Dapo Thomas
I didn’t go to school for the rest of the week. The relocation was so sudden that there was no time to give any official notice. The school didn’t miss me but my House did. I was very good in 100 and 400 metres races. I was excellent in relay and possibly, one of the best in sack race. By the way, where did this come from because I have never come across it in any serious international athletics competitions? Honestly, the school just wasted my time by assisting me to develop the wrong talent. I wonder why we kept promoting a game that had more of novelty attraction than competitive potential. I almost expended my energy on another one called “egg and spoon race”. But I was glad when they removed my name from the game after breaking about 10 to 12 eggs during just one practice. The yanking off of my name from the game was my House’s way of saying “Ma da wa ni gbese” meaning “don’t get us into debt.” I overheard one of my House masters saying: “Ara Dapo o balẹ rara”. Why should I calm down when I was involved in a race? Is every race, whether egg and spoon or bread and butter, not about the fastest person or who comes first? The truth is that the egg and spoon race is an antithesis of race itself for the fact that it slows you down in the race of life. I prefer the concept of hurdles to that of “egg and spoon”.
