By Blessed Adjekpagbon
 |
Left to right: Blessed Adjekpagbon, Adeniran
Abdbasit Adeyemi
and Abdurahman Muhammed |
There is a magnificent hill standing
like the rock of Gibraltar behind Ebedi International Writers Residency in
Iseyin town, Oyo State, South - West, Nigeria. No Ebedi Fellow had ever climbed
the tough hill to its crest before.
Hence, on the 27th of January 2024,
at about 11:30am, three fellows namely. Adjekpagbon Blessed Mudiaga, Adeyemi
Basit and Abdulrahman Muhammed Abu - Yamam, that are the current fellows of the
2024 First Edition programme of the Ebedi International Writers Residency,
decided to tread on it to the peak. But only one of the fellows succeeded in
reaching the top as the other two fizzled out just before getting to the middle
of the highest peak among the four peaks that adorns the hill. We were
accompanied by the young security staff of the residency, whose name is Mr.
Gideon Shadrach. He is the only person who ventured to climb with me from where
the two others capitulated.
 |
Gideon Shadrach and Blessed
Adjekpagbon on top of Ebedi Hill |
The hill is very long. It lies
latitudinally on the north - eastern side toward the western area of the town.
Its length is approximately five to six miles from the Writers Residency axis
down towards the western part of the town. It has four peaks projecting on its
lengthy topography. The height is approximately up to that of a 30 to 40 storey
building. It is far higher than the tower of the Murtalar Muhammed's
lnternational Airport in Ikeja, Lagos. The tower is like a David or an ant
standing beside Goliath, when compared to the
Ebedi Hill in focus. I have been
to the last floor of the international airport tower before, in 1998, when one
of my friends was the Chief Security Officer of the SSS (State Security
Service), Murtalar lnternational Airport in the days of yore.
As for the hill, you cannot see the
roof of any building in Ebedi Writers Residency and its immediate environment,
except a scanty sight of trees below while at its peak. At the mid-section of
the hill, all the roofs in Ebedi looked very tiny like the cups of
sardine. After that level, they become invisible to the eyes like when an
airplane gets to an altitude in the sky and you can no longer see the houses on
the ground well, or at all. That is on the Southern part of the northern hill..
Its surface is inhabited by shrubs and fairly big and medium height trees,
whose roots holds firmly into the rocky laced soil. The bottom part of it is
the steepest and pretty difficult to climb to a little bit before the
midsection. From the midsection, the surface is gravitationally much better to
climb with steady climb and less energy consuming to the crest. Some stubborn
trees that were disobedient to the command of some powerful winds, were crushed
down at different areas of the hill; as there is a common traditional saying
that, "When the wind blows, all trees must bow. Any tree that disrespects
the commanding strides of a powerful wind, will be crushed down."
However, the northern part of
the hill is embodied with a huge presence of swamp and a large river. From my
assessment as a semi - skilled geographer, l observed that the northern part of
the hill is highly dangerous to descend to view the base where the mangroove
swamp is. It is the source and epic centre of ferocious misty winds that
usually travel from the alluvium swamp to the crest, before descending its
velocity to the southern side of the hill. This upward climb of the wind from
the northern part of the hill and its downward plunge to the southern part of
it, is the reason the southern part is cosy nearly all day long. That is why
any occupant of the residency can hear the touching of the wind on the sliding
windows. It sometimes make curtains to go airborne like birds in nuptial
flight. When you happen to be a fellow at the residency, don't be frightened
when you hear the glasses of the sliding windows slightly shaking, it is the
handiwork of the cool travelling winds from the northern section of the hill,
tapping on the windows, to keep reminding you to write and make sure you
complete your target writing project, before the duration of your stay gets
exhausted.
Nonetheless, centuries of denudation
of the northern part of the hill's topography by wind erosion, has created
adverse effect on it, and makes it very steep unlike the southern side which is
less dangerous to climb without hill climbing or mountaineering tools. From my
observation, it is very rare to see any of the natives climbing or descending
from the hill. This could be because of its frightening view from below. It is
abundantly populated by trees, and tends to make someone think there could be
wild animals living on it.
During my ascent and descent with
others aforementioned, we saw no animal on it. Only birds kept chirping at some
points, as if to question our audacity of coming to their abode.
END
