Interview With… is a Zikoko weekly series that explores the weird and interesting lives of inanimate objects and non-human entities.
Today on Interview With, we invited Breakfast to the Zikoko office. Heartbreak and Morning Food showed up. Here is our interview with the both of them:
Zikoko: Hello, good morning. Welcome to Zikoko Interview With.
Breakfast: Thank you for having me.
Zikoko: We understand you have a busy morning ahead of you, so we will wrap this up quickly.
Breakfast: That’s fine by me.
Zikoko: In your own opinion, what is the most nutritious breakfast to eat?
Breakfast: Oh, that’s simple. It can be in different forms. For example, finding out that your partner of five years cheated on you is one very nutritious breakfast. A serious talking stage ending in tears is also another nutritious—
Zikoko: Wait a minute. Which breakfast are you?
Breakfast: The heartbreak one.
Zikoko: There has been a mistake somewhere. We invited the actual Breakfast, morning food.
Breakfast: Oh. One of us really needs to consider changing our name.
Zikoko: How did you even come to be called “Breakfast”? What happened to being called good old “heartbreak”?
Breakfast: I am sure you will agree with me that there are some heartbreaks that fill you up like food. You will collect it and be unable to eat. You’ll just be drinking wine or water. In fact, you can even vomit what you did not eat. All because a Yoruba man broke your heart, or you found out that your serious Igbo girlfriend who went home to visit her family actually went to do her traditional wedding. That is when people say, “They have served you Breakfast.”
Zikoko: Omo.
Breakfast: Left to me, I prefer to be called Heartbreak, but when people started telling their heartbroken friends that they have been served “Breakfast” after a serious disappointment, I said let me in come in and claim the name.
Zikoko: But why Breakfast? Why not Lunch or Dinner?
Breakfast: Well, Breakfast is an important meal, I guess. Imagine being heartbroken and telling your friends that you have been served lunch. The friend might even congratulate you on being able to afford a fancy lunch. But when you call your friend at past 9 in the night, shedding hot tears and saying you have been served Breakfast, then the person on the other end of the line will be forced to sit up straight because eating Breakfast at 9pm is very unusual.
Zikoko: Crazy things are happening.
Breakfast: Even Tems cannot deny that she has not eaten Breakfast before.
Zikoko: Wait oh. Me I thought this Breakfast thing meant good news sha.
Breakfast: Are you talking about that video of Ogogo saying, “Gbogbo wa lama je breakfast”?
Zikoko: Ehen now. He said “All of us will eat breakfast, and each person’s time will be different.” So how did heartbreak enter this thing?
Breakfast: My brother, this is Nigeria. Good news is scarce. But everywhere you turn, heartbreak is waiting to French kiss you.
Zikoko: No, but—
Breakfast: Listen, Ogogo probably meant it as good news, I agree. But come to think of it, all of you will also eat the breakfast of heartbreak, and each person’s time will be different. Just like the angel of doom is knocking on everybody’s door, I, Breakfast is going round and round the earth too, looking for who to feed.
Zikoko: Let me close my mouth before I taste you.
Breakfast: A closed mouth is a closed destiny, don’t forget that.
[Door opens and the actual Breakfast enters]
Actual Breakfast: Sorry I’m late oh. I was delayed by one family.
Breakfast: Could it be that they served Breakfast to you, Breakfast?
Actual Breakfast: Who be this one?
Breakfast: I am Breakfast, the heartbreak edition. Pleased to make your acquaintance.
Actual Breakfast: Please, I am not making any useless acquaintances. I need to rest. I have had a long and stressful morning. Are you Zikoko people doing this interview or not?
Zikoko: Yes, yes, we are still doing this interview. Heartbreak Breakfast, you can leave, please. We have had enough of you.
Breakfast: I will go. [Exits]
Actual Breakfast: See as e be like wetin I no know. Say na pleased to make your acquaintance. If you don’t leave here with your foolish English.
Zikoko: Erm, is this a good time? You sound a bit cranky…
Actual Breakfast: Why will I not be cranky? No, answer me. How will a respectable human being wake up and decide to eat Semo and Okro as breakfast? How? And it’s not even fresh Semo, it’s leftover Semo the person warmed.
Zikoko: Oh wow.
Actual Breakfast: If you know what my eyes have seen in the hands of Nigerians all in the name of eating morning food, you will join me to weep. Some people will decide they want to eat Breakfast by 12 p.m., when I’m supposed to have finished my morning rounds. They will now summon me again. Why not just hold the hunger and eat your lunch by 2 p.m.?
Zikoko: Is there an official timetable stating that lunch must be by 2pm?
Actual Breakfast: Please don’t ask me foolish questions. Knowing your type, you probably eat breakfast by 1 p.m.
Zikoko: Oh not at all.
Actual Breakfast: I don’t even care. I just want you people to do better. Two or three slices of yam, fried egg and a cup of tea is decent. But if some Nigerians have not served a three course meal, they are not satisfied. Breakfast, but you people are serving eba and draw soup with shaki. You will finish eating, only to go and sleep at work or enter traffic to fight.
Look, sorry I’m ranting. I guess I am just having a bad morning.
Zikoko: It’s okay. This is a safe space, let it all out.
Actual Breakfast: Thank y… Oh great. This person that ate Semo and Okro is already calling for milk and Milo.
Zikoko: They want to drink tea after eating Semo?
Actual Breakfast: Now tell me why I shouldn’t be angry.
[Actual Breakfast walks out angrily]
Zikoko: Toh. They have served you too Breakfast.
[Door slams]
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