Fope's Blog

Did you notice that we dropped the '.blogspot' in our name? Yeah we're now about the .com life. Please who's the "our" that I'm referring to? Lol.  I feel like an adult blogger now. Not that it's a measure of anything, but I didn't like the blogspot part anymore and I did something about it! (Such an adult-y move eh?). Shout out to my web developer friend Lemuel for all the help...yes, go see his work. Okay, moving on. Twice this week, I got asked if my nearly month long experience of being back in Nigeria has helped me decide on whether or not I'd like to move back to Nigeria for good. Has it? I don't know. I'm just taking stock of what I love and what I don't want to deal with, so that when it's time to decide, I'll have some things to consider. I love that it's very normal to see beautiful, grand houses here! I love the architecture. I now want to build beautiful, grand houses with lots of chandeliers, marble...

This week started out being uneventful. I slept way more than anyone should in one week. It was very called for. As for "how" or "why" it was called for, let's just say laziness called and I answered.   On the days that I went out, I was reminded of the little things that can frustrate you about being in a developing country. How can one go to three major hotels (including Sheraton), and not be able to find a well functioning fax machine? I guess you could blame it on the transition from fax to email, but still it was annoying. Let me quickly add that I was impressed by the customer service at Lagos airport hotel. We Nigerians are generally well mannered people, but we tend to suck at customer service. Despite being the most scruffy of the three hotels I visited, the staff at Lagos airport hotel were very courteous and fun. So fun that they made our 50-minute long attempt at faxing my documents less-frustrating. Keyword: attempt.  Yes we ended up not being...

I had a pretty eventful week! I've been in three states, I've commuted back and forth Ibadan and Modakeke for three days, and now I'm back in Lagos. It was fun and not really tiring, except the bumpy rides that I ranted about  here . As for a fun discovery this week, let's just say I burn through data real real quick! It's probably because I live on my phone. For me, everything goes on Snapchat and I always have something to Google.  I'm beginning to think of solutions to my surging phone bills. Maybe it's time to go sugar-daddy hunting, after all I'm in my sugar-baby prime and in the sugar daddy headquarters! Absolutely loving Lagos weather! Even the rain knows to fall at night! How cool is that? Potential Sugar daddies apply within...Ok, I'm just kidding. Today, I had the strong urge to laugh in the middle of a serious conversation. I asked a simple question that I had anticipated would take less than  5minutes to answer. But thirty minu...

I counted 7 churches, 1 mosque and 3 major accidents in 2 minutes of traveling on Lagos-Ibadan expressway. They weren't the fender-bumper type of accidents. They were the car on fire, bonnet removed, and tiny-car dragged by a huge truck and wrecked beyond repair types.  So I started thinking: Do our leaders travel these routes too? Or do they fly everywhere in their private jets? Do the citizens in charge of these road-building and maintenance contracts not hear anything in the churches and mosques services that keep us up at night?  Really-no one should have to hit those sizes of potholes at expressway speed.  We almost had an accident too. We had a flat tire, and not only was it flat, we could see how much air the tire was losing in real time because the car was fancy like that. A roadside mechanic charged us to fix it, but our dashboard warning let us know that it was back deflating within seconds. So we pretty much had our hearts in our mouths the entire trip...

You know one thing that comes with looking at old things with new eyes? Interesting discoveries!   For those of you who do not know, I have been in Nigeria for thirteen days and I will be here till the end of the year. So, I’m writing about what it feels like to go back home after half a decade. I already said in my last post that everything seems familiar except that it isn’t. And by that I meant that I’m now noticing things that have probably always been there, but had managed to go unnoticed. Every time I notice something, I wonder if I'm thinking and acting like a foreigner in my own motherland. It's a weird feeling. But it is what it is; I've been out of touch.  Let's move to today's story. One night last week, Oye knocked on my door because she had been sent to get something called a “ruler”.  Oye is the amazing maid, who really has been my right hand person. She's been helping me relearn the art of crossing Lagos streets, perfecting my haggli...

It has only been five days since I got Lagos, but my Snapchat friends will easily testify that they are barely swimming under the flood of posts from my Lagos living. Does anyone feel like attesting to this? It’s so familiar yet unfamiliar. Everything is the same, except that it isn’t. I forgot for a moment (more like for half a decade) that I lived in one of the less-posh parts of Lagos (Ipaja) and that the “Instagram Lagos”, didn’t really extend to my side. Can you blame me?  Let's talk about the flipping HORNS! My goodness! Have they always been so loud? For the first two days I jumped every time I heard one, because you really don’t use your horn in Canada except there is an emergency of sorts. Here, the horn seems to multitask as the signal (left/right signalling), as a means to call prospective passengers (a.k.a any pedestrian), to check your blind spot when changing lanes/ when entering or leaving a three-way street... basically anything. I...

Somewhere between life happening and life happening, I forgot to post this on Monday. But I re-read it and thought it unfitting for the trash. So here you go! Very unlike me, my bags are packed! Seeing as one of the stars on my crown is for excellence at procrastination, I definitely surprised myself on this one! At this point, I've sort of run out of things to buy towards this trip. Or rather, my account has lost any interest in yielding funds to support my "necessary" purchases. The most expensive of these purchases was definitely my travel medication. Honestly, it wasn't so much the actual cost, as it was the opportunity cost of the money spent on drugs and vaccinations. I know I probably won't fall sick, but the way my body is set up, it'd be stupid to go unarmed, because when I do fall sick, I tend to see the "white light" before I eventually come back to earth.  So I'm here in a walk in clinic waiting to receive a typhoid feve...