Lagos is Chaos

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Lagos, one of the smallest state in Nigeria and yet the most populated is one of the last place any introvert would want to find his or herself in, especially Lagos mainland.

Unfortunately, my family live in Lagos and I had traveled over to go pay them a visit. The plan had been to stay for a month, but I know there is no way that is going to happen. Lagos, the former capital of Nigeria is so populated that even when there's traffic, those of us walking on foot get stuck too.

The past few days had been bloody too. A lot of news of young kids dying here and there. The latest one had happened very close to where I live. According to the media, some kids had locked themselves inside an abandoned old car and had suffocated and died in it. It was such a tragic news that almost every news station talked about it.

Everyone wondered where the parents of this kids had been and some had wondered who owned the abandoned car. Mixed feelings and reactions everywhere and while the news was the talk of the town, something similar almost happened to me and my brother the next day.

My elder brother had asked me to come assist him in carrying a bag of rice home from the market. The day had been a little bit hectic for me so I had gone to meet him at the market later in the evening, that way, we would both take the bag of rice home instead of the initial plan of taking it home alone.

When I got to the market, we both lifted the bag of rice (which was very heavy by the way) and headed for the bus park. On getting to the park, we walked up to a man whom we thought was a bus driver and negotiated price with him on how much it would cost him to help us carry the bag of rice in his bus. After some forth and back negotiations, we finally agreed at a price and placed the bag of rice in his booth before getting into his bus.

In some places in Lagos, the bus drivers has made it customary to first of all collect his fare before starting the journey, so when this one asked us to pay first, we had done just that without having any suspicion.

The man had collected money from all of us before telling us he would be right back, that was when we realized he was the owner of the bus, he wasn't even a driver, just a bus park tout who helps drivers gather passengers for their vehicles and the drivers would in return, pay him for his services.

This man had left us in the vehicle for close to eight minutes with the doors locked and that was when we all started getting pissed off. The story about how the kids that died recently in a similar incident came up and all hell was loose, everyone started looking for a way to get out of the vehicle.

The whole commotion must have gotten the attention of people outside because they quickly helped us open the door and right as we were about to pour all of our anger on the man who locked us in the vehicle knowing fully well the driver wasn't available at the moment, the driver showed up and apologized before asking us to get back in.

Later that night, I made up my mind that Lagos isn't a place for me, Lagos is Chaos itself.