This is the first of my emails about Nigeria, copied and pasted below:
Hi family and friends!
Now that I’ve settled in, I wanted to share a few of my thoughts upon arriving:
On Driving…in Nigeria
Driving on Nigerian highways is, to say the least, unpredictable. Large crowds of people populate the sides of roads, waiting for rides from green taxis, buses, or motorbikes. People weave through cars on highways, selling newspapers, gum, snacks, even clocks. Schoolchildren cross the highway, holding hands. Cars routinely get off a traffic-jammed highway and drive along the dirt roads adjacent to it, forming an extra lane or two and sometimes accidentally falling into a ditch. Large stretches of highway have no lane markings at all. The highways are narrow, maybe two lanes in each direction, max.
Once you leave the vicinity of the big city, there is usually only one lane in each direction without a barrier or divider. Kind of like a two-way street, except in highway form. The only (rather horrifying difference) is that the lanes in both directions are passing lanes, so that if you want to pass the very slow car in front of you, you must drive into the adjacent lane towards oncoming traffic, and make sure you successfully get back into your own lane before the oncoming cars crash into you. Yes, I know that there are highways in America where this is done. It doesn’t make it any less terrifying, especially on a busy highway. It’s like one big game of chicken, played over and over again.
Local roads are made up of dirt, and they get muddy and waterlogged in the rainy season. An 18-wheeler got stuck on one of these roads, prompting people to dig the mud out from under the wheels with large plastic bowls. What a painstaking process. This also happened to the MVP SUV I was arriving in, but luckily we were able to free ourselves in about 10 minutes.
On Living in Nigeria
As soon as I got through customs at Abuja airport, the electricity turned off. Little did I realize that this was actually quite common, and that the national electrical grid is off more than it is on. I have electricity maybe 6-8 hours a day (and a couple of these hours are in the middle of the night, which is pointless). The families that can afford to do so will buy generators, but many can’t. Even owning a refrigerator is inconvenient, as the refrigerator can’t run on the generator and must be unplugged whenever it is running. The iron also can’t be used on the generator, so I jump at the chance to iron my clothes whenever electricity is available.
I’m living in an apartment very close to the MVP office in Ikare. It’s shared with my office mate Mary, and her three children. My conditions here are rustic. Goats and chickens roam the dirt roads with their little ones in tow. No running water. There is an indoor toilet, but it doesn’t flush, so I have to add water to the toilet bowl manually. No internet or TV. Fire ant infestation. I hope to get a small plastic desk and chair to do work on. My mattress and pillow are made of an impossibly hard and unyielding foam that’s hurting my back. I couldn’t help myself; I indulged in a small generator (to provide backup electricity), a blanket (to soften the hard mattress surface), and a minifridge. None of these were too expensive by U.S. standards (the minifridge was the most expensive and cost about $180), but I feel guilty that I can afford these things when my roommate couldn’t. So the minifridge and the small generator are shared between us. I have to confess, I may also indulge in a USB modem to connect onto wireless internet when I’m not at the office. Though people here are generally disinterested in having 24/7 internet, I find that it’s tough not having internet in the evenings or weekends, being the information hog that I am. Plus, not having internet makes it difficult to do work on the weekends (god, I’m such a bundle of fun!).
My roommate Mary is sweet and accommodating. I’m touched by the fact that she has clearly bent over backwards to make me feel comfortable. She painted the walls of my room a lovely lime green, she fed me some of her delicious Nigerian food, and she refuses to let me do any of the household chores, including my own dishes. It’s as though I’m a permanent hotel guest. In fact, she almost seems to find it offensive when I try to insist on doing my own dishes, as though I don’t trust her with the task. So I yield. But I secretly try to do my own dishes or sweep the kitchen when no one is around.
On Being a Westerner in Nigeria
Ikare is a teeming town, with a large marketplace that sells just about everything, including high-end electronics. Yet I’m the only foreigner for many miles around. Whenever I go to the marketplace, accompanied by my Nigerian colleagues, I’m greeted with shouts of “white man” and “hello.” It’s their way of being friendly, but I’m now starting to understand what it feels like to be a celebrity, always being noticed and being expected to respond in kind. A few people will actually touch my arm to see how my skin feels. Children gape open-mouthed and approach me shyly. One talkative and ebullient college girl came up to me and asked me for my phone number. When I told her that I don’t have a working cell phone number yet, she gave me her number and insisted I call her. “We will be best friends! I love you. You will call me, right?” I feel like that person who’s just had a one-night stand with someone who’s already making marriage plans. Lady, you came on way too strong; tone it down a notch.
At the same time, the people at the market try to overcharge me for their items. None of the prices are marked; every single item can be (and usually is) bargained down. But with me, they start at a much higher price, trying to take advantage of my ignorance of current market standards and my perceived wealth. Luckily, my colleagues accompany me to the market, which means they bargain it down for me to a more reasonable level.
Money is one of those subjects that I have trouble wrapping my head around since my arrival. Though I’ve always been grateful for the opportunities I’ve had, I’ve never thought of myself as coming from a wealthy or privileged background. Now I’m in a place where I’m one of the wealthiest people around. Some people interact with me strangely because of this. A work colleague brought a friend visiting from another town to meet me. He was talking at great length about how poor he was, and how he couldn’t afford to pay his school fees (there are no student loans or grants here), so he never graduated from polytechnical school, where he had been studying science. He wanted to work as a lab tech but couldn’t find a job and is currently unemployed. He joked that I should take him to America with me so he could marry a rich white woman. When I was showing him some pictures I had taken on my digital camera, he said, “Maybe you can give this to me?” “No, I can’t give you my digital camera.” “When you leave?” “I’m sorry, but I like my camera.” “You can always buy another one.” Which, granted, is true, but the expectation that I would just give a total stranger my digital camera because I can buy another one was rankling, as was his rather simplistic notion that America was teeming with rich white women willing to marry him for love and support him financially. At the same time, I could sense his desperation and frustration at being poor in a place where opportunities are so limited, despite all the intellectual and social potential. I would be frustrated, too.
Being here has made me prone to giving things away, but only in spontaneity, and not when it is expected or demanded of me. The truth is, living with my roommate and her three girls means that I see on a day-to-day basis how hard it is to make ends meet as a single mother and how little most people have here. I had told my roommate that I would leave the refrigerator and generator for her, not only as a way of thanking her for her generosity and kindness, but also because I can’t take either of those things on a plane with me, and it would be too much of a hassle to resell them anyway. I also gave her kids some colored pens and crackers, which has endeared me to them. They love coming into my room and leaping on my mattress and playing with my hair, which they said was like “ribbon” (their term for hair extensions). I’m downloading “The Princess and the Frog” for them on iTunes. The oldest, a bright and industrious 11-year old, wants to go to university and be a lawyer “if someone can help me.” By “help”, I think she’s referring to financial support for school fees, as she can’t afford it on her own.
I’ve developed a stomachache that seem to be worsened by the Malarone (my anti-malarial meds), so I stopped taking the Malarone for the past day or two until my stomach settles down. Today I’m feeling much better, despite some occasional twinges of pain. Applying 25% DDT bug spray and keeping my fingers crossed that I don’t get bitten by an infected mosquito.
The people here are so kind and friendly. Already I feel included in the community, what with my colleagues offering to take me to their church, visiting me at my place, and offering to take me out on the weekends to indulge in “palm wine” or take day trips to nearby cities. My travel guitar seems to be a huge hit, as quite a few people have gotten excited and asked me questions like, “Can you teach me to play R. Kelly’s ‘I Believe I Can Fly?’ ” I look forward to getting to know my colleagues better.
