gumption-
and sip on wines of wise lines.
I try to sleep away my afternoons,
so I can hang out at night, defying-
time zones and body clocks,
As we banter away on policies in politics or the latest of our odysseys.
I soak it all in before they retire to rest for the night to-
start their routines all over again, as I the same.
For my waking afternoons-
My muse is the news,
Televised or otherwise...
I yearn for the evenings and weekends...
to be free again in our virtual pub...

Adieu!

The Economics of Church

The Economics of Church

The one constant in life, after the certainty of death, is that change will always happen.  Thing will always change; babies will become toddlers, teenager, young adults and then old adults.  Eyes which could see miles away will struggle to see up close.  Speeches of wit at rapper-like speed will slow down to slow inaudible soliloquies.  Fields of seedlings will become forests of time-tested trees; so in life, change will always come and it is most times a good thing to embrace the change and adapt to it accordingly.

I have now become agnostic after years of being a Christian.  I was born and raised in the Anglican Church, grew up with its norms and customs but after several years of research and soul searching I have come to the conclusion that whilst it did a lot of good in my early formative years, I no longer need formal religion of any sort or the doctrines of a holy book to instruct or guide me through my journey in life.  I am still open to the debate of the existence of the Christian God, but that is for another day’s debate.

Because I have a fairly rich knowledge of Christianity in Nigeria, I will limit my address and my concerns to the churches in Nigeria.  After I moved from Ibadan, Nigeria in 2002, attending church in Wageningen, Holland felt like it was a bible study class in comparison to my previous experiences.  There were no cassocks, no choristers, no obvious physical feeling of being in a church (in my eyes) but I thoroughly enjoyed it.  I was actively involved; my father had given sermons, as did other members of the congregation and some visitors.  There was only one call for offering collection and most of the congregation emptied their €1 and €2 collections with a few €5 notes gracing the collection basket.  Tea, coffee and biscuits were a routine and if you had some Saturday night leftover homemade pastry you often thought of church to bring it to.  Such was my experience of church until I moved to England in 2006 to start university.  By that time, my journey of questioning the essence of religion and the existence of God was in full swing.  I had begun to feel and realise that some of the things the Bible spoke negatively about were in fact the modern society we now live in which I felt the Bible knew nothing of, but I digress.

I attended several churches in my first few months of my stay in Bradford, England and none of them, for different reasons, felt like church in Wageningen.  I often felt I had been judged in a few of these churches although that didn’t bother me much instead it made me critical of the brand of “flashy Christianity” which they purported.

Fast forward to 2013 and I have now returned to Nigeria and I am gobsmacked at the number of churches dotted around the city of Yenagoa.  In a short 3-minute drive I can count more churches than I have fingers; but we have a bloated population so maybe the number of churches is reflective of this population density.  This is an excuse I’m lending and I’m not convinced in the slightest.

Let me home in on the crux of the matter.  The new Nigerian society, in my opinion, is obsessed with two things; wealth and religion, quite an oxymoron, if you ask me, but who am I to say? After all, I am a despised unbeliever, flirting dangerously with the gates of hell, or so they say.

If we examine the weekly church schedules we would notice church activities for nearly 5 days a week.  The Sunday service and midweek service are staples of almost every church.  Monthly activities often include new month prayer session, end of month night vigils, thanksgiving services, harvests, weddings, funerals, child births, child dedications and most importantly, these days, tithes.  In a 12 month period you may also encounter many special occasions and ceremonies like visiting of bishops, archbishops, overseers, self-styled prophets and apostles.  All of which, might I add, have one thing always on the program – offering.

I have honoured a few invitations to attend church and I listen out attentively, the messages always seem to be about wealth seeking missions and a combination of overt and subtle calls for money to God in return for blessings, life, wealth and prosperity.  So I decided to do a little calculation; in a congregation of 100 people, if there are 4 calls for offering and each member put in N50 each per offering, after 4 rounds that’s N20,000 (just over minimum wage) from one week’s Sunday service.  Now I know there will be costs of maintaining the church building and powering the generators and all other operational costs but at the end of the day I wonder where does the rest of the money go?  The pastors and preachers often have book deals, CDs, shows and other media ventures generating their own income so I ask again, where does the money go?  I see clergymen and clergywomen donning the latest fashion trends and telephoning through the latest Galaxy and iPhone devices; their automobiles matched only by celebrities and government officials (and we know we’ll reserve our comments on the latter), so please I ask, where does the money go?

Stardom and celebrity status are now the vogue for God’s earthly representatives.  They say things like “Our Father God is a rich God, he is a king so we are his royal princes and princesses” then I look around the congregation and see paupers and I think to myself that the preacher and the congregation are supposed to be children of the same God and I’m sure he doesn’t see princes and princesses in his followers.  This new fad to be a star is amusing to say the least.  Talks of wealth, mansions and private jets are commonly associated with athletes and rockstars.  High rise buildings, mansions on acres of land and more luxurious SUVs than in a Hollywood blockbuster movie are now the trending habits of Nigeria’s Christian leaders.  The craze for wealth is driving churches to have expensive schools and universities on national and foreign soils amongst other money making ventures.

I can’t help but think that Jesus Christ borrowed a donkey when he rode into Jerusalem.  He didn’t seek out the best Arabian stallion flanked by a chariot entourage and trumpeters, no... A lowly farm donkey was what he borrowed.

The egocentricity and materialism of modern Nigeria has a bitter taste in my mouth and I detest it.  I refuse to indulge in a society that has come to this, but, to each their own and I often remind myself judge not, lest ye be judged.

I’ll leave you with this article from Forbes - http://www.forbes.com/sites/mfonobongnsehe/2011/06/07/the-five-richest-pastors-in-nigeria/

Enjoy,

Adieu!

Bradford Bears

The past 14 months have gone by really fast but through all that there have been monumental events and lessons learned for the Bradford Bears.

William P. Obubo
+44 786 959 1042

Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone

Gone bald, 5 years on. Goodbye to the afro

Anyone who knew me back in 2006/07 period would remember how very insistent I was about never EVER cutting my afro.  I used to even say that even my father could not get me to cut my afro, so why would I cut it for someone less related to me.  I remember insisting it was my identity and trade-mark at the the early stages of  my last relationship, trying to convince my then girlfriend her mother would just have to accept that the afro is part of William.

In 2007 during my time as president of the Afro-Caribbean society, my best friend AJ Esin begged me to cut the afro for different reasons, the other executive members will threaten to hold me down and shear my locks, I'd tell them then, 'I'm not a violent person but you'll be sorry if ever you were the one who cuts my hair'.  When I think back on my life and my hair, it has just been a part of my life that made me stand out first before my personality would be given the chance to shine.  There was once a quote from my very good Trini-man, it read 'the only thing bigger than your ego is your afro'. Such was the appeal of my afro that people got used to the idea that William was first his afro then anything else.  In a room of two William's I was referred to Afro-William.

Looking back I would say that I used my afro as an ice-breaker, a confidence tool, a fashion statement, a play toy, a cushion or pillow amongst many other roles.  I'd elaborate, briefly, I'm lucky to have never been short of confidence and self-belief but my afro did wonders boosting my confidence as I've always been referred to as small or short but with my afro in full bloom the attention to my height is removed and the afro takes the spotlight and all the applauds. The types of shapes it can take, the length, the texture were all part of the package with the afro.  I reckon it is hard not to want to play with an afro or admire an afro.

This week gone by was the RAG Week (Raise and Give Week) in the Students Union of the University of Bradford and all monies raised would be going to the Bradford City Centre Project and Marie Curie Cancer Care.  The week is full of different charitable acts by the students such as a chairty football match, climbing the height of Mount Everest within the gym's climbing wall (911 times it would be) and a promise auction.  My  American Football team the Bradford Bears decided to put me forward in the promise auction. The vice-president asked me 'how much do you value your hair' and my response was 'very much' and he then said 'would you cut it for charity, Marie Curie' within seconds I said 'yes'.  We were both shocked by my response but I must say that the fact that it had something to do with cancer was what made me say yes.  I had had a chat with my dad earlier that day and he told me of a friend of his suffering from bone marrow cancer and it moved me.  I have been secretary of an awareness campaign last year, the Red Ribbon Society and we raised money for the production of child-friendly anti-virals for HIV/AIDS patients.  The fight against cancer is one I have supported for years but not actively contributed and I said to myself this was my opportunity to do my little bit extra.  So I said yes I will cut my 5 year old afro for charity.  The date wasn't set yet and when I told my close friends, I was greeted with sarcasm and disbelief and jest.  Nevertheless it didn't put me off as I was not out there to prove anything to them, I wanted to do my bit to help.  

The week after I agreed, myself and the Bears VP went round asking people to pledge, it had a very slow start, we ended the day with a total pledge of £97, I was not disappointed but I thought we could have done better. With a week to go we picked up pace and we both were excited with the generosity of students and staff, we soon beat the £200 mark we set ourselves so we raised the bar to £500.  The date of the shaving of my hair was set; 24/02/11. With a couple of days to go I was beginning to feel nervous about how I'd look and  how I'd feel without my afro, India Arie's song 'I'm not my hair' was my comfort.  On the morning of the 24th, I woke up washed my hair for a good half hour, dried it and combed it out to its full extent, one last time.  The money we had raised by this time was nearing £400 and the deal was highest pledger gets the opportunity to shave my hair, AJ Esin was determined to beat any pledges for the once in a life time opportunity to shear my locks without any 'retaliation' from me so he pledged £30.

The time was set to 2pm and I was ready and nervous, the cameras has started popping up but the most important tools needed were missing 'clippers and a pair of scissors'. My excuse was 'I've never had nay reason to own clippers for the past 5 years'.  Finally the clippers were brought, the location was set, I wore my Bradford Bears jersey and shoulder pads and clutched tightly unto a helmet for moral support.  

I was sat down, asked a few questions and the count-down began. I pulled on to my longest strands and handed them to Josh aka AJ Esin, he firmly gripped them and placed the blades of the scissors and the moment the crowd hit ZERO I heard the snip! The locks fell helplessly on my laps and I held them with open eyes and bid farewell as I brushed them to the ground. I couldn't bear to watch so I closed my eyes through the process only opening to dab my eyes with a handkerchief as tears were forming.  Moments later the spine-shivering sound of the clippers came and I knew this was the real deal.  Five minutes it took to shave my head of five years growing; a minute per year.

It was all done and I couldn't be any more proud of myself, the maturity and dedication.  I'd like to say a big Thank You to everyone who pledged and supported. As of now we have raised over £470.  Pledges are still welcomed.

I can now proudly say 'I am not my hair, I am the soul that lives within'.

Adieu!

Before

During the shave

After

Why science cannot disprove the existence of God

I wrote an essay for a theory of knowledge assessment on how science cannot disprove the existence of God and I think the topic of God's existence in science has come to the fore this week with Dr. Steve Hawking's statement of how there is no use of God.
I am a Christian, a believer but I also ask questions, thought provoking, and sometimes faith-shaking about God, man and our existence on earth; fate, purpose, heaven, hell and everything else that comes under that discussion.
I have dug up my essay, blown its dust away and here it goes, (it was written in 2005):


The proof of the existence of anything in science is through a process of observation, data collection and careful analysis, followed by a write-up of the findings. This has been the case through centuries of scientific experiments and research. This yearning drive to seek more knowledge is one that places the human species above all other living things. Through our interactions in daily life, we show this longing to know. We want to know why and how and we ask of time periods-when, and places-where.
This ever-inquisitive trait of man has brought us to endless questioning on the existence of a God or some superior and supernatural being. It is not strange that we ask ourselves “Does God exist?” This has become part of our daily living. Across cultures and races, the human mind needs physical, logical and natural explanations to the happenings of events. It is for this reason that scientists have questioned religions and faiths on the actual existence of God. The effort to attain this knowledge is one that can be endless and fruitless.
The questioning of the existence of God cannot but create doubts in the minds of those whose faiths are not well-grounded. Waving aside the question cannot also stop scientists from trying to find out if God does really exist. Our ever-changing societies, through science, would want answers to this life-long question. We need physical, logical and natural justifications. We need to know why there is God? How is God? When did God start to exist? Where is God? Who is God?


The acceptance of the belief of something that cannot be touched or seen is faith. A dictionary definition of faith is “belief in the truth of a revealed religion: confidence and trust in God”. Although this does not consider the question “Does God exist?”, it opens up a path that allows believing. Believing is to accept as true what is said. Science can hereby not mark out in the minds of people what they accept as true and why they do so. The most that can be done is a rationalization on why we think a person believes in one thing over another. Hebrews Chapter 11 verse 1 “What is faith? It is the confident assurance that what we hope for is going to happen. It is the evidence of things we cannot see yet.” Science cannot disprove the existence of God by tests, research and experiments, because the existence of God is by faith in the hearts and minds of individuals. With our mere knowledge of the physical, logical and natural phenomena, we cannot prove that what we cannot see is not there. That is not to say that all of what we see is actually there, but then again when we do not see that which is not there, but accept it is there, then it is believing that it is there. This is the case when it comes to human relations with God. As humans, for those who accept the existence of God, the explanation of God is not a topic for discussion because we do so by faith. Science cannot prove if faith is indeed believing in a truth or something not yet seen. When scientists ask ‘Does God exist?” the aim is to disprove the existence of God, but due to the nature of human beings and our relation with God, we do not need hard evidence to show that God does indeed exist through what would be termed as the three human phenomena (physical, logical and natural realms). Even when things like miracles do occur, science always steps in to prove how and why it happened to ensure that the sequence of events can be repeated constantly. Those that believe that it was through God’s divine intervention would not care less if science can or cannot prove the miracle. Such reasoning seems to be the closest that science has come in disproving that God does exist.
Scientific theories through centuries have consistently been dynamic and aiming towards a truth. Science once claimed that the earth was flat and if one went too far east or west, one could fall off the earth into oblivion. We now know, through science, that the earth is undeniably a sphere and man can make journeys around it and all matter on earth are held by its gravitational pull. The atom was once known as the smallest particle of matter, but again science proved itself wrong. All these new findings are as a result of the quest to know more in man’s life. Science has constantly had its flaws in trying to confirm or disprove different theories; this is though not to say that science has no use or effect on man’s life. No. Science has its place in man’s existence on earth. With science, we have been able to prevent fatal diseases from resulting into global epidemics. Science has made living easier with various inventions like the incandescent lamp, the motorcar, the microscope and so on and so forth. Despite inventions and scientific breakthroughs, there are things that are beyond the realms of science and faith is one of such. No scientific experiment can explain the faith believers portray. God’s existence is beyond science. This is due to the fact that science deals in the physical, logical and natural realms of life. Believing in a God is outside these realms and therefore cannot be judged under any of the three, whereas believing in a God pertains to the metaphysical and mystical domains. If science would try to disprove the existence of God, it would be futile and biased. A fourth realm would be required and faith would be the in the fourth realm but unfortunately faith cannot be experimented on with research or in laboratories. Due to the fact that experiments need to be seen physically, science would already have its short-coming in trying to prove God’s by analysing faith. As faith cannot be seen, a scientist might want to analyse a person who claims to have faith. The subconscious approach of a scientist would be to address the three realms of science with regards to the person.


To conclude, the effects of religion are beyond the realms of science. Our current knowledge, which is our present perception, learning and reasoning of the world from the bases of science, cannot be the bases for our judgements on whether a God exists or not. The science of today already knows too little to deal with matters that lie in its domain so how cannot it prove a belief that is out this domain. Religious believers are ridiculed for their old-fashioned, unscientific ideas, with their talk of God and Satan, of heaven or paradise and hell, of salvation and damnation. Science may try to kill religion, but cannot kill God, for God lies in the hearts of those who believe.

Time to update football rules, Monsieur Blatter?

I've been watching World Cup football as far back as Italia '90, I know it's two decades ago (gosh that makes me sound so old) but yeah I have been watching football for that long. I can't remember much of the Italian World Cup, but the American, French, Japanese/South Korean, German and I'm still watching the South African.
The debate that has pushed itself to the fore of this World Cup, is not why did the big names flop? or why does the Jabulani swerve even though its the 'perefectest' ball? or why Diego Forlan is the only man that knows how hit the ball so cleanly?.. no it's when will FIFA update the fundamental rules of football? The 'suits' in the FIFA offices prefer to change rules which have very little effect on the game and the players. I was reading the rules recently and the colour of any undergarments such as baselayer tops or compression shorts need to be the same as the jersey or shorts. Sock holders, shinpad holders, wrist and ankle tapes also have be the same colours. If you ask me, I'll say it is a pretty pointless adjustment to the rules. I am sure most players will have my back on this issue, because they'd rather get on with the game and know when the ball has crossed the line for sure or if a player is off-side than have any fashion sense on the pitch.
The decision making has been fairly average or poor at times at this World Cup, the majority of referees seem very keen to compete with the vuvuzelas that the watching the game feels like watch American Football, only difference is technology and the right to challenge decisions exists in the latter.
It does no one any good for Sepp Blatter to come out and apologise for the errors of the referees when in fact FIFA is where the errors lie. You can't punish a law enforcer if he was doing his job in the right way even though the law is outdated. Similarly the refs are only doing their jobs and the rules don't in fact have anything to say about the ref not seeing it before a goal stands. One match in question was the England v Germany, Round of 16 match, where Frank Lampard strike had hit the crossbar, bounced a good yard over the goal-line, then bounced back and hit the cross-bar before landing in the willing grasp of Manuel Neuer. The German defenders saw it, the goalkeeper knew it, Frank Lampard and his team-mates saw it, the whole stadium saw it, Sepp Blatter, Michel Platini, David Cameron, Angela Merkel and millions of viewers saw it but the goal did not stand because the referee and his assistant did not see it. The sound of that makes the whole situation even more ridiculous.


see for yourself...



If FIFA could invest so much technology in getting the Jabulani up to 21st century standards why can't they, in the same vain, get the rules on goals up to 21st century standards. It's very simple put some cameras on the crossbar, or in the nets or above the nets, or a chip in the ball with GPS satellite. There must be some cost-effective way to eliminate such blunders. I don't think it removes the human-element either as some anti-goal-line technology folks will say, it takes 3 seconds to have a review radio the ref and decision is made. Heartbreaks will be prevented, referee jobs will be more secure because they know they can't be judged on the blunders.
Sepp Blatter's apology is a step for us to hope that very soon there will be changes to the game we love, one day goal-line technology will be the normal football world. Hopefully that day is before summer 2014 in Brazil.