The lesson not learnt from Oluronbi

For those who do not know; Oluronbi is a popular Yoruba folklore about a woman who in desperation asked an iroko tree for a child and pledged the same child in return to the iroko tree. Well, she did have the child, a girl whom she named Aponbepore and when it was difficult to honour her pledge the iroko tree took the girl away. Now, I am very familiar with this story. I must have heard it a couple of times when I was younger and I count it a privilege to have watched a live musical (written and directed by Mister Rain) about it on Sunday the 19 th of July 2021 at Glover Memorial Hall, Customs Street, Lagos. After the show ended, most of us expressed our opinion on how foolish Oluronbi had been. Why did she pledge a child when others pledged animals and foodstuff? was it out of arrogance to show her friends she was the best or was it out of disbelief that the iroko tree was not able to give her a child? There were many ‘lessons to learn’ with the chief one being don’t make p...