Adetokunbo Uchechi Obayan: Avatar Of The Holy Yarn ~By Olugu Orji

Within the first month of my arrival in the exquisitely beautiful campus of the University of Ife in the third quarter of 1980, I had met two irredeemably pleasant characters that went by the same pet name, Toks. 

The first was Cordelia Olatokunbo Odubanjo: singer and Architecture major who was to become the choice bride of Oladipupo Osasona: founder and convener of the Livingspring Music Festival and professor of, among other disciplines, Electrical Engineering.

The other was…well, today’s subject matter. How did we meet? In the halls of residence? Awo Hall? Fajuyi Hall? Angola Hall? 

Was it in any of the gatherings of the Evangelical Christian Union? At the Agric Foyer? In the famed Sports Centre? Fact is, I can’t remember, but with Toks, that would never matter, like many other issues.

It took quite a while before I knew he was studying Chemical Engineering. The day he got around to telling me, it sounded like “Comical Engineering” and my restless mind fleetingly suggested, “Hey dude, that’s what you should be studying!” 

Sadly, that wasn’t on the academic menu so I wound up a mere architect.

Toks took an immediate liking for me as I did of him. No, I take that back because it’s a lie. I actually adored him. Straightway, he took me under his wings; taking me to places and connecting me to people endowed with multiple graces. 

And he told me many stories: stories that when I repeated made me appear older and wiser.

He told of the cross-carrying evangelist, Arthur Blessit who had visited Ife, and showed me the wooded park rendezvous that was later named after him. 

Through him, I became acquainted with one of the nation’s most influential evangelicals, Sidney Granville Elton: a man who rallied youths to purpose-driven praying and focused living.

Toks’ tales inspired faith and hope; pointing to the certainty of the triumph of the gospel enterprise. He showed me the footprints of giants – Emeka Nwankpa, Steve Okitika, Ntiense Inyang, Barine Gbosi and Niyi Beecroft among the legion that had bestridden the Ife landscape. 

If people were compelled to bear their maternal surnames, Toks would simply have been Uchechi Abengowe, but he was an illustriously proud Ogori son whose Igboness was never in doubt. Fact is, you could never recruit him for an ethnic-based crusade. 

Now I remember one of the best lessons he taught me: that wooing a woman should not be such a big deal. I accompanied him on one of such amorous expeditions to the Sports Hall. Manifesto masterfully delivered, we retreated. 

As a faithful disciple, I was to return days later to gauge progress, and that was when Sister B elected to tell me something I assumed Toks didn’t know; something I thought would sway his conviction. 

So I come running up to him panting as I blurted out, “Are you aware of so–and–so about Sister B?” And he casually responds, “Sure!” with a look that said, “And so what?”

In that instant, I knew I was standing before a man who had the ability to see the bigger, better picture. Here was a man who knew what was truly important. His life was always going to tell a story that is bold and true. That’s why Adetokunbo Uchechi Obayan will always be for me, the avatar of the holy yarn.

Years after the Sports Hall tutorial, I was at UCH Ibadan where I nearly rammed into Toks’ kid brother, Bola who had come all the way from Ilorin on a wooing venture like me. Evidently, we were being mentored by the same guru. 

After my well-crafted yarn was thrown right back in my face, like Toks, I say to myself consolingly, “And so what? There’s got to be a lass out there who would believe my report!” And there sure was.  

“So I’ll keep spinning those holy yarns and I should become so entangled in them that it would be impossible to tell me apart from them.” That is the remarkable testimonial of this exemplar of a man. And I dearly desire to end like him.

Olugu Olugu Orji mnia; nnanta2012@gmail.com; oluguorji.wordpress.com  

—