A Whole Pot Of Soup

Sometimes it's always a bit difficult to listen to people’s advice, and at times we feel those words are just for fun or out of disturbance. We won't get to learn the consequences of those words until we fall victim to them and then start feeling regretful for not heeding them when we should.

While I was in my service year, I served in the army barracks and one thing we enjoyed as corp members apart from security is the fact that we have stable electricity. Compared to the one others use in the city ours is more stable.

This is to our advantage because we were able to save money by not spending our allowance on refilling our gas cylinders for cooking. I can say some that don't even have one from the beginning of their service year till they complete their service. But on my end, I do fill up for emergencies and it might last me up to about four months before thinking of refilling it again.

The next batch resumed from their camp break and it was nice having them with us. I got someone to share the room with since my roommate already completed his service. Glad we are two in number again. It won't be as lonely as it had been when I was all by myself.

Though I enjoyed the freedom that came from it, I do things and leave them the way I wanted. But now I think there will be some orientation sessions between us.

“Salam Aleikum” I greeted him and he responded with a smile.

“I am Abdulqudus”, what about you?

“Toheeb by name” He responded.

One thing I realized about him was that we had some similarities in our looks, and later a lot of people testified to him. Apart from the fact that he is a little shorter than I am and also I am slimmer than him. We were almost identified as twin brothers.

“Yeah, you can drop your bags here and this is your bed space.” I pointed towards the bed space the former corper used. “If you don't mind, there are also mosquito nets. I added.

“Thank you”

“Okay. And here is the kitchen, and the electric cooker is what I use for cooking the most”. “There is gas in the cylinder, if you feel like using it, and you are free to use other things too” I concluded.

“Okay sir, well noted,” Togeeb responded.

We were about to leave the kitchen before I remembered that there was one important piece of information I had missed out on. So I tapped him to call his attention.

“Please, whenever you are done cooking or the electricity goes off, don't forget to switch off the hot plate fuse,” I said more cautiously.

“Okay, I will,” he said and we both left.

Three days after it was Toheeb’s first time in the kitchen to cook, I had prepared a pot of soup and left it on the gas cylinder. So Toheeb was using the hotplate to prepare his meal. His food was half done when the electricity went off. He had to use the gas to finish up.

The next thing he did was to swap my pot of soup for his pot of rice on the gas cylinder. He dropped the pot of soup carefully on the hot plate.

Toheeb was done with cooking and didn’t even bother to return the pot of soup to the gas cylinder anymore since he had no use for the hot plate.

We already slept off, and then I started perceiving some odor in the room. It smelled like something extremely burnt, I quickly checked the fan and the switch but all was intact, then I headed straight to the kitchen. To my surprise, I saw the pot of soup on the hot red electric cooker. It was covered so the little gaps on the pot lead were where the smell was coming from.

Toheeb didn’t switch off the cooker after he was done cooking. I opened the pot and all I could see was heavy smoke trying to cut loose. The pot was completely back. I called his attention to the disaster he had caused, apart from turning my most cherished soup into ashes, he had also put our lives at risk. He was extremely sorry about his actions.

I told him the consequences of such an assumption that if no one was home? What would have happened? He promised not to be that careless next time.