According to a 19th century legend, the Truth and the Lie meet one day. The Lie says to the Truth: "It's a marvellous day today"! The Truth looks up to the skies and sighs, for the day was really beautiful.
They spend a lot of time together, ultimately arriving beside a well. The Lie tells the Truth: "The water is very nice, let's take a bath together!" The Truth, once again suspicious, tests the water and discovers that it indeed is very nice. They undress and start bathing. Suddenly, the Lie comes out of the water, puts on the clothes of the Truth and runs away. The furious Truth comes out of the well and runs everywhere to find the Lie and to get her clothes back. The World, seeing the Truth naked, turns its gaze away, with contempt and rage. The poor Truth returns to the well and disappears forever, hiding therein, its shame. Since then, the Lie travels around the world, dressed as the Truth, satisfying the needs of society, because, the World, in any case, harbours no wish at all to meet the naked Truth.
~ From “The Truth coming out of the well"; Jean-Léon Gérôme, 1896.
He told the story in an interview for Marc Maron's WTF podcast.
Paul McCartney recently sat for an extended interview with Marc Maron in which he covered a bunch of Beatles memories, as well as many from his releases with Wings and solo career.
One anecdote that stands out is about his 1973 album with Wings, Band on the Run, which was recorded in Lagos, Nigeria.
Paul mentions that he decided to record in Nigeria because at that time it was "kind of fashionable for people not to record in their normal studios." So, he asked his label EMI what international locations they had studios in, and when he heard of the Lagos studio he was set on Nigeria.
When Paul arrives in Nigeria, the first thing he sees in the papers were headlines of Fela Kuti accusing him of "coming to steal the black man's music," a story he's told many times before.
So he calls up Fela and invites him to the studio to hear the songs he's working on, to prove that his recordings are nothing like afrobeat or any other African music. That's where the new bits of details of this story start.
In Paul McCartney's own words:
"[Fela] came over with his 30 wives and a studio full of ganja. He was one wild cat, he used to have a bottle of whiskey in which was marinating a pound of pot... in the whiskey. We turned out to be real good friends, he got it, he said 'no you're not doing that' [stealing African music].
Ginger Baker was there, he was his big friend. So, Fela invites us to his club which was outside Lagos, the Afrika Shrine. This was a few of us, little white people, me and a couple of friends. So we go out there and I say, '"let's not smoke any pot." Cause it's pretty crazy, we're out in the jungle and it's pitch black.
So we're sitting there with Fela [at The Shrine] and one of Fela's guys comes up, he's crouching and he's got a packet of Rothmans cigarettes. They're all joints. He goes, '"You want one of these?" I say, "no thanks," so he carries around and gets to Ginger Baker who says "Yeah man! Sure!'"
Then Fela shouts, "Ginger Baker! The only man I know never refuse a smoke!"
So I go, "A-ha! Ok, I'll have one of those."
Man. I tripped out. It was so strong. It was stronger than anything I've ever had, I don't know if there was something in it.
But in the end it was a good night.
After the Fulanis systematically captured and made Ilorin their territory, they sacked the old Oyo Empire in 1835/1636 .
They were still not satisfied with their victory; they wished to extend their rule deep into the heart of Yoruba land. Thus in 1840, they set to capture Osogbo , a Yoruba town. The Fulanis, under the command of Ali , the Hausa balogun of Ilorin, laid siege on Osogbo.
When the king of Osogbo realized that the Ilorins were too strong for the Osogbo army, he summoned the Ibadans for help. Ibadan immediately sent some auxiliaries to Osogbo under the command of Obele alias Mobitan , and Alade Abimpagun. As this force could not stop the Ilorins, another contingent was sent to Osogbo under a more experienced leader. But still the Ilorins won every battle and gained more ground.
When Ibadan realized that the Ilorins were becoming more threatening to Yoruba land, they sent a large and stronger force under Balogun Oderinlo to crush the intruding forces and Jammas of Ilorin . When Oderinlo and his men arrived at the battlefield, they realized that things had gone worse than they thought.
They could not show their faces in the open field for the fear of the Ilorin horses, and for about 20 days after their arrival at Osogbo, they could not fight outside the town thickets. Oderinlo suggested that Elepo, a brave Ibadan warrior was badly needed at the war-front. Elepo had been rejected by the war-chiefs of Ibadan for his actions at the late Agbamaja expedition.
As soon as the message from Oderinlo reached Ibadan, the Bashorun wished he could send Elepo to Osogbo but could not go against the wish of other war-chiefs. The Bashorun gave Elepo a cow to worship his god, Ori , and pray for the victory of Ibadan at the war-front.
At the war-front, the Ibadan could not attack the Ilorins during the day because Osogbo was practically in a plain and the Ilorin horses might have advantage of them with disastrous results.
They decided to attack at dusk when the Ilorins would no longer be able to use their horses. About 2:pm, the well prepared Ibadan army left the gate of Osogbo for the battlefield. They were to keep a strict watch and arrest anyone suspected to be a spy.
About a mile from the Ilorin camp, they halted and arranged the order of the attack.
The Osogbo army and the earlier auxiliaries were to handle the center of the battlefield, chiefs Abitiko and Labuju were to command the right wing, Balogun Oderinlo with the rest of the Ibadan war-chiefs were to form the left wing of the army. The Ilorin camp was then attacked at midnight. The watchword was “ Elo ni owo odo? ” (How much is the ferry fare?).
The reason this watchword was chosen was because the river Osun had to be crossed in entering Osogbo from the south, and anyone who could not tell this was likely to be an enemy.
Stampede engulfed the Ilorin camp as the Ibadan army set it on fire. The Ilorins could not offer the slightest resistance; they were smoked with the gunpowder of the Ibadan guns.
This attack was a success for the Ibadan. Some Ilorin war-chiefs were captured in the attack. Prominent ones were:
1. Jimba the head slave of the Emir;
2. One of the sons of Ali the commander in chief;
3. Chief Lateju;
4. Ajikobo the Yoruba Balogun of Ilorin.
The first two were released while the latter two, being Yoruba by birth, were regarded as traitors and were executed. This was a huge victory for the whole of Yoruba land. After the Osogbo victory,
Ibokun, an Ijesa town not far from Osogbo was taken by the Ibadans for being an ally of Ilorin.
After this war, Ìbàdàn later became a force building a formidable war machinery than later prosecuted many other wars with resounding victory.
Notable among the wars was the KIRIJI WAR where the Ibadan warlords formed a historic alliance with the Igbajos. Even though Igbajo became the war front for many years that the war lasted, it was never captured by the raging Ekiti parapò warriors. Rather it was a place where many of them met their Waterloo.
Notable among the warriors were Fabunmi Okeemesi, Ogedengbe Agbogun gboro of the Ijesas, Apasikoto pasigegele of Igbajo and Latoosa of Ibadan to mention a few. There were many more great warriors of the time.
It's worthy to note that the KIRIJI WAR was the last war in Yoruba land. It's also recorded as the longest native war between in Africa.
Since then the Yoruba people have continued to build strong bonds among themselves and they have sustained the peace.
We must continue to tell our children the history of the Yoruba people and the bond which our father had built so that we can continue to see ourselves as one. If the Ibadan people can sacrifice their lives for the people of Osogbo in other to safe other towns and villages in Yoruba land and in essence the carnage of innocent people were prevented, then, we the modern Yorubas have no reason to divide ourselves for political reasons or any reason at all.
Our leaders must continue to put their lives in the forefront to safe the land from all aggression.
And we have the responsibility to support, to advise and to pray for all our leaders irrespective of political divide.
God bless our leaders,
God bless Yoruba land
God bless Nigeria.
WRAP YOUR HEAD AROUND THIS IF YOU CAN!
On March 23, 1994 the medical examiner viewed the body of Ronald Opus and concluded that he died from a shotgun wound to the head.
Mr. Opus had jumped from the top of a ten-story building intending to commit suicide. He left a note to the effect indicating his despondency.
As he fell past the ninth floor his life was interrupted by a shotgun blast passing through a window, which killed him instantly.
Neither the shooter nor the deceased was aware that a safety net had been installed just below the eighth floor level to protect some building workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able to complete his suicide the way he had planned.
"Ordinarily," Dr Mills continued, "A person, who sets out to commit suicide and ultimately succeeds, even though the mechanism might not be what he intended, is still defined as committing suicide."
That Mr. Opus was shot on the way to certain death, but probably would not have been successful because of the safety net, caused the medical examiner to feel that he had a homicide on his hands.
In the room on the ninth floor, where the shotgun blast emanated, was occupied by an elderly man and his wife. They were arguing vigorously and he was threatening her with a shotgun.
The man was so upset that when he pulled the trigger he completely missed his wife and the pellets went through the window striking Mr. Opus.
When one intends to kill subject "A" but kills subject "B" in the attempt, one is guilty of the murder of subject "B".
When confronted with the murder charge the old man and his wife were both adamant and both said that they thought the shotgun was unloaded.
The old man said it was a long-standing habit to threaten his wife with the unloaded shotgun. He had no intention to murder her. Therefore the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to be an accident; that is, if the gun had been accidentally loaded.
The continuing investigation turned up a witness who saw the old couple's son loading the shotgun about six weeks prior to the fatal accident.
It transpired that the old lady had cut off her son's financial support and the son, knowing the propensity of his father to use the shotgun threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation that his father would shoot his mother.
Since the loader of the gun was aware of this, he was guilty of the murder even though he didn't actually pull the trigger.
The case now becomes one of murder on the part of the son for the death of Ronald Opus.
Now comes the exquisite twist.
Further investigation revealed that the son was, in fact, Ronald Opus. He had become increasingly despondent over the failure of his attempt to engineer his mother's murder. This led him to jump off the ten-story building on March 23rd, only to be killed by a shotgun blast passing through the ninth story window.
The son had actually murdered himself, so the medical examiner closed the case as a suicide.
A true story from Associated Press, Reported by Kurt Westervelt.
Facts are sometimes stranger then fiction!
