Garin Mazugal

CHAPTER 4.

CHAPTER 3.
Konar Dan Ja,a place that has gained notoriety for housing kids of Mazugal's well to do was dimly lit by 24 "red ends". Papers were rolled and God knows what was in it,and passed round.The girls however,weren't given this. They were sipping bottles of cough syrups,nodding their heads to  beats made by crickets. This was their rendezvous point every night. Here,they smoke, drink,fornicate freely. Even Mazugal police men who are sometimes short on drugs, frequent this joint for their daily dose. And if any overzealous good policeman tries to arrest any one of the boys, he'll have his mum to contend with. The girls need not worry. They'll scream and call for help. A new born baby knows what this means in Mazugal.

   They have a practice of reeling out the atrocities they've committed for that week, a competition of sort. Hafsah,the ringleader of ringleaders, short and stoic,was a girl of 32years.Her flesh was reduced to the softness of a tissue paper and weight of a feather by regular intake of drugs. She was a mobile pharmacy as she have and know different drugs and their uses for the purpose of seeing the best in intoxication. She was called " Mama" and rightly so. She was older than all of them with a healthy age difference of more than 7 years. Maybe that was why she was respected. Or maybe because she always had drugs in excess. She traditionally opened each session by giving a professional demonstration of her indiscipline. Today was no different.

  "Club 90! " She said staggering to her feet. They've never had a 60 man membership. The name is as intriguing as it gets.

"Saaaaaai Maaama!!"

"Club 90!"

"Sai Maaaama!"

"Oya Ku saurare ni(Listen to me).

  "So today I went out I was on my way to the market, kun sanni ai,blowing my thing,then this Mallam Ishaq came wanting to preach.I stood,listening, waiting on him to finish without saying anything. He thought I was really interested in the nonsense he was saying...Dan iska continued his noisemaking. When he was done,I brought out my lighter...a agaban shi na kunna aba ta(Lighted it in his presence)!!"

" Sai mama" "Anyi an barki ".They all clapped at her testimony obviously impressed with her exacerbatingly intransigent indiscipline.

"Toh,who else has something to say? Saboda ni I have no time.I have about 25 wraps to go.."

"Sai mamaaaaa!!" .Someone shouted.25 wraps! She wasn't called Mama for nothing. She thoroughly deserved that .The next speaker at this very clandestine and nocturnal meeting was a very skinny girl called Munifa. She was light skinned, obviously a very beautiful girl,with lips darkened by the heat of excessive smoking..Her voice was an example of femininity drowning in delusional waters of synthetic masculinity.A girl who once held so much promise due to her ingenuity was reduced to a sordid drug addict whose future is dependent on the availability of drugs. She stood,staggering, waving her hands up,beckoning on the moon to come play with her. She tapped someone sitting close to her,motioning with her hands, the direction of the heavens.
"Wutan NEPA aka kawo(NEPA light)"
The neighbour replied aggressively.
"Karya ne. Solar aka kawo ( Lies. It's solar!)"

She wore a brightly colored plaited blouse,a fitting sweat jacket and a matching pair of shoes. Her face radiated through the shrill darkness of the night making her easily recognisable. She wasn't a girl of too much words but drugs has his own way of making chalkboard have similarities with a big bowl of Akamu.

"Kuulub 90! " She said faintly..She wiggled her body,with intermittent crispy laughs,swivelling from side to side. She couldn't as little as maintain a standing position.

"Club 90 ! "  This time however, a similitude of coherence was noticed.

"Bari in gaya muku tawa (Listen to my own)..Today, we were in a lecture hall. Our H O D came in looking very angry. Toh ni ina ruwa na(How does that concern me?)?? I continued doing what I was doing. Kuma that time,a chaake na ke in gaya muku...dip! Complete! (I was high)" She allowed her hands transcend into the air as if to show the height of intoxication she attained.

She continued "My leg was now looking like tyre of motan baban mu(Dad's car). So he told me stand up. When I did,kawai he just started shouting. Kuma ni I hate shouting. Like I was his daughter. I kept quite. When I realised that he wasn't going to stop, I replied him.

" Kai H O D!  Listen! Babu wanda ya isa! You can't talk to me that way! You're paid 1.5m Mazugal dollar per year.I just bought 3 handbags  worth 1.5m each. I can happily pay your salary for 10years! So shut up and don't disturb me !"

They clapped. She is one bad girl.

"You need to see how he looked at me."

"Dan iska baa"  Hafsah said.

"He couldn't talk.He just went out of the class to his office,crying.I didn't beat him fa.An old person crying like that,Allah kiyaye!"

"Gaskiya kin yi iskanci..wai tsoho kika sa kuka kaman yaro (You're something else! Did you really make an old person cry?)" Hafsah asked rhetorically. Laughter filled the air. Mamaa has a gift of adding spices to an already sweet meal.