I attended St. James’s African Church School, Idi Ape, Abeokuta between 1957 and 1962. Before that time, my father enrolled his children in a kinderg… - Alaba Lawson

I got into trouble each time I took my mother’s clothes and wore them for a photo shoot. I would have poured perfumes on the clothes and my mother would get to know. She would then report me to my father, who would use cable to beat me. You know my father worked with the ECN and he did about two years with the National Electric Power Authority before he retired, so he had cables to beat anyone of us that misbehaved.

She never used the cane, but she had another way of doing this. Her countenance when anyone misbehaved was more potent than the cane. Once her countenance changed, one got the message.

I don’t have anything called sad day and I don’t pray for anyone to have a sad day. But there was a day I felt the grace and faithfulness of Jehovah God in my school, when a three-year-old girl swallowed a 5 kobo coin many years ago.