Just Adachi

The moon has turned its back on me, no longer a witness to the keening utterances I make. Last week, it kept vigil as I tossed and turned in bed. Yesterday, it watched me wander through sleep in search of you. But tonight it turns away, refusing the burden of my grief, no longer a witness to a soul reaching for another already in flight.

I can't stay. I wish there was an easy way to tell you. I can't stay. When I decided to leave, I cannot say  but on the day I cross the threshold I will leave behind a gore that will break you, a gore only you can feel. You will double in pain; you will shatter as you stare at the red streaks. Your heart will clench like a fist as you look back on our time together, what we ate what we drank. You will cry for me. But by that time I will be at the border, trying to cross over into the city of the has-been. Your pleas unreachable to my ears, your prayers muffled in padded cotton holding my shed skin. I couldn't stay. I wish I had a reason for you. We are back to square one. Perhaps we will choose each other again.

She reminds me of ancient trees, firmly rooted despite the punishment they receive. She who once held her world in her backyard learned that anticipation carries a deadline. One day it rains and her backyard sprouts. One day it stops and her backyard wilts. Anticipation has a deadline. And on that day, she did not lay out breakfast for the milk stopped getting delivered. She went instead to her backyard and uprooted the tree with twin stumps straddling the pond. “They drink more water than they deserve,” she said with a heavy sigh. “Shall we have breakfast tomorrow?” I asked. “Yes,” she said, “but not with milk.”

Last night I came across a tweet that asked if it is possible to have a conflict-free relationship. While most of the responses circled around romantic partnerships, I couldn’t help but think wider. Every kind of relationship, be it family, friendship, community, work, lives in the tension between challenge and care. Problems arise, emotions flare, and suddenly the way people respond to each other becomes as important as the issue itself. In those moments, two tendencies often show up: the comforter and the compounder. The comforter is one who listens with empathy, who understands that solutions often begin not in logic but in tenderness and empathy. They sense that what the other person needs first is not a lecture but presence; an embrace in words or even silence that says, “You don’t have to carry this alone.” For the comforter, the framing is always we vs. the problem. That shift alone changes everything: it turns conflict into a chance to deepen trust. Even when the answers are un...

The erosion of values in Nigeria is a widely observed and discussed phenomenon, yet its root causes are often oversimplified. Basic courtesies, communal belonging, and a shared social contract appear to be dissolving, replaced by a cutthroat ethos. This systemic decay is not merely an external force but a self-perpetuating cycle deeply tied to the choices of the nation’s elite and peculiar form of disengagement. In my humble opinion, I postulate that the deterioration of Nigerian values is driven by a paradox: the privileged’s escape creates a vacuum that is then filled by a new, unprincipled class, further accelerating the societal decline and prompting more departure. The initial stage of this cycle is the privileged class's retreat from the very society they inhabit. Overwhelmed by the country's failings, this group, comprised of the elite and top-tier middle class, begins to actively curate a Euro-Americancentric existence for their children. Through carefully selected scho...

To the best of our poor efforts, Nigeria remains a society that frequently prioritises ethnic loyalty over merit. This is most evident in our politics at every level, and at the national level, ndi Igbo in Nigeria face a unique and paradoxical challenge, which I call the burden of excellence. While other major ethnic groups readily support their own candidates, even those with questionable character or credentials, ndi Igbo often hold their potential leaders to impossibly high standards, standards that the majority of individuals among them could not meet themselves. Ironically, this insistence on righteousness, competence, and near-flawlessness has become a major handicap for ndi Igbo in the Nigerian political sphere. Unlike their counterparts who rally behind mediocre or even evidently corrupt candidates simply because they are "one of their own", ndi Igbo scrutinize their own with relentless precision that most of the time borders on spite and sadism. This results in them ...

Over the weekend, I had a thought-provoking discussion with friends about parenting in Nigeria. The conversation made me reflect on how much has changed and how much we might be getting wrong.   Growing up, the phrase "it takes a village to raise a child" wasn’t just a saying; it was a lived reality. Neighbours corrected you, aunties and uncles scolded you, and even strangers felt entitled to guide you (much to our annoyance back then). There was an unspoken agreement that raising children was a collective responsibility.   Today, parenting feels more like a solo mission. Everyone is hyper-vigilant about their own child. We keep them indoors, shield them from “bad influences,” and micromanage their social lives. The irony? In trying to protect them, we might actually be stunting them. A recurring theme in our discussion was the fear of other badly raised children corrupting our own. Parents pull their kids from group activities, avoid certain schools, and restrict fr...