#INYB3: RODRIGO AMARANTE

Escobar And Inquisition Into Our Humanity

LET'S TALK

Narcos. In 2018, I watched the lauded Netflix series, Narcos. The series was based on the life of the Colombian Drug Lord, Pablo Escobar. From the first episode, I was awestruck by the brutality and evil a man that looked so calm with a wide grin could evoke. By the time he came full circle in Season 2, his character was a mix of evil and good. While he ordered the kill-shot at will, he burnt millions in dollars to warm his cold daughter. But every time, something hooked me about the series: the theme song.

In TV series production, the theme song is essential. It ushers you quietly into what you're about to watch. It's embedded with thematic and artistic directions spiced with images that offers an introductory glimpse into the story. The opening sequence, for example, of Breaking Bad is overlaid with periodic table backgrounded by gritty music. This emphasizing the transition of an high school chemistry teacher (Walter White) into a drug baron.

The Narcos opening sequence was a chilled song. Very passionate, almost like the sound of a lover's ballad addressed to a lover. The sonorously weaved Spanish is made beautiful by the voice. Netflix didn't employ subtitles in its credits. So you're left bewildered as you watch galloping zebras and plenty of slo-mo cocaine clouds rising miasma-like in picture sequence.

I don't understand Spanish. (Except, of course, I Duolingo and Chill). But here was a TV series about a drug Lord who was on the Forbes richest list having an opening song that sounded like a love song. That didn't make sense. It was just not right. I decided to inquire further. It was dark.

Rodrigo Amarante, an accomplished Brazilian singer, wrote the song. When he was asked to write a song for the series, he thought to himself, " what kind of song would Pablo's mum have listened to while raising his son?" After much artistic enquiries, he came up with "Tuyo" (translated as "Yours"):

I am the fire that burns your skin,

Soy el fuego que arde tu piel

I am the water that kills your thirst.

soy el agua que mata tu sed.

Of the castle, I am the tower,

El castillo, la torre yo soy

the sword that guards the treasure.

la espada que guarda el caudal.

You, the air that I breathe,

tu el aire que respiro yo

and the light of the moon on the sea.

y la luz de la luna en el mar.

The throat that longs to be choked

La garganta que ansio mojar

that I’m afraid I’ll drown in love.

que temo ahogar de amor.

And which desires you are going to give me.

y cuales deseos me vas a dar

just to look is treasure enough,

mi tesoro basta con mirarlo,

it will be yours, it will be yours.

tuyo será, y tuyo será.

Reading through, you begin to realise that the sound of the song doesn't go with the new information exposed by the translation. You see words that show brutality, narcissism, and greed. That all that sounded like a lover's language was in fact an invite to evil.

Amarante himself noted,

“The lyrics are supposed to sound like a very in-love, strong man talking to a woman,” he said. “But in the end, it gets more and more intense. You realize that it’s someone saying — the ultimate message of the song is whatever you want, all you have to do is look at it and it will be yours. So, on the surface there’s this generosity and ultimate passion, but what’s underneath is an extreme narcissism."

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Yellow. The sun comes to mind. The brightness of the day. Everyday has its own colours. But, yellow is constant. Now, you're sitting in a bus, a bank cashier. Something about you is obvious. Your tie. We can all see it. We want to hold it but we understand that the day has been just another day. You, battling with customers who walk in with mouth odour demanding to see the branch manager. You, trying to shield your nose. We know one of them asked for your pen today. We know another came in to withdraw his last ₦200 and all you did was give a wicked laugh, dipped your hand in your pocket, and blessed him. Of course, you didn't laugh out loud. You've realised that those with complicated signatures are those with nothing in their accounts.

So, we don't pull you by your tie. We just watch as you, in a Danfo, throws crumpled ₦50 down this road as you buy our Gala relishing the yellow of the bus.

You don't see us. We see you. Everyday.

But, we understand that man never sees beyond what's presented to him. So, we have decided to tell you about one of us.

*************

Chinedu Okarafor came to Lagos from the East with a Bagco sack, two jeans, and two shirts in 2016. Once he arrived, he took the trade of hawking and the street of Lagos. Walking, as Lagosians now do, he bought into the Lagos Dream.

He walked and ran after buses. Because it's on Lagos roads that death lingers, he was sometimes faced with it. He learnt the art of manoeuvring through buses while in traffic. He quickly learnt that paying change fast was more important than selling. That a customer could escape with his Bigi if the bus driver jerks into speed avoiding traffic.

But in everything he learnt, he saw humans. Those who see him running after their buses and just smile at his passion. Those who threw ₦10 down as if to say "I see you, get pure water to wash your head." There were also those who hissed at him. Those in ties who dropped their payment on the road and expected him to pick it while risking being hit by a car. In everything he saw men and their hearts.

Four years down the line, with a monthly revenue of 1 million naira minimum from his hawking business, he's still on Lagos roads, in patched slippers, hearing slurs thrown at him. When asked what he thought, he noted,

How sometimes, out of pity, a consumer throws N50 through the window of a bus, to a sweating hawker in traffic. How they sometimes allow the hawker to have the N10 change, their faces glowing from their apparent generosity. He spoke particularly about Bank Cashiers earning N35,000 monthly looking scornfully at or talking rudely to these hawkers who may as well earn ten times their pay.

******************

Surface. That's the word that defines us humans. How what we know is thought to be what defines the world. Because we don't know better, we are what we know on different occasions.

A girl walks into a restaurant and slaps the waiter who served her the wrong menu. A man in a Danfo is scornful of an hawker. What's obvious is the surface for which we operate. Our humanity is limited by how much we can define what we relate with. The surface defines how we react.

The surface is "Tuyo," the Narcos theme song. A new information changes our understanding of it. What appears to us as simply a love song begins to change meanings upon translation. We realise that the sound of the song is antithetical to its meaning.

Chinedu is written in Spanish, most times. We might not have realised. But look at how a new information changes how we see him. How we define him. An hawker who's a millionaire. We forget his profession. See how we change, how we reverse, how we get down from our Danfo and bow, shouting "Boss, do something for your boy now!" With hands raised to the heavens. See how we translate?

Our humanity is constantly in translations. In progress. A slapped waiter may be the owner of a chain of restaurants including the one (s)he's slapped. When the person who slaps requests to see the manager and the one who's slapped identifies, there's an instant translation. A new information changes us. We want to beg and apologize.

We are constantly forced to ask ourselves, should I respect this human? Should I be human to this human? At what level is his humanness to mine? Then, we act according to our definitions. Our exposure. Maybe, we always need a new information to act otherwise. The cleaner in your office needs to inform you of a side business (s)he does generating millions before you show respect. You start to greet.

Is this how evolution has worked? That humans have to translate themselves to other humans before they become human enough?

I have no answers. I just want to say, "See how the theme song plays? Translate it before some new information is revealed."

Soy el fuego….

ON DESK

1. I started reading a novel about Boko Haram girls that was written by an Irish Novelist, Edna O'Brien. It is titled Girl. You have me to tell you that it is a disgusting and widely inaccurate account of the BBOG. Many reviewers have lashed the book. You know, whites trying to romanticize black suffering and struggle. It's quite annoying.

   

2. I have a new story in the works that should be published soon. I can't really say much but you will be the first to get the news once it's published.

3. On rejection goals #100 rejections, I clocked 8 rejections when another pitch of mine was turned down. This game? Quite hard.

MUSA'S GATE

The CUNT award.

If you know Katie Hopkins, you know the female version of Trump. Only that she's British. She most probably hate you. She hates anyone that's not white or if your face doesn't turn red when touched by the sun.

Anyways, this YouTuber, Josh Pieters, flew Katie Hopkins from Britain to Prague to receive a fake award, The Campaign to Unify the Nation Trophy.

Well, see for yourself.

Okay that's all!

See you on the 25th

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