Hostel balloting in Naij Unis — University of Lagos.
I honestly believe we need an intervention for people who write Nollywood script about university life because I don’t understand why I’d be existing in my own world and you drag me into yours and start to tell me lies — Unprovoked.
It’s one thing to ask how things are and not wanting to make your listener disinterested, you lie. But it’s a whole new level of crazy just lying unprovoked. And that’s what Nollywood had done to the average Nigerian kid’s psyche for university. Lied, unprovoked.
I think to a certain extent, you’d understand why I’d be excited about getting admission into the “University of first choice” — University of Lagos. I could already imagine the life. Having two or three roommates who’d be some really big girls on the campus and I’d be living the dream.
But I’ve awoken from my dream and it’s 3 hours left for me to log into the school portal to get a bed space — into a room of more than 3 roommates.
Here’s how it goes: The student portal’s open for a fixed time on balloting days. Something between 8am to 5pm in which a minimum of 20,000 students battle for about 3,000 bed spaces. It’s squid game come alive except instead of dying, you just don’t get a convenient or fixed place to stay. And for those hours, you and your mini squad of avengers which probably involves family members, folks that are out of school and even out of the country battle to get into a site that’s usually down way before mid-day.
Getting a bed space is almost luxury, but it only gets even funnier because realistically, you never have just 3 other roommates — even in a four man room. There’s only so little space but so many students needing a place to put their head and for a minimum, you’d have a four man room accommodating 7 people. Still, that’s a minimum.
So as we say, we’re genuinely “battling” except it’s a war of devices and internet speed just for a place to lay our head while school takes its toll on us.
P.S. If any University of Lagos official comes across this article, I’d love to ask if you could be kind as to build more hostels in place of random microfinance banks and all that. It’d go a long way for us students. Also, place a ban on Nollywood writers from portraying lies. I love you, thank you.
