Final Tour

My last few days in Nigeria revolved around shopping and one intense tour through the capital city.

I was fortunate enough to have the ambassador's driver give me a personal tour of the capital city. We started off with the basics: Government institutions. One rule to remember about Nigeria is that you need special permission to take pictures within a federal zone or take pictures of federal buildings (i.e. government buildings, the airport etc). If caught doing so your camera would be confiscated and destroyed. Therefore despite my ambitious attempts, I was unable to capture any good shots of the National Assembly (Capitol building) or any of the other federal institutions. I was fortunate enough to be driven through the restricted compounds and presidential residence since we had the ambassador's car ans diplomatic access.

Our next theme was natural surroundings. We explored the lakes around Abuja eventually leading us to the dam. Interestingly enough the construction plans around the lake seemed quite amazing...despite the fact that they are still in proposal stage and have been for the better part of two years. At the moment only the expatriates working for ABB live on the prime lakeside properties. There seems to be a lot of ambitious hope and expectations for this city. The damn that we visited, when fully functional, is expected to solve all of Abuja's water issues. A magnificent sight, the water seemed to stretch as far as the eye could see. Hilltops became islands and the reservoir a popular fishing spot amongst the local villagers.

The natural surroundings of Abuja are beautiful. Green hills and giant rocks seem to encircle the entire city. Aso rock, one of the largest rocks in the world, overlooks the capital and is a key landmark because it can be seen from any point in the city. In order to climb Aso rock, you need the blessings (permission) of the priests who guard it.

Near the damn was a village we drove through. This could have easily been the most intense part of my trip. We rode in the same Mercedes G Wagon which was used to pick me up from the airport. This is important to note because this car, despite it being an SUV, is not wide…neither were the streets. Nor was it exactly a smooth ride.

Driving through the village was like nothing I had ever seen. The pure state of poverty was overwhelming. I had the opportunity to take many great shots with my camera, but instead I held back. I was not goint to take a picture a picture out of admiration but shots that were trying to capture the state of poverty. Therefore I could not bring myself to pressdown on the shutter release. Who was I to do so? I am not an anthropologist, I am not a journalist, I am a visitor. I had no right to try and make any statements with my pictures because my audience would be a personal collection of people and the pictures I took would have been taken for the sake of entertainment.

I remember a sense of desperation come over me as we drove through the village. An innate feeling to run away from this dire situation. I could only imagine how the locals felt. There were naked children running in and out of houses made of clay, half naked women carrying their children, and trash everywhere. We passed through what seemed like the village center, where the locals were burning wood and gathering around looking at the half a million dollar vehicle drive through their existence. Its windows darkened completely showing only the reflection of their poverty bounce off of its luxurious facade right back at them. A hollow feeling lodged itself in my throat for the remainder of the afternoon.

After passng through the village we arrived at the clay pot factory run primarily by the local women. They gathered clay from the banks of a nearby river and shape their clay pots in the factory. When I say "factory" I mean to say a couple of small huts and about ten women. I bought a couple of them out of a combination of (primarily) guilt and the fact that they were extreemely cheap for what they were.

The last stop on the tour was a local palm wine bar...err...road-side set-up...however you would lable a shady area on the side of the road with wooden benches and two ladies serving palm wine out of two large palstic drums. Oh, not to mention that there were a lot of drunken faces. Apparently this location had the best palm wine. What exactly is palm wine? Well, its fermented palm milk. Its naturally fermenting in the heat so when its bottled and capped the pressure builds up in the bottle - - I didn't learn that until I eagerly brought home a large water bottle full of the stuff and unscrewed the lid, letting out a sudden burst of noxious fumes in the kitchen nearly forcing my family to temporarily evacuate the house. Needless to say the stuff is pretty strong and will put you on your backside faster that Butterbean can (Heavyweight boxer, YouTube him).

My final tour was eye openning at the least. I don't know if I'll be able to do that again but I am glad I did and I would definitely love to.