Random

Ok some totally disconnected random stories here.

One of my bosses dog gave birth to 8 puppies earlier in the week. Pity it was her first time and she seems to be struggling a little with the whole motherhood thing. Namely she keeps getting up then sitting back down ON the puppies. Even their screechy cries do little to shift her. And then one night we found two of them were dead. Likely suffocated under her. Though she did manage to retrieve them from the bin during the night and put them back with the others. This morning she jumped up with one still attached to her nipples and it subsequently dropped to the ground. I think maybe she will put this all down as a learning experience.

There generally aren't that many types of animals floating around. There are plenty of goats everywhere and they risk their lives (and mine) constantly by running across the road. A more amusing scene the other day was a hen and her little chirping chickens paid a visit to the puppies.

I finished reading my first Nigerian book. It was "Ake" by Wole Soyinka who I'm sure is Nigeria's most famous writer (winning a Nobel Prize and all, ok maybe second behind Achebe). It was actually very interesting. I'd recommend it to most. Incidentally one of the boys who lives next door to me is his nephew and I share Wole's birthday (I told you this was random didn't I).

Nigeria's Contribution to Midnight Feasts

In Australia, after a good night out and a few beers, it is generally customary to end the night with a hearty snack. However, the only places typically open in the early hours of Saturday morning, belong to the well-known, and much maligned Kebab shops.

Now I am generally a fan of the Kebab. Hot, greasy, plenty of meat, the option of cheese and fairly cheap. With the added advantage of being able to pick your toppings. But here in Nigeria I have been enjoying plenty of their own variety of the after-drinks, snack-stop – Suya.

Nigerian's have managed to cut the process down to its pure essentials – namely lots of grilled meat and not much else. It is of course customary, like most foods here, to sprinkle a generous helping of pepper on the meat.

Typically, one goes up to a seller on the roadside, selects a steak-like piece of beef, leg of chicken or skewer, negotiates a reasonable price and the meat is then given its final grilling on hot coals (or sometimes it comes ready hot). The seller will then slice it up into bite sized pieces, sprinkled with the pepper and normally served wrapped in newspaper with some sliced onion, and if your lucky some tomato. If the seller is well stocked you can even choose your preference for the portion of meat (many people here like beef kidney).

Of course this all comes with the advantage of coming out to around to 1 Australian dollar so you can't complain about the price. Am definitely a fan of this custom.

Ado - Ekiti

I made my first attempt at travelling last weekend with a friend to his parents house in Ado (Ekiti State). Travelling was amusing, interesting, though I wouldn't say entirely enjoyable.

We caught a couple of buses that are basically like extended panel vans that squeeze about 20 people. There were not designed for somewhat lanky white men like myself, but it was only a couple of hours so it was fine. Only problem was we got caught in a heavy thunderstorm. This brought a couple trees down on the road and a massive accident resulted. So for an hour or so we were stuck in the middle of a standstill while injured people were carried to cars, semi-naked men argued in the rain, and all 18 passengers on my bus (ok everyone but me) yelled at the driver to do something (though plainly he couldn't move forward backward or do anything really).

The conductor also had a fine time compensating for the bus's lack of completeness. There was no window on the sliding door, so when it started raining heavily he was forced to stick his back up to the open space to stop the water saturating the (paying) passengers.

My second bus that evening broke down, however it wasn't far from our destination so we arrived safe and sound. We did nothing all weekend but eat and sleep. Also ate another couple of snails, this time they were bigger than my fist.


My friend is actually a prince. But that doesn't necessary mean a lot because i'm sure he's one of several hundred in his family alone. His grandfather, the former king (Ewi of Ado-Ekiti) had 18 wives and 72 children. Not quite as good as his great-grandfather who had 57 wives. Anyways I read the grandfather's autobiography which was very enlightening on the matter of royal custom and polygamy.

Generally an enjoyable time.

What Else Do You Think Of?

Following from the last more serious post (and yes Nigerians I know its kind of negative).

The other big thing all the books say about Nigeria and you hear is about the violence. This I also don't fully understand yet, though with time perhaps I will.

In fact my lonely planet doesn't really have a section on Nigeria because is says something to the effect of we thought it was too dangerous to go there – sorry. And stuff like – full of random sporadic violence. Try going elsewhere.

Now I really haven't seen much to that effect myself but its hard to say if that is commonplace. First of all I was always with locals in Lagos that I knew and Ife is a bit more of a quiet place. But I'll share a couple of stories with you.

Even the sleepy student town that is Ife is no stranger to extreme violence. I recently found out that just 3 years ago there was a massive fight here. One local government area and its people weren't happy about their representation on the local government. And they speak with a tiny variation in accent (though everyone here tells me that the two peoples – the Ife and Modakeke people are intermingled anyway).

So now there are all these shells of houses along the main roads. They were from groups of rioters setting fire to the two groups. A friend of mine lost all his possessions when they set fire to his house. And my current roommate is in fact my roommate because he had to move out of the affected area. The buses stopped running on the main road between town and uni during this period because too many people were getting killed. So although there is barely a sign of it now, right where I am was (fairly) recently a hotspot of violent trouble.

One of my bosses Nieces is from Kaduna. Now this place is in the north and the centre of Nigeria's most infamous violent times in recent years. Some smart chicken tried to hold Miss World (or miss universe) or some pagent in the muslim north. One thing led to another and massive violence occurred. This girl didn't even want to speak to me about it because her house was set fire and her dad was badly injured etc. So it touches many people, including those around me, though I would never know unless I asked.

I haven't seen really anything violent (except perhaps the odd fight on the road) yet and I hope I don't. Plus things may be different when I say, travel on my own.

Again, more on this later.

What do you think of when you hear Nigeria?

Despite the fact that I am gently urged by some Nigerian readers to emphasis the finer points of life in Nigeria, its would surely be incomplete not to mention a few more negative things. That is why I ask, what do you think of when you hear the word Nigeria?

I think for most people in Australia it might have something to do with those Nigerian email scans.

But of course the other big one might be about corruption. On the list of the most corrupt nations in the world, Nigeria comes in at number 3, only behind Haiti and Bangladesh. When I first arrived I was wondering what was going on for the country to deserve such a reputation, but the longer I stay the more I am beginning to understand.

It seems to occur at all levels. The most visible is the police. Far from doing any real policing most seem to just take up residence on any road they choose. So when you are travelling you can get some sections were every kilometre or two you will find 3 or 4 policemen making all the cars stop, have a look inside, get bribes off some and let the rest pass through. What crime they are hoping to prevent I don't know.

The other thing about travelling on the roads is the amount of documentation required. You seem to need all manner of documents and photocopies such that no-one will ever have the right ones. So if a policeman wants, he has a perfect excuse to waste your time checking through the documents until you give up and give him his 20 naira (the standard "fee"). Those that have it the worst are the commercial drivers, buses, taxis, trucks etc. who automatically just hold out the cash as they go past. There is no avoiding it for these people.

A friend told me a wonderful story how one day she just had enough and decided if they were going to want money, she wasn't going to give it and would make as much trouble as possible. It's a long story but needless to say she made camp by the side of the road and they certainly won't be bothering her again.

But beyond this how is corruption such a problem? Okay two stories from work.

One was told to me by a workmate. He said that one day a friend of his came to his house with a bag offering him about 50 blank notebooks and a hundred pencils or so. Now this friend worked as a local councillor. My workmate asked him where he got them from. The guy said the state government was giving them out for schools. So my workmate asks then why are you giving them to me and not to the schools. Although there are some people like my workmate who just can't accept things like this the fact is most do. It may not seem like much, but if every person is taking a little off the top like this then a lot of resources are not going where they are meant to.

Indeed one of the reasons I am told that our organisation doesn't really have any external sources of funding is that in the grant process, we refuse to give bribes to the boards making the decisions. So we have been told explicitly, you're not getting any money because you won't give us a cut.

But by far the biggest problem occurs right at the top. For some reason government departments and those in charge seem to be able to just pocket huge amounts of money and not suffer any consequences.

The head of the police, the inspector general, recently resigned over a scandal just before I arrived. They know he stole millions, but instead of taking him to court they just asked him to resign and that money is gone forever. I think someone put it right when they said that these things may happen all over the world, and indeed they do, but when corruption happens and there is no justice that follows, that is when the problems occur.

I expect to learn a whole lot more about this later. I have had many chats to people about this topic and will keep all updated.

What's in a Name?

Like most Asian people that I've met, Nigerian names are made up of real words so most names mean something. Plus Nigerians also have a tradition of giving "destiny" names. For example if twins are born (apparently twin births occur most frequently of any place in the world in this part of Nigeria) they automatically get certain names, or if the baby comes out backwards its given a certain name, or if its born on a certain day it gets the name etc.

But of those other babies, most relatives are given the right to name them. So generally at the naming ceremony, as well as the parents, each set of grandparents plus as many aunts or uncles etc. who want to can give the child a name. So your average Nigerian has at least 5 or 6 names.

This means that some names are very common and also shared between boys and girls. Most common I have come across are variations of dele, femi, tolu, tope, bukola, tosin, segun, sola, bayo, dayo and funmi. Then it is common to add other bits to the name - the most common of course being Olu or Oluwa (meaning god). So and example of a name is Tolu lope (meaning thanks be to god) or Bukola (adds to the wealth) or Adebayo (crown meets joy). Though of course I am not, as yet, an expert Yoruba translator.

I was given a nigerian name at the party when I arrived though almost no-one uses it. It is Oladipupo. You can call me Dipo or Ladi for short. I think it means something like – my wealth is multiplied.

Also I should add these are generally Yoruba names. The other tribes have very different names (different languages after all).

Jesus Power

I couldn't go on much longer without hitting the topic of religion. Nigerians are, it would seem, among the most religious people in the world. In fact the joke in the UK (apparently) is if you see anyone going to church on any day other than a Sunday (yes they go several times in a week) they must be Nigerian. Generally it is Christian around here, but of course about half of Nigeria's population is Muslim.

Religion is visible everywhere. Most noticeable on the roads, as most public vehicles (buses, motorcycles, trucks) are covered with religious slogans. My favourite so far being "Jesus Power". Also, with no sense of irony, one motorcycle rider had on his mud-guard the quotation - "I shall not die", very apt for a motorcycle driver on these roads.

I get asked to accompany people to church constantly. Although I haven't been to church in years in Australia, I thought no experience here would be complete without sampling a few different churches. So the other weekend I went.

Now the one I went to was a youth church (all uni students) and it was of course very different to those in Australia. I was told to expect stereotypical-black-gospel-church-on-american-movies and that's basically what I got. With a couple of differences.

A whole lot of dancing, singing and praying. Plus the pastor continually (as least every ten seconds) says either "praise the lord" – congregation says "hallelujah", or "in Jesus name" – congregation says "Amen". Most interesting was when the pastor started speaking this really odd language. I didn't get what was going on and asked my friend if he was speaking latin (cause that's what it sounded like). He laughed and later told me it was some kind of religious babbling that they do. He's not actually saying anything real but its supposed to be this communication with god that only god can understand.

Although I am sure to visit many more before I leave I have to say I didn't feel entirely comfortable in there. And the having to explain to people about my religious beliefs, how in Australia almost no-one goes to church etc. is becoming just a little tiresome. But then again I have had some great discussions about the topic. You really find no two people are in agreement about many things.

And the best dressed award goes to....

One of the few pieces of advice I received before coming to Africa was to dress down so that you don't stand out and attract unwanted attention (and thieves). I think this piece of advice is a little useless here for a couple of reasons.

1) I haven't seen another white person in a month (except for the odd albino) so standing out is not a problem, no matter what I'm wearing.

2) Nigerians like to dress well. So well that they consider themselves the best dressers in the whole of west Africa (although some concede those from Cote de Voir may top the list). Incidentally if Nigerians want to compare themselves to anything its usually other west Africans.

So most of the clothes I've brought, though appropriate for the climate, don't quite match the standards of the average man around here. I think I generally packed well. I have only one jumper which I only used whilst waiting in Heathrow airport. I perhaps brought too many shorts as you can barely wear the things at night (mosquitoes are just waiting for a bare pair of legs).

Am getting used to the whole hand-washing clothes thing, the only problem is if I for some reason am too busy one weekend this is going to be a problem as I won't have enough extras to get me through the week.

But anyways I hope to supplement my wardrobe with some more native attire soon enough.

Drinks, Games and Nigerian Guinness

An obvious cultural difference here is the culture of drinking and particularly in relation to aiesec. For all those in the know, your average aiesec conference is filled in the daytime with some gruelling sessions, but then at night we party, drink, chat etc. etc.

The whole drinking games thing seems to have missed Nigeria entirely. Now I remember going to the Asia-Pacific conference and pretty much everyone knew at least about the game zoom. No-one knows anything here, so I am having lots of fun teaching.



One of my first nights here in Ife I played a very interesting game of never, never with 3 boys. And on the weekend, I whipped out the only bottle I brought from Australia (one very large bottle of the old aussie favourite, bundy O.P) and taught some friends zoom. I think I might have started a movement. Rest assured Marty, the hash run will come and as soon as I get the aussie compendium I shall introduce skolling (no they haven't heard of that either).

Aside from the games the drinking culture is also minimal. Yes, most boys get into it, but the girls don't want to be seen drinking in public. Normally the girls just drink Maltina which is like a very, very sweet, non-alcoholic, beer-like, sugar fest. The beers taste ok, plus they are a bit stronger, bigger and cheaper (all good things). However there is usually only about half a dozen varieties max. Typically either Gulda (not that much removed from a Tooheys), Star (a clearer larger) or one little gem I've had – Nigerian brewed Guinness! (its really strong and only comes in bottles). A 600 odd mL bottle of star is about $1.20 Australian, which is cheap for me but not eastern European cheap (so I'm told).

The oddest thing about having a few drinks is the timing and venue. By 9pm most people wanted to leave. If you did that in Australia we would still be making jokes about you 4 hours after you left before the thought about going home even popped in my mind. And drink driving isn't exactly a major crime here (well to be truthful its not policed) so I pity the poor souls who engage in this regularly.

AIESEC in Naija

Ok this one's for the AIESECers only. Seeing as though I spend a bit of time with them I couldn't go without comparing the way things are done with the way they are in austraila. Of course AIESEC is going to be a bit different in Naija. However, there are one or two things that I will point out.

In lagos I had the opportunity to visit the MC office and felt so at home. Although the MC members live in their office, it is remarkably similar. Kind of cluttered, aiesec crap everywhere, but fun in a way. Plus, like the Aus MC, they too are dirt poor (well its all relative isn't it).

The LC meeting I went to last week. It isn't like the casual fair I was used to at Usyd. It was an ultra-formal (by this I mean you are fined if your suit and tie aren't looking sharp enough) and full of the motions, legislation, nominations etc. that Australians would only ever see in a legislation session at a national conference.

However, NEPA struck half-way through the proceedings which meant that the last half of the meeting was done in the dark. Busola who was sitting up on stage staring at us in the audience said when this happened I was the only one she could see. There are also a whole lot more members here. About 80 or so at the meeting (which I might add is compulsory, fine for those not attending of course).

The formalities of course don't stop the fun. Needless to say when they had enough, some smart alec in the crowd put forward a motion to call it quits immediately. If anything is put forward (of course seconded by two full members) then it has to be voted on. So it was. And we finished.

My Job

A few people have asked me about my work here so I thought I' better just explain it a bit just so you all can know.

I am working for a local NGO called Family Health and Development Initiatives (FAHEDI for short). They are a small organisation based primarily in Ile-Ife and occasionally have some programs in surrounding areas. It was started in the late 90's basically by a group of academics at this university who saw a whole lot of problems and wanted to do something about it. They are mostly lecturers of health sciences, for instance my boss, who is the Executive Director and the person basically running the whole show is in the Nursing Department.

There aren't a whole lot of staff here. In fact the organisation is basically run by my boss, Mrs Lola, a program officer, Dayo, a handful of other loosely connected people including a typist, a cleaner, the resource centre operator, and the rest of the work is done my the various directors (the lecturers) and volunteers. But like I say my boss is the one who does the most and perhaps the only other person really doing a whole lot is Dayo.

So what do we do. The organisation runs a huge assortment of projects typically based on health but also some development issues. Whatever you can think of in this area they either have something going or have ideas and projects in the pipeline. So my role centres around getting involved in any and all projects that happen to be going on at the time.

For example at the moment they do things like running a monthly seminar series in secondary schools on adolescent health, run a youth organisation is each of the same schools, run a support group for people living with HIV/AIDS, operate a resource centre out of our main office, run health and education mobilisation programs in the community and in family compounds (like an extended family group), support a group of disadvantaged and disabled children, etc. etc. There are so many things I struggle to think of anything they don’t do or plan to do in this area.

Also because the directors are all health experts they are often involved in facilitating programs for other NGOs. Plus my boss seems to be on the board of an incalculable number of development and health related organisations, so there's a whole lot of networking to be done.

I am somewhat amazed the organisation does what it does sometimes because they basically have no money. Most of the money comes out of the salaries of the directors and especially my boss. I think occasionally they might get the odd grant or short-term funding but this is rare. There are some reasons for this, some of which I will tell you about when I write a little about the corruption problems.

If you have any more questions just email me.

General Replies

A couple of people have written some comments and since I don't know half the email addresses here are my replies to all.

Maz - nice to hear from you and I will keep myself posted on your blog. What are your movements like?

Tom - have been reading your blog frequently, very entertaining. Your African adventure seems very different to mine but equally as interesting.

Lil - same again about your blog and yes I guess now you know I'm alive huh. Have you moved yet?

Jen - You seem to be jet setting around the globe. Its hard to keep up with your movements sometimes. Thanks for the hello.

Surya - Wetin you dey happen? I'm great and picking up a little pidgin. As for the food recommendations I've had a few of them already. After your first comment I was wondering how was it with a name like yours you call yourself Nigerian.

Jessie - Well I'm not actually in Lagos anymore. I'm based in Ife. But I'll be sure to visit lagos a few times before I leave.

Make My Dinner!

One thing that I think will be of great benefit to me here, and I find a little strange, concerns the attitude of women to domestic issues. I am constantly reminded by my mother that boys must learn to cook, clean and do their share as no Australian woman is going to do it for them these days. And I agree.

Yet over here in Naija, things are a little different. You will hear most girls telling you how good a cook they are and wanting to prove it to you. Hence lunch and dinner invitations abound, so each girl can show off their domestic skills. In fact, most girlfriends will do all the food shopping for their boyfriends and this is a hard task, let me tell you. The one day some boys and I did the market shopping. We didn't eat when we got back to the house as the boys just needed to nap and rest before starting to cook.

So then the girls will cook their boyfriends meals for the week and they will just take a bit out of the fridge every day. You will also find that most guys would never think of marrying a girl that wasn't proficient in the kitchen etc.

Although it hasn’t happened to me yet I was told an interesting story. Another (now departed) trainee went over to a girls house one day. She asked him what he would like to eat when he got there. Shocked, he said something or other. So the girl went out and bought the ingredients, came back to the house, cooked it and served it up to him.

I think I am going to enjoy this.
P.S. send all complaints about sexist attitudes to my mother thanks :)

Australia Day (yes i know it was a month ago)

Another quick story I forgot to mention was right after I arrived. I came in on the Saturday and was told on the way back from the airport that they had organized a party for me on the Tuesday. Little did they know that Tuesday was the 26th of January which also happens to be Australia day!

Suffice to say the co-incidence was remarkable but I needed to do something to mark the day. It was my first Nigerian party and since no-one was likely to bring very much at all I made sure we went out and bought a few drinks (Nigerian Guinness in fact) and some food. The food was going to be a problem at short notice first of all because Australian's aren't known world-wide for our cuisine and secondly whatever ingredients I would have liked aren't really available. But I got as close to I could to re-creating and Aussie BBQ.

Lucky I did because almost no-one else did bring food like they were supposed to. The "snags" in question tasted a bit like hot dogs but I think it went down well. I threw my Australian flags up and made the most of it.

The party was otherwise great, I met a whole host of aiesecers for the first time, and I got my first taste of the dancing culture here. More on that later but to summarise – I can't dance, and everybody else can. Ok maybe that's a slight exaggeration. There were one or two people who didn't want to dance, but the majority can, and look good at it. I'm not a big fan generally. But I did try. But yeah more on that another time.

They say white man can't jump. But he sure can swim.

Two experiences here.

First one was a trip to a beach in Lagos (this was a while ago). It was actually quite nice. Although of course some "entrepreneurs" had put up a gate to the road and charged us entry. All along the beach there were huts. However, it was during the week so unlike a beach in Australia, there wasn't a person to be seen.

Not that they would have been in the water anyway. Nigerians are generally not good swimmers, and especially not so in the ocean. The exception being the people living in the Delta (river) states. So they only dip their feet in and paddle about up to waist height at most. There isn't any surf anyway so its not that dangerous but they are still a bit scared.

It was quite a nice beach and I'll try and scan a photo in one of these days. It was a pity I didn't come prepared otherwise I would have been in that water in a second. Hundreds of metres of beautiful blue water all to myself.

Two days later I went with some aiesecers to a pool at a hotel. I clearly excelled here. Most of my friends refused to leave the shallows. So this decidedly average Australian swimmer looked like an Olympic hero next to these Nigerian boys and girls. Pity my physique did not match. Its seems most people here (boys especially) are naturally well built as compared to my slightly overweight body that looks like it hasn't seen the sun for 10 years.