I don’t remember anything Nigerian being this efficient…

Whatever happened to being yourself?

It’s is very likely you will be successful in life.

Verbatim.

“Would you drive a pink car?” I asked my boss on the way to work.

“I don’t think so,” he replied, after thinking for a while.

“But have you ever seen a pink car?” I pressed. I hadn’t.

“Yes, I believe I have,” he said. “It was a pink SUV.”

I tried very hard to imagine a pink SUV, but couldn’t. There are times when your imagination fails you, and this was one of them.

As if in answer to my question, we spotted a pink sedan not long after. It was one of those ‘wow’ moments, and I assumed (wrongly as it turned out), that there weren’t many pink vehicles around.

We’ve run into a lot since then — more sedans, a huge SUV, and the topper, two pink fire trucks in tandem.

Only three more  things would make my year – a pink motorbike, a pink limousine and a pink helicopter or jet.

Azuka: Hello

Lady on other end:  Hello

A: Is this Third World Grocers?

L: Are you serious? I hope you never find Third World Grocers.

A: …

L: Everyone’s been calling me asking for Third World Grocers.

She hung up. Typical example of what happens when you find a site on Google with out-of-date information on African market addresses and phone numbers.

That was the first message I sent when a friend of mine signed in after a long hiatus from Yahoo Messenger.

Understandably, she was shell-shocked.

This was the Azuka — who, a while ago wasn’t comfortable when others called him ‘honey’ or ‘love’ — using a word like ‘sweetie.’ It just came out, and I suppose I would have thought nothing of it if she hadn’t pointed it out.

Apparently, I’ve changed — and not just physically, as I thought, but in many more ways…

How have you changed?

As the resident ‘explorer’ in my family, I explored that notebook to death. I played those silly DOS games from morning till night, and dreamed about how cool it’d be to own one someday — I started writing code because I thought it’d be cool to do something most people didn’t understand.

Most of the laptops I saw were 15.4″, and I always thought I’d get one until I saw — and fell in love with — a 17″ Dell my (then) boss at CAD Consulting got. It wasn’t pretty, but it was big and that was what I liked (I’ll probably get a 20″ or 21″ sometime, when weight issues are taken care of).

Since then, I tried hard to get one. When I finally could afford one, I discovered the less-expensive ones just weren’t powerful enough. I went for a monster desktop instead, which I took with me on my trip to Nigeria this summer. Something must have gotten loose during the flights (I had three stopovers) because I didn’t pad the suitcase well enough, and you should have seen the loading “people” (what are they called?) toss it.

Everything was messed up when I arrived, and I didn’t make things better when I forgot to switch the power to 220v. PayPal decided to lock my account for logging in from a suspicious country. All the money I’d been saving towards a notebook went down the drain — repairs and unpaid credit card bills during the period. To make matters worse, even though I padded it properly on my journey back, I discovered something had gone wrong again, so I had to go back to my old baby. So I lost my chance … or so I thought.

I got an unexpected windfall last month and straightaway did some research. By balancing price and specs, I arrived at the Dell Studio 17.

So what do I like about my new notebook? First, it’s cool (I seem to be stuck on the word ‘cool’ today). It’s fast, it’s sleek. But I love the mobility most of all. I no longer have to stay 24 hours in my room.

Strangely, now that I have it, I don’t feel any different. Even though I moved almost everything I have just yesterday, it feels like I’ve been using it forever…

I wish I could say Nigeria was completely fun — not that it wasn’t, but being away for quite a while had gotten me unaccustomed to some of the important things. Like NEPA PHCN.

After a few weeks of making excuses with my employer and spending quite a bit on diesel for our generator when not doing so (making excuses), I got flat-out broke and had to stop working. The internet connection at home was a joke, and I don’t want to talk about it.

I probably sound like I hated going back home, but I didn’t. Mom’s cooking was absolutely fabulous and although I intended to lose some weight back home, I couldn’t, although I didn’t gain any either. It was great seeing my younger brother, Uche, and my elder, ‘Chief’ as well as my cousins, aunts and uncles. I met up with a few old classmates too.

I’m not blogging from my PC (which has some issues at the moment), but in any case,

Tadaima (I’m home).

My ‘school’ is in the GRA area and I stay in Mile 4. It’s not very far, so I decided to get there quickly on an okada, today. The ride was uneventful — the okada-man made some dangerous maneuvers, but how many of them don’t? We had just headed in from Agip Junction when I felt a beautiful sensation that was matched only by the jarring impact some milliseconds later. A car had hit us from behind, sending us through the air and into the gutter — or almost in.

I think I was more shaken than wounded, as the cyclist cushioned my fall. Fortunately, we landed on a section covered by wooden boards so he didn’t really get hurt either, but his dashboard (or whatever it’s called on a motorcycle) and headlamp were torn off.

The driver parked and emerged from the car. Most of the onlookers who’d gathered dispersed quickly in disappointment when they saw the driver was female.

‘Na woman sef.’

Is there some law of nature existing only in Nigeria which renders women incapable of driving properly? I don’t think so, but for some reason whenever a lady driver commits some error, the men standing around almost always say the same thing. Na woman sef. Funnily, some women join in, as though female drivers are expected to possess poor driving skills. OK, OK, I’m ranting.

From her story, a taxi driver had tried to ‘chance’ her at the junction, and he had done it so abruptly that she swerved to avoid him. The cyclist had suddenly jumped in front of her and gotten hit. Passersby confirmed her story.

My cyclist was having none of it. Swearing and cursing himself (or at least that’s how I would interpret ‘If I you no repair my motorcycle today, make thunder fire me!’), he proved to be very unreasonable.

Azuka hates getting in conflicts, especially when the person whose side he should be taking is being an ass, so I paid him for his services, accepted the apologies of the nice lady, and boarded another okada with side mirrors — I’m never getting on any without them again.