The ways in which we are able to express courage also depend on the hand life deals us.

Courage is a muscle that develops through use. It's no use waiting for some inner fire to conveniently become apparent at the moment of crisis - that's cartoon stuff.

If your face is swollen from the severe beatings of life, smile and pretend to be a fat man.

A scar does not form on the dying. A scar means, I survived.

This is the forked tongue of grief again. It whispers in one ear: return to what you once loved best, and in the other ear it whispers, move on.

Is it my fault if I do not look like an English girl and I do not talk like a Nigerian? Well, who says an English girl must have skin as pale as the clouds that float across her summers? Who says a Nigerian girl must speak in fallen English...?

And thus love makes fools of us all.