Housejob Tales (1)

Disappointment! Broken Promises!! Weak Connect!!

Those three words describe how I began my internship.

Six years and six months of educational turmoil had just come to fruition. After a barrage of ASUU strikes and constant exams, we don get the “Dr”, Pharaoh don look our eye say “Let these people go!”. You know how it is na! As soon as we finished from Med school, we felt brand new, we were like hot cakes and everyone left right and center couldn’t get enough of us, they told us we were free, we were powerful, the world was our oyster or akara or whatever we wanted it to be, and we believed that.

“I am going to do my internship in Abuja.” “I will do my own in LASUTH” “I will do my own in Finland.” There are was no limit to the dream. We could have it all.

Even Family members and friends were saying to us, “I have a friend in Alausa, you can do your housemanship inside Tinubu’s house in Bourdillon itself, they will pay you 250k in a month!” 

 And some of our friends were actually getting the dream, barely two days after induction, a couple of our guys had literally started working. Let’s say induction was Friday, by Monday some people don dey Iron shirt dey begin work. 

The rest of us were like, “Ehn, we’re just a little slow!”, Lol! Little did we know how much slower we were going to get. 

We had written LUTH internship exam, but none of us wanted LUTH.  LUTH that scarred us as students, LUTH that ate of our flesh, drank of our blood and then used our bones as toothpicks, Lol! Who would want LUTH!? Tueh! Children of Israel would rather die than go back to Babylon, the land of Chains!! We are going to go forward to Abuja, where Politicians will slap our pockets with hard Notes, or to LASUTH, where they have a million dental chairs, all working osha prapra! 

Well, the first exam I went for was LASUTH’s. I even took the trip in an Uber, I was super-duper confident, I had a connect, a big Prof had assured he’d help me look into it, why will I be entering Danfo for somewhere that will soon be my workplace? No oo! Lemme go in style! I’m already a LASUTH Doctor. 

I reach there, the uber bill, although quite a hefty sum for an unemployed bro, no even fear me. My parents had stopped giving me allowance from the moment I inducted, fortunately I still had some buffer cash in my account. 

The first thing that struck me about the exam was the crowd. Omo mehn! Doctors plenty wey dey find job oo!! The thing be like audition for Project Fame. 

Doctors from all over Nigeria came to Ikeja that day just because of Internship, see mature men with bald Gorimapa heads, my papa age-mate, they were following me to drag the few spaces they had in LASUTH! 

But I did not let that one faze me. I had already bought form of 5k, and submitted directly to my connect, nothing go sele. 

Na so we enter waiting hall, I thought we came here to do internship exam next thing I know I started hearing people reciting states and capital and Current affairs!! 

“Haaa!! Am I in the wrong exam hall?! “,I thought to myself

 “The first CMD of LASUTH is Professor Lagbaga, he was from Somolu, he started LASUTH in the 18th Century!”, the person beside me was reciting 

“Haa! Mogbe! What are you doing?!”, I quickly inquired

“Don’t you know that apart from medical questions they would also ask you political questions and current affairs of Lagos and Nigeria?!”, was the reply.

The whole thing didn’t even make sense to me. What was the relevance of politics and current affairs to my skills as a clinician!? Will the CMD help me do my Surgeries? Abi is it the Capital of Ebonyi that I will import my Forceps from?  What relevance is the date of LASUTH founding to the treatment of Trigeminal Neuralgia? 

Temi Bami!!

But as a sharp Lagos boy na, I didn’t let it daunt me, I quickly gained stamina, we were all there, all my classmates, all MMBS and BDS holders. So I sharpaly started cramming and reciting the useless figures and data, if na la cram la pour, then that one na smallz. I be badoo! No be today we dey read scheme of work for exam hall. One time in my secondary school, I read an entire 20 leaves book fifteen minutes before a test and passed, I did much more enviable feats of human memory in Med school.

We, the dental guys, went in first. And what ensued would be my most tribalistic encounter ever in this our Nigeria. 

After we had been seated, the panel of examiners before us included the CMD, and other top-ranking officials. What began was nothing less than surprising to say the least, we were to stand one by one and introduce ourselves, and then at the end of the introduction, they’d ask you for your state of origin. At first, I saw no harm in that; until they began, that is. 

The first person had introduced herself, her school of training and she’d told them her state of Origin; Lagos state. Then bam! They asked her where in Lagos State 

“Idi-Iroko, Sir!” 

“Haa! My daughter, is it to the right or to the left at the junction?”, one of the officials replied 

“To the left, Sir!” 

“Oh, so you know Chief Bamidele of Idi-Iroko town?” 

“Yes, I do! He even celebrated his 70th birthday two weeks ago!” 

“Wow! Help me greet Baba oo! That’s really nice, my daughter!” 

Of course, there was nothing innately wrong in that exchange, until the next candidate stood up.

He spoke out his own introductions, which in summary was something like this

“Dr Chinedu Obioma, from Agaju, Imo state!” 

The reply was a short moment of silence, as though they wondered what had brought baba to this Yoruba hospital. Then the reply

“You can sit down!” 

The reply in itself was an embodiment of what was not said, it was communicative of what it did not contain. It was as though they had said to him, “We don’t know you, we cannot relate with you, you are a stranger, and so we merely want to acknowledge that!” 

That was how it typically went on, those from Western states were given less cold replies than those from other states, and those with the warmest replies were those from Lagos State, they’d gist for a while about their states of Origin before they were told to sit. I think now that I look back on it, that the gisting too was part of the process, they wanted to be sure perhaps that the candidate wasn’t just a Lagosian in name, that he indeed had knowledge of his roots.

Before real interview began, you could already feel it that the interviewers already knew what they wanted, or at least, they already knew what they did not want. And it was Non-westerners. I was like WOW! It was later I would learn that this was a practice in all state institutions all over the country. The states would give preferential treatments or marks to indigenes, which means in an interview, you got marks for your state of Origin, some could get a zero for being from a state outside the geopolitical zones, and people like us could get half score for being from a nearby state like Ogun, full mark was kept for the indigenes. Well, I guess there goes your Merit! 

After going through the thirty something of us applicants, and fraternizing with the Lagosians amongst us, they started the interview proper, there and then, they went through us one by one, it was quite an embarrassing ordeal actually. Many doctors don’t even know how many continents we have in the world, with silly answers like 4 and 12 ringing out. Twelve?! As if na Jesus Disciples we dey talk! If you’re reading this and you don’t know how many continents there are, just stop reading and go and open a map abeg! 

There were other more difficult questions like “The only Nigerian that ever-won Presidency election from Prison?”, here’s a hint, it’s not MKO. 

Well, anyways the current affairs were a bloody affair, but the clinical questions showed that at least, the majority of us were competent enough to administer treatments, I killed my question on the spot, it was a small easy thing. On the way out of the hall, I saw my friend Emah, a medical colleague who was waiting for his own interview. He quickly asked me for tips on how the questions were like 

“Na small things, my guy!”, I told him, not wanting to deflate his spirits. 

But in my mind, I knew that with a name like “Emahbong”, my guy was probably just wasting his time anyways. Ibo never find way, na Calabar wan come put head. Musa should just forget and lock the gate. 

Anyways a few weeks passed and we got called for written exam, meaning those of us that passed the interview stage, we were remarkably fewer, no coincidence that many of the Emahbongs and the Obiomas were surprisingly missing. 

This was now mainly a Yoruba struggle. When they started calling names into the hall, mine was the second on the list

“Haa! My connect don dey work! Number 2 on the list?! Wow! I don make am finish!”, I quietly thought to myself as I entered the hall, my head bin dey scatter

They brought papers for us to shade. Sharp guy like me, I shaded the thing hot hot like ata rodo. 

The following week or so, people started receiving texts of employment. Jesu!