Ibadan and Beyond

After a good time in Lagos, Aunty Bimbo told me that we have to go to Ibadan for the weekend, and that leaving early on Friday morning was mandatory since the Lagos-Ibandan expressway is in such a poor state and the great church "Mountain of Fire" have their camp/retreat/great conquest on saturday and completely block the road. If we went any later than Friday morning we might spend the night on the road! Aunty loves going to Ibadan, and says sometimes when she gets fed up with working in her store she'll just go to Ibadan for the weekend, which can very easliy turn into a whole week or more. Uncle Seun likes to say that what God has joined together, Ibadan wants to break apart since he doesn't like to go nearly as much as Aunty Bimbo does because everyone and his brother comes out of the woodwork to ask him for help in something or another.

Our plan of action was to go to Abeokuta to visit my Uncle Segun and Aunty Funmi briefly on the way to Ibadan, so we packed up the car with Uncle D and Awa, Aunty Bimbo's house help, and we hit the road. I had a good time "jisting" (that is just relaxing and conversating, or maybe even "chewing the fat" if I may) with Aunty Bimbo in the car about what we'll do in the US, how Nigerians are absurd, and my favorite, her threatening to give Uncle D a "dirty slap from the back" for his "Jaames Bond" driving. Since we left early enough we were able to more or less avoid go-slow on our way to Abeokuta and reached it just before noon.

It was great to see Uncle Segun and Aunty Funmi again, and we had a good time talking about what was new in life, and then we went to go see Aunty Funmi's office. When we got there, everyone asked me if I was Brazilian and laughed really hard when I greeted them in Yoruba, and interjected into their conversations about me and answered their questions. It took me a while to explain to one lady that I did not have a wife even though I am a full 20 years old because my Yoruba is so limited, but I didn't stick around long enough for her to make any suggestions for me...

Next we went to Olumo Rock, a historic site for which Abeokuta is named. Over a century and a half ago, the people who settled in the area fled up a hill to this massive rock to hide away while an inter-tribal war was being carried out, and they didn't come out from under the rock until the fighting was all over. The rock was considered a deity, and every year to this day the traditinoal leader of the city and the high priest make sacrifices to it. I went some years ago with my whole family, but the place has since been turned into a tourist attaction with elevators and guides and the whole 9 yards. They really did a nice job with the place. After some picture taking, the view of the city from the top of the rock is breathtaking, I went with Aunty Funmi to the market to go price for Adire, haggle for some traditinoal cloth that originated in Abeokuta. By the time we had found some cloth that we liked at a price to match, it was well-after time to leave for Ibadan, so I met up with Aunty Bimbo and we were off again.

I really enjoyed driving outside of the city because the Nigerian landscape is beautiful and I was really taken by how much closer the sky looks than it does in the US. After a while I realized that it is probably because there's nothing blocking the skyline and you can always see the clouds on the horizon in any direction. While looking out the window at the landscpae, buying fresh pineapple from people on the side of the road, Aunty and I had fun singing along to P-Square and Ty Bello CDs my cousins left in the car until it started raining. In Nigeria when it reains, which is all the time, the roads become even more abominable. Needless to say our quite pace was turned into a slow drag. By the time we got into Ibadan itself we were hardly moving at all because the roads were so bad, and the drivers were even worse. At one point Aunty Bimbo got so mad at one driver who was driving on the wrong side of the road and wouldn't move out of the way to let us go, she told Uncle D to get out of the car and she parked it in front of the guy and told him she would teach him the lesson of his life until he let us go. After he huffed and puffed, while Aunty just stared him down, the guy's life was indeed changed, as he got out of the way for us to pass.

We finally arrived at my late grandparent's house in Ibadan at about 10 pm and I greeted the people who keep the house for us (Ma Gbeji and her family), we ate some rice and then passed out so we'd be ready for more activity tomorrow.