ETP Takes: #HJO2020!

Hey loves! My journey with this blog started 5 years ago thus you guys don’t know much about my pre-medical school experiences, so today I’m going to share a little on my UK secondary school (I went to two secondary schools in two different countries).

I had just been brought back to London after three years of boarding school in Nigeria (JS1-JS3/Year 7-Year 9) and I was placed in year 9 because that was the age appropriate class, as I had skipped year 6 in primary school.

Joining a UK secondary school as the new girl who’s kind of more Nigerian than the others as she had just come from Nigeria, but was also British, was a confusing time. The first time I saw a student shout back at a teacher I actually gasped. Such could never have happened in my Nigerian secondary school lol, if you looked at certain teachers the wrong way you were going to get whooped, not to talk of actually raising your voice. So I was going through a lot of culture shock and I needed help readjusting without going to far as imbibing bad behaviors all in the name of “trying to fit in”.

That’s when I met my friends who became my sisters, Hannah Brown and Perdita Klingbeil. Hannah is my Jamaican sweetheart who came with all the best hair advice, girl talk, outfit ideas for non-school uniform days – you name it! Perdita is my Ghanaian spice with all the crazy that never let people mess with us! She protected us like a mother bear, fostered our bond and we became inseparable. They helped me acclimatize and accepted me in a time when image was such a big deal; we were teenagers after all. Some time later, Isata Bah from Sierre Leone joined the school and I had the privilege of welcoming the new black girl to our group as the former new girl, so it was easy to see how we all just gelled. We all studied together, prayed together, chilled together and when graduation time came – we all succeeded together.

Last day of secondary school! Sign out day haha

Secondary school prom!

Ten years on from finishing secondary school, we had our first wedding! Hannah had her traditional engagement and she married a handsome young Nigerian man – so the first Nigerian wedding of the group was for the Jamaican 😂🙌🏽

My Hannah ❤️

I’m so happy for my sister, we’ve come a long way, we did our undergraduate studies in different countries but still the love remained over the years. It was great to get to have a secondary school reunion and we certainly had so much fun!