AJEGUNLE (LAGOS)
NIGERIA
16th - 21st May 2011
SUMMARY.
The BornTroWay Creative Workshop kick started on 16 May 2011 at Tolu Complex in Ajegunle (AJ City) with 35 participants, all from AJ City and aged between 14 and 23. The participants were shortlisted through a process of public auditions, which held at Ayota Arts Centre on 26 March and at Comfort Hotel (both locations in Ajegunle) on 27 March 2011. As the ice was broken in the inaugural day, the participants shared enthusiasm and ideas and the days flew very quickly, all starting with a energetic warm-up session coordinated by Segun Adefila (the dance instructor) aimed at inspiring a stronger bond and team spirit. On the 3rd day the instructors’ team was joined by Wura Samba, a professional percussionist and participants collected waste objects from the garden and the nearby lagoon and learned to make music with them. By the 4th day the shell of a performance was ready and rehearsals started for the public performance, which held at 1pm on Friday 20 May 2011 at Tolu Complex. Amidst cameras, both motion and still, all eyes were on BornTroWay Participants and their Instructors. In the audience were students from each of the 21 secondary schools in Ajegunle.
The public performance was a tale told through the telescope of the rejected eyes in search for inner talents and self-discovery; it was made of beautifully choreographed contemporary dance steps and acrobatics, a well-rehearsed dance drama. The strive for excellence and success through thorns and tongs until finally finding a place in a superficial society that accepts people of humble backgrounds (BornTroWays) only when they are made, as opposed to encouraging them from the start was the highlight of the day. In addition, the greenhouse gas emission ravaging lives around the world was not left out in the performance without been treated. A polluted lagoon – whose spirit cries a melancholic song, of sadness for being suffocated by human wastes reacted…. A boat choreographed staged a theatre scene where a fisherman – Papa Kenwe returning from his fish farm. He arrived at home to a nagging wife who had thought some games would sold and the rest would be cooked for feeding after a whole day. Listening to her parents rants about the sea and scarcity of fish, Kenwe, enlightened them that fish suffocated in the sea because of the consistent wastes being dumped in the sea on a daily basis. At a point, Kenwe invited her hilarious and ignorant mother to listen to the wailing of the lagoon, it was then Mama Kenwe pluck the fruit of her daughter’s wisdom. We are the cause of our own sorrows, Papa Kenwe and Mama realized. Large part of the performance’s lines were rendered in Pidgin English because it’s the language commonly spoken by the people of Ajegunle. The public performance was followed by a series of 9 performances by the musicians and dancers in the BornTroWay group. The performance was followed by individual music and dance acts like Music: Cent Lorry by Daniel Ekechi, Iniy Klassyk / Omo Eko by Paul James, Champaign by Ottah Charles, J-boy by Papa Essien, Skool Prince by Williams Obuhoro; Henry/Nnambi/Philip rapping on the instrumental by Da Grin’s Pom Pom; and 2Tek Odey who performed his own (unreleased) songs. Dance: Cool Sheppers (Wisdom. Ifeanyi, Emmanuel, Joseph, Liberty, David, Victor) performed to the sond Timaya (who born the maga); King Brown in a solo dance on a song by P-Square (break it).
The workshop ended with a picnic on the beach at Tarkwa Bay on Saturday 21st May 2011
PHOTOS.
QUESTION
OF THE DAY.
DAY 1
How does water affect your life?
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Aliu Jemilatu (17)
We depend on water for life; without water we can’t live, our body needs it.
Akaedu Nnamdi (19)
Beautification (e.g., water fountains).Helps in manufacturing products.
Ochu Peter (15)
Water makes my environment cool, which is conducive for me to be a good poet. Finally, water helps the green plants I eat on a daily basis grow and keep my fishes and livestock alive.
David George (19)
It is a source of life …. Water helps us to live.
DAY 2
Can waste be beautiful or useful?
Godspower Emmanuel
What one calls waste, somebody else may find interesting or useful. You can make a toy car out of Eva water bottles.Papa Essien Water bottles could be taken to where they are manufactured and be recycled into new ones.
Victor Ayodele (17)
Everything in life has a cycle span, any waste could become useful, e.g., bottles that are thrown away can be used by others as juice containers.
Obuhoro Williams (20)
Your excrete materials are waste to you but useful to farmers. Industrial waste can be useful to scientists.
DAY 3
What’s “BornTroWay” to you?
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Nejo Sarah (15)
It is anything a owner finds useless/not needed in his environment or anything people see or call waste - a person or society that is not financially well.
Elechi Blessing (16)
It is something that has been wasted and thrown away without knowing that it could be transformed and renovated into something beautiful and useful.
Onyesoh Wisdom
Borntroway is somebody abandoned, helpless and neglected for years and in that process he starts hawking. I am not a borntroway.
Ibe Michael Izuchukwu (17)
It means things that someone considered useless, like nylon, human being, plastic, iron, etc. But all these borntroway which are considered useless by the formal owner could become useful either through training (human being) or by recycling (plastic, nylon, iron, etc)
DAY 4
How you go fit bring change in your community or your environment?
Ibe Michael Izuchukwu (17)
I can help my society by advising those who are going astray; by respecting the rules and regulations; and by educating others on the benefit of respecting the rules of the community.
Chukwumah Grace Ogochukwu (16)
Change of orientation; good morals and ensure others see and follow good morals too.I will also ensure that peace and unity are kept.Young Grace EdojeWe can change our environment by keeping it clean, because when we keep it clean we are doing ourselves good.
Adekanbi Olabisi (17)
We can impact our environment, our society through cooperation, thinking and working together as a team and we can achieve this by being educated and being able to read and write. Then we will know our right from our wrong, also, accountable to people around us.
DAY 5
Who will you be in 10 years?
Aliu Jemilatu (17)
By the grace of God I believe that in the next 5 years I would have graduated from the university. Then I would start my music career because I know I could make it as a musician and by the 6th year I would have become a superstar. In 10 years I would have become a world music star of my dream.
Francisca Agbanzo (17)
In 10 years time I would have finished climbing my ladder towards achieving my dreams. Is either I become a banker and a movie star or I solely become a movie star.
Peter Ogeh (15)
I want to be a great person, a motivator, a person who commands respect just like you guys – the instructors. Victoria Bolawa In the next 10 years I would have become a playwright and a popular novelist – writer.
Tessy Augustina Ese (23)
I see myself as a leader and an achiever
Olabisi Akekanbi (17)
I want to become a chartered accountant, with my 1st degree and my ICAN certificate, happily married with 4 children and go for acting to become a superstar in future, 10 years to come!
DAY 6
“What is the most important thing that you learned in the Workshop?”
David George (19)
To concentrate and be focused, respectful of others and to listen carefully
Tessy Augustina Ese (23)
To always be creative and no matter what I should make my book my friend.
Umar Mariam Asmau (17)
If you don’t work hard you cannot achieve perfection
Augustina Nwanevu (16)
I learned that borntroway is someone that has an unused or abandoned talent.
Young Grace Edoja (20)
The MIND MAP
Adekanbi Olabisi Ayomide (17)
How to compose myself and become a teacher to other people around me.
Chukwumah Ogochukwu Grace (16)
Teamwork and cooperation and also being focused.Ikhumhi
Emmanuel (21)
I learned many things, like borntroway and I also learned how to sing