There's this African that's been on all our television screens... Maybe not all of them. Some of you that read this blog don't know anything about African television, and some of the Africans among you don't watch content developed in Africa. But, all of you go on youtube and that's probably why Stephanie Coker's rebooted her show, StephRocksTV on StephRocksTV brought to us by First Bank. I know! It's a little bit confusing but I suppose we'll have to live with it. It would be a little bit nice if she maybe called it something else like Steph entertains us with various degrees of success because if that happened I'd be able to write, "there's this fairly new show that I've been watching called Steph Presents (or something like that). It's on StephRocksTV, a youtube channel that's really quite watchable."
I hadn't heard of it before her latest episode, the accent struggle. She promoted it on instagram so I thought to give it a watch and then maybe a blog. I've watched it so here's your blog.
As you might expect the episode called accent struggle is about Stephanie's general struggle with accents because this is one of her Nigerian problems. I would probably have preferred if it was about something like the price of fish in the market. Conversations about accents are tiring and tired. There are two sides to the problem and both of them are equally daft.
Side 1:
Why do they complain about how I sound? It's just an accent. I didn't live here for a very long time, so it should be understandable that I do not sound like everyone else. Stop complaining about me and the way I speak and move on.
Side 2:
Why are there so many people with fake accents about? Can't they just speak the way they do naturally? Uh! It's so annoying.
That's all there is to it. It's a problem borne of entitlement. If you cannot stand that people cannot understand your Eastern London fare, and you want to be understood, there are two things you can do. The first is hire a translator, and the second is change it. It isn't a particularly big deal. About side 2, you hating that people have copied an accent that isn't theirs is nothing but the obstruction of social movement. Let me explain. Foreign accents are associated with wealth and most people like to be associated with wealth, so when most people speak, their accent is going to be running far far away from the typical Nigerian fair to some other plane that you may not have heard of. A foreign accent is basically a Benz in your mouth.
And that gets us to my problem with that episode. Its main segment is content absent. The previous paragraph has more content than the 10 minutes she spent on the same subject. There's just nothing there. I can't even write about it properly because I don't know what it was about. It was a meringue without sugar, and anyone that knows anything about meringues knows that eating a meringue without sugar is exactly the same thing as eating cardboard. Luckily the section f the show that had the accent bit in it also had Falz who is great. I had a few laughs, and I'll always be grateful for laughs. However the funny bits with Falz confused me a bit because I wasn't sure if it was supposed to be a variety show, an informative show for Nigerian returnees, or a vanity project.
Having said all that, you mustn't think that it's terrible because it isn't. It's merely confused and this is good because you may find a diamond hidden in the rough. All in all, I liked it. It's only the first episode of what looks to be a revamped version of the show, so I'll give it a season.
Finally, that opening sequence is extraordinary! I'll never forget it as long as I live! It gives me the hippitty hop in all my fingers and toes! It's like that song that we used to sing in primary school, Chicken no dey cry for night.
Chicken no dey cry for night.
Chicken no dey cry for night.
If it cry for night.
I go kill am chop.
When the owner come,
I go tell am say,
"Chicken no dey cry for night"
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