My NYSC Journey: Ebonyi Gave Me More Than I Expected

If I’m being honest, NYSC was one of the best phases of my life. I was posted to Ebonyi State, and at first, I didn’t really know what to expect. But looking back now, I’m grateful for that posting. Ebonyi gave me memories I’ll carry for a long time. Camp life was fun in ways I didn’t imagine. Somewhere between drills, Hotel cleaning, parades, and exhaustion, I somehow became the best dancer in my batch, still funny to me till today. I was the hostel Governor and also Asst Platoon Leader. I was also selected for the Banner Party and colour party, doing special parades on camp. That experience taught me discipline, teamwork, and confidence. Camp pushed me out of my comfort zone, and I liked what I found there.

After camp, I was first posted to a school in Ishielu LGA which I will tag as a poor standard for a school, but deep down, I knew that wasn’t where I could function well. I took the risk, rejected it, paid for reposting and later got reposted to the Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources in Abakaliki. That decision changed my service year for good.

At the ministry, I worked in the Admin Office under Mr. Okocha, one of the nicest people I met during service. Always calm, always supportive, full of vibe. Working there didn’t feel stressful; it felt meaningful even though I was only coming to the office once a week.

Outside working at my PPA, I stayed mostly at the NCCF Family House, and that place became home. From prayers, which was our regular thing in the house, to bible study which I always missed because I have to go to my church, to games night (football matches, playing ludo, draft, chess, wott), laughter, and real conversations. My room (Rhema room) in which we were known as the spoken word of God, won the inter-room football competition twice, and as a family house, we also played against other family houses. Good times to connect with other corpers via football and create real bonding. I also attended Christ Embassy, where I served in the New Media Department. That season helped me grow a lot managing church social media, sorting out good pictures to post, editing with photoshop, creating content, and understanding digital media on a deeper level. I didn’t even realize how much I was improving until much later. I joined church outreach programs, hospital visits with Pastor Solomon, praying for the sick, taking Healing Streams with Pastor Chris to the Hospital and my place of residence, moments that grounded me and reminded me why service matters.

In the midst of it all, I also served actively in my CDS group (Medical and Health CDS) as the Media Officer, documenting activities such as sensitization and HIRD via pictures and video and also doing same during our usual CDS meetings. I became creative in shooting and editing videos under 1hr to produce an interesting and loving 2mins video clip each Thursday we do have our meetings.

This service year was also big for my business and career journey. I applied for several grants with my team. We won some, learned from others. I was recognized as one of the 75 Agripreneurs in Africa this year, something I’m deeply grateful for. I also won the BATNF grant and NIYA grant (I’ll share that story soon). There was a time I got a call from Kaduna Business School to join an AGRA program and pitch in Abuja. I was supposed to travel, but I fell sick and couldn’t go. That one hurt a bit, but I learned that sometimes opportunities don’t disappear, they just wait.

I travelled a lot during my service year, across different states in Nigeria. I flew five times, used trains, night buses, and endured long road journeys. Each trip came with lessons and stories. One highlight was flying to Abuja for a one-week bootcamp at Innov8Hub, organized by the Israeli Embassy under I-FAIR NG. That experience opened my eyes to business development and technical development needs for a company, innovation, collaboration, and thinking bigger.

Culturally, NYSC really dealt with me 😂 A full South-South boy, I found myself eating plenty Igbo food like Oha soup, okpa which was make with maize and red oil and even trying Yoruba meals like Amala and gbegiri which I haven’t tried out in my entire life time. Adaptation became normal especially to their food and hash climate.

This year also stretched me mentally and technically, As I worked for few startup company as their freelance UI/UX Designer, did a lot of graphic design and also worked as a freelance web designer using Wordpress and Zoho. In the process, I learned vibe coding, worked with Google Firebase Studio, explored Web3, crypto trading, and started building my stock investment portfolio. Growth was happening quietly, every day.

When POP came on 18th December, 2025, it felt unreal. Standing there, I realized I had changed. I had grown.

I had lived fully. This NYSC journey was good to me, truly good.

I learned. I served. I travelled. I met amazing people.

And I can’t help but smile every time I think about it.

NYSC I am grateful for the memories.

NYSC Ese oooo.