GARBAGE IN GARBAGE OUT

What a waste!

Phew...is this even necessary?

There I stood, infuriated yet helpless and powerless, staring at my beautiful mom as committed an act that passed for a complete atrocity in my books.

This was the 7 years old me wondering what on eat was going on with my mom as she kept picking up large tubers of yam, dividing them and dropping almost half into the already dug planting holes. What was she doing?

Sweet yam that even if it were to be boiled and dipped in oil would have made a very wonderful meal for me and given me the utmost satisfaction.

This woman paid no attention to me even with my vehement and persistent protest. She was being impossible while I was completely frustrated.

Worse, she did not even bother to quell the volcanoes that were erupting within me by volunteering an explanation.

Obviously, I was in no position to rebel further but to grudgingly keep at my assigned duty of digging the holes where my beloved tubers will be sacrificed or risk getting some unfriendly attention.

As can be guessed, when I was given any duty to prepare the yam for a porridge or pounded swallow, "Yes!" I would exclaim. This was my chance to treat the yam tuber as meticulously as I theorized to be fitting.

After all, what is needed is just the head and the buds for a new tuber to form. I would not spare more the an inch of tissue to be attached to the head and even lesser atimes.

On multiple occasions, I would receive serious lashing for this. Mom would say I had condemned the yam for planting and she would be particularly furious if the yam was a good variety.

Over the years, I had to loathe any episode of yam planting because I will be subjected to watching how those promising tubers were going to be "wasted unnecessarily."

Growing up, I began to realize that there is a relationship between the size of the planting material sown and the size of the tuber produced at harvest.

In my undergraduate days, we produced seed yam. Here, I got to learn something quite valuable. All parts of the yam tuber can be used for planting. The whole tuber is covered with buds which can be planted to obtain whole tubers using some techniques.

This is the reality; the yams produced by cutting tubers into small portions can only get as large as half a normal tuber size no matter how good the soil is even after growing for a whole year. This is why the harvested seed yams have to be replanted to get the market size tubers.

What is the point in all these?

One of the first things I learnt in computing was this phrase, "garbage in garbage out." This is the answer.

There is a proportionality between what is put in and what is gotten out. Effort will produce results. We buy larger shares, we get larger dividends. We eat plenty food, we send out plenty waste. By putting in more effort, we get more results.

My dear mom was not wasting the sweet tubers, she was investing more to get more.

When we make the sacrifice necessary, we will gain the rewards attached.

By the way, I am a strong fan of yam in what ever method of preparation, especially the light, sweet ones.