Tastes and Tales: Dining Hall Adventures at GCI

My class set enjoyed what could easily be termed as the twilight of the glorious days of GCI, the central dinning hall was still in place and very effective. We ate meals that were worthy of princes. Breakfast was served with either cocoa or tea. Boiled eggs was constant on the menu. We even had corned beef. Lunch came with a serving of fruits. And there was more than enough for everyone. Dinner particularly on Thursdays was a delight. Fried plantain with vegetables. This also coincided with compound work. The junior boys had a field day watching the tussle and bravado and prefects and non prefects showing off their influence.
The athletes table was my personal albatross.
Because I was not good enough in sport I personally nursed animosity towards the beneficiaries of that table. They were simply over pampered.

By the time we got to Form 4 in 1979/80 all these had changed for the worse. Dinning had been decentralized, all those night escapedes to Deles village had stopped. lya Mbe, ase, aop had given way to what was more like anything goes.
It is impossible to capture all the sweet sour memories in any one write up. I remember the Saturday ritual of writing exeat permit, the road work preceeding Inter-house sports in the brutal harmattan.

Source: Gboyega Aofolaju (3191, Swanston, 1976)