NYSC Camp: The LAB Experience (4)
Hey there! Took a pause to prepare and celebrate my convocation, but we are here for the final part in the NYSC series. Thank you for reading along!
Joining OBS
If you’re a prospective corp member, one thing everyone advises you against are the long hours spent under the sun during the marching drills. The solutions often paraded are to either join the orientation broadcasting service (OBS), become a platoon executive, or join the Red Cross. As someone who particularly didn’t like marching, I was not looking forward to marching. (Inserts Wikipedia picture of marching purpose)
As soon as I got settled in a bit, after dropping my bags and with some time on my hands from helping out with kits, I started looking out for how to join the OBS. The orientation broadcast service is the information house of the whole camp, broadcasting to the camp inhabitants the ongoings, news, programmes, handling events, etc.
To be honest, though, I didn’t join the OBS merely because I wanted to escape marching, but because I felt it was what I’d actually studied and to not do so would be a waste. I studied Mass Communication from the UNESCO rated centre for media excellence Mass Communication department from the prestigious University of Lagos, the best at it.
Just so you know, I’d served as the editor of the University’s newspaper, UNILAG Sun, for about 4 years altogether, producing about 4 sets of the paper and leading an online newspaper platform. Heck, I even won a prize for best graduating student in Journalism! So, I felt the OBS was just the place to be.
But was getting in easy? No.
The fact that almost everyone was seeking to escape marching made the ‘wheat and tares’ apply together, and the process got disjointed at some point. I and some former classmates resolved to find our way in at all costs (good costs, please). I, Modupe, Igho our first class scholar, Moyo Broadcaster, Joy newscaster and Faheedah the talk show boss.
I found the office on my way to the boys' hostel and popped in, signifying my interest. I was told to go put on my white white and come back downstairs. I hinted the others and went to change. By the time I came back downstairs, a little crowd had gathered. All folks who wanted to join the OBS.
So there are departments in the OBS. There’s the technical guys who handle sound, equipment, power,etc. Admin handle admin tasks (majorly lost and found, from what I was able to observe sha). Folks in Broadcasting speak, read news, make announcements, handle shows, etc. Media guys take pictures both with cameras and phones, and also make graphics, videos, etc. Last but not least is Editorial who basically write, news, social media captions, etc.
To join the OBS, you had to indicate which you wanted to join. But tell me why about 100 people are indicating to join the OBS if not that they are running away from something?
I wrote my name on about 3 lists, I didn’t bother joining any unit apart from Editorial cos I knew folks would run away from there. After many lists upon lists, I was fortunate to be around when they started an interview. Praise God?
Luckily, whenever lectures were going on in camp, I was always making jottings in the form of news stories (a habit I’ve gotten used to, thank you, UNILAG Sun). So when during my interviews, the lovely Mrs Salu asked if I could write, I told her I already wrote a story. She asked me to send it to her, which I did. I didn’t even know I was a part of the OBS yet. So, you can imagine my surprise when the next day, as they read the 4:30am news for the first time, they read two of my news stories during the morning drills. I was elated!
So that’s how it was for the first few days, I’d write and send it to her, and they would read. Moyo and Joy read the news stories, too, and Modupe also became a part of Editorial. Being a part of the OBS was my highlight of camp. The guys (I mean ladies, too) in the editorial department were just awesome. Ideraoluwa Akosua (our editor), Eugene, Ifeanyi, Aisha, Ore, Truth, Prize, and Hyelsidzira became another family in camp. Our editorial buddies group chat still exists. Writing stories, sending to Mrs Salu, Ms. Momoh, and Mr. Henry, having meetings and covering literally everything on camp was just awesome. Mrs Salu even commented that she didn’t have to write at all, we did the writing, and she only had to edit. If only journalism was that sweet outside.
I remember the social night my editor and I (I became deputy Editor by the way), had to stay up till past 1 for an event to finish to get the results, then write the news story that same night, knowing that it would be read that very morning.
Joining the OBS comes with it’s privileges. You can always escape drills. We were always either having "meetings" or meetings. If you know, you know. For most of camp, though, I was quite busy with my platoon. Even during drills, I didn’t need to stay with OBS to escape. I just showed up when there was work and went back.
Later on, though, during drills, we got intense too. Those periods were used to write and edit stories. There was a time we were even called to cover an inauguration happening at another part of the camp while drills were going on. Your OBS ID card has some respect, officials and corp members alike respect it, and like David Enumah would say, they are careful to talk around you. Who knows, they could be the next news? (It’s an inside joke, tho)
In all, though, I enjoyed the experience, and the commendation from our coordinators made it worthwhile. I have since joined the editorial CDS after camp, and I even contested for the office of the assistant project manager, and I won.
Epilogue
This has been a summary of my NYSC Camp experience. There are other aspects I didn’t include for lack of descriptive words and time. Such as the joy of allawee, bracing the odds for Man O’ War Drills (I’ll attach a picture of that), dozing while standing, dozing seated, dozing washing my white shoes everyday and discovering the joy of garri, nuts and powdered milk. (Ife, thank you o)
NYSC has started. I resumed work the week after our discharge from camp. One clearance (I was drenched. Fun fact: I got to the Local Government Office by 6am, and I was still number 77) two CDS meetings already, general CDS next week.
Thank you for the generous comments and engagement so far. Mr. Jerry Agada, you don’t know what those comments mean to me. I will definitely be back to share more over here. Until then, it’s all service and humility from here.
