December 19, 1993, was unlike any other Sunday in Lagos. The air was thick with the scent of harmattan and the promise of Christmas, yet beneath the surface, an uneasy silence stretched across the city. The streets, usually bustling with traders and restless danfo drivers, carried a tension that was hard to ignore. Nigeria was holding its breath, caught in the grip of uncertainty after General Sani Abacha’s hostile takeover. The people had seen power change hands before, but this time, the fear was palpable.
But within the Okunloro’s compound, the atmosphere was different. There was no talk of politics or power struggles, only whispered prayers and anxious glances exchanged between midwives. At Ayike Hospital, my mother clutched the sheets, her body wracked with exhaustion, but her face radiant with something beyond pain. Nine months earlier was March 19, my father’s birthday, he had celebrated the purchase of his second car and first property, unaware that the rumble of that night’s celebration would set in motion a different kind of legacy.
Two months later, my mother had mistaken the first signs of my existence for nothing more than a fever, a passing flu. But now, on this December morning, beside her lay a 7-pound boy, swaddled in warmth, his lips curling into a smile as though he already knew the world would never be the same. No one could have predicted the storms he would bring, the laughter he would command, or the weight of the name he would carry.
I sat there, looking at my mother, her face still wincing from labor yet glowing with something deeper—relief, perhaps, or destiny unfolding in real time. For nine months, I had been tucked away inside her, not unlike Jonah in the belly of the great fish, waiting for my moment, waiting for the world to know my name.
And this was only the beginning.
You’re writing your autobiography. What’s your opening sentence?
Michael Okunloro | Elevate Your Style 