My dearest brother Prince Nazir Ado Ibrahim of the Royal House of the Atta’s in Ebiraland, Kogi state has passed and it has hit me hard.
We grew up together, shared an eventful and rich childhood with many remarkable experiences and went through thick and thin together for 60 years!
I thought we would grow old together and share the memories of our childhood whilst in retirement.
I thought we would comfort each other in old age whilst the world quietly passed us by.
I thought so much and planned so much but alas you are gone!
You were one in a million brother. Always putting smiles on everyone’s faces.
I remember the days of Atta Lodge in Yaba, Lagos, your dear father, the late Ohinoyi of Ebiraland, His Royal Majesty Dr. Abdulrahman Ado Ibrahim’s private house, where we all used to meet with friends and have a great time in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s.
I remember our days in the United Kingdom, at my apartment in Pier House, Chelsea, my fathers “Tower House” in Temple Gardens, Brighton and your father’s massive mansion in Belgrade Square, Belgravia.
I remember the days of Lagos Polo Club, Ikoyi Club and Apapa Club where we used to gather and move around in our fearsome and daring “gang” of wild and adventurous friends!
I remember the boxing and karate lessons we used to have and what a great warrior and courageous fighter you were.
I remember how we were at JB’ s house in a place called Bourdillon near the National Stadium in Surulere, Lagos and police raided the place!
I remember how we fought back to back and shoulder to shoulder together against our assailants whenever either of us was attacked or threatened.
We never lost brother and they never had us down! That is what made our relationship so special. Nothing and no-one could come between us.
We spoke a strange language to one another and we communicated in code and with our eyes.
We walked the dark side together and, by the grace of God, we both survived.
I remember how we learnt to ride horses together and play polo and how we used to both love marking the streets and treading the paths of the rougher sides of old Lagos in flashy cars whilst flexing our hard and crazy muscles.
I remember the rivalries we all had over the girls, I remember the fights with the white boys and the locals, I remember the squabbles we all used to have over the most insignificant things, I remember the love that our band of brothers shared, I remember the numerous controversies we got into, I remember the numerous punishments that we jointly faced from our respective parents for our many wild outings and I remember how we used to go to night clubs like Legends, Tramp, Main Squeeze, Monkberrys and others in London, Studio 54 and Xenon in New York and Princes in Federal Palace Hotel Lagos which was owned by the Dan Princewill brothers.
I remember visiting you in a place called Geneva in upstate New York where you went to University and how we drove to meet our brother Des Braithwaite in a place called Syracuse, where he was at University, again in upstate New York!
I remember your Porsche 928 S and his and mine and I remember how, in the various cities in the world, the police would stop and ask us how we could afford such cars at such a young age.
We laughed them to scorn because they did not know who and what we were and more often than not we served them with hot words and left them with teary eyes and red faces!
That was in the early-1970’s to the mid-1980’s and my goodness we had fun!
Do you remember the wild teenage years that we shared?
Do you remember when we stormed the home of the Adeyeye brothers in large numbers in the dead of the night in a strange place called Catford for daring to make a pass at one of our girlfriends?
Do you remember Layeni Fagbayi, Tonye Amachree and those we fondly called the Kentucky Fried Chicken gang?
Do you remember that pretty, tall, slim, wild white girl with long and jet black hair from the Kings road that refused to leave my apartment?
Do you remember Glenn “the shady character” in Sloane Square and Etan “the fixer” in Hampstead?
Do you remember the Good Earth Chinese Restaurant on the Kings Road, Mr. Chows in Knightsbridge, the White Elephant on the River on the banks of the Thames and in front of Dolphin Square and Mumtaz, London’s best Indian restaurant in St. Johns Wood, all four of where we used to wine, dine and make merry whenever you flew into London from the United States?
Do you remember the Horn of Plenty, that beautiful restaurant in the beautiful English countryside of Devon and do you remember Sloopy’s, the nightclub in Brighton where the Swedish, Norwegian and Danish female students used to flock?
Do you remember Peter Noble, Bertie Wilkins and Charles Draycott, colleagues of mine at Brighton College in the early 1970’s with whom we used to have so much fun and such good times whenever you were in town?
Do you remember the West Pier, the Palace Pier, the Devil’s Dyke, the Pavilion, the Grand Hotel and the Seven Dials in Brighton and the charm and warmth of that beautiful seaside town on the southern coast of England in the summer?
