Moin-Moin for Breakfast

I've been temping for a week now, and the only remarkable thing about it is that I manage to get any work done between all the nodding off at my keyboard. I sit at a desk for approximately eight hours during the day, entering missing data into employee records. It's all I can do sometimes not to peer over the edge of my cubicle and inform my neighbor, "I went to Yale. I can really be entrusted with more than this." But it pays, and relatively well (for senior college students), so I suppose I shouldn't complain too much or too loudly.

Waking up in the morning is very interesting. I've always been an early riser, but as it turns out, getting out of bed before 7am five days in a row is harder to do than I might have suspected. My eyes never open fully until I've plunged my head under the shower, and I've had to drop the water temperature lower and lower to achieve the desired effect. The good news is my pores have never looked better. The bad news is that I'm fucked for winter, when my basement apartment will probably have icicles hanging from the ceiling.

I'm also very unused to eating so early in the day. My stomach never accepts anything creamy or sweet before 10am so my go-to favorite, oatmeal, is out of the question, as are a number of breakfast foods. My first day of "work" last week, I gagged at the thought of making even a cold bowl of the stuff, realizing instead that I had a sharp craving for akpu and ultra-spicy vegetable soup. Perhaps I was a farmer in my former life. So I left for "work" on an empty stomach, and lived to regret it. Since then, I've forced myself to down at least a glass of OJ with whatever itty-bitty leftovers I'm eating. The other day it was a (yes, one) jerk chicken wing from Sweet Mango Cafe; some day before that, I made a bowl of oatmeal and ate three spoonfuls.

But then, on Sunday, I went to Chidi's house. She's a lady I met on the street, on my way to a piano recital. She stopped me with her three bright yellow children, one tied to her back with a bright, red wrapper, and asked me, "How do you take care of your hair?" I was rocking my 'fro, recently released from the twist extensions I had shamefully kept in for over 2 months. Chidi's children all have natural hair because their African-American father insists on it. Chidi, however, is Nigerian and has never in her life had to deal with natural hair so the kids are suffering. I imparted my wisdom, gave her my number should she have any questions and went on my merry way. Three weeks later, she calls to say that nothing is working, so I went over to her house to save the day.

What happened there is a story for another day (and indeed deserves to be told), but the relevant gist is that she was making moin-moin when I got there and gave me some to take home after I was done with the oldest girl's hair (she was an angelic four-year-old who asked me not to come back, but her hair was cute, so whatever). Chidi was a bit miffed that I wouldn't eat at the house, but I had my own hair to twist and it was already 2pm. Plus, I'd given in to my craving and made some hot egusi and pepper chicken the day before that I couldn't wait to dig into. But the next morning, her cellophane-wrapped moin-moin caught my eye when I opened the fridge, and something said, "Eat it."

So I did.

The somewhat annoying smell of sour cheese filled my apartment as I cut into my bean-cakes, but I didn't even notice. As I licked the beans and corned beef off my fork, tasting simultaneously the delectable undertones of dried shrimp and crayfish, I was in heaven. I ate a whole one without feeling even a ripple of nausea, and found that I had more than enough energy to brave the already-sweltering day (DC at 7:30am has 85% humidity and is 25 degrees Celsius), battle fellow workers in the Metro and collapse at my desk, ready to fall asleep once again. So, in the end, it is the food of our ancestors that have, once again, saved the day. None of this mede-mede for me anymore; I'm a "moin-moin for breakfast" kinda gal. Bring on the beans, bring on the eba. So my colleagues will reap the rewards (or repercussions) of my chosen diet; so what? I am hale, hearty and Nigerian and I'm representing for all the people who don't want to be forced to eat bangers, eggs and cereal just because we are forming effyzie in obodo Oyinbo!

I'm gonna have to call her up and ask her to make me some more, freezer-bound and individually wrapped for my weekday morning pleasure.

In unrelated news, I'm published! My first officially published article comes out online today on the Voices of Tomorrow website, including the filmed interview I conducted with Irshad Manji and the clip I was forced to shoot of myself introducing the interview. I'll post a link when I know for sure it's been released, but I couldn't resist the opportunity to bray about my achievement. Yeah, me! I do wish editors wouldn't change so much of the writing though - the article ceases to sound like me at certain points, but beggars can't be choosers, right? And it doesn't matter cuz...it's published!!

I should get back to "work". More later.