Down Below

        

        The plane hugged the night sky longer than normal, hovering atop dark, electric clouds that seemed to crackle with forewarning before the mad, eventual descent into the great kakotopia that was the City of Lagos. She lay sprawled out beneath us, enshrouded in the cover of night like a pirate’s hidden loot awaiting discovery. NEPA had long absconded its duty of supplying the land with regular electricity — long before I was born, even. Still, I looked through my porthole, somewhat expecting some kind of miracle that one can expect only time to wring out of a most miserly and unyielding contraption.

    “We are here, love. We’re home.”

    I turned to look at my wife as she roused our sleeping kids. I could sense suppressed glee in her voice, curbed only by the toll of the wearying journey from Istanbul.

    “Indeed, we are,” I said, nodding my reluctant agreement. “The darkness bears witness that we are finally home.”

    She gave me a rather stern look (the SMH type), her lips curling with a hint of humor. “Ase e ti poju,” she said in Yoruba (meaning “You are too pretentious”). “Look, you should be happy we got to land. What matters most is that we made it, babe,” she admonished.

    I understood the point of her reproof. The flight to Lagos had been fraught with some interesting events. Our pilot had to delay takeoff by at least 1 hour because of certain mechanical contingencies the engineers noticed in one engine, and simply could not overlook. Also, the Turkish Airlines pilot intimated he could probably do the Lagos trip on one engine to save time, but he’d rather heed the engineer’s advice to fix the other engine. As most of the manifest were Nigerians, the latter choice received overwhelming endorsement.

    Now the thing about Nigerians is that we take flying seriously. The typical Nigerian is deeply spiritual, and that constant spiritual consciousness often informs our important undertakings. Flying is one such undertaking. The decision to even fly at all would have undergone logistical analysis, divined through the eye of the Spirit, the plane and the pilot committed to the tender mercies of God, and our fellow flyers prayerfully screened for ill fortune in the higher realms. So, yeah, we waited until the captain eventually allayed all anxieties.

    Much later, the plane banked toward Lagos.

    IST - LOS/ TOUCHDOWN: ETA - 5 MIN

    The noise of the aircraft unraveling under-carriage unofficially signaled our impending landing at MMIA. The 5 mins had since passed, but the plane remained nestled within the clouds. Complaints echoed through the cabin. A dark, short, middle-aged man with an accent that sounded like a terrible hybrid of Ghanaian and Igbo took it upon himself to explain to the rest of us his thoughts on the latest developments. His opinion thus paraphrased: “The captain is having certain issues with the plane’s landing gear, and he simply can’t land yet. The noise we heard earlier was the under-carriage struggling to come out of the wheel well.” Remember, Nigerians don’t suffer negativity too well, especially when on an intercontinental flight. Therefore, Mr. Ghanigbo’s opinions were tantamount to sacrilege! And so, we let him have it. Long-winded hisses and short bursts of remonstrances flew in the man’s direction for a while. Las las, one no-nonsense Naija guy simply told Uncle Negative to sit his short self down, if he did not have a more educated take on matters arising.

    Suddenly, the pilot’s friendly voice crackled over the overhead PA:

    “Ladies and gentlemen, the authorities have delayed our scheduled landing at MMIA, Lagos, because of unexpected high traffic on the runways. We shall recommence the landing process when we receive the ALL-CLEAR confirmation from the Tower. Sorry for the inconvenience.”

    The plane banked left, and my monitor showed it headed toward Ghana. (Happy now, Mr. Ghanigbo?!).

    Wetin dey hapun na? Why ‘im dey carry us go Ghana? (What’s happening now? Why is the pilot taking us to Ghana?). Protestations rang out from Nigerian throats, even as flyers of other nationalities remained calm and mostly unbothered by the changes in proceedings. A Nigerian revolt threatened to break out in the cabin; the Turkish pilot (intuitively?) turned the plane toward Lagos.

    After a short while, we heard the now familiar noise of the landing gear, as Oga Pilot informed we would descend and finally land. The Airbus cut through the dark clouds pretty quickly with the usual gut-wrenching motions, as the airport loomed larger with every meter. The loud scrape of rubber upon tarmac announced our arrival to the sleeping city. Emotions welled up within me. Motherland began her pull like a living, hypnotizing magnet. Nostalgia had given way to feverish anticipation.

Oh Lagos!

To be cocooned in your humid embrace,

And my senses thus again assaulted

By the more familiar fragrance of thine open gutters,

Elated by the cacophony of the morning hustle,

Simply to drown in the night’s sweltering bustle

I have hence returned

Returned for a lungful of this here golden dust

One more time.

          

        

   

     The plane taxied toward the gate post haste, as if to apologize for keeping us in the air longer than usual. It slowed to a roll and came to a stop on the runway. We all sat there waiting, the sound of the Airbus’ engines and the drone of the airport’s generators the only stimuli around us. A faint light emanated from MMIA and pushed against the dark of the Lagosian night. It appeared a stick man pushing against Olumo Rock. We were still at least 1 km out from the gate. The captain came online for the 1000th time: The gates are so busy, officials are resolving the inconsiderable matter of a plane delayed at our designated gate, and things will clear up soon.

Loud groans filled the cabin for the umpteenth time, mine included. I cocked my head at Wifey.

“Se mi o so fun e? Ko s’ina. Gen gan ni airport n lo (Did I not tell you? There’s no light. Even the airport is running on generators). Could you imagine that after so long, the main international airport in the country still relies on generators for its operations? That’s just sad.”

“That’s true. I expected Ikeja to at least have light o.”

“Did you also notice that of all the places we’ve traveled to, only in Nigeria have we experienced jammed runways and overcrowded gates.”

“Ifemi, I think they have just been busy tonight,” she said, her tone somewhat apologetic on Nigeria’s behalf. My wife was still pretty attached to the place, having left only a few years prior. I left over a decade ago, and the strings of attachment and empathy for the nation’s shortcomings had worn rather thin by years of sojourning in other realms.

“No, ma’am... the other airports were busy likewise. The difference lies in the quality of organization and leadership, or the lack thereof in this case,” I lectured, gesticulating at the silhouette of MMIA in the distance. “Does a leopard ever change its spots?,” I asked Wifey, letting the sarcasm drip.

“Wo, iwo lomo. T’emi sha ni pe a ti de’le layo,” (Look, I don’t know what you’re on about. I’m just glad we’ve landed) she retorted, gathering some of our stuff. She was becoming irritated by what she later expressed as my “pontificating” where it concerned Nigeria.

It did not mollify me, instead my indignation stirred. The decay and regression I expected had materialized right from the skies above the homeland. I realized — during that eventual plunge — we might have been time-traveling between civilizations foregone, and what now presented like a rugged and uncharted terrain. Although reluctant to acknowledge it, the uncomfortable truth hit me: I could well need a guide in order to navigate the Fatherland, after all.

A stranger I had become in the land of my birth. That Wifey came with me was comfort itself.