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I have always had this culture of ‘impatience for time wasted on queues’, especially for food, more so if it was avoidable. And so by the time I became a medical student at the Enugu campus of the University of Nigeria this attitude had become a habit. I was either amongst the ‘1st XI’ at the dining hall or amongst the last ‘XI’.
On the fateful afternoon in 1972, at about 1.30pm while killing time in a lecture room on the first floor of the science building, studying and waiting to do last ‘XI’ lunch, three girls walked into the lecture hall. The chatting and giggling caught my attention and I looked up from my Physiology book. My eyes fell on one of the girls and something snapped in me and I said to myself, “this is your wife”. I had never seen her before that moment and had no idea who she was. I watched them drop their books to ‘colonise’ seats for their afternoon lecture.Again this was the practice on campus those post-civil war years. Due to the paucity of facilities and infrastructure lecture halls were shared between various disciplines and there were not enough seats for all the students, so to be sure of a good seat upfront, serious students had to go in advance of the lectures and secure seats with their books. The three girls took no notice of the young man who was gazing at one of them. They left the hall having secured seats for whatever lecture it was they were programmed for.
I immediately walked up to where they had placed their books and opened the one placed by this unknown ‘angel’ that had me transfixed at first sight. I saw her names- Mary Nzenwa – Faculty of Law, instantly internalized the information and went back to my seat. I could not concentrate anymore on what I was studying before the entrance of the three girls. I closed my book happily and was consumed with thoughts of this little angel Mary that my heart told me shall be my wife, ever after. I silently watched Mary for the next three and half years without her knowing or even suspecting.
The Enugu campus was a relatively small place and it was easy to shadow anyone of interest. I monitored Mary, I gathered all basic necessary information about her, but made no moves whatsoever to approach her. Like all things of destiny, one fateful evening an old CKC friend Papp Alumona who was a Law student on campus requested my company for a birthday of one of his colleagues in their faculty – I obliged. It turned out that Alumona had in his company, his girlfriend and her roommate who turned out to be my dream girl ‘Mary’.
You can imagine the internal excitement I felt at this unforeseen, unplanned and fortuitous coincidence. Mary and I met for the first time and got introduced to each other. We clicked. The ‘bug’ I had harbored for three and half years also caught her that night. Our chemistry ‘jived’, we bonded. Nature, time, and opportunity met at destiny’s door. We both fell instantly in LOVE, and got married 18 months after. We have remained in love ever since.
Former Rivers State governor, Dr. Peter Odili has been married to Supreme Court judge, Hon. Justice Mary Odili for over 35 years.
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