Early in my fifth secondary school year, my school organized a field trip for my class to visit the Sea School located in Apapa, Lagos (Nigeria) under the aegis of the Citizenship & Leadership Training Centre. My teachers have always enlightened me and my classmates about this training program since we crossed the threshold of the secondary school doors. The main objective of the School, as its name implies, is to provide training for the development of society's citizenship and leadership skills. The Sea School exists so that students in their junior year can prepare for the class office positions they will come across the following year. Most secondary schools in the country sponsor the centre because they see it as a way for students to hone awareness about others and themselves. Many, if not all, of my school alumni have taken this route and come back with altered mindsets. It was me and my classmates' turn to journey down the same road.
The training centre was located on an island. As we arrived there, the instructors didn't give us time to settle down. They ordered us to line up, walk to the field and wait there until further orders. As it turned out, the further orders came around about two hours. The gods of the sun must have been very happy that day because I couldn't find any more reason as to why I was sweating waterfalls. Eventually, the instructors returned but with a group of students from another school; the students we were going to undergo the course with. They lined the students up opposite us, briefly welcomed us, and told all of us to jog around the soccer field five times. My classmates and I refused the order and complained about being tired from standing in the sun all day but the instructors would not budge. One of them brought out a whistle and demanded we start running. We returned exhausted and were told to go to our assigned rooms and unpack. They told the other students to wait for two hours.