Uncle Stephen Profile picture
Aug 5, 2018 31 tweets 11 min read Read on X
Lagos is a crazy place to live. It teaches you things whether you want to learn or not. You don’t even realize, till you see your reaction in certain situations

A town rife with different kinds of people and packaging, a town we “hate” but can’t leave

Brethren
Issa thread
Brethren with how long I’ve spent living in this town, till date, I cannot stop myself from reacting the way I do whenever a stranger stops me on the road like

“psst! Bros! Excuse me. Im looking for so and so street....”

Eh? You say
First of all, I adjust, take in the strangers face, examine it mentally in my ritualist-o-meter to see in what range they fall. if they score low and my milk of kindness is flowing that day I point them in the right direction, one hand stylishly on my you know you know you know
In this town you can trust no one. Don’t care if he is carrying one of them Christian brother bag. It could be filled with people’s things. Lagos is a town replete with stories of people’s utensils disappearing and I don’t know if it’s true or not but I don’t wanna find out
Because if my utensil disappears, how do I cook for my partner. Tell me, How will you, an Indomie man, who cooks for two minutes and the food has cum, cook.

How will I, an iron beans man, three hours and e never even soft; how will I cook for my partner eh?
So Lagos has taught me to take precautions Abeg.

Can’t come and hear stories that touch.

My good friend Progress I trust him. This is the kind of story he’ll like. Useless boy will come and say “Stevhoe! StevOnokillpeopleDaughters!Tell me again how you say e take loss
Lagos brings out the other side of you. You’ll be thinking you’re normal, you’re classy. You’re posh, till rubber meets the road and your inner Ojuelegba surfaces.

I remember this one babe I used to roll with. Packaged babe. Fresh babe. Always speaking supri supri English
Always ending her sentences with yeah. Like you know yeah. That thing yeah. That I’ll do to you yeah. I’ve even head her say this year yeah?

Ehen as I was saying yeah(their daddies me sef sabi talk yeah) she was raised somewhere in the mainland, but she had me sold.
I mean, if our artists can learn full blown patois that can make Jamaicans jealous from agege then maybe she had purged herself of all her pako tendencies I said to myself yeah?

As motivational speakers say, I guess anyone can fire to perspire and retire to the choir

Amem?
So we were walking down my street and noticed a commotion. People were running helter, skelter, most in our direction followed by gunshots renting the air.

A robbery had taken place not too far away and the robbers were trying to scare people away as they were escaping
Instinctively I stretched my hands to my side, hoping to grab Aunty and take her to safety, and on getting there, I’d go on my knees as I sang “I can be your hero baby”

But as I tried to grab her, I grabbed air. Breeze.

Brethren, the babe was gone!
I panicked slightly, only to turn and see that in less than three seconds, Aunty had removed her heels, gathered it in her hands, and was running something very similar to a heavenly race or what my people call Osondu!

This babe had no lots wife spirit bruh she didn’t look back
See babe who was always cat walking. Always Dey waka small small like please don’t stain my shirt. Someone who to cross gutter sef she’ll want to hold my hand. Now she was a new creature.

As I saw her running, her spirit animal became clearer to me; Charley this be a hyenana
These babes aren’t loyal o. In a situation needing everyone to answer their respective surnames, the babe no even remember say our two surname start with the same letter.

Na wa o
Did I mention that the babe was fast. Brethren, try as I could to catch up with her, babe was “gapping” my spirit soul and body and feeding me dust.

No doubt in my mind she must have been the star runner for red house while In secondary school

Blood of Abule-egba!
By the time I reached her at home, babe had showered,eaten, changed into her nightie and was watching E!

Na wa o babe so you can run like this?

She started again with well you know yeah?

I’m like na yeah go kill you. Yeye
Or do we talk about driving in Lagos. That one certainly brings out your inner madness.

You might just be coming out of church where you just promised the lord that you’ll never utter another curse word only to hit the road and someone will drive absolute nonsense near you.
And before you know it, you can feel the word coming out of your mouth.

An F or an S word, which you know when it eventually comes out, will not be FUFU or SOUP
There is something about being called stupid or fool while you’re driving that hurts more than a 10 year relationship hearbreak.

I remember the day a man, demure looking, formally dressed, in his very nice Lexus rx350 SUV wound down at a traffic light and called me a fool.
Admittedly, I had driven nonsense. It wasn’t just the angst in his voice that hurt, it was the time it took him to produce the words that knifed my spirit.

Trust me when a stammerer calls you fool in traffic it hurts.
“Mis mis mis miista man, why are you driving like, like, like, like a, fu fu fu fu fooool”

I swear all the while he was dragging his words, I wished for a second it was fufu. Why are you driving like a fufu would have been better than being a fool in the way he said it.
Honestly, I felt like if I looked in a mirror, there would be the words fu fu fool tattoed in red across my forehead or even worse, instead of seeing my head, there’ll be a big mound of fufu where my head shoulda been. Even worse Cos I didn’t have soup at home
Lagos makes you feel life cannot be lived any other way if not fast. I remember during NYSC, how much awe I was in when a cab flagged down by a lady, overshot and was in London, only to reverse till it got to her in Nigeria.

What a wawu.
People were even entering small small and I laughed, remembering the day one old man was giving me elbow at costain under bridge as we were dragging for the last molue it seemed, at 10pm.
I don hang, baba don hang, baba dey gimme better elbow and closeline like ‘my son respect my old age na. allow me enter’

Lagos is a town of hustlers. You know this when you can see somebody comfortably selling alligator, not the pepper oh, the real animal itself, in traffic.
And you cannot help but wonder e don reach like this?

Yes we may say the guy selling it is mad but think about the guy driving his car, who winds down gently as if it’s nothing and says

‘psst wey! You. gimme two alligators there’.
It is this same hustling spirit that will make someone with the blackest lips I have seen in my life stop me at Ikeja underbridge like ‘psst yellow! Pink lips?’

I’m like don’t you have the fear of god or whoever you serve? If you say I be yellow why u come wan gimme pink lips.
How does it usually do you brother? This your thought for me is it a thought of good to bring me to an expected end?

Kuku buy me green shirt, blue trouser and complete me ROYGBIV.
But in all the madness of lagos, one thing I deeply appreciate is the never say never die attitude. People are genuinely trying their best to make it amidst all the madness, the flooding, the overseas president and so many other things, which should normally drive someone crazy
Wait maybe we are crazy sef.
Who knows?

To Lagos, the town we all hate but leave na. Wosai!

Have a beautiful week ahead.

With Love,
Uncle Stephen…..
#TalesbyTweetLight

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More from @ItsUncleStephen

Jul 1, 2020
FUTO babes?!!!!

Brethren shall we?!!
I remember when we go ọta miri Bridge go rescue my cos of IMB babe..

Baba dey shout," take me take me!"

Take who werey? My friend Chop your L and drink eismann beer
Abi na for year 1 with my real man. Escorted him to town.. Baba spent his last card to buy a dress for his babe for freshers night. Dress, shoe, watch.

We reach freshers night, baba see him babe untop SUG FINSEC lap.

That's the night he picked up smoking.
Read 23 tweets
Jul 20, 2019
I have tried and still, I don't get Horror movies. Everytime I watch one, several questions, especially about the behaviour of the actors, confuses my mind, and I'm like guy! seriously, why?!

Let's consider some Why's in this horror #GuidesByStevhoe

Brethren,
Issa thread
Q1. WHY WILL I GO FOR A PARTY INSIDE HOUSE THAT'S INSIDE BUSH?

As a naija guy, I've weighed this scenario in my head several times. I don't know the thing, the reason, that'll be good enough to convince me, to go for a party overnight, in a house deep deep inside bush.

Why?
Azzin if we go to a normal club the party won't be sweet? Won't babes still grind me like fresh tomato as if to transform my nether regions into Purèe?

I've seen it happen many times in horror movies, this inside bush party thing, that I've imagined if my friend suggests such.
Read 25 tweets
Jun 23, 2019
In light of the anti substance abuse project #MTNASAP for I’m part of, I’ll share a personal story.

Addiction is really easy to get into if one isn’t careful.

A THREAD
Few things bring me joy like writing. Especially once I’d found my niche in humor writing.

The joy of knowing someone is having a good day because of stories I tell gives a warm,fuzzy feeling.

But for a long time I struggled. Felt like an impostor

Why?
I’d tried to write other genre and come short. As much as I had found my strong point in humor, it felt awkward reading moving pieces from my peers especially then on Facebook, and unable to produce same.

Worse was when I was referred to as the guy who writes funny stuff
Read 26 tweets
Jun 15, 2019
AN MCM’s GUIDE ON HOW NOT TO HANDLE BREASTS

Brethren,
Issa thread

#GuidesByStevhoe
Dear MCM, I have received messages upon messages, letters upon letters from your respective WCWs, and immediately after Dear sir, the subject of their letter, written in Red block letters is the same across board.

it reads

PLEASE SAVE OUR BREASTS.
The horrors I read in therein, is what has prompted this #GuidesByStevhoe

A particular babe even said she and her friends now call her MCM, Emma Eba.

Why?

She said the way he kneads her breast, it feels like he has egusi soup close by and will cut and dip some breasts in it
Read 27 tweets
Apr 26, 2019
“...Yes we love smoking weed” Progress responded before I could say a word.

I looked at him, and he at me, as if to say “baba calm down”

To cement his words, he took it, puffed and passed to me.

I took a drag and I knew, damn! Wahala have get me

Brethren,
Issa thread..
I was in Ajegunle.

I had gone to my Aunt’s place during the school holidays. Dà Chioma, my Aunt, would do you well when returning to school if you helped out at her bar.

Sometimes I was unofficial DJ, sometimes I served drinks.

I generally helped out, however I could.
Her Bar at Second Mosholashi attracted all sorts.

From the Rasta who could speak patois better than Jamaicans even though he had never left AJ. To the Old soldier never die, who fought for the queen in Burma.

Her bar brewed with stories and my ears drank to its fill
Read 49 tweets
Mar 23, 2019
Going to Lagos island market is not for the faint hearted. I must have entered almost 4000 shops today looking for a shade of burgundy material with my friend and his fiancée. Health app is saying I’ve walked just 6000 steps. Coulda sworn it’s up to 1 million.

I’m tired man.
Funny all the burgundy looked the same to me and my friend but no o, for his madam, it’s either too deep, too light, or too busy( I’m like busy doing what again chineke nnam)

And boom we’re off to another shop.

And I’m like
Then when we find the right color, price becomes the wahala.

Shop 1: it’s N5000
Shop 2: it’s N5000
Shop 4532.12 : madam it’s N5000

Friends fiancée: Let’s check the next shop

I and my friend:
Read 5 tweets

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