A Saucy Road trip

 A Saucy Road trip. 

One of the reasons why many things are left unattended to in a system, is probably the level of internal complicity in that system. 

I'm looking out for some new opportunities, so I set out to get by certificates from Akure. I got to Iwo park early in the morning, so I could get back to Ibadan the exact same day. I never knew I was in for some unexpected moments. 

The first bus I met on ground was almost full but on sighting the bus, I lost faith in it but gained humor - for anyone who is accustomed to these commercial buses ; as long as these buses have four circular wheels called tires, a battery, a fuel tank, brakes and some set of wires that can start the engine, they are good to go - the rest is OYO (on your own), the tires of this bus was almost worn out, the chairs were tilted at an angle so whoever seats on either edge is either closer to the bus base or his/her head is close to the roof implying that, if the bus runs into potholes, whoever seats with the head close to the roof will have his/her head smacked… ooch..but the thing is, these drivers have mastered their buses and know exactly how long the tires will last, so the confidence is there. 

I went for a smaller motor car which looked appreciably better but I was soon proved wrong - a experienced driver on a rickety vehicle who knows his vehicle in and out is better than an inexperienced driver on a good vehicle but doesn't know his car. The car charge was ₦2,500, in Nigeria, any increased fare or price is blamed on fuel, fuel, and fuel. The car took fewer minutes to get passengers and the journey started. 

Few kilometers to Ile-Ife, the car started dancing on the road and all 8 passengers knew that we were in for it, the driver just danced the car to a stop and discovered that the timing belt was cut, we all got down and the visibly shaken driver was seen making calls to the owner of the vehicle. 

We were angry at the situation and the possible delays this would cause us. We asked the driver for a refund and with tears welling up in his eyes, he explained to us that he already paid his garage people and bought fuel so he didn't have enough to go round. I didn't know whether to feel pity for him because my day was going awful and I needed to get back the same day but I did understand that the money left on him was probably for himself and family and a portion to whoever leased the car to him. 

Out of ₦2,500, he refunded a ₦1,000, we protested about this because he was implying that Ibadan to mid-way between Ibadan and Ile-Ife cost ₦1,500. Luckily, myself and four others joined another bus headed to Ondo-Ore and requested that the driver pay a ₦1,000 to the helpful driver and he complied, we felt that the tears in his eyes would make him more mindful of driving a well-maintained car next time. He learnt his lesson and I was about to learn mine too. 

On getting to Ile-Ife, we had to do another round of waiting, buses headed to Akure from Ife take hours to get filled, we waited for some time and I even used the minutes to google if flights were available from Ibadan to Akure, the discovery shocked me and I laughed when I realized that if bus rides from Ibadan to Akure took a whole year to get filled up, then flights would probably take the whole decade (sic). I got down from the bus and entered a fancy barbing saloon to take a shave, it was my first time at the shop and the barber tried to impress by using some new tools, so when he charged me a ₦1,000 as against the expected ₦500, I paid off to encourage his goodwill. By the time I got back to the bus, it wasn't filled up yet, I told myself and the other guys who came from Ibadan alongside me to seek an alternative, we wished we had taken these buses that had spare spaces and charged less called "Sọlẹ" when we had the chance.

As we were moving our asses, the bus conductors and marketwomen around appealed to us to wait for the driver who was in Lagere doing whatever-it-was aside driving. He came around, packed up his bus and it took forever to go through the hold-ups that characterize the Lagere and Sabo areas, we got to the main park and the driver got the needed papers, afterwards we started on his noisy and rickety bus. 

As we headed out of Ife to Osu and connected with the highway, we got to a police checkpoint, this wasn't my first time traveling on commercial buses and all of the time, the commercial buses are never stopped, alas this would be my first time experiencing a stop while in a commercial vehicle.

All of us in the bus were all young people, we would have been allowed to go had the driver's uncontrolled tongue and taunts not betrayed us. He gave these officers an assumptive look of "we know what you're looking for - implying yahoo boys - and none of the persons in my bus are", this pissed off the police officers and they decided to beam the searchlight on the vehicle. 

We can't teach life how to live it, but we must submit to life to learn its lessons before we can enjoy life, no matter how bitter these lessons are. 

The police officers asked all of us to come down and open up our bags, I was spared because I had a hand-held bag, the rest of us were searched thoroughly, one of the young men had a laptop and the officer requested for the receipt, the young man went bananas, the officer then followed through on the energy and started shouting "if you want to prove your rights, then you have to show your receipt to get this laptop back", pleas from myself and other passengers further boosted his ego which got him more adamant and took away the laptop as a side effect. 

The emotional drama spiraled and what was meant to be a routine search became a search for yahoo boys - and they found what they were looking for. 

What amazed me the most was, the driver's license of the driver wasn't requested, the search was mainly targeted, the driver's tongue might have betrayed us, nevertheless he was right 

Just after the bags were search, mobile phones were checked out, my phone was collected by a young chap and he told me "you don't look it" to which I replied "I do it the hard way", he raised his eyebrows and wanted more, I then said "study"...the Quora mails I receive daily on my Gmail was enough to vindicate me. He gave me my phone back. Those who used more expensive brands of phones had more of the spotlight on them. 

10 minutes turned to 50 minutes to an hour plus, finally they picked a guy who was indeed into yahoo. 

His mails and financial dealings on his bank apps gave him away, and one thing about the police officers is always their unwillingness to let anybody go except they get what they came for. [speaking of rights, it is illegal to barge into people's privacy, the policemen defaulted on this but rights are only for people with well-defined lives and for developed realities, and not a country like Nigeria where rights are theories] 

The young chap was bundled into their van and this affected us because we couldn't go without him. So we had to wait, the bus driver after conniving with the officers even gave the idea of leaving him behind by driving away from the checkpoint. After hours of waiting, the young chap came back into the bus and confessed that he transferred the sum of ₦80,000 before they let him go, after they initially requested for the sum of ₦200,000. 

We continued the journey, aside the incessant stops to deliver goods to a receiver that infuriated us all, we finally got to Akure. I spent 6 hours 30 minutes on a road-trip from Ibadan city down to Akure. 

I did learn new things and the cost of learning was my time, which emphasizes the reality that there is no learning except painful costs are paid. 

One thing that I'm still trying to figure out is this, who was at fault in the whole imbroglio? or who wasn't? 

Was the police extortion the right thing to do? From extortion of ₦20 from motorists to extortion of ₦80,000 from yahoo boys is really an extreme sports ; man must chop right, the salaries paid the police aren't able to feed themselves and families conveniently. Also, yahoo boys have the argument that the country isn't working out and they also have to feed and fend for themselves, and this is by getting money from foreigners who have sufficient money, well enough to send to anyone who poses as a lover or a friend online. 

If yahoo boys are extorting and scamming foreigners, and the police are extorting yahoo boys, does a wrong cancel out a wrong? It always spiral down into more wrongs. 

While the policemen probably finished the day with good feels for a profiting day, the yahoo boy probably got more bitter towards them and will seek revenge against them when given the opportunity - this is exactly the spiral down into more wrongs I'm talking about. Armed robbers will readily shoot down police officers because of their notoriety in extorting money from people - whether you like it or not, predators preying on preys. 

I got to Akure city and couldn't move as I expected because of an heavy rain, so the delay lengthened and I even doubted if I would be able to get back to Ibadan. 

I left Akure hurriedly by 6pm and got to Ibadan by 9pm. I hadn't eaten anything for the whole day and bought some boiled corn to pacify my belly while in the bus. 

It was a pretty long day, I got back home, cleaned up, ate something and slept off like a log of wood. 

Sharing my story has helped me transform the lemons life threw at me into lemonades for my enthusiastic readers. 

Bless.