Online musings

Hey guys! This post is about one of my two greatest passions and that is writing. When I was little I always had an over-active imagination. Some might say that I was in a world of my own. I also used to read a lot of comics, some of which I enjoyed. I thought it was time I put my thoughts to paper and write my own comics. It carried on from when I was in secondary school. Later on I stopped producing comics not least because I am not a brilliant drawer. I decided to continue writing in a script-like format which was part narrative and part dialogue. The story was about a group of agents who would fight crime and prevent natural disasters. It focused on their friendly rivalry and competition with a superhero. I never completed the series and the scripts were really short. Reading them I thought they were rather average and that I could have done better. From 2006 I wrote my first series of longer scripts called Battle of Wits. It was about a group of people fighting demons. The gro...

During my days at university I joined the Afro-Caribbean society. Amongst the events they organised were debates and talent shows. But what if someone came up with the ingenious idea of blending a debate show and a talent show? Well a good friend of mine from uni who also happened to be my one-time flatmate did just that. The result is The Flair Debate Show. Up till now I haven't taken part as I am not much of a public speaker. I usually shy away from these things. Mind you, I won a prize in a speech competition in school. Please note that this is a rare opportunity to big myself up and I sure am grabbing it with both hands! One day my friend invited me to one of the shows. My curiosity, coupled with my support for my buddy, made me accept the invitation. I booked online and paid about £9 for the ticket. On Sunday I went to the event. It took place at the Light E1 Bar which was not far from Liverpool Street station. However it took me half an hour to find it! The topic of the eve...

In the autumn of 2010 I started doing something amazing. "What was that?" I hear you ask.  Well after years of deliberating I finally gave blood. Throughout my life I have been shedding that thick, red fluid of mine. One day I thought that the next time I lost some blood I would have it put to good use. However, my apprehension stopped me and I was in two minds. One part of me thought, "Would I be OK?", "Is it safe?" and the other part thought, "Just think of the many people you'll save." My mind was finally made up several years later when I heard that a colleague of mine who has now left my workplace to go travelling - the jammy get! Ahem! OK. Envy over! As I was saying I learned that my now-former colleague became a successful bone marrow donor a few years earlier. I was extremely impressed and it inspired me to take the plunge and give blood. So I registered and booked my first appointment. I was sent a booklet as well as a DVD which pr...

Hey folks. This is my first review. There are some books that I enjoy reading and then there are others that I really enjoy reading. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddon falls in the latter category. So does the book I read recently. This tome is called Before I go to sleep by S. J. Watson. It is a brilliant book which makes you think as well as root for the protagonist. A close friend of mine recommended the book to me and when I finally got to read it I was intrigued. It is about a woman called Christine Lucas who loses her memory and every time she wakes up her memory is wiped out. I like that it is told in the first person as it makes the readers empathise as well as sympathise with her. She sees a doctor who advises her to write a journal to help her remember things. The majority of the book is written in the form of Christine's journal which makes the book very exciting. What makes the book interesting is that Christine is regarded as an unrelia...

Everyone has an accent. You can tell where people are from by their accents. However this is not always the case. Although I was born and brought up in Liverpool I don't have a Liverpudlian accent. It was made clearer to me when I was at uni and I was asked where I was from. When I answered them they would ask "How come you don't have the accent?" "I don't know," I would reply. Another fact about me that few people believe is my age as I am told that I look younger. I always take it as a compliment and besides you know the phrase! I would describe my accent as Received Pronunciation with a hint of Ghanaian. When I was in Liverpool my family would speak English to me and Twi to everyone else. Moreover I didn't go out that much and I didn't hang around with my fellow Scousers. I wasn't the mingling type. It was no wonder I didn't pick up the scouse accent. I do pronounce words like a Northerner though and on rare occasions I would sound l...

I have a confession to make. I am a quitter. I know that it is contradictory to my last blog but please hear me out. Quitting is sometimes good. I know what you may be thinking. "Is he mad?" "Is he on crack?!" Of course not! After I finished my degree I decided to go on a teacher training course. Goodness knows why on earth I wanted to go into teaching at the time! One contributory factor was that when I was in France I worked as an English Language Assistant. I enjoyed my job and the pupils were really enthusiastic. When I trained as a teacher in Hertfordshire I realised two things. A) I was terrible and B) I began to hate the profession with a passion. I decided that enough was enough and dropped out of the course. Yeah that's right I'm a dropout!  There's something to add to my CV! Although I felt bad at the time I came to realise that I was not a failure and that I made the right decision. I read an article on Metro Focus which advocated the fact...

My father likes to tell stories about our past just like most people. One of them told of when I was a toddler. I was faced with one of the biggest challenges in my life then. My thirteen-month-old self travelled to Ghana. When I returned to Britain I lost the ability to speak. I had language difficulties. I was unable to express myself and as a result I felt withdrawn. My dad took me to a doctor who had little faith in me. He said that I might never speak again. My dad wasn't having any of it and taught me how to read. I then began to read aloud and mastered the ability to speak again with the help of my dad and my speech therapist. Moreover I can understand two more languages apart from English. We all face challenges throughout our lives. In school, in university, at home, at work and during our travels. Married people face challenges, as do parents and everyone else. Challenges make our lives more interesting and give them a purpose. They also make us much stronger people. It...