Hello Everyone,
Trust you are all doing great and having a stress-less time. A quarter of the year is almost gone! How time flies!
Here’s my story for the last few weeks!
And its valentine’s season in Las Giddy, not day but season! Lagos came to a standstill yet again for the 2nd year running based on my observations. I even hear that November babies are a lot – get my drift! Traffic was very manic. Believe it or not, loads and loads of people wore red. A lot of stores, if not every store I saw had just red themes, red items on display. Even lace sellers displayed red lace, voile etc. Some people even flouted their company’s colour scheme policies to wear red that day. The height of it was when I saw a vacuum cleaner retailer display red vacuum cleaners only. Na waya o! I heard babes were queuing up at the flower shops! Hmm! Who would babes be buying flowers for? Blokes? Themselves? To themselves most certainly to give the impression(s) that demand is very high! Na waya sha!
Lovebirds were holding hands everywhere. Restaurants had special reserved seating areas for those that might have / had proposals up their sleeves! Somehow we always seem to make the most of something in Las Giddy. The grace to spice things up lies here despite the abject poverty that often stares you in the face!
Since I couldn’t have a red day on Thursday, I had mine on Friday but just somehow it just wasn’t the same sha!
Anyway onto other stories!
1. Picture this – How about this as aLas Giddy address! ‘Anfield Road, City of Liverpool, L4’! Honest o, For real!
2. I promised to update you on more number plates. Here we are: Jimmy 7; Bacchus; Ray; Lake 1; G 7; Golden Lion; PaulPlay; Albarka, Anny!
3. Picture this! I went to have lunch at one of the restaurants around – Munchies to be precise. A few spoons into my food, I noticed that what I thought was ‘thyme’ spices were in fact insects (probably weevils)! Yeah, disgusting I know! So I quickly psyched myself so that the urge to vomit or feel nauseous will not even start. So I brought it to the attention of one of the attendants, who was very apologetic. She quickly offered to bring another plate. On looking closely at the next plate, I noticed the plate was still infested and in fact questioned her on whether it was a fresh plate or not. I told her I didn’t want that either. Then she offered me white rice. I told her that any meal from the rice family was now a no, no and that she should give me something completely different like yam porridge. This, she did. A few spoons into my food, she comes back asking for my receipt. I obliged her, only for her to come back asking me for the price difference of the meal, since my last resort was more expensive. I told her that they had the nerve to ask me for the difference considering the inconveniences and disgust. I requested to see the manager. It turns out the attendant knew the right thing to do was to offer a bit of service recovery but the manager was obviously not ser vice oriented to say the least. When I was done and I beckoned to know what they had decided, she told me it was ok to go that there was no need to pay anything.
But then, just when I was about to say ‘Glory, Hallelujah’, I ended up with ‘food poisoning the next day, obviously from Munchiesl! Imagine that!
4. Picture this! I saw with my own korokoro ‘eyin oju’, an ‘ako le’ (garbage truck for LAWMA) trash the side / front of a Hummer jeep! It was just not funny! Being a truck, it couldn’t run far so the jeeper and its occupants caught up with the driver. I wonder what kind of stories must have ensued. It only took a split second for a spanking looking jeep to become disfigured! At least if you are going to be hit, being hit by like minded vehicles may not be as painful (you are certain to a degree that insurance will come into play) but to be hit by a smelly, ugly looking trash truck is not just a story you want to regurgitate to your socialite friends!
5. Yet another picture this – ‘London Girl Is Falling Down’! Na so I go one of our office o. As I dey come down the stairs with my colleague, na so my ‘bata gogoro’ make me miss step! Na gburuguguru I hear as I dey fall o missing more steps as I approached the lobby of all places! Luckily, my colleague realised what was happening and quickly prevented me from stumbling further. Even if he no helep me, I for don grab am for dear life and potential shame! Thankfully, no harm was done; my heels didn’t break and I didn’t sprain my ankles!
6. And the last piece but not the least! Picture this – ‘Police Yawa’!
I go my friend house and as I comot for her estate, na police check point I run into. One of dem come stop me, e come ask wetin I get for boot, im say make I open am. I comot for car to open de boot. When he no see anything, he com ask for my drivers licence, I show am. He com ask for particulars. I com tell am say de particulars dey house. The truth be say I no even know wetin constitute particulars. U know for jand, we no dey carry anything around. If police stop you, anything wey dey ask you wey you no get, dem go give you seven days to produce for police station. I get some document for car but I know show them. Anyway, sha, yawa broke! They obviously wanted some ‘egunje’ but I was not having any of it. In trying to be mean, I was not allowed to leave and was told it was only on provision of the particulars that my licence will be released. Already, I had forfeited the licence in mind and was willing to go pay to do another one. What was more shocking to them was the fact that I refused to be intimidated by them. By this time, I had called my friend to let her in on what was going on. She was worried. She got her dad on the phone and he spoke to one of the ‘ogas’ there and it was all blah, blah. The officer was saying stuff irrelevant to the situation at hand. One of the men came and abused me and this was the last straw for me! I gave him back and everyone of them in sight a piece of my mind. Then a few of them they came knocking requesting that I let them into my car. I refused blatantly. One of the guys had tried to be a pacifier and we were talking through the little space I had left open on my window. So I pointed out to him that we were communicating just fine through that avenue and couldn’t understand why they now wanted to come into my car. I remained sat in my car and ensured the AC was in full blast. Then one of them came and gave me a piece of paper that he had scribbled a number and police station to go to. Now this is what I would have expected them to do from the onset, to have given the details of a police station to go and present whatever it is they felt I had not shown them. At a point though I was a bit worried because they were seriously harassing a lot of motorists – hitting some peoples cars, threatening to shoot, shouting at people, cooking up stories (this was the fate of the passengers in a car that were parked near me). At a point also I was the only one around. What worried me the most however was when they stopped a car carrying some villain-looking people. One of them came out limping and I just really feared a gun battling ensuing. Truly, they looked like armed robbers. They were delayed too for a very, very long time and thoroughly searched.
The truth however is that as much I detest the police force (sorry), it is often through this stop and search that criminals are apprehended - robbers and ritualists alike!
My friend’s dad now came round and so did my brother who had gotten in touch with one high ranking officer he knew. By now, I was fuming. After much deliberation, blah, blah, and phone conversation with some of the officers from the ‘oga’ my brother was talking too, my licence was released. By this time it was 11.40pm and terribly late to be thinking of going home, so I went back to my friend’s place and spent the night there.
Some of the interesting points overheard and made by some of the police men before the arrival of my people was the fact that most of them were ‘on the beat’ grudgingly; would prefer to be at home et al.
Oh what a night!
And that’s it for this episode. Watch out next for a Las Giddian’s experience in India!
Ciao!
Always & Always,
Moi (Real Life Content)
