When I got posted to this City for my camping activity, it was a mixed feeling, or better still, I was feelingless. I didn’t know what to feel. Partly because this City has been one of the places I have fantasized about growing up, but it’s not what it used to be anymore.
I admired this city because of their cultural differences. I love to explore, and their food, even though had few positive reviews, I wanted to taste it, but not anymore.
Going there at the time I got posted there felt like a death sentence. First, the route to the location was and is still very dangerous. So many people have died plying that route even during the day when everywhere is bright talk more travelling at night. Some got robbed, some got kidnapped for ransom and all, so, I was certain that it was a death sentence. Oh, how I was prepared not to die, but to survive by all means possible.
I remember registering in a martial art class years ago so that I would be able to defend myself against anything or anyone, but I dropped out three months into the training. It was too intense for a soft girl like me. (I plan to try again though. Maybe @moremoney28 will help me this time).
I had imagined, planned, and replanned on the strategies I would use to protect myself over there, because I was supposed to spend about one year of service in that city.
In my dreams, I saw myself planning, and I most times was in my head strategizing how I would survive. At the end, I decided to stop stressing myself because there are people living there too. So, whatever happened, there would be a way to survive.
Three weeks on camp was fun. I worked indirectly with the state coordinator, met people on camp, but I still applied to be relocated to a safer community which I later cancelled because I have coconut head. I mean, I was scared earlier for God’s sake! Whatever gave me the confidence to cancel it?
Anyways, it was our last day at camp, and the first instruction from the state coordinator was, “as you are heading out of this building, make sure you don’t have anything showing you as a corps member. It is for your safety”. Okayyyyy. So, it gets interesting from here.
I sourced for a place of primary assignment for myself and went to the local government for registration and there, I saw, I saw, and I ran. Come with me…
Oh, did I mention that we speak different languages, and only a few people there understand English? Oh, I skipped it. Well, it was when I entered town that I knew that something was up with me.
I met people who would snare at me and kind of gossip and whisper about me. It felt like I was going to get kidnapped in the middle of the city. I knew I needed a plan, and it was to learn their language. I learnt, but I didn’t learn much, but I knew the words for “kidnap, steal, carry, run, where, how much, pikin” and every other word that could mean that I was in danger.
I learnt really well within two weeks that the grandpa I stayed with asked me if I had learnt the language before coming, and I responded No. Well, that’s what being in danger does to you.
After an encounter with a man that looked like he would stab me with his eyes in a tricycle, I decided to reapply for relocation, and then ran back to a safer place.
The night I travelled out of the community, I was scared on the bus, but it was better that I was scared on my way out of that city.
Barely a month out of there in a new community where corps members are respected and appreciated, I let my guards down, and I enjoyed the rest of my service year. And all those words I learnt, I don’t remember any of it now.
Phewwww. Nothing is as good as peace truly.
All images are mine.
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