TRAVELS w/P: Tales of Adventure Here & There

08/03/13 Friday – Calabar debut day

Ah. Finally, the Nigeria I imagined: lush, green, and visibly different. Uniformed children, sweaty browed but tidy, walk home from school in early afternoon. Cars jockey for position on crowded roads in a civilized horn-honking kind of way. Plain looking shops line dusty main thoroughfares. Though fronting the street, enticing window displays are nada. In fact few even have windows. Marketing comes in the form of shoddily prepared posters like “The Jesus Boutique for men, women and children wears.”

Already since leaving Abuja I’ve been asked if I’m Christian, twice, and invited to a Pentecostal service by Christine and a Baptist service by Angela. Angela is one of my new best friends. She’s a young woman, maybe in her early 20s. As a local Ibo and housekeeper at Concern Universal, Angela’s arrangement is to provide domestic services in exchange for her education. Soon after setting up house for me she dashes off to catch a computer class somewhere in town.

My accommodations here are AWESOME! I have my own wee house with five rooms (a toilet room, shower room, kitchen with gas cooker and small fridge, family room and bedroom). There's even a screened in porch, something I've long coveted for my own home in Canada. Foot long lizards in reds and blues, greens and greys, sunbathe and scamper. The grounds are tropical. A flower garden flourishes outside the wee house. I hope to plant some veggie, perhaps. The guard dogs are sweet too. Whiskey is a peppy 1 year old. Lola looks like a weary, bedraggled pooch - not what I would describe as a shepherd.

The compound walls are about 10 feet high, topped with large shards of glass and three-foot high coils of barbed wire.  Heavy metal bars cover every window. As if that’s not enough, as night falls, the screened porch must be bolted and locked from the inside to keep outsiders outside.  There are more locks for indoor doors. Security guard, Collins, sits watchful, on site, 24/7.

Sidebar: It’s begun raining. Raging. Pounding on the tin roof; nature’s drummer gone wild. These rains wash away the heat, bringing a companion cool breeze. Though the ol’ body is covered in a damp glaze the heat is bearable.

The meal Angela and I fetched just before the rains, sits unfinished; a fish of some sort and rice. It's during our walk that Angela asks if I go to church.

“Ummm, well, I’m not one for man-made rules.”

That stumps her until she gets to talking about having to kneel before statues and say the rosary.
“Man-made rules?” I suggest.

She briefly considers; eyes widen.“Oh. Yes. I see what you mean. Rosarys and statues are man-made rules.” Her commune with God she explains, doesn’t need all those trappings, it’s a more personal thing. 

True that.

Somehow methinks I’m gonna be seeing the inside of a few churches over the next while. Yowzer.

Sidebar II: Rains are in intermission. Rumbling thunder, crickets and some creature sounds I can’t identify have taken the stage. One is a trillish call. Another is like a dog’s whimper except more singular and plaintiff.

Tomorrow is market day. Fresh fruit and veg day. Get to know my surroundings better day. Tonite I’m going to soak my head under the shower, or maybe the rain as the shower doesn’t seem to be working, and then dive back into an incredible read, compliments of Leah-Leah.  “Shantaram” by Gregory David Roberts, here I come.

Sidebar III: Rains have returned with cruel ferocity and the power has just gone off. Thank heavens for flashlights and dancing in the rain.