With Love, Anaya III

17th May, 2021

Saturday

9 pm

Dear Diary, 

 I am back with another irregular entry. On the plus side, let’s be grateful for the small win. Last time, I waited over a year before making an entry, but this time it’s only three months. So, what has been going on with me? I’m currently enrolled in the National Youth Service Scheme (NYSC), which is a fancy term for a graduate exchange program, and as a result, I’ve had to move across states.

About two months into my internship, I registered for the National Youth Service Programme (NYSC) and was assigned to Lagos State. Naturally, I had to postpone my internship, but I left hoping to work with Scale during the service year. I read somewhere that if I submitted a letter from my current office to the NYSC camp requesting to be posted there, I would be assigned there for the rest of the service year, so I got a letter of request from the office and took it with me to the NYSC camp. Now, my intention to continue working with Scale, my family and friends were NOT happy about it, but did not argue with me because I’m an adult. My family and friends only tolerated the job on my behalf because it was remote, but now I actually wanted to go there? 

Kam was so unhappy with the arrangement she offered to put in a word for me at her company so I had better options. I refused out of loyalty to my employer, and my friends started to consider that my loyalties were not in the right place. Sure, they understood that I had only worked for about two months, and was leaving before my six months contract ended, so I felt like I was leaving things unfinished, but they didn’t understand why I wouldn’t look for a different job with better prospects. Kam was worried and kept trying to convince me to change my mind. It was either, “Babes, why are you still there? How much money does the business have? You could make so much more” or “Please talk to me; is there a reason you don’t want me to help you?” Blessing never spoke to me directly, but she was always ready to support Kam. She gave up, convinced I would see my folly when it all fell through. Eventually, they got the point and left me alone. 

 The National Youth Service Scheme (NYSC) camp, where all corpers met two weeks before being assigned to the organisations where we would work for the rest of the year, was an experience I was not prepared for. The camp operates like a boot camp, with early wake-up times, coordinated uniforms, drills, planned programs, exercises, entrepreneurship classes, and shared accommodation, similar to a hostel. The experience at the camp was quite demanding, and when I called my friends to tell them about my experience at the NYSC camp, they would listen to me, nodding occasionally and only speaking to express their support or ask questions. 

Look, I wasn’t going to be fighting for my life, and my girls would be chilling, okay? One way or another, I was going to have my fun, so I would exaggerate details to Kam and Blessing to get a rise out of them. Blessing wouldn’t fall for it, and ignore me, but Kam? I got her hook, line, and sinker. I remember the day that I told her that the camp had a single bathroom for all the female corps members, and she started to hyperventilate. I had to tell her I was joking before it got too serious, abeg. 

On the last day of camp, March 18, 2021, I logged into the portal and saw that I had been assigned to the Scale office in Ikeja, and as far as I was concerned, I was ready to take over Lagos!

WITH LOVE, 

Anaya