Thread by @TundeTASH

The day Ṣàngó found himself in Walt Disney Studios.

A sad ending.

<As narrated by Ṣàngó himself>

Thread.

RT ❤️

To be one of the most feared King to ever live in the Old Oyo empire is no joke.

It is also not a myth.

I once lived amongst men and women alike. I ruled my people with dignity and protected them unapologetically.

Ravaging at anyone and anything that caused me or my people displeasure.

My anger produced not only fire, but also led to thunder.

Burning or causing pain to whatever stood in my path.

An ounce of anger and my mouth goes wilding like a Dothraki dragon.

Wild, intimidating and fierce.

Although, I produced thunder depending on how furious I was. Or how angered I might have been by whoever or whatsoever.

Family or foe, man or woman. I did not care.

I was fearless across the land.

Emi Sango Olukoso! And I enjoyed all the time I was at Oyo.

Don’t get me wrong. I was also one of the most loving and best Aalafin the Oyo kingdom ever had; and one of the most powerful ruler Yoruba land itself ever produced.

I was loving to my family too. Even though, it is hard for most men to love their wives equally, I loved Oba, Oshun and Oya alike.

Giving them my all and ensuring they do not lack a thing. Ensuring they do not think men are scum.

No wife of mine ever lacked a single thing.

However, I couldn’t control the jealousy that brewed in my youngest wife’s mind. In Oshun’s mind.

To think she would be jealous of Oba who was my first and legitimate wife. If I had been asked who Oshun would have be jealous of, I’d have said Oya.

You see, this is because Oya made the Suku hairstyle that I wore. An hairstyle that is now proudly worn home and abroad by men and women alike. Oshun wasn’t jealous of this feat attained with the hairstyle. Instead, she was envious of Oba’s position as 1st wife.

Hence, she plotted an evil deed.

If I knew this ahead of time, I would have banished her.

Apparently, Oshun had met Oba while I was out in one of our hills. She had convinced Oba to cut her ear and put it in my food. Telling Oba I’d love her more if she did so.

Without thinking of the pain or consequences, Oba did cut her ear and put it in my food.

On getting to the palace that day, I was served by Oba as it was her turn to feed me that week. However, on opening the bowl of soup, there it was sitting in my gbegiri and ewedu soup.

“Ear in my soup?" I ravaged!!!

Angry to my marrow.

I am not a man to think before acting. All that came to mind was that Oba was trying to poison me. So, I drove her away from the palace. A decision I live to regret. A decision that somewhat led to my fall.

Oba’s absence led to a hollow space in my heart.

A vacuum even Oya and Oshun couldn’t fill. Because I had sent her out, she fell on her way in the forest and turned into a river. I did everything I could to bring Oba back to life, but my powers weren’t enough.

The local herbalists we had in town couldn’t bring her to life as well.

I was devastated.

Fast-forward to 5 years later, a strange herbalist visited a nearby town with his fellow kinsmen.

An herbalist everyone talked about. He brought mirrors; guns and foreign objects which people had no idea what the names were. Objects they would later trade gold and humans for.

One of my counsel advised that I seek the help of this herbalist. He was a strange looking man with narrow nose and pale skin, and he went by the name Nikola Tesla.

After much persuasion, I reluctantly visited him and he told me he could help.

He had a strange looking room he called ‘Time Machine’.

Something he had brought with him from his land. A machine he was going to test using our people.

‘If it worked’, he had mentioned, ‘would be one hell of a discovery.’

Maybe it was fate. Maybe it was coincidence. Maybe.

But it was going to help me go back in time to stop Oba from cutting her ear and putting it in my soup. That was all that mattered.

I couldn’t let Tesla use any of my people as guinea pigs. So I decided that he used me.

With the kind of power I had, I believed anywhere I landed; I could control my way back to the Oyo kingdom.

Only if I had known really. That afternoon, when I decided to use the time machine I ensured I had my axe with me. Just in case.

He instructed me to go inside while he controlled the machine.

He was indeed a strange herbalist and he conjured power I had never come across in my life.

However, I don’t know if he had configured it wrongly but he did not take me back in time.

He jolted me into the future.

I found myself in the house of a man named Dean Armitage somewhere in America. Dean would later be my guardian and teacher.

The placed looked new, fresh and had an ambience different from where I had come from. Somewhere that looked more advanced than my empire in Oyo.

There I was, trying my best to conjure myself back to Oyo, but it wouldn’t work. My axe won’t work. I tried to bring fire from my mouth, but I only made cloud of air because of the freezing weather.

I shivered. Fear ran through my veins.

What had happened to me? I did not feel like Sango anymore.

I tried one more time by saying my 'oriki'.

To see if my ancestors Obatala and Aganju would listen.

From the bowels of my soul, I screamed:

Sango Olukoso
Akata yeri yeri
Arabambi Oko Oya
Alaafin, ekun bu, a sa
Eleyinju ogunna
Olukoso lalu
Ina l’oju Ina l’enu
A ri igba ota, sete
O fi alapa segun ota re!

But nothing happened.

Dean had approached me. Asking if I was okay. If I was coming from an halloween party. If I was cold due to the weather because I no jacket on.

He asked if I was from around the area but I couldn’t understand what he said.

After I tried and couldn’t go back to the past, I found myself gradually settling into the new but strange place.

The new way of life of being ordinary. Of being just a mortal.
The one who used to be the most fearful ruler of Oyo Empire had fallen.

How the mighty had fallen.

That wasn’t the worst part.

Recall that I landed at Dean Armitage’s house? Yes, he is the same Dean in Jordan Peele’s ‘Get Out’.

The one who sells black men to his fellow kinsmen.

Little did I know that he was preparing me for a potential buyer.

My power was not just lost. My kingdom was not only a thing of imagination. I was now going to lose my identity as a person.

I lived with Dean for 4 years and in that period he taught me to speak in his tongue. While I was in his care, I had told Dean of my escapades; of days when I ruled, how I ruled, and all the powers that I had.

This was going to be his selling point to my buyer.

Only that there was a twist. They only needed my abilities. So they were going to transfer my soul into a new body. I was helpless. My ancestors had forsaken me.

I wept.

They had carried out an operation on me. An occurrence I could hardly remember. An event I try not to replay in my mind even if I could.

Fast forward to today. Here I am in Walt Disney studios with my buyer, wearing what seems to look like my garb.

A red cape flowing on my back. An enhanced version of my axe in my hand.

Although, in a strange body that looks far from what I used to be, my new persona seems to be a representation of my former life.

People adore the new me. They love me and want to see more of me.

Sadly, I have come to understand that Tesla’s kinsmen made my people forget about me back home. My people have abandoned me and those who worship me are called evil and stigmatized.

They have forgotten their heritage, culture and tradition to follow Tesla’s kinsmen. Forgetting the sons and daughters of who they are.

The same people go to the cinemas to watch movies of the new me.

But they can’t tell that it is me Ṣàngó Olukoso. It is me that is now trapped for years in the body of another whom they now adore and love so much.

The man they all refer to, as Thor.