ONE BIG FAMILY...THE PARTY!

By -


We organized a Christmas party to celebrate their recovery and liberation as well as thank God for his blessings. The party was organised by the hospital team and also supported by the 'Help Wihtout Boundaries' Foundation. The event took place on the 22nd December 2018, at the Federal Neuro Psychiatric hospital in Calabar, graced by the head of clinical operations Dr Ekpe, the consultant psychiatrist in charge of their case Dr Oluntoki, Oberiko Progress other doctors, nurses, social workers, guests and other patients in the hospital.


You can imagine the feeling of extreme joy Ben and his family had as they celebrated Christmas. To every normal child Christmas is special, it is a season where they look forward to new clothes, an outing and unlimited fun but to these kids Joy, Ebenezer and Joshua who had no idea what Christmas means, nor looked forward to any new clothes, it was an extraordinary occasion and an amazing feeling as they had the opportunity to wear new clothes, shoes, Christmas caps and other accessories. These are Children who do not know what it means to have a birthday, on that day they sat in the front chairs and cut their Christmas cake, for the first time ever, they were the center of a celebration. Their joy was unlimited. This is indeed a tremendous beginning, an overwhelming feeling they had.

This is somebody who would frown at the camera or get aggressively defensive when anyone tries to offer a helping hand or advise him about his condition, but there he is smiling and looking cheerful before the camera and all the attention he received. His wife would not talk to any man apart from her husband Ben, who would also only have a conversation with men only apart from his wife Blessing, their kids would not go anywhere close to a stranger but here they are around people, chatting and having rapport with all gender and everyone equally.



Mr Ben and his wife Blessing spoke and appreciated God for their lives and thanked the ex-Corper Progress Oberiko who made it possible and the hospital who has shown them care. Looking at them before and now gives me some sort of fulfilment  and am grateful to God for His Kindness.
But this isn't the end of the story, their recovery will be at it's peak if they are fully reintegrated into the society.  But as it is, the burden of caring for this family has solely been on the resources of the hospital and nothing is on ground for them up till now. It is therefore an appeal to the general public, NGOs, Churches and everyone whose interest has been caught by the plight of this family to kindly offer scholarships to these children Joy, Ebenezer and Joshua, provide a home for them and also an employment or source of livelihood for Mr Ben to cater for his family.



God Bless You!

Intriguing articles on Instagram @diaryofafemale9jakopa and @progressoberiko
Twitter @Oberiko_pro
Facebookpage @Progress Oberiko
Progressoberikoblog@gmail.com

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

THE DUMBEST THING I DID GROWING UP

By -
Image
So there was this guy ‘chyking’ me (asking me out). He was like 7years older than me. Anytime I passed through their house, his sisters would call out to him saying “ Kevwe, your babe dey pas o ”. I was still a teenager, and he was way older, I despised him. Cos he’d obstinately escort me to fetch water, against my will. Even when I’ve warned him severally to gimme SPACE, he wouldn’t listen. This guy was stalking me and I hated it! Before you know it the “area boys” who normally teased me whenever I was carrying a bucket of water on my head, would find another reason to tease me even more; they’d begin to call him ‘my guy’. And I’d be so mad! I fetched water morning and evening, and this guy would just goan position himself somewhere and be waiting for the hour when I’d pass through their compound, as there was no other road to the borehole. He’d walk by my side, asking to help me, but I always shunned him,  most times I’d double my pace and walk faster even with water on my head, he w
Read more

IGNORANCE...

By -
Image
    My hand luggage and backpack were meticulously packed for the journey, and since they were pretty portable, I decided to keep them with me instead of getting them checked in.   On arrival at security checks, I was asked to declare all my liquids, and with a clean conscience, I brought out all my deodorants, perfumes, body lotion, liquid soap, toothpaste, makeup foundation, etc... It took me by surprise when, at once, the immigration officer gathered together all the above items (excluding one of the smallest bottles of my perfume) and said to me: “we’ll have to trash these”. 😳 You said…? I asked him like I didn’t hear him quite well the first time. And he firmly repeated himself: “We’ll have to put these ones in the bin”, he paraphrased. At that point, I was like “trash”? “Bin”? What’s the relationship between my newly purchased body cream and the bin? I really wasn’t clear what he meant and why for goodness sake he’ll want to shove all my stuff in the bin. Maybe the word “bin” ha
Read more

MISSING

By -
Image
  Something horrible happened to me recently. Turns out it is one of my 2021 highlights  Quite a lengthy read tho... I was all packed to leave for Brighton from London. Had one piece of luggage and a backpack, with my purse hanging in front of me.  Got on the bus, then on a train and then landed at the National rail station to board to Brighton. It would take 8mins for the train to arrive so I sat on a waiting chair where a young man was already seated, greeted him with a smile and sat beside him, with my backpack on the middle seat separating us.  Train arrived and I jumped on it, sat on a seat beside the toilet but decided to move to another cos of how close it was to the toilet. My earphones were plugged in throughout most of the journey. One & half hours into the journey we arrived at Brighton and people were already stood up waiting to alight, I noticed my backpack was missing.😳🤯 Scurried over and under my seat, see if it was there, but no, it wasn’t. Left my seat at once, r
Read more

VOLUNTEERING

By -
Image
I want to stress the need for volunteering. Volunteering means offering your skills, time, and resource to the benefit of other organizations or to someone else, without having an interest in being paid. I know that the term volunteering may sound synonymous with “ OSHOFREE ” for some people, especially Nigerians. It’s not your fault. For an economy where people struggle for survival, people will definitely eschew anything that doesn’t put money on their table. But regardless, the importance of volunteering cannot be overemphasized.  Volunteering gives you the opportunity to render service, and at the same time develop your skills. Sometimes our problem is that we focus too much on our stomachs and on immediate satisfaction that we lose out on many other opportunities for growth.   Yes, “man must survive” but there are so many other factors that can contribute to man’s survival, and some of them include: recommendations, improving your cv, building relationships, having goodwill, etc.
Read more

Different Gospels

By -
Image
  When you move abroad you’ll notice a difference in preaching styles. The gospel you’ll hear from Nigerian preachers is absolutely different from abroad gospel. While many Nigerian preachers focus more on  tithing and prosperity, - Breaking generational curses, - Casting out poverty, - Binding demons, - Praying for jobs, husbands,  - Praying against accidents etc The preachers abroad focus more on building righteousness: - Their gospels are less about wealth, or tithes, or poverty, - They preach about building a relationship with God - About how to be righteous, - About Charity, and helping others - About loving one another, etc Although different, these two types of gospel are valid and essential in their own way. But the former is influenced mostly by bad governance, which is what we suffer in Nigeria. It is true that people stop being overly religious when they move abroad, and this is because all the things they pray for have been taken care of by the government. They don’t have t
Read more

CALABAR CARNIVAL 6...Wahala

By -
Image
Episode 6... 28th December came the big day, The almighty Calabar carnival itself. A festival of culture, colors and life! In fact Christmas Day in Calabar was not as colorful as the Calabar carnival day itself. Xmas dey trek for where Carnival dey,...It was a blast! Just before it’s 1pm when the major routes will be blocked, Lucy and I left early to get our nails and hair fixed. We meandered our way through to Watts market... Hmmmm, coman see babes, see chicks, slay queens, and hardcore Calabar babes with their hairy yellow skin and 'Yam-Legs'...lol, (abeg na joke o) some don dey there since early mor mor! All queued up in the various saloons, either changing their hairstyles, attaching artificial lashes, carving their brows, fixing nails and others doing “bend-down-select”. We wait wait wait ooooo!... Until it finally got to our turn, after hers was done, Lucy immediately rushed off and left me behind cos she was part of the bands participating in the carni
Read more

SUCKING

By -
Image
When I first saw them sucking, so many thoughts ran through my mind; I couldn’t help but wonder what manner of food that could be. Although I was very young, I could still replay the look on their faces whenever they sucked. I’m referring to the 'Calabar' neighbor we had, whose kitchen was marked by the unique redolence. The aroma alone does a public announcement that they are “Calabarians”. I dunno if you’ve tried this sucking before; but my first time was with Afang soup. Afang soup makes no sense without  “suckables” in it. Omg...I lack words to describe By now you’re wondering what exactly this thing is ... “Mfi”, as it is locally called, is simply unshelled periwinkles. It is mostly eaten by Cross Riverians and Akwa Ibomites; and it is characterized by so much sand content. You can tell when someone is cooking with “Mfi” during the washing... The process is so tedious. Enough water and enough patience are the basic tools for washing, as it makes so much nois
Read more

Proudest thing ever!

By -
Image
  One of the proudest things I’ve done in my life is resigning from a toxic work environment. I once worked with this Start-up organization, where the CEO was a real bossy boss.  He was walking in his “CEO shoes” every day of his life, he was so obsessed with achieving his dream for his org that he cared less about his employees!  We would use our personal emails and our personal mobile number to reach out to clients.  I remember suggesting that a work phone should be provided for me because the clients were beginning to encroach on my personal space, but I was told off and tagged a complainer. In so many ways we were going out of our way to help him achieve his goals for his organization, yet these sacrifices meant nothing to him.  He kept demanding more.  He’d give us tasks that encroached into our weekends even though working weekends wasn’t part of our employment contract, and when we fell short of delivery he’d scold us so harshly, making us feel like we were not hardworking enoug
Read more

NOTES ON FEMINISM

By -
Image
  Feminism is one subject that comes with a lot of different baggage, and over time I’ve seen the sprout of different facets of feminism. In Nigeria, which I know of, there’s an amount of negativity attached to the title “feminist” or the word “feminism”, both from self-acclaimed feminists and from society.  And this is because the word feminism translates to different things for different people who identify with this title. A feminist can be: 1. A woman who fancies and promotes the idea that women are in no way less than men, hence should have equal opportunities and be treated fairly in society. 2.  A single and heartbroken lady who therefore thinks all “men are scum”. 3.  An aggrieved/hurt lady who takes out her annoyance by blasting men under the ideology of feminism. (But automatically changes her ideas of men when she finally falls in love with one helplessly).  4.  A lady who doesn’t fancy the idea of marriage, or has attained a certain age where she thinks she’s totally fine w
Read more