THE FOOD THAT GOT US GOING

 

I can't really say with exactness why we loved it the more. 

In those years in boarding school, we had a strict dining menu. So strict, we knew exactly what would be served as breakfast, lunch and super all the days of the week. In fact it was so strictly followed that we had the right to go on a hunger strike without punishment, if the supposed and desired meal was skipped.

As teens, we were good with nick-naming everything and so our foods weren't exempted. Garri was and still is ASOKI. Yam porridge always deficient of vegetables was called 'ESAU'. Then there is this particular soup we really can't fathom the name so we named with 'SOUP WITHOUT NAME'. Rice and bean cooked together was known as 'COMBIDO'. 

But one stood out; loved, cherished, honored and always anticipated by all- PAP n BEANS. 

For the ease of pronunciation we nicknamed it ' PAMBI'. So great and glued was the love that I still remember at least three times for its serving: Monday morning, Saturday morning and Sunday morning. We would ask each other for confirmation "Arinze, hope today is the day for PAMBI?" ibegbunam would respond from his bunk as if the question was thrown to him: " of course, I even passed the pantry this morning for confirmation." Nobody wanted to miss the special delicacy. Whatever might bring a delay or a total miss of this meal was avoided as we braced up for the yummy meal.

Then we would sit in tables of tens, a big pot for the beans and the smaller one for the pap. Then in front of the table stood a sharer for the week on whose hands lay the quantity of PAMBI to be served in your plate. Woe betide you if you have unsettled issues with him.

First, he would ditch the beans and allow you to perfectly shift it to one extreme thus creating a semicircle with enough radius for the pap. Having added the pap, each and everyone of us would eat gloriously with fork and knife in observation of the refectory culture.

So happy that we have eaten that which had kept us alert and awake, we would go in for morning assembly and then morning classes. Before the mathematics teacher would be done with his Pythagoras theorem, the whole class atmosphere would be filled with 'poisonous' farts emanating from the gluteus maximus of sleeping students. 

PAMBI was the best regardless of the fart. In fact the fart made it more memorable. 

#PAMBISIMPLYTHEBEST#

photo credit: buzzfeed.com