NII ARMAH’s HYMNAL

The Lost Key ( Friday 18th July, 2025)

One day, Ama came home from school. She looked in her bag and could not find her house key. She checked her pockets. It was not there. She sat on the steps and waited.

After some time, her mother came.

“Why are you outside?” her mother asked.

“I lost my key,” Ama said.

Her mother smiled. “You left it on the table this morning.”

Ama laughed. She was happy to go inside.

Kofi and the Bird (Thursday 17th July, 2025)

Kofi went to the park with his little brother. They sat under a big tree. A small bird flew down and picked up some bread.

“Look at the bird,” Kofi said.

“It is hungry,” said his brother.

They broke more bread and placed it on the ground. The bird came back.

Soon, more birds came.

“We made friends,” Kofi smiled.

“Yes,” his brother said. “Hungry friends.”

The Rainy Day (Wednesday 16th July, 2025)

It rained all morning. Esi wanted to go outside and play. But the ground was wet.

She sat by the window and watched the rain.

Her grandmother gave her a pencil and paper.

“Draw what you see,” she said.

Esi drew the sky, trees, and water on the road.

When the rain stopped, she showed her drawing to grandma.

Her grandmother clapped. “You made a picture with the rain.”

Esi smiled. It had been a good day after all.

Tuesday, July 15, 2025

President Mahama Ends Fuel Benefits for Appointees

President John Dramani Mahama has ordered an immediate end to fuel allowances and free fuel given to all political appointees.

This move is part of a larger effort to reduce government spending and use public money on more important areas.

The President says leaders must also make sacrifices, just as they are asking citizens to do.

This decision comes after he reduced the size of government by appointing fewer ministers and presidential staff. Other cost-saving steps include canceling satellite TV services in the Presidency and other government offices.

Monday, July 14, 2025

Bitter Medicine.

In a local supermarket around 9pm in the evening a white man with his wife and son were getting some groceries. In the next lane was a young black man had finished shopping. He got some groceries and toys for his son. He was in his car with his wife. He brought his stuff he bought to the counter to rearrange them into the bag. As he was doing that, one of the toys in his had caught the attention of the white man’s boy and he smiled at the black man. The white man turned and saw the action and asked the black man what he said to his child. “Nothing, he was just looking at the toys” he said. The white man didn’t agree to that and started humiliating him. He continued to tell him he was only showing him the toy in his hand but the white man wouldn’t calm down. He got tired and walked out. The white man got provoked more and called his mob friends outside the supermarket to stop the man outside. They took him to his car, scattered the things he bought, and b3at him up mercilessly. The black man’s family couldn’t help him but locked themselves inside the car and cried while watching him get b3aten up. After, the white man took a gallon of milk the black man had bought, took a sip and poured it on the black man’s face to tease him of his color and left. They really messed with the wrong guy.

The next day the white man woke up and went on a vacation with his son and friends like nothing happened. He trained his son to shoot and setup a watermelon target for him to hit. The boy hit it perfectly and they were so proud. They knew he had mastered at a very young age which is good in their context. 

In the evening when they were heading back home, He split with his gang guys. They all used different routes to their houses. 20 minutes away from where they had split up, a van had blocked the path. They honked severally to signal the driver in the van to move but the van never did. He lost his temper and got out to confront the driver. When he got closer, two big guys got out and shoved him into the van and drove him to an unknown warehouse and was surrounded by so many black men. Instead of beating him as a sort retaliation, they injected him with sedatives, cut his clothes and tattooed his skin with the very thing he hated, black ink. They then dyed his whole body with black dye and left him where they found him. He got so angry and tried to scrub his skin vigorously but the dye didn’t come off. He headed home.

When he got home, his wife couldn’t recognize him and pulled a gun and asked him to leave but he begged her not to shoot. She recognized his voice and lowered the gun. His son came out with a different gun but didn’t recognize his father. He then fired two shots straight to his chest and his father fell. He got a taste of his own medicine.

Loneliness Spoke Louder (Friday 11th July, 2025)

She was only 22 years old when she got married. Her husband was 33. In the beginning, everything was fine between them. Even when they fought during the day, at night things would get better. Just seeing her husband made her forget all the problems. He knew how to make things work.

After one year of marriage, her husband had to travel abroad for work. She didn’t like the idea, but he told her it would be just for two months. He also said the company would pay him and take care of all her financial needs. He left her with some money before leaving. At that time, she was six months pregnant.

When he left, she felt very lonely. The house felt too big for her, so she planned to move back to her mother’s place. But that same week, her ex-boyfriend contacted her. She allowed him to come and stay with her.

Sadly, they ended up sleeping together and acted like a couple again. The money her husband left was more than enough, and every Monday, the company also sent her more money. She felt comfortable, and so did her ex. He didn’t mind that she was pregnant. He still made love to her, roughly. Even though it felt good, it caused her baby to come early.

She told her husband that she had given birth. He was happy and came back home the next week. By then, her ex had already left.

But she didn’t know her husband had installed cameras around the house. He later watched the videos and saw everything that happened between her and the ex. He was heartbroken. He took the baby and told her to leave.

It has been seven years now, and she has never seen her husband or the child again. She married young and was still learning. She feels he should have understood her mistake, but he chose not to forgive her.

She now regrets everything. At the time, she was just excited to be alone in a big house and to receive so much money. She didn’t think carefully, so she made a bad choice by allowing her ex to stay.

Now, she misses her baby boy and really hopes to see him again, even just once.

She asks: Is there any legal way I can see my son?

Her husband has divorced her legally, but she wonders if the law can help her. It has been too long, and she feels left out of her son’s life.

She says: “He is growing up with a very rich father. He will be rich one day. But he still needs to know his mother.

Lost Files (Thursday 10th July, 2025)

A young cinematographer Nii Ayi wakes up sad and emotional at 5am early in the morning. He started prepping slowly to start his day as he had a Production to attend. The previous night was hectic as a result of ups and downs, long confrontation with a touch of pleading with his girlfriend. He caught her in bed with a writer he knew and couldn’t take it physically and emotionally so he left the scene. The lady never regretted her actions and showed no remorse that moment. Instead she pretended nothing happened and went days without any means of communicating with Nii Ayi. He called his girls Mum since they’re very good buddies because they share the same birthday but He couldn’t reach her. He pocketed his emotions like a professional and set off to the film set.

Meeting before call time ended, he was all set with high spirits. He spoke with the production designer and the grips for some few adjustments before they kick off. Everything was fine and smooth, Production started. After a few takes his phone’s light flashed, indicating received message since it was on silent according to production ethics. He took a glance whiles actors were correcting themselves on a particular dialogue in a scene. It was against his work ethics but he did anyway. The message was from his girlfriend. His stomach rumbled for some seconds then his facials shifted. The message didn’t look good. “Standby all departments” the director shouted. He quickly put the phone in his transparent shoulder pouch and got set with the camera ready to shoot. His spirit dropped and his eyes slightly filled with tears. He had upped his spirit earlier but the message summoned that feeling once again. Even though he couldn’t read the long text, the beginning didn’t look encouraging.”let’s do this” she said to himself gripping the camera firm. The shoot proceeded.

Nii Ayi started missing the character blockings, his framing was off, very shaky footages whiles he’s on a steadycam stabilizer and seemed lost in the moment at some points during the production. The director broke the set and requested playback. He was lost in the moment whiles looking on the monitor. It seemed he was listening but wasn’t till the playback was done. After the playback he tried checking the remaining space on the drive. there a shadow fell on him. He raised to see who that was. It was the Writer. His stomach rumbled again, this time with a sharp breath intake. His phone flashed again and he took a look. It was a breakup message. There he unintentionally touched the format option without knowing. He turned back to the camera and quickly touched “okay” on the screen without reading the full warning. He formatted the drive with all the shots, then he realized what he had done. He was dumbfounded for a while and called the director aside. He told him what he just did without any proper explanation. That was very unusual of him. The director asked him what’s wrong, a tear rolled down his eyes slowly but couldn’t tell him anything. “I’ll fix it, give me time” he said while cleaning the tear. The director understood and broke the production till further notice but didn’t tell anyone why, to prevent panic and complains.

Nii Ayi quickly rushed home broken and in tears. He called the girl severally but she never answered. He quickly grabbed his laptop and started researching on how to fix his mess while crying. He did have some flashbacks of some sweet times they’ve had together amid the research which made him cry more with some liquor on his side. He took a break. He went to the kitchen to grab an apple. He began slicing it and had a quick flashback and snapped right back into the moment due to a sharp pain he felt. He had cut himself. Blood was all over the tray. He grabbed the first aid kit and bandaged his palm together with his finger and got back to work on the lost files.

After some moments of research he finally found a software that recovered the footages but he had to Pay the software to re encode the videos. The bill was almost a half of what he’ll be paid after three days of production. He hesitated at a point but remembered he has an account he had saved some money in for his girlfriend which she has access to as well. He filled the billing with the details of that account into the software and paid to fix the files. He then transferred the balance into his personal account as a payback for the pain she had caused him. A few minutes later his phone began to ring continuously. It was his girlfriend, trying to reach him after probably seeing alerts of the transfer. He ignored the calls and stared at the laptop counting down time along with the software fixing the files. After some rings, he put his phone on “Do Not Disturb” to prevent any calls coming in.

Nii Ayi woke up later in the evening to several notifications of missed calls from his girlfriend and her Mum, He sighed. The files had finished repairing. He quickly reviewed them and it was all good. He then dressed up and headed out to a strip club. He ordered some drinks till he was almost drunk. He danced for a while and booked a str3pa for the night. 

The director resumed the production and he returned to the set with the footages, flex, a smile and confidence. They proceeded with the production. Ftb.

Negative Effects Of Social Media (Wednesday 9th July, 2025)

For the past few years social media has provided virtual means of interactions among people in which they communicate, share ideas, connect, and do business as well.

Though It has impacted many lives in many ways with goodies, it's  also had other effects on it users.

These include;

1. Unhealthy Sleeping Pattern

Both Kids and Adults can be so addicted to social media to the extent that they sometimes forget bed time. Though they might have other real life stuff they might have to take care of in the next few hours. This patterns aren't regular due to the mood of the user and also what interests the user on the media. This can result in tiredness and also laziness mostly stress in the sense that the body doesn't get it required amount of rest.

2. Increase In Cyber Crimes

Despite the goods social media has brought, some bad people has taken advantage of it since it does not involve interacting in person. They sign up onto these social media sites with fake personalities to scam, steal and blackmail other individuals

3. Addiction

Social media has got all it users posting any of their content though no individual will be allowed to go against the network's policies. Social media users get any of those interesting content of their choice, whether to listen, watch or read. Social media has been built in such a way that there are special accounts for content creators which allow them specify in a kind of content. With this, other users gradually develop addiction towards their favorite contents and makes them hungry for more anytime.

4. Loss of focus 

People split their attention since they have other stuff to do in real life but also have to be on social media.

When this happens individuals are not able to focus fully on these real life activities that should be taking place. Examples are; taking their kids to school, Preparing meals for the family and sometimes their sex life. Since they're addicted, they find more pleasure in being on social media than focusing on their actual lives.

Found Self (Tuesday 8th July 2025)

In a city somewhere in the southern part of Ghana, a 28 year old young man trying to get his life together after dropping out of school, trying to setup a band, and attempts of establishing businesses that failed, finally got a Job of a temp in a bank for sorting of files and documents. He lived with his parents and his younger sister whiles his other two male siblings lived with their wives out of town. The do visit sometimes and times like that brought some sort of pressure to Jona, their younger brother. They do ask him what he’s doing with his life, what he has accomplished so far, his plans for the upcoming years etc. so his new found job as a temp brought some sort of relief, though that wasn’t part of his life plans at all.

He started work, though it was boring he tried hard to put in his all, to sustain himself at least. He sleeps at work sometimes, misses personal deadlines he set for himself and gets stressed since his interest in the job was not at its peak, same as his energy.

One day he run into and old friend, one of those who got out early, his guitarist in his band back then. He heard the temp was asleep and snoring at his post and paid him a visit. He was a prominent employee of the bank with a high position and a good salary. He wondered how things changed to better for Eliot this fast. They caught up with old times, talked about their current lives and Jona’s was a tragedy. Due to the past and how far they’ve come together, Eliot decided to put him on what’s helped and turned his life around within this short period of time. He introduced to him a drug that enhanced the cognitive of humans, speed, enhancing the thinking ability and the ability to recall even times in the womb of the parent. Jona was hesitant at first but he gave in after Eliot convinced him for a while. After all he knew him very well, he trusted him and he thought “what do I even have to lose?”. Eliot gave him a pill and left. Jona continued his sleep for a while but then woke up suddenly and thought to himself the pill was a joke, remembering how serious Eliot was, speaking about it. He laughed it off and continued his quota for the day. After about two minutes, the pill kicked in. He felt anew, he could see things differently, he could read lips, he could remember everything he’s ever done, even ideas that slipped away whiles in the bathroom. He was able to finish a whole job that was estimated to be done in about 6 months in hours. He got really happy and decided to go see Eliot for more.

He rushed to Eliot’s apartment to get some more pills from him rhat evening. He entered and found Eliot shot dead. He checked the house and couldn’t find anyone. He checked his suit if he could find some of the pills but unfortunately the remaining pills were gone. He stood for a while to think and remembered he knew Eliot so well that he knew he used to stash pills in his guitar during their band times, to enhance his performance on stage. He checked and found some pills. Not long enough the police barged in since nearby residents reported a heard gunshot. Brian had to escape through the back but the police somehow saw his face.

After escaping he still knew the police could find him since they saw his face. He thought to himself “they think I murdered my friend and there’s no way to point them in another direction than getting the real criminal for them”. He looked at the pill in his hand and that was the only way he could solve that mystery. He took the pill, it kicked in and started by checking Eliot’s phone. His contacts, call logs and messages. It looked like someone jealous of his progress wanted him dead. Jona follows some leads he thought of that led him to one of Eliot’s colleagues from work. He broke into his apartment but unfortunately walked into him immediate entered. He then begged him to help him, he  went inside to get something and asked Jona to wait in the hall. 

Whiles Jona was waiting he spotted some irregularities with a carpet in the room and checked it out. He found some stash of that drug and some cash. He then took the pills and headed straight to the door. The other guy came out from the room with a gun and Jona ran. Unfortunately he caught a bullet in his leg but he managed to get out into the public on time. Desmond then came out to threaten him outside since he couldn’t touch him there and left. Jona still had a case to solve and his name to clear. He hid in a hotel that’s closed for renovation to take care of his wound. He fixed himself up and stayed there for the night.

The next morning he took another pill and made some research and found some clues and leads. He then walked into a local bank and played some tricks on a security guard, got his gun and badge and held the bank hostage in a playful way but the hostages were intimidated by the gun in his hand. He then ordered a teller to call the police and requested for their unit commander by name. He also asked the teller to inform her he (Jona) is robbing the bank so she needs her to come alone. Within some minutes she was there with some backup police officers but they didn’t enter as agreed by her and Jona. 

He then leads her into the private safes room in the bank and requests a break into Desmond’s drawer. There they found a watch and nothing to tie Desmond to Eliot’s murder he almost gave up. He was about to stretch his arm to surrender to the police for arrest finally but he thought to shake the wrist watch. They heard some rattling. They opened the rear of the watch and found some pills with Eliot’s blood in it. Desmond took that and hid it there to prevent the police from having any evidence against him to the murder.

Desmond was arrested and jailed, Jona was given proper care to his wound and was rewarded and was given employment in the police force as a special consultant with full healthcare insurance including his family, a house, cars and some money.

 Title: The Last Lantern (Monday, 7th July 2025)

Ataa Oko was the last lantern maker in his quiet coastal village of Nungua, where electric lights had replaced tradition. His goal was simple: to craft one final lantern, his masterpiece to hang in the village square during the Festival of Lights, a fading tradition he loved. He hoped it would remind the younger generation of their roots.

But Ataa Oko’s hands had grown unsteady with age. Each time he tried to cut the delicate bamboo

strips or tie the intricate knots, they splintered or slipped. The village elders, seeing his struggle,

gently suggested he let go of the past. “Let the festival rest,” they said.

One evening, as Ataa Oko sat defeated in his workshop, a young boy named Nii Quaye wandered in.

Curious, the boy asked questions about the tools, the paper, the fire that danced inside the lanterns.

Ataa Oko, warmed by the interest, began teaching him. Day by day, Nii Quaye returned, learning,

fumbling, improving.

Together, they built the final lantern not flawless, but beautiful. On the night of the festival, they lit

it and hoisted it into the square. Villagers paused, children stared in wonder, and for the first time in

years, the village square glowed not with bulbs, but with memory.

Ataa Oko didn’t just finish a lantern. He passed on a flame.