Junkyard Blues

Chapter Thirty-one

125 C Chapter Thirty-one t didn’t take longer that he had thought it would take. In less than a month, one surprisingly bright April morning, the world all covered now in green, he found himself at the post office collecting his admission letter. It was inside an important looking envelop along with the school’s brochure. His heart was pounding heavily in his chest as he held the envelop in his hands. This was his gateway, the gateway into another life, a life that he had always wanted. But how was it going to happen? He asked himself, how was Eric going to do the magic? Was he going to simply hand him money to start following the procedures? And how many procedures were they? He did not even have a passport yet, and he needed to go to the embassy which meant money, and even the transportation, the flight and the tuition…he could not see how it was going to be possible. Get an admission and we’ll see what we can do, we can work something out. He had the admission letter in his hand and a colored brochure that told him everything he wanted to know about the school but he did not see how they were going to work something out. It was impossible! Nothing’s is impossible if you want it bad enough. He wanted to believe that, but he could not. “Let me see,” Niba said when he walked into the shop that evening. “Take care,” Jude said handing him the envelop and its contents. “I’m not going to bite it, man,” Niba laughed. He looked at the contents of the envelop for a while and shook his head, “I still can’t believe it.” “You can’t believe what, that I’ve admission?” “No, that of all the countries in the world you chose Britain,” Niba said and shook his head in wonder, “You’re completely crazy,” he said and handed back the envelop to Jude, “Completely crazy.” “Britain has the best schools.” “Who cares about best? I’m talking about a country where you can hustle, man. America’s there and you go and chose Britain, Britain where you can’t even hustle, where you’ll come back empty handed.” I 126 “My only problem’s a postgraduate degree.” “You’ll never change.” All he cared about was going back to school and getting himself a postgraduate degree - any school, even if it meant going back to Buea. That was all, or so he believed, for at the end of the day it was one of those subtle lies that the mind accepted because of conditions. It was a lie he would’ve accepted to live with if he had not held the school brochure in his hand, all colored and filled with pictures of the school and all sort of promises about what programs were available to him, all the opportunities. This was what he wanted, to go to a proper school and come out with a proper degree. It was the dream of every serious aspirant. A postgraduate study was good, but being able to jump that social bridge and find yourself away from sub-Sahara was the biggest thing. A postgraduate degree from Africa and from Cameroon in particular was like a thatched hut, while a postgraduate degree from overseas was like a villa, a shiny villa that everyone was going to look at with a lot of admiration and jealousy. It was one of those things that created a rift in the university communities, the issue of an overseas degree and a sub-Saharan degree. It was a rift that was strong enough to separate them into two camps, one made up of cheap and angry and always voiceless people, facing a camp of rich and completely reassuring people who commanded everything. It was a rift that when given a choice, anyone would easily pick the right camp without needing any prodding. And now, he had the opportunity to make a choice. Jude looked at the brochure in his hand and slowly replaced it into the envelop along with the admission letter. He kept them on his counter where he could keep a keen eye on them. For you just can’t know. “When he calls you next time don’t forget,” Niba said. “Forget what?” “What do you mean forget what? Didn’t I tell you?” “Didn’t you tell me what?” “About...