More Than Strange

They named the elementary school compound as the avenue. Why they chose the interior village, no one knows. One thing Anthony has found out is that humans seem not to know what they really want. Those dwelling in the rural areas ogle city life and those in cities ogle rural areas. Human nature had been asking questions discreetly to know the reason behind such without success. He pegged it to humanity sickness. What they have doesn't move them, what they don't have draws them like a magnate even though that is too inferior to what they have.

On the day of the meeting, he woke early to prepare for the meeting. The boys they employed just sent out fliers and there is no way they will know the numbers coming. Anthony doesn't believe many will be answering such a call. I mean, this is Christian region and people are prone to thinking how he and his friend do.

The elementary school was cleansed, the pit toilet they used was washed, scrapped and ready to be washed again once the school classes were over that day. They had paid two local middle aged ladies that were more than happy with the little change they paid them to clean the toilet and they did more than good work of it according to his estimation. 

He and his friend Jonathan had been arguing on the WHY of the reasons behind what had been happening to them for long now. Infact, Jonathan doesn't even know that his friend Anthony suffers the same faith or entertains the same thought. Anthony had been wondering why everything he thought of and put down in writing, believing he was the first person to have thought of the same thing only for his research to turn up the same topic having been written about over twenty years earlier and points enumerated almost the same. In fact, this phenomenon has been happening for as long as he could ever recall. He first noticed that seven years ago. To think that he never read anything of such nature before writing his down and yet, after laboring over such an article to come up with about 1k plus words, only to find out after wasting his data that someone has written on the same topic decades back. 

Jonathan was having a similar experience but on a different wave. His own problem is that he is becoming afraid to write any dreadful things or rather anything that warrant injury, pain or death being in it for anytime he does something like that, it always happens in almost similar ways either in their village or another within their town within a month. Infact, some had been asking why he asked certain kinds of dreadful questions about the injured or the dead that he has found a way of couching it in intelligent ways that have stopped eliciting certain kinds of questionable glances and direct questions he is tired of answering and attracting unnecessary attention. 

They had sent out fliers to the nearby cities and rural towns on the issue and put it in the form of mystery from abroad and asking anyone with knowledge of the issue or have such an ability to attend. They had spent two months doing all manners of odd jobs to raise the money prices listed on the ad they sent out. "At least, such will attract some crazy ones that are after the pay" Anthony said with a smirk on his face while eyeing Jonathan. " Yeah some, will for real, some for the money. Just expect 80% to be here for the money while 20 for the knowledge"  

They had chosen  Wednesday as the D-day not for the weather or any other reasons but for the middleness of the day in the week. People seem to be on the roll on Wednesdays more than any other day. They had met with the headmistress of the Chuka Memorial Primary school and informed her two weeks earlier of their desire to hire the venue that very day and after hearing the reasons had asked them lengthy questions and invited herself for the topic intrigued her. "Do you two really experience such  things or is it just your way of milking information?" She asked, eyeing both like snakes.

She had asked Jonathan to let her in on the dead after each of his writings. Had Jonathan not known well to do quick calculations to know if anyone has ever died in her family or related by any means to his writings, he would have dismissed her query with laughter and waved her off with 'it's one of those young men things' but he narrated her experience with few away connections to it.

Wednesday afternoon saw them make an early trip there to deliver water to the two ladies who were stand-by to wash the toilets once the school closes by twelve.  But the headmistress had closed the day off around fifteen to eleven when he saw about fifty unknown faces sneaking into the compound. He was surprised just like the two organizers that up to that time had believed no one was coming. When they saw those faces, they were amazed. Not all were even young people they were expecting, they were some in their fifties and thirties.

When they had with the help of some senior students arranged the chairs and tables and many were still creeping into the venue from god knows where, they concluded that the school hall might not be able to accommodate those people. 

The headmistress was the one that chaired the occasion with a few senior teachers she asked to be around. Their presence and maturity gave the gathering a kind of importance that would not have been there had the two young organizers handled the issue on their own. Her experience from attending various meetings of every kind brought the experience needed into the event that doesn't have an agenda written down. She drafted it offhand and many were narrating their experiences here and there and suggesting reasons of every kind the two senior teachers with her were jotting down. 

At the end of the occasion, the woman told them that their contributions and suggestions will be aired on the state radio station. Some that were recording the whole events on their smartphones were asked to wait a little after the event. It never occurred to them to get minute taker let alone a cameraman to do the recording. They had believed it was the queer that would grace the occasion and hence the few money they had promised in their fliers only to be swamped by many educated and organized people. The topic from what they had been talking of were in their minds for long.

Some contributors were leaning on the side of religion. Connecting the incidents to coincidence that it had happened to them too and then, suddenly stopped. Some were saying it's a sign that they will do spiritual work in the near future that their uncles and aunts were experiencing the same phenomenon while young but now all were well known herbalists and seers. Some claimed that it's a sign that something happened in their lineage down the line that they will soon start experiencing the happening in their families. Contributors were overflowing and the headmistress lost herself in the gathering trying to rein in the eager contributors.

 The whole thing came to the end after five healthy plus hours and the headmistress had more ideas in her head. She even had an economic aspect in mind from the way she was going about the airing and broadcasting of the event in both the radio and the TV and the two organizers were eyeing hundreds of thousands if not millions they never budgeted or anticipated in their young lives if everything the woman is saying comes to pass without a hitch.