News of the passing of one half of one of Northern Nigeria’s famous identical twins, often referred to as The Miller twins, reached me mid-week. Mrs Jummai Jarma, twin sister of Mrs Dorothy Akanya passed on at the age of 84 in Kaduna. Our prayers are with her family and friends at this time, especially her surviving twin sister, Mummy Dorothy. It was a little over a year ago that I went to Kaduna to visit with them. As usual, they were throwing banters, joking and generally keeping each other company. Alert as ever, they were now living in the same house especially as Mummy Jummai had been ailing and also to keep each other company.
It was beautiful to see. They were pleased to see me and we shared memories and had lunch together. My relationship with Mrs Jarma dates back to my formative years when she was Headmistress of a beautiful school in Zaria, Staff school, ABU Zaria, where I completed my primary school. She had been instrumental to my attending secondary school very early in life when I passed my common entrance examination at the age of nine. My father had decided that I should stay back and go on to Primary six so I could be more mature but Mrs Jarma had advised that I should be allowed to go and if I was not coping should then repeat Form 1. Of course I took it as a challenge and never failed any class and the rest they say is history.
As a young girl, I was deeply affected by Mrs Jarma’s passion in education, her love of children and her hard work. She knew us all by name and took particular interest in children who seemed to need extra care or as they say difficult children. She wanted us all to become something in life and instilled high moral standards. She also superintended a school with some of the best teachers at the time and also made time to teach herself. It is from this school that I picked up my love and talent for poetry which partially defines me today. The teacher who so influenced me in poetry was Mrs Whittle and she was an excellent English teacher under Mrs Jarma’s belt.
I was about seven years old when I encountered Mrs Jarma but her memory remained with me and I celebrate her today with all of us who met her in Staff School ABU Zaria and with my siblings whom she touched in many special ways; my elder sister Eucharia, my brother Augustine and my sister Maryanne, to whom she was Principal at Queen Amina College, Kaduna. To a woman of high worth, an Educationist par excellence, a dedicated teacher, mother, sister, wife, grandmother, mother and aunty and friend to many, I salute you, I celebrate you. May God grant you a peaceful repose, Amen. To Mummy Dorothy, your twin sister, May God give her the strength to bear this loss, Amen. Here are five books in tribute.
1) The lives of children by George Dennison.
The lives of children by George Dennison. This is a book written in 1969 by the author about his experience when he set up the first street school on the lower East side in New York. He taught 23 kids made up of white, black and Puerto Rican origin. He tells of how the kids were mostly difficult children with behavioral issues that he helped turn around by education. He talks about these children in the book with such tenderness and humanity and most reviewers describe Dennison as a graceful and elegant writer. This is a book that makes us all want to become teachers and a book that could have been written by Mrs. Jarma.
3) One and the same: My life as an identical twin and what I have learned about everyone’s struggle to be singular by Abigail Pogrebin.
I am literally tied to the hip in relation to the Miller twins as not only was I taught by Mrs Jarma, I came to live in Makurdi with Mrs Akanya, who married a Benue man and lived there for many years, her house a delight to visit. In addition, several years later, I became a mother of a set of identical twin girls myself. I have therefore added a book on twins to this tribute. One and the same: My life as an identical twin and what I have learned about everyone’s struggle to be singular by Abigail Pogrebin. Abigail explores how genetics shape us and the varied relationship between twins. Also what does it mean to have a mirror image and how can you be unique when someone shares your DNA? An amazing book for those who have identical twins and a resource for those interested in genetics and genealogy.
This is Socrates setting out the ideal curriculum for both men and women to include the basic virtues of wisdom, courage, justice and temperance. He also adds PE to help prevent illness and weakness and for philosopher king, education in goodness, military training, Maths, further Math, astronomy and music. An examination of Mrs Jarma’s time of teaching and today’s type of teaching leaves much to be desired. As they opined in the aforementioned interview, everything is now about money not integrity. Sad.
Mrs Jarma and her twin sister loved music and their favorite hymn is “Great is thy faithfulness” But then they would love music and why not, with their father as a Vicar and their elder brother a famous musician, the late Bala Miller. It is expected.
