The fire was ignited on Good Friday by my close friend who decided to share a broadcast to our "alma mater" high school group chat, I kindled the fire by expressing my surprise that the dormant group chat was still in existence.
Others joined too and from one message, it turned to hundreds of messages. And currently the fire of messages is still burning since Friday the number of messages (in different forms, pictures, text, voice note) must have been more than two thousand.
It seems we have all missed one another as it been six years since we all graduate from high school.
Now we are all scattered in different fields and works of life, some are in tertiary institutions (like me), some have graduated from tertiary institutions, some are now married, some have given birth to kids and some didn’t think of furthering their education and some are working in companies or are into business of theirs.
Oh! Tempus fugit! (the Latin expression for; ‘time flies’ ). It all seem like yesterday when we were young teens receiving classes together, but now we are all adults.
When the group chat was still dormant we were not up to thirty but now a lot of people have been added, as a result we have more 55 people in the group chat. Everyone is confused as we all ask; "oh who is speaking", and we decided to share pictures to help remember one another and clear the confusion.
Sincerely speaking it is fun and exciting chatting with those former high school colleagues once again. Few of us see ourselves sometimes especially those who still live in the town our high school is situated or those who are studying in the same institution.
Apart from being exciting, the online reunion is actually an eye opener as you get to see different things my mate are into. Some have a particular skill and they are very good at it now.
For example we have a software engineer in our midst who specialize in data analysis and artificial intelligence. Sometimes when I look at what some of my mate have achieved I feel disturbed, envious (not in a wrong manner) and feel piteous.
But I was brought to my right senses when someone reminded us of a colleague of ours; a very jolly guy who was in art department. This lad "kicked the bucket" more than 2 years ago. Then I ask myself why do I feel so bad or sad. I realize that being healthy and alive is something to be grateful. (This just a reminder that not every of our set is still alive)
The scammer party
I noticed from the reunion that some of my former classmate have become rich. Most of them who are rich have not gotten their wealth in a legit manner that one can be proud of.
Many of them (most especially the guys) are into what we know as "yahoo, yahoo" (a local slang in my country for internet fraudster.)
Internet fraudster is becoming a norm in my country, many use the "lack of jobs" (a cock-and-bull story) as a pretext to get into it. Young boys and men that are involved in fraud these days don’t even hide it anymore. They all flaunt their wealth in public, they wear the hottest and nicest clothes, they use the most expensive phones. It a common thread, that even ladies these days want to date or marry a yahoo boy all because of money and materialistic possession.
This raise a cause for alarm because if you ask anybody, they all know one person be it a friend, a family member or an acquaintance that does fraud.
Bad image
This internet fraudster gives the country a bad image, sometimes when someone online ask what country am I from. I feel shy to say, due to the image these fraudulent individuals have painted about the country
This bad image is making many talented youth lose a lot of opportunities as many international companies don’t want to hire or employ a Nigerian, or some certain payment system are not supported in the country.
Just yesterday while I was viewing one of my friend's whatsapp status I came across a TikTok video showing the ranks of the top ten countries with the most scammers.
As you can see from the screenshot my country; “Nigeria” was ranked on top.
What you should know
I want to tell everyone reading this, that not every Nigerian is a scammer. Nigerians are very intelligent and hardworking people, we have people that have contributed immensely to the development of the global world in different sectors ( I'll probably write an article about great people that are from Nigeria)
Remember that every country on earth has its share of good citizens and bad citizens. Don't let the actions of the bad citizens cloud your mind and make you prejudice a particular nationality🧏
Scams are everywhere. We just have to be vigilant.
Good for you that you had time to catch up with your former classmates.