“It’s today, the presentation is today.” that was the first thing on my mind when i woke up 

A little backstory: our program had originally been assigned to portray the Fulani culture, but many of us weren’t excited about it. So, after some back and forth, we agreed on Gbagyi culture. Rehearsals kicked off almost immediately. As expected, not everyone showed commitment to it. A few of us took the lead, meeting daily to plan and rehearse.

The presentation would include a brief showcase of the Gbagyi history, greetings, food, dressing, and values. I was one of the two guys chosen to dance, something I wasn't so excited about but did to balance the equation. The other was Godfrey, he was the OGG: Original Gbagyi Guy so he had no choice. We picked a song that was such a banger. Chioma and Miracle expressed that "Normally gbagyi song dey get vibes" and they were right; we caught the vibe instantly… maybe too much, because we started forgetting about cultural accuracy.

Soon, there were disagreements. Some felt the song didn’t reflect the Gbagyi tradition. Tension rose. For a moment, it felt like the presentation might fall apart. But somehow, we pushed past it. Every time things got tough, someone would yell, “Gbagyi to the world!” and energy would fill the room again.

The night before the presentation, Saskay and I stayed up late trying to merge our selected songs into one track, but it didn’t work out, so we scrapped it.

“That morning, I got prepared and headed to the faculty. After classes, we waited for the presentation set for 3 pm. When they announced the location was Cov Ground, I started feeling nervous about dancing in public. So did many of my course mates. But we were ready. Or were we? Ruth had not arrived with our costumes and our secret weapon and time was running out, we decided to go there and wait for her to arrive.

At the venue, I saw the other programs at every corner in their costumes doing final rehearsals and started feeling intimidated but that was just me, I took it as a competition. Ruth arrived with the costumes and the secret weapon, I took them to get dressed and wait till their presence was needed while the others went to put on their costumes.

After we finished dressing up and doing a little traditional makeup, then came the pictures. Everyone took at least 3 pics before we went back to Cov Ground. When we got there, the hausa culture were already presenting. 

"Omo our own better oo" said Happiness, the lead dancer and other OGG: Original Gbagyi Girl. There was no exact list on who performs before who so we chose the sixth spot. The Yoruba culture did a drama that had a cultural dance in it, the Ibibio culture had a simple but graceful performance. By then some some of my course mates had sprung into action and started filming the presentations as we had to document it after all. Our turn finally came and it was time to unlock the secret weapon - guys dressed in traditional gbagyi hunter attire called "abache"  that revealed their bare bum and as we walked on stage, the crowd erupted " Woo! Whoa!!, OMG!" It was chaos, sweet chaos

We introduced ourselves and gave our short presentation. Then I hit play. We danced back in and took our positions as the main song started. The vibe took over again, but this time we stayed focused on accuracy while still enjoying ourselves. The hunter guys moved around the stage with their bows, arrows, and even a gun. The speaker wasn’t as loud as we hoped, so the sound didn’t carry well. It was a letdown. But still, we were grateful that it happened better than expected.

We danced off the stage, and the next group came on. My heart was racing again, but this time from pride and excitement. We regrouped on the side, laughing, hugging and taking more photos with the hunter guys who were enjoying the attention and still expecting their pay.

Sitting back now, watching the final acts, I had a thought of us jumping in front of a sunset and screaming "Gbagyi to the World!".