Upper class

Who are the real upper class? Are they the people that throw parties every weekend or the people that drive around in the most swanky cars? Are they the people that hoard obscene amounts of money in various accounts scattered around the world? Are they the people that live like kings and queens? Are they the people in government pocketing silly amounts of money?

I couldn't sleep last night. Those questions swam around my head. I know both my grandparents and parents are upper class but does that make me upper class by default? I also know that my parents do not hoard obscene amounts of money in accounts all over the world. "New money, upstarts and opportunists" are words I grew up hearing. My grandparents and parents used these words so freely to describe all the people mentioned in the first paragraph. I understand that upper class people own things instead of working for other people and its something you're born into. Does this mean if I buy a bookshop, I'm upper class? Or my children will be? Afterall, I own it. And they'll be born into it. Growing up, I remember my nannies being told off for me getting a bit of chocolate on my new dress. Was it really their fault?

Maybe that's why I'm constantly trying to defy this system. From infancy, I was my mother's most clumsy child and her only daughter that was a tomboy. Furthermore, I was a Yoruba child more interested in Igbo than Yoruba. Something my parents had not seen nor heard before. Of all their seven children, I stick out like a sore thump. People that meet me first and then meet any of my siblings always say "omg, I can't believe those are your siblings, they are so different from you Dara." Honestly, I see it as a compliment. Is it bad that there's something about being crass I love so much? Ofcourse I'd never ever be crass at a party. Especially not a family party. No, no, no. After, maybe. But during, I've got to be in form, displaying the highest level of sophistication. Afterall, the family are the stars of that show.

My maternal grandpa's 70th was my major introduction. I was 8 years old. I remember it like it was yesterday. Preparations for that day started just before my 7th years old birthday. Two weeks to the day, my mother called me into her room and ran through all my manners, sternly reminding me I'm not a boy. God forbid I broke a glass or spilt my chapman down my beautiful dress. Thankfully, I didn't. But still, I left that venue with only one shoe and one earring. My mother couldn't care less about the shoe but my word, that earring. She told that story to anyone willing to listen. I titled it, "how Dara misplaced her silver swarovski earring." I was 8 for crying out loud.

By the time I turned 10, I had an amazing birthday party which in hindsight was probably my send off party because barely a month after that day I was whisked off to what my mother called a "boot camp training school" I remember crying myself to sleep for 2 months after I got there. It was hell. I was with people I didn't even know existed. In the middle of nowhere in Nigeria. It was the opposite of everything and anything I had known. I woke up crying everyday wondering how my parents could be so wicked. Previously, I had thought Lagos was Nigeria and Nigeria was Lagos. I mean I was taught the 36 states of Nigeria at school but it was just something I needed to know. It wasn't real. My parents took me from Lagos to England. From Lagos to America. From Lagos to Italy. From Lagos to France. And then back to Lagos. Travelling meant leaving the country. I couldn't believe you could travel to anywhere outside Lagos in Nigeria. I mean, I didn't believe there was anywhere outside Lagos in Nigeria. That is, until I got to this "boot camp training school". At age 10, the normal thing would have been for me to go to England to start prep school. However my mother said she sent me to Ogun state because I was so badly behaved. That was when and where my life changed.

The people at this school came from Warri, Edo, Portharcourt and all over Nigeria. I met people who had never been to Lagos and nearly collapsed. I had to wash my own clothes, make my own bed and get up at 5.20am everyday. There was no hot water or running water. I had to share my room with 3 other people. I wasn't allowed my phone, to bring food from my house nor any money. No laptop, no internet. I saw the other side of life. Everybody from my grandparents to my aunties and uncles begged my parents to remove me from that "jungle" but my very strong willed mother fought them off. My mother left Lagos to start prep school in England at 10 years old and my father left Lagos to go to a private boarding school in America at 12. How could they possibly understand how miserable I was? My 1st year there was horrible. I cried every single day and night. The other children noticed how weak I was and used that to torture me. My second year there was a tiny bit better. I cried every other day. My third (and last) year there was the best year. Still horrible but better than the first two. I cried twice every week. A lot of tears, I know but I definitely left there a changed Dara. Maybe my parents just got tired of my tears or maybe they actually started seeing some change, I don't know. But after my 3rd year there and at the age of 13, they finally moved me to England to start my school.

Ofcourse something had shifted in me. I wasn't the regular Nigerian upper class girl coming to England kind again. I was the Ogun state school-girl coming to England with all happiness and gratitude to God. At long last. It was literally heaven. There was running water, hot water. I had a room to myself at school. I woke up at 7.15am, everyone was so nice and polite. I had pocket money every weekend. I had my new phone, could eat anything I wanted and went to bed early. There was internet and I could go shopping every week. Heaven. A few of the people I went to primary school with in Lagos (the fellow "upper class kids") were just starting to come to England then too but I honestly couldn't care less. I saw the pictures of parties they had in London on facebook and I'd be lying if I said wasn't jealous however, something had changed in me. Was I still upper class, I think so. I mean, I was in the boot camp for only three years. My family was still my family and I was still a Lagos girl. But my friends had changed and my former friends, had become pictures at parties on facebook. Seeing I had lost all my "upper class" (many of which my parents described their parents as new money and upstarts) friends, I turned my energy into getting to know the people that were not upper class.


At this point I had left Ogun state, so the closest I got to the "middle or lower classes" were my parents staff. And I only saw them when I was on holidays in Lagos. Nonetheless, I spent most of my time in the kitchen with the cook or house keeper, learning how to cook and clean. My two younger sisters that went to England with me (at 11 and 9 years old) couldn't understand why I spent so much time with the staff. After dinner at the table every evening, I was the only child who thanked both parents for the food and washed my plate with the househelp. Did this mean I had become a middle or lower class girl? I don't know. However I do know, it grew compassion in my heart towards people less fortunate than I. Maybe, my mind is middle class, or maybe its upper class, I don't care. What I do care about is using all the privileges God has given me in life to help other people.

My family is made up of lawyers and doctors on my maternal and paternal side so it was only natural for me to gravitate towards law (I hated maths). Whenever people asked me why I wanted to do law, my reply was, I want to help people. Two years ago, I had an epiphany. My family has and had some very great lawyers however, this doesn't mean I'll be one. This was when I set out to find my 'own calling.' Now I'm doing Media and Communications and I LOVE every second of it. My grandpa is still quite weary of this decision even after my first year of uni has just ended. On seeing my obstinate drive and ambition, my parents have turned into my no 1 fans and I really am thankful to them.


When I set out writing this post, I had no idea who the upper class were except that my family are in that class and now, at the end, I still don't know who they are exactly. But I do know that, truly being upper class is a thing of the mind. Something that you don't fight to acquire. Its something that you just have and its something that can't be taken away from you. The how's and why's, still elude me.


Have a wonderful day!!



With all my love,
Dárà Rhodes. X