Ipara Remo, where I own plots of land!

I had a very nice week-end at Solomon's village, it was his birthday. Solomon is my best friend and salvator in Nigeria. He is allways there when I need help or need to know how to get something, somewhere, when I need to yell at someone about Nigerian Red Cross etc.
Anyway, we partied, he had the whole village helping out with the food and organization, we had pounded yam (they pound boiled yam for hours as you can see in the picture) which is a delicacy in Nigeria and is cooked for special events and guests, Eba, catfish, chicken and jollof rice(this name amuses me indeed) among many other dishes.
Saturday night after dinner Solo murdered the heart shaped melted birthday cake carried all the way from Lagos by Sasa(Solo's to be fiancee, a Slovenian teacher for disabled children and a very nice person) and we had palm wine (interestingly alcoholic and healthy drink made of the small nutty things of palm three which washes toxines out of the body, Nigerians say it's good for malaria too so I had a lot but I hope it was made with drinking water since I have typhoid too) at the terrace of Solo's beautiful village house and talked and watched the stars. Then, Nigerian friends started dancing with fela kuti, akon, lagbada and many others' music. After around 2 am, Solo's friends started making an incredible percussion music using the glasses, wooden table and their voices and it was just amazing! They kept playing and singing for about 2 hours, my fingers would be crushed if I had played a wooden table that long...
On sunday, we went into the tropical forest with the hunter bushman to hunt antilopes but all we hunted was a bushrat(they actually eat it and love it), we trekked for about 4 hours, it was tiring but nice, very very nice and unique.

By the way, as I now completed 1 year of voluntary service in Nigeria trough Solomon's NGO, he announced me as a national coordinator to Heritage Nigeria and gave me 4 plots of land in his village with official papers from cadastro and staff as an appreciation!!! And all I got him for his birthday was a travel book:-) So, I now announce my self as the new queen of Ipara Remo, my new village...(That's no joke, beleive it or not he really did that!)

More info and rememberings: Ipara Remo is a small village in Ogun State of Nigeria(jaga jaga) and I have lots of memories there. I was actually supposed to teach there Maths 3 times a week at the primary school of the village but then had to change plans because it wasn't taking 1 hour with public transport as Solo promissed, my record time to get there is 4 hours as every bus I take broke down or had a flat tyer. But the funniest story is about the king of the place, every village, every town and establishment in Nigeria has an Oba or Emir or whatever they call them(they are called with different names in different regions as the tribes and languages change according to the region), and Solomon comes from Ipara's King's family, so he brought me to meet the king the first time I arrived to Ipara. He didn't speak english, an old guy respected by everybody there and he lives in his ''palace'' with multiple wifes and numerous children and grandchildren. I was asking questions and he was answering and Solo was the interpreter. We talked about politics and staff, then I started asking questions on how to become a king and how they elect the next king when the other one dies, so he explained to me that there are some 2-3 respected families in every village and usually the oldest and most experienced person among these families is choosen to be the next king and the elected king has to eat the heart of the former king to become a real king, they actually take out and preserve the heart of kings when they die to be eaten by the new elected person, he was telling me all that on my first week in Nigeria and I kept cool just not to cause any cultural misunderstanding or disrespect, so I kept so cool that I found myself asking if they cook the heart before eating or they take it row and the king suddenly got angry and shouted at me saying they are no hannibals of course they cook before eating a human heart. Gosh, I felt so stupid how could I ask such a question:-)