Stories inspired by African folklore, spirituality, legends, myths, and imaginative worlds rooted in culture.
I have never understood why weddings come with so many instructions…Smile…Don’t sweat…Don’t step on your dress…Don’t cry too much…Don’t cry too little…Don’t eat too much…Don’t drink too much…Don’t forget your bouquet…Don’t lose your earrings…Don’t let your makeup artist ruin your face…And, obviously… Don’t forget to greet dead people.Yes.Dead people.That was the instruction that nearly ruined
I have discovered something about finding human remains…Television lies. In movies, detectives arrive dramatically, everybody wears sunglasses, someone removes a sheet, music plays but reality is considerably less glamorous. Reality involves yellow tape, confused officers, forensic photographers, people shouting instructions, and one very embarrassed software engineer trying to disappear before anybody asks difficult questions. Unfortunately…Life
If there is one thing adulthood has taught me, it’s that responsibilities don’t pause simply because your life has become impossible. My rent wasn’t going to pause because dead people had started following me. My electricity bill wasn’t going to become spiritually sponsored. My boss definitely wasn’t going to accept, “Sorry sir, I couldn’t finish
I didn’t sleep. To be fair, if an old woman materialized beside your bed at midnight, eating groundnuts and casually informing you that a dead man wanted to speak to you, you probably wouldn’t sleep either. I spent most of the night staring at my ceiling and trying to decide which was more likely. I
There is a particular kind of lie adults tell themselves, the small and comfortable lies. The ones that help you get out of bed every morning. Mine went something like this:You died.You came back.It was weird.Now everything is fine. For three months, I repeated that lie so often that I almost believed it.Almost. Three months
My name is Kelechi Nwafor.I’m twenty-six years old.I live in a one-bedroom apartment in Ikeja that is somehow too small and too expensive at the same time. I work as a software engineer on the Island, which means I spend a significant portion of my life sitting in Lagos traffic questioning my life choices. My
People think journalism is glamorous.It isn’t. Nobody tells you that most investigative reporting involves sitting in uncomfortable places for unreasonable amounts of time while questioning your life choices. For instance: At the moment I am writing this, it is 2:17 a.m. Mosquitoes have declared war on my existence. My back hurts. My phone battery is
Most people don’t expect to die on a Tuesday.Especially not before lunch.I certainly didn’t. The day started the way most of my weekdays start: with disappointment.Specifically, disappointment in myself. My alarm rang at 6:00 a.m.I ignored it.It rang again at 6:15.I ignored it with even greater confidence.By 6:30, my alarm and I were no longer
People say honesty is the best policy.Personally, I think honesty is expensive. Honesty gets you into trouble.Honesty starts difficult conversations.Honesty forces you to explain things. Lies, on the other hand, are efficient.Elegant.Convenient.Like shortcuts. At least that’s what I believed until last Thursday.Now I’m not so sure. The funny thing is that I’ve never considered myself
I used to have festivals.Let us begin there. Because if I begin with my current circumstances, I may become emotional. And gods should not become emotional. It ruins the image. Three hundred years ago, people crossed rivers for me.Entire villages prepared for my arrival weeks in advance.Drums echoed through forests.Goats disappeared mysteriously.Priests suddenly became very