It’s nothing short of a pleasure having to talk about this subject which I hold dear to my heart. When I see the words — childhood and books — together in a sentence, my mind is transported back to those days when my siblings and I would surround my father at the dining table, drinking in every word he read out of the book in his hands or spread out before him on the table. Those were the days!
Well, I was fortunate to have parents who understood the importance of and need for stories, and to have a father who devoted so much time reading aloud to his kids animatedly. It turned me to a reader, and I’ve been a reader ever since.
Reading was more than a pastime to me. It was my happy place. The place I could go to dream and get ecstatic about living. If I was dull, a storybook would light me up. It was always interesting to read about different characters who lived a different life from mine. And because I did not read just Nigerian books but foreign books as well, I got to learn about other cultures too — a way of life tremendously different from the one I was used to. Now, so many years later, I’m grateful to all those years of early reading for building my power of imagination.
Talking about my favourite childhood books, I would have to go back to the beginning and start with:
source
I had the copy from Ladybird written by Mandy Ross and illustrated by Sam Childs. The book tells the story of Chicken Licken who while going about her business has an acorn drop on her head and just surmises that the world is falling down. She hurries off to tell the king and on the way, meets up with the other birds — Cocky Locky, Henny Penny, Goosey Loosey, Turkey Lurkey, Ducky Lucky, Drakey Lakey — and informs them of her discovery. They all join her on her journey to find the king. On their way, they cross paths with Foxy Loxy who they also tell the news and who then offers to help them find the king, but only leads them to his den where he and his family make a meal out of them.
The story is said to go way back. It’s a European folktale that has an underlying moral of making conclusions without proper investigation.
I was so in love with the story and the book itself with it’s colourfully illustrated pages and the funny names of the animals. I took it everywhere I went that in the compound where we lived, I was nicknamed Chicken Licken.
source
This was written by Chinua Achebe and published in the 1960s. It tells the story of a young Igbo boy, Chike, who leaves his village to stay with his uncle in the city, Onitsha. Schooling in Onitsha, he experiences city life and has adventures with his friends, particularly Samuel, alias S.M.O.G. Despite warnings from his mother never to go near the river, he dreams of travelling across the River Niger to Asaba and the story follows him as he finds ways to get the money needed for the fare.
The story emphasizes determination and bravery as necessary tools in achieving our dreams.
Going with Chike on his adventures was always fun for me whenever I picked it up to reread. With the fact that the story was set so many decades ago and other factors included, Chike lived a life totally different from mine, and I followed him on his many adventures. I turned when the headmaster called “Abraham!”, I ate suya with him under the shade of the mango tree and even hid with him at the back of the lorry in Asaba.
source
I read the book when I was seven or eight, and it was the first in the series that I read. By the time I’d finished it, I was hungry for another. Who wouldn’t be after reading about the awesome Five Find-Outers and Dog who always solved cases before their local policeman, Mr Goon, to the amazement of the Inspector. They were literally the bane of Mr Goon’s life, and everything they did riled him up.
In the book, Mr Goon’s nephew comes to spend the holiday with him and gets friendly with the Five Find-Outers after an embarrassing mistake. He’s in awe of them especially the multi-talented Fatty after he hears of their mystery-solving and exciting adventures and he begs to join in solving any mystery which might come up. In the course of making up a mystery for Ern and leading Mr Goon astray, the Five Find-Outers stumble on a real one and things get serious and even dangerous when Ern is kidnapped, mistaken for Fatty.
It was always an entertaining read despite how many times I’d read it. There were a lot of funny episodes. I can remember Fatty jumping on Mr Goon at Christmas Hill making him think it was a cow, and Fatty in his well-put-together disguise of an old woman at Mr Goon’s doorstep. All these made the story worth remembering and deserving of multiple reads.
My life wasn’t as exciting and adventurous as that of the Five Find-Outers, but reading about them gave me a feel of what their world was like.
It’s been fun going down memory lane and recalling those lovely years. Thank you @BDCommunity for this contest. I invite @geminimissy to join in. If you’re interested in the contest, cick here to learn more about it.