Jaachi Writes

Have you ever been in a room crowded with people and still felt lonely? The truth is, you can feel lonely anywhere, anytime. I’ve put together a guide to help you feel more connected to those around you. 1. Start small The best way out of loneliness is to start small with some simple social interactions. Try making small talk with the cashier at the supermarket or starting an IM chat via Messange, Whatsapp, Telegram, with a friend. Aye! It might feel super awkward at first, but these small interactions can help you feel less alone and isolated. 2. Hang out with like-minded people What are you into: video games, yoga, writing, music, books? Joining a club is an awesome way to meet and connect with like-minded people. Your school or community centre might run different clubs, so check out if there’s something there that’s right for you. Another option is Meetup. It brings together people who enjoy similar things or activities, whether that be fitness, poetry, photography, tech or, well …

Writeousness: This Is How I Wrote My First Chapbook Whenever you published writers give advice on writing, it almost always includes this: Start to Finish. What they mean is, don’t just start a bunch of writing projects and never finish them.  This is the struggle, because we are prone to getting rather too excited about NEW ideas at the exact same time you get sick of working on the OLD ideas. This shouldn't be. It gets one nowhere. I used to be in this cult of 'off to new goals', leaving old projects half done and unrealized. I would be working on a book project, then of a sudden, a new idea sneaks in, I abandon a solid 20 pages of ten half-thought out books moved to 'revisit folder' (which I never get to revisit) at the very first brick wall of writers block. It’s easy to go, “Well, 'Story A' isn’t going anywhere, so what’s the point? I’ll just work on 'Story Z' instead. Life's too short to expend energy on one project. Go bro! Go!”  How sad! 

Blame the School System for Those Lies Our Teachers Told Us, by John Chizoba Vincent  BLAME THE SCHOOL SYSTEM FOR THOSE LIES OUR TEACHERS TOLD US Blame the school system for those lies our teachers told us in the classroom. Good grades are not what life needs, in reality, good grades sometimes don't take you up there but they condition your mind to one man's idea. Blame the school system for teaching us how to manage other people's thoughts, it never taught us how to think but how to manage and hold on to the thoughts, principles, formula and theories of some men before us.  Why don't you sit down one day and question all these principles and formula and theories you were taught in the school? The school system told our teachers to tell us that in order for us to be successful in life, we'll need good grades that will get us a good and secured job in the nearest future not ideas that will create jobs for us. Blame the school system for those lies our teachers

WRITE ME A POEM (VIII): RUBY she calls me ruby, like the fluid of life that run her veins, she said I am precious stone on which the foundation of her heart is laid she calls me ruby, the jewel that gunned her down, drew her eyes, heart, to it's glistering goodness, and pegged her to affections deep. do you think that arrow is the shooter? doth not the bow play a role assigned it by the arm that pulled orchestrated the shot? she calls me ruby, the hand that trained the bow to carve out a map to her heart, the tomb raider that smashed her defense walls with words wrist from her marrows - every drop evapourates - the jeweler who made a smuttier mesh of tingly symphonies echo in her ears. she calls me ruby, the fountain of love sprayed around the room, creating a mosaic of retro blues, but her ruby follow the faint pathway of unsung songs, contouring into a silhouette in a desert sun, dancing the left-to-right wave of goodbyes, up the heights, down the lows, flash lik

May We Always Remember, by John Chizoba Vincent MAY WE ALWAYS REMEMBER The black cat came again. You know Grandpa told us last time that black cats especially, symbolize evil. When it came, it went towards the shrine. It looked at the tallest wooden goddess, then to the gods at the dark side of the shrine where grandpa usually sit and later to the oil on the wooden bowl. It dipped it's tongue into the bowl and licked the red oil. It looked back and returned to the back yard. I followed it gradually, then, I saw it stood tall and skinny; eyes flashed and terrible. I became afraid. I remembered grandma. I remembered she told us how a black cat appeared in their backyard before the death of her mother. I prayed that nothing happens to any of us.  I was timid. I ran inside and looked at grandpa who was lying on the wooden bed. He was fine. He was breathing fine, although not loud but he was very fine. He had fever in the morning and Chike got some herbs from Ubakala bush f

Our School System Has Failed All Of Us, by John Chizoba Vincent  OUR SCHOOL SYSTEM HAS FAILED ALL OF US One of those places that our school system has failed us is that It never taught us how to manage our finance. Our financial intelligence is one of those things that our glamorous curriculum compilers had failed to include in our school syllabus. We were believed to be omniscient in financial matters. We have so many unemployed graduates out there under the scorching hands of the sun, they are desperately miserable because the school system never taught them how to manage their finance. They were never taught how to make ideas become ventures that could pay them in the nearest future when properly managed. They were never taught how to monetize their ideas to opportunity or rather how to identify money yielding opportunities. The school system failed to teach that idea rules the World and how to manage our Talent to prepare us for the future. Notwithstanding, the school system ha

WRITE ME A POEM (VII): SHARDS contorted by wind, flawed as it is with my breed mere armatures for ice or snow, mere mortal munching incantations of gods unknown, like palm trees resolve to endure for now, the boisterous wind that caress their balls, i bend here, there, everywhere to the musical of the wind then, comes autumn, like leaves, I fall uprooted from the loamy of my heritage, and planted on the sandy surface of foreign cultures, ripped apart, burn to ashes, the indentity of me because, I must be as patient as a toad, lurking in a pool of it's own tears, for that fly, whose mama couldn't instruct how to fly, before he was snatched from her arms, leaving her nipples wet with milk i am broken, and I will break all over again, as the cold reality of yesterday's dreams pierce hard through my skin,  like mosquito bores holes through my soul,  its sharp blade against my throat, muting my cry for help with the puff of what's left of me write me a poem about shards #Pen

QUESTIONING THE ILLUSION OF BURYING THE DEAD IN SOME PART OF NIGERIA Why do people spend much money during funerals? Why do we honour people more when they are dead than when they were alive? We build houses, we re-paint the old house, we repair the Zinc, we build more rooms and repair the damaged toilet and do some other things where as when this gentle man and woman was alive, you could not afford to give him/her one naira to buy drug to get himself or herself treated. On that day when he/she is dead, you kill the fattest cow, you gather the whole bags of rice in Nigeria, you make the whole village bubble in joy of things to eat and those to drink. What happen to this money when this man or woman was alive? Why don't you collect this loan to treat him/her? Why don't you create an opportunity to celebrate him/her? What kind of honour do you want to give him/her in the grave? We are all hypocrites! I grew up seeing things. Things that made me want to lose myself int

A couple nights ago, while chatting with a female friend, she asked to how how I am coping without anyone to talk to, in the neighborhood. I replied: 'I am coping pretty well. Thing is, although I am alone, I am not lonely'. Friend: 'It's pleasing to know that you're not lonely.'  Of course, being alone and being lonely aren’t the same. Loneliness feels draining, distracting, and upsetting; desired solitude feels peaceful, creative, restorative. According to Wikipedia, loneliness is a complex and usually unpleasant emotional response to isolation. Loneliness typically includes anxious feelings about a lack of connection or communication with other beings, both in the present and extending into the future. As such, loneliness can be felt even when surrounded by other people. I do not feel lonely, not because I have a romantic partner to fall back to whenever loneliness beckons. Not because I have a thousand and one friends who drop by to gist, chat, laugh and ta

THE REALITY OF LIFE IS BEYOND THE FOUR WALLS OF SCHOOL If I have to start all over again, I will blame the government with it corrupts system of who-do-you-know before a graduate can get a good job for himself. I'll points my accusing hand towards the private organisations for demanding unreasonable years of experience from fresh graduates before they can be employed. I will blame all of them, yes, because I don't see the reason why they would demand ten years of experience from a person that just graduated yesterday! How would he gain that if not from somewhere? This is disheartening and frustrating to hear or see our graduates pass through this all day long. The demands are getting to serious, many are tired of waiting at home for their calls. Many graduates have committed suicide because of this. How could a country be this weak and frustrating? When is this nightmare going to end?  I will still blame the teachers that told us that great job opportunities await us i

WRITE ME A POEM i'm used to sipping strength from her word smoothie and drawing confidence from her words soothing. my first stage performance is a day whose memory can't self destruct it's that one day I wouldn't forget in a hurting hurry. i was fidgety, palms sweaty, knees knocking my heartbeat could be heard over the public address system. a giant of self-doubt stood before me and made a dwarf of my self-confidence. then i remembered her words "jaachi" she said, "i believe in you. go be useful. you can, find strength in my love" smiles engulfed my trembling lips. like the last droplet of water from a dry faucet, courage dropped on my patched soul, moistened my vocal chord and filled feet with motivational bones. i found my voice and raiser an hallelujah in the wings of love i'm used to drawing confidence from her soothing words. but the frame that house the voice of her words is long broken, dust ridden and left hanging out to rust in a galler

WRITE ME A POEM: STARS AND SCARS write me a poem about stars and scars, would you? begin the second verse about how close to tears it could get when scars, skin deep, bite through the sole into my soul, until i forget to remember to count the stars which still wink at in dark nights though surrounded by the blackness of darkness. in the third verse, tell me how 'twill all be over one day, and remind me again; can one experience happiness without a brief requiem of sadness? can one get so high as though the lows would never surface? would you write yet another verse, the fourth? if yes, make a long line linger along an alliterating alternative universe until the black hole that suck in sweetness appear as a different colour with the texture of rainbow, so at the end of life into the beginning of afterlife, i will remember the days, when close to the edge, a line from a verse of a poem was, like a life line, let down a well To save the shards remainder of me from swirling in the arms

Understanding the Power in Your Writing, by John Chizoba Vincent UNDERSTANDING THE POWER IN YOUR WRITING It is only passion, dream, aspiration and wit that makes life worth living. Even if you find your passion late in life, don't let it go, pursue it with all your being. I have looked for many excuses to live in a world others made for me but, writing said no yesterday. It said no today and will still be saying no to that world until cinematography and writing cinematically create a balance in my craving life. The best person you could be is that person within you. Discover this person that has unique talent; this person that can dream and make a common dream uncommon reality, that one person that won't give up on you no matter how hard the journey seems. Discover this one person and never let go of him. Dare not become a common writer that nobody will employ. Be an influential writer, that force that people won't but only reckon with. That force that takes you be