MY FIRST RODEO AS A COMMUNITY PHARMACY LOCUM

Thanks to a close friend, I found myself working as a locum pharmacist at a community pharmacy a few paces from where I reside. It was something completely unplanned. He was leaving the country to further his education and was asked to provide his replacement and he selected me. I find his confidence in me reassuring as he knows me well enough. Naturally, my timid self wanted to safely decline the offer but my friend insisted. He’s someone who looks out for me. Upon his stubborn insistence, I decided to give it a try. How bad could it be? What could go wrong? How wrong was I, at least considering my first day experience? Afterwards it was smooth sailing with a few rough patches here and there. We’re still doing our best to adapt to the situation at hand.

I was told to resume work on a Saturday and I was to work alone. Considering the fact that prior to starting work I had about two years post-graduation experience, it was supposed to be a simple jig. The only wrinkle was that I had never been in charge of a community pharmacy all alone. This was to be my first time. I promised to give the best and be at the top of my game before I started. I even studied up on a number of topics including malaria guidelines and mechanisms of administering injections.

I was to be on duty the whole day. Due to the length of the work hours, I decided to open the place by 11 am and work for twelve hours. And that’s what I did. I wanted to appear in my lab coat to boost my confidence but my lab coat was a bit dirty and that plan failed. I appeared without a lab. I began attending to my patients; recommending medications for them based on their conditions and our available stock. The moment of truth came when I was asked to administer an injection. At first I wanted to evade by giving an excuse but I decided to be courageous. I then administered with confidence and my client was happy. That’s what I wished happened! In reality, the courage left me the first time. I was praying when the patient came in, and I overheard him saying he is here for an injection. I prolonged the prayer with the hope that he would lose patience and leave. Alas he stayed. After my lengthy prayer, I faced him and he explained that he was here to receive his second dose of a three dose antimalarial intramuscular injection. As I wasn’t confident enough, I explained to him that I couldn’t find the record of his medication and I wasn’t sure of the exact medication. ‘I was safe for now’, I thought. I was wrong! The same guy came back and asked that I call the person that administered his first dose. I claimed that I didn’t have his number. This guy looked for the person’s number and called him. I was told the injection over the phone and I had no further excuse. I then told myself, if this is it, so be it. I led him to the injection room and used my theoretical knowledge to administer the injection. It was a smooth one. My patient was happy to have received his injection and I was overjoyed and thanked Allah for aiding me to escape humiliation.

At the end of the day, I gave numerous injections and saw many patients. The sales were also modest. I knew then that there was hope yet for me and that I may survive the work. At exactly 11pm at night, I closed the place and I was ready to go home. Instead of me to use opay I was stupid enough to use a regular tricycle. I hailed down one and entered. Upon entering I noticed the young barely sober guys giving me the side eye. I was terrified. I had a lot of wrong thoughts at the moment. I was afraid I would lose my belongings at the very least. In a rare moment of quick thinking, I asked them to allow me to alight as I forgot something at work. They insisted that they could take me back and I refused. I alighted and got myself a safer ride home.

In retrospect, it’s surprising how much of a scaredy-cat I am. Only Allah aids me to survive through all the ordeals I have been through. Alhamdulillah.

WHY WOMEN WRITE

Women write for a number of reasons but I can summarise the reasons into two; to have a voice and to bring about change.

As we still live in a male-dominated world, there is a need for women to write to air their voices and opinions. This is a major reason women write. Women write to bring issues that affect them to the forefront. Women are more qualified and positioned to write on subjects like menstruation, child-birth, breastfeeding, menopause and the likes. Men writing on such would be inadequate. Women writers would increase our understanding of these female-centric topics by writing from their experience and this is why it is important for women to have a voice. Consequently, women write primarily to have a voice and to be able to air their opinions on things particularly on issues that specifically pertains to them. This is not to say that they can’t have opinions on things that are not specific to them. Women have the right to air their views and opinions on whatever they want. Therefore, women write to exercise their freedom to have a voice and air their opinions on topics and subjects of their choice.

Another important reason women write is to bring about change. Women have issues bothering them and writing about them could bring about needed publicity that could change their situation on the issues. This could include things like domestic violence, sexual abuse, gender inequality and so on. The only way to drive home the importance of changing these challenges would be by women writing passionately on the issues and explaining the importance of addressing the problems and challenges. This a major reason women write.

In conclusion, women write to have a voice to air their opinions on challenges that could bring about change in their lives.

FACTORS WHICH LIMITED WOMEN WRITING IN THE PAST

We do not have an abundance of works by women in the past. From Shakespeare to de Cervantes, most of the authors of the early classics were men. Only recently did we begin to have reputable and popular works by women, from Jane Austin with her famous ‘Pride and Prejudice’ to Emily Bronte who penned ‘Wuthering Heights’.

From my narrow point of view, I can attribute the limitations women had writing in the past to the following broad factors; patriarchy, literacy gap, interest and lack of support.

Women like attributing many of their problems to patriarchy. The fact that the world is basically in the control of men puts women at a disadvantage according to the women rights activists. When it comes to limiting women writing, patriarchy definitely contributed. Men were in charge and had all the opportunities and advantages. As a result, male writers thrived and produced classics and women offered their successful husbands support at home. All the other factors are like sub factors under patriarchy. The world was meant for men and women just had to make do with what they were given

Directly related to the factor above is the literary gap between men and women. Men were more educated than women in the past. Even in the present day, some third world countries do not consider educating females as important as educating men. The fact that men had better education meant that men would naturally write more than women. One thing that cannot be denied is that writers need to be educated and experienced, otherwise their writings won’t have substance. As women had less education and families preferred to educated their male children, women were consequently limited in writing.

Despite the limitations above, some women wrote but the third factor limited them. Less interest in works written by women meant that women would be limited and discouraged from writing. The reason for this is that women tended to write on the ‘less interesting’ topics like love, marriage, relationships and family as opposed to ‘more interesting’ topics covered by men like adventure, war, politics, games and so on. These thematic differences between the works of both genders limited women because the readers, who were predominantly men preferred the ‘more interesting works’.

The last factor I consider to have limited women was the outright lack of support for female writers. A relatively recent example is JK Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter series. She used a pen name, initials of her name, to skilfully hide her gender in the beginning. This was because she believed boys would not read her book if they found out that it was written by a woman. She did this because there was an apparent lesser support for female writers. She still uses the name JK Rowling because the name is too popular to be changed. The fact remains that the perceived lack of support led her to use the pen name and she is not the only one.

The above are in my opinion some of the factors that limited women from writing in the past. Most of the factors no longer apply today.

AFRICANIZATION OF ISLAM AND CHRISTIANITY

Africanization in the context of this essay refers to the various ways in which Africans have created ‘Muslim or Christian space’ and made islam or christianity their own.

Islam and christianity all came from their places of origin to Africa a long time ago. Christianity being the older religion arrived much earlier than Islam around the second century in north Africa. However, the spread of christianity was stifled by the emergence and spread of islam into north Africa in the seventh century. Christianity will however continue its spread into the south around the nineteenth century with the help of the missionaries who came with the colonial masters.

Islam spread southward earlier than christianity. By the time the colonial masters came around the nineteenth century, many regions around west Africa and some parts of east Africa were already practising islam.

The first example of how christianity and islam was africanized will have to be the emergence of African Christian and Muslim religious leaders and institutions. Institutions established by Africans began to appear even before the Europeans left. Once they left, the indigenous leaders took over. This is the first instance of Africanization of the two religions.

A more glaring example of Africanization is how the religions merged with the cultures and became one in some places, particularly islam in the northern part of Nigeria. In some parts of northern Nigeria, some people cannot differentiate between their culture and religion (islam). Both have merged to symbolise the same thing. This sort of fusion between culture and religion can be seen in many parts of Africa, though not as extreme as seen in Northern Nigeria and parts of North Africa. To people living in this places, culture and religion mean the same thing. They mistake many of their cultural practices as religious due to the fusion between the two in such places.

Another area where both religions were Africanized is in the area of practice. It is accepted that Africa is the most religious continent in the world. Asia has more people of faith and is the origin of all three Abrahamic faiths, but Africans practise religion with more dedication and diligence than any other continent. Africans practice their religion more devoutly than the Europeans who brought christianity to them or the Arabs who brought islam to them. This is also a glaring example of Africanization of the two religions.

Attempt has been made to examine how Christianity and Islam was Africanized. It is a fact that Africans own the form of Islam and Christianity they practise.

IN SUPPORT OF MY CULTURE

In the precolonial times, different regions in Nigeria were governed by different systems depending on the specific location, its people and the time considered. The Hausa kingdoms date back to the seventh century according to some sources. The yoruba kingdoms have also been around for a long time before the colonial times. For the purpose of this essay, the political systems in place just before the colonial times will be considered.

Legend have it that Oduduwa founded the yoruba kingdom and his seven sons were the rulers of the first seven kingdoms of yorubaland under the Alafin of Oyo. After the fall of the Oyo empire and the yoruba inter tribal wars, the seven former kingdoms then broke into fourteen kingdoms. At the height of the power of the yoruba, the Oyo Kingdom was the most developed and served as the model. In this essay, the Oyo kingdom will be used as a representative of the yoruba political system.

The precolonial hausa-fulani political system can be said to begin at the beginning of the 19^th century (around 1804) when Usman Danfodio established the Sokoto caliphate. Even though the hausa kingdoms date back to the 7^th century, the Sokoto caliphate was an upgrade to the system in place before the Dan Fodio’s jihad.

Both the Yoruba and Hausa-Fulani precolonial political systems were centralised systems with a single head. In the yoruba system at a time, the alafin of Oyo was the head of all the yoruba systems the same way the Sultan of Sokoto was the overall head of the Sokoto caliphate. In addition, both systems had an organised structure, a strong military with a military commander (Kakanfo in Oyo, Madaki in the hausa-fulani empires), a judiciary that tried cases, units of administration (provinces, towns, villages and wards) with various heads. Both systems were organised and efficient.

The differences between the two systems arose from the fact that the hausa-fulani system was a bit more organised and had structures that were not present in the yoruba system and also in the different way the systems were organised.

Firstly, though both systems had a centralised leadership, the hausa-fulani political system was more centralised with the king having an authoritarian power without much check and balances. This is in contrast to the situation in the yoruba system where for instance the activity of the Alafin of Oyo were checked by the Oyo Mesi (the 7 kingmakers headed by the Bashorun). The Oyo Mesi were even stronger than the Alafin and could overrule some of his decisions.

Another area of difference between the two systems, though small, is the adopted state religion. The yorubas practised traditional religion and the Oba or Alafin was expected to make sacrifices when required. In contrast, the hausa-fulani system adopted islam as the state religion and Islamic rules were enforced in the kingdoms.

One thing the hausa-fulani system had that was absent in the yoruba system is the police. The hausa-fulani political system had a sort of state police headed by the ‘Sarkin Yan doka’.

The hausa-fulani also had a more organised judiciary with judges who try cases according to Islamic law. Though some high profile cases were tried in the palace by the King. In the yoruba system however, the cases are usually tried by the alafin, obas and bales depending on the severity of the cases.

Another area where the Hausa-fulani system beats the yoruba system is in the presence of an elaborative system of taxation to support the administration of the empires. There was cattle tax and land tax.

Overall, though both systems were organised and made administering the kingdoms easier and effective, the hausa-fulani political system was a bit more advanced than the yoruba political systems as evidenced by some of the differences highlighted.