TALIUS DIKE IS STILL ALIVE!

Hey guys.

I haven't been here in a long while; since last year actually. That's because I've had to divert my time and scarce resources into bettering myself, and I apologize for any discomfort my absence might've caused.

These days, my write-ups can mostly be found on Medium (www.medium.com/@TaliusDike), Instagram (www.Instagram.com/TaliusDike), and Facebook (www.facebook.com/TaliusDike)

If you're a fan of movies and TV series look up this handle @RinzyReviews on both IG and FB, that's the only thing we discss all day, everyday, and I love it. I can't wait to link up with y'all over there.

These days, if I'm not discussing movies, I'm scripting mine, or working on my debut novel.

Cheers,
Arinze Talius Dike
(#TheSummarizer)

Advice To Women

A woman is only as good as the man she beds.

The one she shares her sheet with tells so much about her.

What she likes; What she loathes; How she thinks.

It goes beyond the thrills of skipped heartbeats. The initial attraction;

The fatal feel;

The dreaded seal.

The stench to come, so deep it follows through, the days after.

Things are never the same again after that hour of guilt.

She takes a part of him same way he takes of hers.

But she's mostly ill because emotions take the better part of her.

Emotions begin to cloud judgements;

And in time, all that's left is an empty vessel dwelling in sentiments and regrets.

It's a dangerous place to be.

So, use your head.

#TheSummarizer.

I'm Really Looking Forward To This

I'm really looking forward to this:

A world where people will love one another sincerely;

A world that'll be slow to anger;

A world that doesn't stone first and asks questions later;

A world that doesn't judge easily;

Where discrimination will not be tolerated, and prejudice with respect to race and sexuality uprooted without bias.

A world where freedom isn't only guaranteed before speech.

A world where no one longs to kill for self-gratification.

A world; My world; Our world; This world: can be better. It starts with you and I.

- Arinze Talius Dike
#TheSummarizer

The Power Of Life To Death

At that point she refused to budge, she never knew it'll turn around to her detriment.

She was on top of the world and she loved the feel.

The thrill, the risk, they all worked to amplify her already stroked ego - they contributed to her defeat, her demise.

At the point of death, she thawed. "What a life I lived," she reminisced. Thoughts of her actions and inactions caused her tears to flow freely.

Soon, life fled from her... the stench of regrets filled the air.

At her funeral, the atmosphere was solemn.

'She led a good life,' one of the eulogies read.

But we all knew it was a great lie.

A woman was born with nothing. She grew up, had a name and became mean. She died. And now, a woman has no name anymore; memories are all that's left.

The powers of this world intoxicate; if only we can always remember it almost never ends well.

Be wise!

- Arinze Talius Dike
#TheSummarizer.

My New Age

That I may live always looking forward with the hope of a better future as my drive, and the thought that I have the power to influence it every step of the way

• Life is a journey, not an adventure - I hope to enjoy very well.

If you think of it, life's quite short; too short to hold on to grudges and keep malice. Preach peace!

Should peace no longer be an option, go straight to war. This is because, life's also too short to live cowering under the dictatorship of a fellow man.

• Enjoy everyday as it comes: you may never get another opportunity like it. Take risks, break away from routine and abandon protocols - this way, you'll always discover new techniques to go about old assignments.

• More often than not express yourself. Avoid living life under the shadow cast by another person.

By expressing yourself you stand a greater chance to be heard and getting to proffer general solutions that actually work. With this comes the opportunity to build a larger circle of associates who'll love nothing better than to partner with you.

• Life's too short to remain alone. Go out; meet that fine person meant for you - the nice girl down the street who wants nothing more than to know your name. The calm guy who'd do anything to spend five minutes in the presence of your awesomeness. Fall in and out of love (if need be) because love is the greatest gift of life, it is the purest form of energy that has the capacity to pass through every one of us if we allow it. You owe it to yourself to love, in truth.

• Never deny the world the awesome package that is YOU! You are unique in your own way, made to bring something special to the universe. Never sell yourself short, as incompetent, or uninspiring enough to effect change on subject matters around you. You have the ability to affect your immediate environment and the world at large.

• Never let songs get finished from your lips: Your song is your contribution to the humanity album.

• Take it from me, bless yourself and neighbors as many times as you can. Effect your society by being part of it, not just a spectator but a participator also.

Happy birthday to me!!!

- Arinze Talius Dike.

PS: This was typed two months ago against my birthday. I forgot about it until today. Though four days later than its originally slated premiere, the message remains same.

My Classroom

Today I took time to study my class closely; to look farther into the casual-minds of people I've called mates for some years now, and I came to a conclusion. Let me tell you the story of my classroom.

The many things visible inside my classroom:

• Uchendu enjoying himself peacefully with a bottle of Pepsi at the entrance. Timothy sees him, and runs to beg for a sip. Soon later a mini scene strats. Timothy is laughing loud because the supposed-Pepsi tastes just like Zobo;

•  Amaka, in a circle of her friends - Somto and Gabriella - the clique she always boasts off - they take joy taunting every other girl who isn't in their league: any babe who doesn't dress up to their high standard is an enemy, those who don't dress well and do not worship them either are greater enemies;

• Anderson, who comes to school only twelve times in a semester of which ten are exam days. He suddenly becomes a friend in these days of sudden school interest, and can possibly give me a private jet if only I have the courage to ask. He's best friends with Liz;

• Anwulika, who has vowed to never talk to me again till the day we graduate. This is because she got an E, and I got a D in Maths 301 during our last semester's exams even though we sat together (Please, help me tell her I wasn't the one who marked the paper?) I've tried to apologize but she doesn't want to listen to me, and always uses the slightest opportunity to fall my hand in front of the class;

• The guys - Magnus, Sylvester, Kelechi, Ugo, Nnamdi, and some other department's guys from the next class separated from us by a thin wall, all digging it out with the talk about last night's big match, consoling themselves over their 'casted' bets and the reassurance that the next gamble will be more successful;

• Special shout out to all the department's love birds - you might still make heaven, who knows;

• Chika, the finest girl in the department, the only fine girl I know without a squad, a well known enemy of Amaka and friends because they refused to agree on who's better between them to lead the squad. She's actually beautiful but I don't really care much after that fact,

• Pastor Elijah, the guy everyone loves to avoid: the killer of every atom of fun in the class, always reminding you that Jesus loves you and hence hates your skinny jeans because you're revealing too much of your body's contour - LOL;

• Sister Linda, she complements Brother Elijah, she's the butter to his bread, always sitting with him on the same bench studying the bible with him (He he he!) and going for evangelism together. I wonder what he'd do without her;

• Let's go to the front of my class, 'the den of the geeks from Greece' I always try to do the maths in my head, I try to deduce who's worst off from this squad (they all appear equal), not because I hate them or anything, but because they can't help but look and sound awkward in everything we do in class, their worth isn't known and their happiness not anyone's business until it's time for quiz or worst exams when the entire class suddenly realizes they exist and begs them incessantly for the slightest of answer to not get an F;

• Liz, the self acclaimed finest girl in town, since our first year I've always wondered what's so fine in her, I keep praying that God reveals that hidden truth to me (but until then). Liz (who's full name is Elizabeth, but rejects it because of the stigma from her village people who call her Elizah!), is that kind of girl most of you have met at one point in your life, she's always feeling too fly (Even Amaka and Chika no reach), because she has contested in all the top pageantry around school we won't hear word again, I really hope she understands that all is vanity.

• Before I forget this bunch of weirdos, they always walking together and doing weird things - I suspect they're a cult, but no be my mouth anti-cult go here that suspicion from, God forbid bad thing. Shout out to you all weird gees (Bolu, Red head, Skin-guard, Sandals, and Fanta) I dey hail una, big bosses dem, even though I hope una no read this.

Who I'm I forgetting? Hm-mm ... Should I talk about my lecturers, the strange ones ... maybe some other time.

OK!... Here's my humble class. (I almost forget to say, my course-rep's name is Humble!)

Everyone should be able to relate to this tale: we all have our own Uchendu, Amaka, Anderson and all the rest, it's not peculiar to any school in any particular geopolitical zone, it's a general thing you get when you pack people from different walks of life into a space, they react and respond differently, we should learn to tolerate our individual differences.

Now I understand this, I have nothing but love for my class, and I can't imagine a class without the weird gees, the beauty queen or even the drama queens, they all have their function and destinies,

I love you all, my ever noisy class.
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Wait! Wait! I almost forgot myself and my crew. #TeamSilentGuys, we're the quiet ones, and the most liable to enter heaven out of the entire class, we complement the 'Terry G' in the others.

Now I'm done.

Specially dedicated to Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka,

Pure and Industrial Chemistry Department, Class of 2016/2017.

PS: All characters here a fictional, but I'm sure we all can relate to them
(Tweet @TaliusDike FB: Life Summaries by Talius

WHAT THEY SAY WHEN YOU'RE NOT THERE.

Yes. I've come again.

I believe the title is self explanatory, I'll delve straight into the reasons I decided to talk about this.

The yearly Easter period sees lots of festivities within its dates. As customary, wedding ceremonies take alarming precedence; practically every street has a bride to be during this time. It happened my good friend got married to her long time beau during this year's Easter festivities. I graced the occasion with my one of a kind low-key presence. At the point I sat with a mutual friend I heard lots of things, what people had to say about the young couple.

This particular clique sat behind me spread out to my left hand side. About four of them, three ladies and a man. They were friends of the bride, save for one of them (the ring-leader, a slay mama) who realized midway the ceremony that she also knew the groom. You needed to see the lamentation in her voice - lamentation expertly laced behind clamors of fake-excitement. I could tell they were fake because its my joy uncovering slay-idiots and their misguided way. According to her, the guy used to live across her room at acertain point in his education journey, and she couldn't believe he was getting married.

'Benji, is getting married. It's a lie! Small Benji. Jesus!'

Her wails were endless. I was almost tempted to asked if she had a thing for the guy, or if they once ran a certain package, to stylishly signal my friend to beware of her and wiles she might present in the near unforeseen future. But it later became clear that she was suffering from a case of latent-jealousy.

At first, I am sure, slay-mama Nkoli (let's call her Nkoli), would have been shaken when Ada (let's say that's the bride's name) invited her for the wedding. Girls can be unnecessary covetous even when they don't need the bone of contention. Nkoli arriving the ceremony in all her slay glory and recognizing the groom, and coming to realize that what Benji and Ada share she doesn't yet have, and might not in a long while because she's still slaying, buried strains of jealousy begin to rise up like Christ did. In fact, I think wedding ceremonies should be banned from Easter period; maybe that's the cause.

Anyways, this is the tale of one slay mama/ trap princess/ slay queen/ trap idiot, started to blow her mouth out of proportion. When she realized she was beginning to draw much attention, she ended by praising the couple,

'Both of them are responsible sha!'

And that was when her slay man, or should I saw sugar bobo added his own, 'Responsible people are the ones that make mistake the most.' And that was how another round of gossip started. SMH!

So know, whatever it is, people must talk, and it's not because they care; nobody cares; but because their lives are so empty they hope to fill up the void at that moment by trashing yours. That high feel is temporal, yet mind-blowing. But then, is it worth it?

What do you say at other people's back? Answer this before you start to curse and castigate this slay-mama, or wonder what people are saying at your own back.

- Rinzy Talius Dike

(Tweet @TaliusDike, and @LSbyTalius)

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