Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Outrageous Courageous and FireGoofs!


So I really love all the movies by the Kendrick Brothers. Fireproof was great, courageous was even better! I've watched these movies like 10 + X times already. I like the fact that they are wholesome with great messages for the family. God bless Sherwood pictures. Ya'll are doing a phenomenal job!

So I found these silly video of the making of courageous. It's filed with bloopers and jokes and funny dancing and stuff. It's great to see how these films are made...and to think they work with mostly volunteers and a low budget. Nice!

For those of you who appreciate these movies, more films are coming from Affirm Films (owned by Sony Pictures). Great christian movies with awesome messages. You should look out for them.


Here's the funny courageous video... Enjoy!



Here's another silly video of  the making of Fireproof. Does any one recognise a mock scene from Facing the Giants? That is just hilarious! 

And Kirk Cameron just inspires me. Watch...




 I just love these guys and what they're doing. :)

Roy!

Monday, October 29, 2012

Tochi Eze: Waiting for Isaac!



I read this note written by Leading Lady Tochi Eze, my friend, sister and personal person for whose headache I will joyfully take Panadol. hehehe  :) That's Tochi speak, if you ever heard one! 


Anyway, I read the note and I nodded hard till I felt my brains rattle in my head. You'll understand what I mean when you read it. 2012 is almost over...I rest my case.


Tochi at a Selah Inspirational event

Waiting for Isaac!

It's the 10th month of the year o, just incase you have not noticed, 2012 has almost finished! That's right; now is a good time to take stock and balance account...or perhaps for someone, now is your convenient time to panic!

Like seriously, what have I been doing?!!! Those were my thoughts three weeks ago; tucked away in my room, on a late saturday evening, sulking away in familiar despair, hanging out with demons of depression and almost enjoying their company. I have always been a dramatic melancholy, so it's always easy for me to paint dramatic pictures of doom in my head and fall into the lead role. Honestly, na Jesus dey slow me down!

What my problem was? Simple...Isaac. The Isaac matter. Relax; I'm sure you think I am talking about a Man...(You no see yourself) hehehe.

I had spent over 9 months waiting for Isaac and I couldn't stand the ambience of the waiting room any longer. I panicked!!! Isaac; the child of the promise! Isaac; the child of laughter, Isaac; the proof of my visitation, Isaac; the defiance of natural laws and human logic, Isaac; the assurance that I am not barren, Isaac; my seed of posterity!!!

My mind did a time travel, and I quickly recollected the boisterous excitement and thunderous applause as we all cheered on in the place of worship...The shepherd had just announced to us that 2012 was going to be our year of laughter. The congregation keyed in Faith, the expectation of the future was almost a physical cheque you could cash in a bank, and in the midst of tight hugs that threatened to squeeze the air out of your lungs and firm handshakes from the sweaty palms of strangers, I knew without a doubt, that 2012...I would bear Isaac!!!

So imagine my horror as the months went by, with friends testifying about the authentic reality of God's sure word...I began to feel like the blacksheep of the Christian family. (What; I told you I could be quite the melancholic).

But this is it! In the action movie of my negative thoughts, just as I was about to pull the trigger on the character I was playing in this self deluding script, just as I was going to write off myself and write off my year...I saw Light!!!

As in Nepa literally brought light. But the light that hit my bulb did not travel on it's own...It came with a certain measure of hope, It came with strength, clarity and a warm mushy feeling in the pit of my belly!!!

So it is this same hope that I have come to share with you...To live Life without Faith, without expectation is like going to bed at night without expecting the sun to rise in the morning. It is a certain death on it's own! To stand aloof in complacency and succumb your emotions to the events of chance as you physically see it is like embarking on a mission of self destruction.

Will a player disqualify himself from the match because he hasn't scored any goals? Do you stop your push-ups simply because you haven't seen the six packs yet? Even if you do, does it mean the muscles were not building underneath your skin?!

In truth, Isaac may seem like a distant echo, a vague memory, an idea lost in the sea of life, By this 10th month October, what has your Isaac become? Wishful thinking or a faint whisper? Have you moved on to more 'practical goals? Remember that Convenience has never been the path thread by Champions!!

Sweetheart, Ore mi, Beloved, Stranger or Stalker, Ndi otumokpo...feel free to categorize yourself! *hehehe (na joke o), Don't give up on God's promise...don't insult him with a filthy slap of unbelief. Even though there is nothing in your logical mind to prepare you for it, Isaac is going to come! You know why? Simple; God said so.

Life can really be that simple, we can go to bed resting on the pillow of God's promise...because no matter how long the night is and how loud the darkness makes her boast, morning will still come and the Sun will radiate brilliant glory...You know why?...Exactly! Because God said so!!!

I love you jare.

With 2 fingers in ah d air,
(C) Tochi Eze
October 2012



 Tochi is a writer, Author, Speaker and Social entrepreneur. She is the Chief Efficiency Officer at Selah Inspirational.
 @tochi5 


So, do you feel a little trepidation that the year zoomed past and now it's almost over? Then re-read Tochi's last paragraph. :)

Roy.

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

So I'm supposed to be a Versatile Blogger O...


Relentless Builder gave me the Versatile Blogger Award. I feel guilty sha, because I have not been blogging with diligence (Sounds like christianese, abi? hehehe )

Thanks Relentless, for passing the award to me. However, I apologise before hand because I doubt I'd be able to fulfill all the requirements. I shall try though. Here goes.

Here are the rules for accepting the award;


  1. Thank the blogger that nominated me (done)
  2. Share 7 Random facts about myself
  3. Nominate 15 bloggers who are relatively new to blogging
  4. Let the nominated bloggers know they have been nominated

So here are 7 random facts about moi :)

1. I can watch a movie a hundred times!!! Seriously i can. As long as i really like it, i can watch it over and over and over again. Some of my friends think i'm crazy but hey na me be dat. Case in point, 3 idiots! I must have seen that movie a gazillion times already. *sigh*



2. I am an introvert. Okay thats no news abi? Well just had to say it. I'm energized and more creative when I work alone. I get physically drained when I move around lots of people for extended periods of time. Ask my colleague Susan Cain, she understands lol! 

3. I hate honey. I know its hard to believe. Sweet as it is honey nauseates me. 

4. I'm so not a morning person. I can stay up late working, playing, watching movies anything but when the first rays of light break through the sky, I change gears in la-la land. 



5. I still want to marry a rich man who will buy me a house by the sea, provide all I need and I will send the rest of my life just writing. *sigh*

6. Aal izz Well is my favourite song right now. (3 idiots again!) Sue me *grins*


7. I still love God more than anything in the world. Cant get past what He's done for me. I'm sold!



8. Okay this is an extra. I love Mandisa!!!! Do ya'll know her? She's this awesome sister who was on American Idol some seasons ago and Ryan Seacrest used to call her ManDIVA! She's a full fledged artist now with awesome songs like Good Morning, Stronger, He is with you and many more. She's just too much. I follow her on facebook and she always inspires me. Plus she has changed a lot since American Idol; used to be really overweight now she has lost all that and never stops sharing her story. Hmmm, she just rocks!



So those are random facts you may or may not have known about Roylicious :). 

Well about the next part, I haven't been around blogs a lot these past few months but these are a few I'd like to pass on the award to.




Roy!




Wednesday, October 3, 2012

So I'm An Introvert, Now What?? (Jobberman and Time Magazine speak)

blog.social-marketing.com



Yes. I am an introvert and if you're like me you've probably been through the "Lord, why did you create me thus?'" phase.

It can be most unnerving to find that words elude you when you need them most. Or the fact that crowds and activity draws energy from you while others thrive on them. Or you mentally relive a conversation or moment where you should have spoken up more, given that person a piece of your mind instead of standing there like a stick figure. :(  The list is longgg. 

So what's an introvert body to do in this jet age, especially as per careers where it's a dog eat dog world and you have to speak up or get left behind? Well, I bumped into an article by Jobberman that made sense. The meat of it was how to sell yourself and succeed at a career (that seems to be tailor made for extroverts) despite being an introvert. Below is a short excerpt of the piece. Find the full article HERE


You are shy and introverted; you always  seem to be at loss for words when you need the words most. And you are concerned, even worried that your career choice needs a certain level of being extroverted. So, how do you sell yourself seeing that you are such a shy person?

Three points were mentioned: 
1. Know your audience very wellMake sure you understand the kind of people you want to sell yourself to, what they are interested in, what makes them tick, what businesses they are involved in etc.Research is therefore very essential.
2. Use your wealth of knowledge as your weapon against shynessposition yourself in your friend and family members’ mind as the go-to person on that industry and subject matter. Gradually, begin to talk to people outside your circle as you meet them, on the knowledge you have. For example, you know a lot about social media and you want to be positioned as someone who is vast in career fields related to social media. Let your conversations with people and problems create awareness in their minds that you know a lot about the subject matter. Pick up words and conversations in the line of that career and job, and talk about it.
3. Use other non-verbal platforms to sell yourselfBlog, be active on social media networks, get on the professional network platforms and build conversations around your business, job and career path.

Emphasis was:Be an expert, become known as an expert and build relationships.

Another article I really like was written by Bryan Walsh of TIME Magazine. According to him there's an Upside to being an introvert. Although he started his article by examining the different ways in which the world system seems to be in favour of the extrovert. I particularly like this paragraph;

Simply being an introvert can also feel taxing--especially in America, land of the loud and home of the talkative. From classrooms built around group learning to open-plan offices that encourage endless meetings, it sometimes seems that the quality of your work has less value than the volume of your voice.       *Ouch!*

Read more HERE

I think its good to encourage introverts to not see their personalities as a hindrance. It's a serious cause of insecurities and it certainly hampers creativity and performance. 

But is the system really unfairly slanted toward the extroverts?


What do you think?


Roy






Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Download #klo3 for free!+ Mazi Nwonwu reviews the City Issue of Klorofyl Mag




Mazi Nwonwu reviewed the City Issue of Klorofyl. Below are his thoughts.
If you're like me and patience is not your middle name, sharp sharp download your free copy of #Klo3 Here  :)
Don't forget to drop your feedback @ feedback@klorofyl.com.
Now to the review. :)

Klorofyl Magazine’s City Issue and the Modern Reader


Writing a review is not as easy as people think. It is not just about reading, viewing or listening to a work of art and writing glowingly about it, or dismissing it with a few strokes of the pen, or key strokes, as it is these days. True, you approach some reviews with care, especially when the artist is friend or family and a bad review may put paid to the economic success of their artistic expression, however a good reviewer knows to tell the truth at all times. No, this is not as impossible as it sounds. Since a review is about the good and the bad of a product, any product, a good reviewer can either focus on the good more than the bad or the other way round. This way, the truth is told and the reviewer gets to keep his integrity.
To tell the truth, it is easier writing good reviews than bad reviews and this is primarily because it is easier reading, viewing or listening to good works of art than not. I don’t see myself as a reviewer, not a professional anyway. I am in simple words a consumer who has answered the call to provide feedback on works of art I come across and feel strongly about.
Of late, there have been calls for artists, especially writers, to embrace the peculiarities of the internet, to create platforms that will pander to the dictates of modern living, to take the short attention span of the multitasking internet user into consideration, to evolve with the times. Many online publications have tried this, but most seem to lack that special thing that captures the essence of the advice. These failures may have more to do with not understanding what is needed, than with anything else.
The meat of all these talk about reviews, attention spans and the internet generation isKlorofyl. Klorofyl is one of those answers you seek, those ones you know lie somewhere at the back of your mind and yet can’t grasp, those ones you touch but can’t recall for the life of you, until GBAM!
Klorofyl is a digital magazine that hits you from the first page and gifts you a Eureka moment. You think, this should be me, I should have thought of this, this is my idea of an online magazine. It is funny, but the truth is that you never really thought about it, but the concept is one of those simple ones that must have taken serious thought and planning to achieve.
I didn’t know about Klorofyl—beyond a mention here and there—before I got the third edition via a writer friend who was featured in it. This third edition, “the city issue”, appears to be a continuation of the magazine’s focus on literary and graphic art and it does it with aplomb. If the fluidity of the “Captains Log” that introduces you to the magazine does not convince you this magazine takes its topic serious, the beautifully done cityscape of the content page should. You know, just as you feel it: this is one of those outstanding ones.
The theme is city and the writers, photographers, poets and graphic artists that Klorofyl collected, delivered one of the best odes to the concrete forest that I have seen in a long while. Jibola Lawal begins the offerings with an evocative picture of school girls probably on their way home from school and an endearing flash fiction “The Bariga Philharmonic”, a story of the city of Lagos at night, of the humming of the mosquitoes, vigilante gongs, snoring spouses, and generator buzzing- all that makes for an annoying harmonic.
This flash fiction effectively opens the book and the beauty it conveys is replicated across the magazine. Story after story, picture after picture, Klorofyl celebrates the city in a myriad of ways that are beautiful and redolent in their familiarity.
This edition, as I said before, is dedicated to the city and the treatment is classic. Tosin Otitoju, Dami Ajayi and Olatunde Asagba used poetry to express the theme and gifted us beautiful poems that could only have come from poets of their statue.
The arrangement of pictures was thoughtfully done and complimented the essays and flash fictions. An example is how Segun Alawode’s photo treatment of Lagos traffic on a rainy day opens for Sylva Nze Ifedigbo’s poignant creative non-fiction piece “Rains in the City.”
The general idea, I feel, is a conscious effort to engage with the reader through beautiful prose, poetry and visuals. The attempt in my opinion is a resounding success. The stories are short, very short, and there is no monotony to it. The photo essay on Makoko byLeke Alabi-Isama was exquisite, same for the essay on New York by Olubunmi Ode,David T Msimanga’s “A Day in Town” Olatukunbo Ayorinde’s “Rising”, and so on and so forth.
Klorofyl’s City issue may have Nigerian leaning, but it is not overly so, not that that can be helped as most of the contributors are Nigerian, but the magazine still manages to evoke a global appeal as it touches South Africa, Zimbabwe and Asia.
There was nothing not to like about this magazine, at least I am still searching for something not to like.
The truth is that liking or not liking an artistic work should be determined by individual tastes. However, in this age of multi-tasking, that burden has been passed on to the reviewer. The reviewer is supposed to make that choice for others. You read, view or listen to an artist’s creation and you pass judgments. It is this judgement that is difficult.
For Klorofyl, I have a a judgement and it is thus: A high quality magazine tailored for the multi-tasking reader whose attention span is limited.
For the City Issue I say, Exquisite!
@mazinwonwu

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

What Have I Been Up To?


I woke up today wishing I were a poet. I wanted to write a poem on how crazy life can be. The ups, the downs, the demands, unexpected twists and all. All I came up with was...

Life is...crazy. 

Lol!

I'm so not a poet. :(

Well, on to other things.

ONE

Klorofyl Mag, that awesome online literary and graphic lifestyle magazine with urban and African roots, is set to launch it's City Issue on September 15, 2012!  It's totally awesome again this issue. The design, the graphics, the photography, the stories, the poems...all out of this world! I am so proud to be associated with this work! You'll find my story in there somewhere :) 

You can visit the Klorofyl Mag WEBSITE and you'll come away impressed, I can ashuwa assure you! :)

Congrats to one of my many bosses, Tolu Oloruntoba, the editor of Klorofyl Magazine.

Here's the cover image.




TWO

My story "When Grandpa came to stay was shortlisted for the Ugreen Foundation sponsored Creative Wings Prize. See the link HERE
I hope I win something. :)


Cheers people!
Have a great September!

Roy.

Wednesday, August 8, 2012

He Is With You by MANDISA encourages me!




He is with you By Mandisa (Lyrics)


There's a time to live
And a time to die
There's a time to laugh
And a time to cry

There's a time for war
And a time for peace
There's a hand to hold
In the worst of things
In the worst of things

He is with you when your faith is dead
And you can't even get out of bed
Or your husband doesn't kiss you anymore
He is with you when your baby's gone
And your house is still
And your hearts are stone
Crying "God what'd you do that for?"
He is with you

There's a time for yes
And a time for no
There's a time to be angry
And a time to let it go
There's a time to run
And a time to face it
There's love to see you through all of this
Through all of this

He is with you in the conference room
When the world is coming down on you
And your wife and kids don't know you anymore
And He is with you in the ICU when the doctors don't know what to do
And it scares you to the core
He is with you

We may weep for a time but joy will come in the morning
The morning light

He is with you when your kids are grown
When there's too much space and you feel alone
And your worried if you got it right or wrong
Yes He is with you when you've given up on ever finding your true love
Someone who feels like home
He is with you

When nothing else is left and you take your final breath
He is with you

He is with you



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

Awesome Song!

Roy.