Winter was coming, I was so excited. I was going to visit my parents for the holidays. We’d roast peanuts in the comfort of our home, tell stories and just have a great time. I had packed up all of my things and said goodbye to most of my friends. Aboard the train, I was surfing the internet because the train was so boring and quiet. It was filled with lots of old people and if things couldn’t get worse, I sat next to an old man who was fast asleep and snoring loudly. I hate it when people sleep in public.

I tuned all the annoying and irritating things out and focused on surfing the web; at least it would keep me occupied. On the internet I came across some online programme called – Astral Stranger. It got the best of my curiosity and I decided to click on it. I found something called astral projection and it was explained in detail. It said astral projection is the art of wilfully leaving your body and allowing yourself to travel on the spiritual plane. Wow! What an amazing and mind blowing thing. I’ve always wanted to experience something like that. I mean imagine if you could just float and melt away into the great unknown. I continued to read more and at the end of the article was a Zoom link belonging to an astral projection teacher. She said she’d have video astral projection classes at 8 o’clock in the evening. I quickly subscribed and eagerly waited for the time to come when I’d float in the spiritual plane.

I put on my headphones and began to play music, while waiting to arrive home in Coventry.

After twelve completely boring hours of hopping from taxi to taxi, I arrived home. I entered our flat and walked to the third floor. I knocked on the door and my little sister opened the door. I was filled with so much joy I hugged her and picked her up in a bear hug.

“Hi Imani, how are you?” I asked.

“I’m fine. How was school Lami?” she asked.

“It was great, I made tons of friends,” I replied while putting her down.

I looked in the kitchen and no one was there. I walked to the balcony and no one was there either.

“Imani where is everybody?” I shouted from the balcony.

“Well papa is at work and mama is at the train station waiting for Uncle Barry,” she replied.

Uncle Barry, did she just say uncle Barry? Of course she said uncle Barry. My smile turned upside down at the mention of his name. Well uncle Barry is one of the many religious freaks in our family. He was a pastor at some Adventist church and he always, I mean always, talked about the great controversy we were all in. Well the great controversy was just a fancy term of saying; light against dark, up against down, good against bad, Satan against Christ.

Over the past few months, uncle Barry kept on trying to talk me into religious freakishness and I kept on denying. He once told me that the devil and his angels masqueraded as human beings and tempted actual human beings. Hogwash if you ask me.

Tell us: Would you subscribe to something like Lami is doing?