Interview With… is a Zikoko weekly series that explores the weird and interesting lives of inanimate objects and non-human entities.
Nigerians have a love-hate relationship with beans. It takes too long to cook, that’s a fact. It has been said to make people grow taller, that’s one hypothesis we are yet to try out. But is beans also responsible for a number of offences like making people purge and having smelly farts?
Today on Interview With, we spoke to Raw Beans, Baked Beans, and Ewa Agoyin to get their sides on the matter.
[Ewa Agoyin walks in first]
Zikoko: Hello Ewa Agoyin. Welcome to the Zikoko Interview With session.
Ewa Agoyin: Thank you.
You are a bit early. We have to wait for Raw Beans and Baked Beans. They are on their way.
Ewa Agoyin: Ah, can you please interview me first so I can go my own way? It’s past 6 in the morning, and there are people waiting for me with their plates. In fact, my best friends are outside the door. I told them I had an interview here, but that it would not take long.
Who are these best friends?
Ewa Agoyin: Yam and Bread. We have been friends since childhood, and people like to eat us together. In fact, we are so close that we cannot stand alone.
Or you cannot stand alone…
Ewa Agoyin: What do you mean?
I’m saying that people can eat bread with other things, same with yam. But if there is no bread or yam with Ewa Agoyin, then you have no purpose.
Ewa Agoyin: It is you that will have no purpose. Wait a minute, did you call me here to insult me or interview me?
No, I—
Ewa Agoyin: Do you think it’s easy to come all the way from Togo and still make a name for myself here in Nigeria? Go and ask about me oh. Married men and women will wake up in the morning and hold their plates, waiting for the people that hawk me.
If you think I have no purpose, wait for an Ewa Agoyin seller to disappoint you. Just let her not show up when she usually does. It is that day you will know that I am greater than cocaine. Very soon, there will be an Ewa Agoyin rehab. You know who will be admitted there?
Who?
Ewa Agoyin: People who cannot go a day without eating Ewa Agoyin, and people who lost their minds when their Ewa Agoyin seller refused to show up at the regular time.
So what you are saying is—
[Raw Beans walks in]
Raw Beans: Who lost their mind?
Ewa Agoyin: No, we were talking about something else.
Raw Beans: Ehn, I know. That’s why I am asking.
Hello, Raw Beans. We are pleased to have you.
Raw Beans: Abeg, can I get a cup of water?
Sure. Here you go.
[Raw Beans gulps the cup but still remains hard]
Raw Beans: Oya, Ewa Agoyin, answer me. Who lost their mind?
Ewa Agoyin: Please move your chair back a bit. Since you entered this office, you have been dropping chaff, weevils, and small-small stones. Didn’t you shower before coming here? How do people even eat you with all this dirt?
Raw Beans: Sorry oh, Togosian. Because you came from Togo now, you are the overall best in cleanliness, abi?
Actually, it’s Togolese.
Raw Beans: Please and please. I will call it whatever I want.
[From outside: Ewa Agoyin dear, we are waiting for you]
Ewa Agoyin: I’m sorry, Bread! I’ll come join you soon.
Raw Beans: Shior. Nonsense and copulation. Interviewer?
Yes?
Raw Beans: Ewa Agoyin told you that he’s just friends with Bread, abi?
Yes, that’s what I was told.
Ewa Agoyin: Because that’s the pure truth.
Raw Beans: You can lie to other people, but please don’t lie to yourself. You people are calling yourselves friends but you are sleeping with each other.
Ewa Agoyin: Isn’t that what you people do in Lagos? He’s my best friend, she’s my best friend, but you people are entering each other’s secret places. What is bad if I do the same?
Raw Beans: Oho, the truth is coming out. Keep going, there’s more where that came from.
Ewa Agoyin: You want to hear the truth? We are in an open polyamorous relationship, all three of us. It is why Yam can sleep with you and still go and sleep with egg. It is also why Bread can sleep with you and still come back home to me. It is—
Sorry, sorry. We eat you people. Could you please not make this awkward by telling us about your sex life? We are fine with seeing you all as food items.
Ewa Agoyin: Then tell Raw Beans to get a life and stop policing my movement.
Raw Beans: You must think you are very important in the grand scheme of things. All because of a Togosian passport.
TOGOLESE.
Raw Beans: Listen to me, I be your mama oh. I’m your Moh-mie. Whether they cook you for 8 hours or more, you are still beans. You hear me? It’s just the stew that makes you think you are different. And you know what? Yoruba people are already closing in on your secret. Once they perfect how to make that sauce, it is over for you. Interviewer, can I please get another cup of water?
Sure. Here you go.
[Raw Beans gulps the water and still remains hard]
Ewa Agoyin: It will not be over for me in the mighty name of Jesus. And let Yoruba people perfect the sauce first. When they do, we will revisit this conversation. Interviewer, am I done here?
No, we—
[Baked Beans walks in]
Baked Beans: Hiya lads!
Hello, Baked Beans.
Ewa Agoyin: Hello.
Raw Beans: How are you?
Baked Beans: I’m good. Lovely weather innit?
Yes, yes.
Ewa Agoyin: Wetin be this?
Raw Beans: The weather is good, but it’s not our concern.
Baked Beans: Oh, bummer. Thank you, mate.
Raw Beans: I am not your mate. If we look at it well, I collected like 10 good years from you.
Um, Raw Beans, I don’t think Baked Beans means it that way…
Baked Beans: [Stares in surprise]
So, thank you all for being here. We brought you in to address some rumours. As soon as we clear the air, you all can go back to your daily businesses.
Ewa Agoyin: Please keep it short.
Raw Beans: I agree.
Baked Beans: Oi, mate! Sorry to interrupt you. Can I get a bo-ou of wooa?
Sorry?
Baked Beans: A bo-ou of wooa.
Oh, a bottle of water. Here you go.
[Raw Beans and Ewa Agoyin exchange glances and burst into laughter.]
Baked Beans: Is there a joke I am missing, lads?
Sooo. Raw Beans, Baked Beans, and Ewa Agoyin, this question is for you all.
Raw Beans: Say it.
Why are you deceiving people?
Ewa Agoyin: In what way, please?
People believe eating beans will make them grow taller. And so they eat you people a lot. With bread, garri, yam, plantain, rice, but they never grow taller.
Baked Beans: Maybe they were never meant to be tall, you know?
Ewa Agoyin: Ah, thank you oh.
Raw Beans: This is the first sensible thing Baked Beans has said today.
Baked Beans: [Spits out water] Are you facken schewpid?
Okay, okay, let’s not fight. Please just answer the question.
Raw Beans: Sorry, Baked Beans. I didn’t mean it that way, the same way you too called me your mate and the interviewer said you didn’t mean it that way. By the way, Baked Beans, I hope you know where you are really from? This your English accent, hmm. You are a Native American oh. If you like keep joining body with the colonisers. When it’s time to fight, they will pack their own people and dump you like hot shit.
Baked Beans: Oh bloody hell.
Raw beans: Back to your question, interviewer. Let me tell you, someone that is meant to be short will remain short. If the person likes, they should eat one drum of beans, what will be will be. And really, can we please leave beans alone? Any small thing, “Beans.” You mess, it’s beans. You purge, it’s beans. You grow tall, beans. You don’t grow tall, beans. Can we be allowed to drink water and drop cup?
Sorry about this, but—
Raw Beans: Please give me another cup of water, please.
Sure. Here you go.
[Raw Beans drinks the water but still remains hard].
Ewa Agoyin: For me, the worst thing is when people come out to say they don’t eat beans because beans looks like shit. Me, I just hiss and ignore. I’m a fine babe; beans are cuties. If you think we look like shit, you need to get your eyes cleaned.
Raw Beans: And you should talk to those people that cook beans with sugar. Why do they want to kill me before my time? Am I not sweet enough? Now, they will complain that their fart smells, or that they are purging.
So you admit that you are responsible for smelly farts and making people purge?
Raw Beans: Not always. Some people need to take deworming medicine.
But wait. Why does gas finish when they use it to cook you?
Ewa Agoyin: What kind of question is this one?
Raw Beans: You too, why are you using gas to cook beans? Gas is not man enough to handle me. You want me to be soft and weak? Find me a man who can sustain the pressure until I give it all up and surrender.
Baked Beans: Erm, is this Fifty Shades of Grey? Are you into BDSM? Is that it?
Ewa Agoyin: No. Thirty-five shades of moi-moi.
Baked Beans: I’m just going to say this: I do not share the same realities with these people, I’m sorry. I grew up outside Nigeria, I have a foreign degree, I feature in ENGLISH breakfasts, so maybe I’m not the right interview subject? Plus, these people stink, ugh.
[Baked Beans walks out]
Raw Beans: It is your mother that will stink, you soggy beans!
Ewa Agoyin: Um, going by what you told me earlier, are you not the mother of baked beans too? Does this mean you are the one who actually stinks?
[Ewa Agoyin runs out]
Raw Beans: Interviewer, please give me a cup of water first.
The ones you have drunk are enough. Please be going, we need to sweep the floor.
Raw Beans: Wow. Nice one, nice one. Please don’t insult me sha. I will go.
[Raw Beans walks out. Zikoko carries broom and packer to sweep weevils, chaff, and small-small stones from the floor].
Check back every Friday by 9AM for new Interview With episodes. To read previous stories, click here.
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