Childhood myths; yay or nay?

This article has been sitting in my draft since last week and I finally decided to write on it today. It was during the recent power outage in my city and I was playing football with my friends when my girlfriend noticed ripe pawpaw (papaya) on a tree close to our fence.

My friends succeeded in plucking it and two kids helped us to retrieve them from the next house. The mother of the kids then told my girlfriend that since she will be eating pawpaw, then she should stay away from soft drinks throughout the day (specifically Fanta). After hearing that, I started thinking about all of the myths I have heard during my childhood and I wondered if there was a truth to them.

1. Pawpaw (papaya) vs soft drinks (Fanta).

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I am not really a fan of pawpaw and I don't like eating it right from childhood but I can remember my mom strictly warning my siblings never to drink Fanta after eating pawpaw because they will end up dead. The argument was that pawpaw and soft drink when combined are very deadly.

The one that is even more popular and widespread is mango vs Coke or Fanta. It's the same as the pawpaw case above, and it's said that both of them should never be combined. But is that true? Definitely not! 😀 I believed it a lot when I was a kid but as I got older, I find out it isn't true because I have mistakenly tried it a couple of times.

And also, there's no medical evidence to support this claim that mango or pawpaw and soft drinks combo could kill. Mango contains ascorbic acid like most fruits, so what specifically is in mango that will combine with coke to form a poison? 🤔 I have seen people that took soft drinks after taking mango and nothing bad happened to them. So yeah, it's just a myth 😉

2. Coconut water is bad for kids

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I don't know about people in other parts of the world but in Nigeria, this was a very well-known myth that was very popular during my childhood. I remember my parents will always drink the water inside a coconut when they have opened it and when I ask for some, they tell me that kids shouldn't drink it because it will make them dull 😆

I believed them a lot and I stayed away from coconut water because I don't want to end up reducing my intelligence (but I guess my intelligence did reduce for believing in that sh*it 😂). There's definitely no relationship between coconut water and a kid's brain, if at all it will even contain nutrients that will nourish the brain.

But I guess my parents wanted the coconut water all to themselves, hence they came up with that lie 😆 But I believed them because other adults around also said the same thing. It was like they all held a meeting to come up with that lie, it worked for years. But later on, I just damned the consequences and started drinking the water.

3. Throw your teeth on the roof

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This one is very funny and I believe most of us in Nigeria have heard it before. Whenever a person's milk teeth fall off, they are told to throw them on the roof or else new teeth won't grow back. I did it for years and whenever a tooth falls off, I quickly throw it on the roof.

My mom even told me something even crazier; that throwing one's tooth to the roof will give it access to lizards who takes the tooth and gives the person a new one (I guess our tooth fairy in Nigeria are lizards 🤣). I thought about it one day and just concluded that it's very absurd and not true. Till today I still don't know the reason why teeth have to be thrown on the roof.

4. When your right hand itches you, money is coming.

To be continued...

Thanks for reading 💖💖💖

Monday April 4th, 2022