The Learner

Muhsin Ibrahim @Muhsin234 (Twitter) While serving the nation as corps members, there was nothing more on our minds than life after the assignment. The life was full of uncertainty and apprehension. The allowance, which was almost doubled during our stream, of N19,800 and the little stipend given by our various places of primary assignments (PPAs) would stop coming once we finish. Subhanallah! My confidant, Anas Musa, went and purchased job application forms for us at the Kano Senior Secondary School Management Board (KSSSMB). He filled him, but I was somewhat reluctant to do the same, for I was tipped off that I might be retained at my PPA or employed by a few other greener places. I finally did, and we submitted our applications. About a year passed, and nobody invited us for an interview, aptitude test or anything else. Immediately after the Service, I got an appointment with BUK and later Anas with the Federal University, Dutse. Months after, I got a call from one famous p...

Muhammad Muhsin Ibrahim muhsin2008@gmail.com @muhsin234 (Twitter) “What is your name?” Muhammad. And all eyes would turn around. It often starts just like that, for to them, every Muslim is a potential threat, a terrorist. It is extremely awkward, if not annoying, to someone like me who was born and reared in an almost 99% Muslims community. Hitherto I didn’t know that being Muslim means that much and weighs that loads; some feel even reluctant to disclose their belief. Muslims living in multi-religious and non-Muslims majority societies today have a lot of stories to tell. The story is sometimes nasty in conservative, religiously touchy and volatile places like India , where I presently reside.  Although home to about 200 million Muslims, it was discovered in a recent survey that some  Muslims have to masquerade as Hindus for India jobs.  This happens due to the schism, and sometimes animosity, between them and other faithful, particularly the majority H...

We are, yes, individuals. But we are, sometimes, stupid individuals. Perhaps I and you are among the latter group; who knows? Forgive the affront and don’t take any offence. None is really intended. It’s baffling, to say the least, what we humans sometimes do with our lives. I strongly believe that we all are endowed with one or another intellect with which we use to lead our soul and body towards some mental gratifications such as to eat food and drink to quench our hunger and thirst; wear clothes to cover our nudity; communication ability to express feelings and wants; etc. But yet, we tend to do other things so glaringly self-destructive for no constructive reason whatsoever in the name of fashion, passion and thingamajig . I am not moralizing or sensationalizing anything, for that is, or can be, relative and subjective; I am rather rationalizing them. Often it happens, we utter: to each his own. I shake head at this pomposity and respond: to each his ruin. It was only a few ...

My stay in India aged one today. My wife and  l live contentedly and our studies go on well—praises are due to Allah. I have shared lots of my experiences within the span of the year in some of my write ups. Another fresh experience, nonetheless, prompted this short piece, and this is an ongoing 3-week workshop I am attending on film, T.V and theatre acting, choreography and cinematography at the beautiful, hilly, artists’ hub of Andretta in Palampur, Himachal Pradesh (HP). There are about 50 attendees from mainly three states—the host i.e. HP, Punjab and Haryana. I am the only non-Indian; so, imagine the feeling. I have met some people that have reshaped the-year-old views I held on India and Indians; hence the novelty of the experience. Our trip to HP was exhilarating , for the state is well known for its remarkable atmosphere and tourist attractions. So we all were enthusiastic the first day we heard about the workshop. The anxiety was multiplied when I ‘googled’ the na...

Muhammad Muhsin Ibrahim @muhsin234 (Twitter) Sunday, 01 st June 2014, marks my maiden wedding anniversary. Unlike today, I was filled with happiness beyond expressing this day, last year. I was all the more excited that we were, pragmatically speaking, honeymooning outside Nigeria, starting in Cairo, where we would have an eighteen-hour transit, and India, where we still are, essentially though for studies. My euphoria was, nonetheless, shattered by two fears since we were airborne:  first, India was often described in the news as religiously a volatile country; and second, as being ‘infested’ with lusty rapists. I am Muslim and coming with a newly wed wife! Though after spending almost a year now, I discovered that although the religious schism of course exists and the rapists rather ravage, some stories are untrue, or just being exaggerated.  Yet, I was spirited in another way, for I was ‘escaping’ from the wrath of the infamous, dreaded Boko Haram (BH) unthin...

Director :         Geoffrey Galadima Producer :       Rabiu Haruna Story:               Yakubu M. Kumo Language :      Hausa Year :               2014 Company :      Al-Rahuz Film Production, Kano Introduction Hausa film spectators are introduced to a new genre of science fiction by the filmmakers of Aduniya . The same is said in its earliest preview on Premium Times online newspaper in its September 4th, 2013 edition.  The same had also been mentioned like a litany in the film’s often-repeated adverts on the radio stations and in numerous other films. The boisterous voiceover boasts that viewers will, for the first time, see cars being blown up like never before, the actors in unique and more captivating roles, and, ab...

Muhammad Muhsin Ibrahim muhsin2008@gmail.com As Nigerians, we don’t have to go to a far place like India to learn anything in politics, for two reasons. First, we get a model to learn from right below our noses. I am talking about the Niger Republic , yes, our poor, neighbour Niger . In their last general election of 2011, not a single soul was lost as a result of violence, and everything went on efficiently until the end. Second, India is, independence-wise, older, and, democracy-wise, much older than Nigeria . While our democratic government had been interrupted by several military coups after our independence on 1 st October 1960, theirs is never halted since 1947, when the country got independence from the same British colonial brutes that ruled us. But being here, I can’t help but to appreciate and commend their comportment and confederacy during and after the just concluded general elections. India is famously the world’s biggest democracy with nearly a billion el...