FOOC Lagos Nigeria
I can't believe how much you folks have talked while my back's been turned! It's taken me ages to catch up.
The dd's and I arrived here on Monday evening, after a very early start - I was up at 3.20am that morning. The journey went as well as any journey to Nigeria can (although baggage reclaim was even more of a zoo than usual) until we went to get our transport from the airport to home. Dh set off with our bags in the car while the girls and I got on the security-escorted bus. There were two or three other people on board, then a woman with four boys arrived, entailing a major shift about. We were all finally comfortably settled and, we though, about to move off when the cry came 'Everybody off, everybody off!'
What now? we wondered. It seemed that another family had turned up unexpectedly (how?? - they have to be on the company manifest, therefore are not unexpected!!) accompanied by fourteen pieces of luggage. The luggage normally goes on a separate van as a security measure but there was no way everyone's luggage would now fit. So all luggage had to be offloaded and identified, at which point I was thanking my lucky start dh had gone ahead with our bags.
The girls and I were redirected to a larger bus, along with a couple and a young lad who was visiting his father in the Delta. He was just staying overnight at a nearby hotel, while the couple and we three were going on into Lagos. The family with four boys were also going into Lagos while the unexpected family were also going to the hotel. The differing destinations and the amount of luggage threw the bus crews into chaos, at which point the cry went up for 'Everybody off, everybody off! again and off we dutifully trooped, tripping over rocks and potholes in the almost pitch-black car park.
My merry band of three and the couple were again sent to board the smaller bus, where the chap suggested to the driver that his and his wife's two bags were also loaded on and we depart for Lagos. But that wasn't acceptable as luggage must travel separately so would have to be sent in the van. Thus the couple's two bags sat like pimples in the middle of the van while, to our astonishment, all the luggage for the family with four boys and the 14 pieces of luggage, which included a home-gym, a large keyboard and two enormous cardboard boxes, from the unexpected family, plus some luggage from other hangers-on who had by now arrived, were crammed on board the other bus via a back window! God only knows where the passengers sat because at this point the man on board our bus more-or-less ordered our driver to get a move on and we departed, taking the security escort with us and leaving the others to their fate. I've not seen or heard of any of them since.
On Tuesday I didn't wake up until 12.30pm, partly due to being totally shattered by the trip but also because it was so damn dark; I couldn't believe we'd come all this way just to be confronted by rain p*ssing down so hard we could barely see more than a few yards ahead of us. Weds was dry but yesterday was heavy rain and again today. But it's okay because our steward assures me 'It's just a shower, madam.'
I must be off to bed now as we are going to the beach tomorrow, hurrah - lets hope it doesn't rain!
PS am chortling at the thought of listening to R4 online - half the time we don't even have a phone signal, let alone internet, hehehe!