When every other person were in their churches or in the arms of their beloved on the day when we all celebrated the new year, I was in a mosquito ridden bus on the brink of a mental breakdown.
Oh wait! Before you say I'm over reacting, let me give you the gist. It all started on the 30th of December 2024 when I waved my beautiful girlfriend goodbye from the city of Lagos. Well, I wanted to try a luxurious bus since I heard it was more comfortable, AC chilling and all those good things we hear about them.
I found my way to Iddo from Ikorodu with a single thing on my mind "find an affordable luxurious bus" I saw Silver Luxury Travel which was my top pick because of how clean their busses looked and the general ratings they had but to my dismay they said the bus available as at the time I came was only carrying loads as the one for passengers was fully booked and had already gone.
My heart sank but I didn't let that spoil my steeze even as one agbero nearly cut the hand of my bag which I was gently carrying all in the name of trying to take me to the best place where I'd get a good bus, probably he thought I was blind and couldn't see the line up of other luxurious buses stand or maybe he was just more focused on the 200naira I would give him or the way he'd brag to the station that he was the one that brought them a passenger.
After winning the back and forth with the agbero, I sha landed in SD Express. Well, it wasn't as fancy and the other brand but who cares? As long as I get to my destination. I paid and the attendant at the park kept assuring me that by 5pm we'd depart. Well, we didn't depart till 7pm that's not even the kicker.
As we moved across the busy streets of Lagos, climbed the 3rd main land bridge, I was already excited that I would see my beautiful Hausa speaking Kaduna town in a couple of hours. Only for us to Branch one of their stations again, to pick other passengers which I kind of understand.
Ladies and gentlemen, we were there till past 9pm. I was already feeling upset but I just calmed myself down with the hope that latest 5pm the next day I would be in Kafanchan which is where I live. That itself is a 4 hour journey from Kaduna main town.
The journey was going on smoothly, until around 3am when I was hearing idle chatters. In my mind I was like what's doing these people now? Only for me to open my eyes and see that the car wasn't in motion. As I pepped, I could see the assistant driver ferociously twisting what I eventually got to find out was a disk in the gear box.
Not long after everyone exclaimed with delight as the cars engine revved and the driver honked as if to beckon those who had gone about their business. I was happy because we'd finally get to move as I was already becoming restless.
Little did I know, this was just a tip of the iceberg. The car again stopped but this time at a filling station somewhere at the outskirts of Abuja, I was already excited as we have already gotten home from the looks of things. We all got down and headed in different directions, some to eat, some to let out the shit and pee they had been holding for a while and others just took a walk.
A couple of minutes passed and we expected to hear the usual honk of the driver, so we'd all converge and carry on with our journey which we believe was already over. This was around 8am on the 31st of December, 2024.
As a curious person that I was, I went to the bus to check the driver. Only to see that they had opened the same place we thought had been fixed earlier. Hmmm, turns out they just managed it so we'd get to where they can find a welder to fix what was broken.
What we thought was going to take a couple of minutes became hours... A lot of people "rich people" took down their stuff from the car. Some chattered cars to their locations, other called and had people come get them.
But in my own case, I didn't have the money to do that. All that I had left was what would take me from Kaduna main town to Kafanchan. My girlfriend called and was like should she send money to me, but as an African man, I said No and I was there, hoping and praying that the bus's engine would suddenly rev and we'd hear that everything was fixed.
Hmmmmmm, ladies and gentlemen around 8pm, I grew restless and started to regret why I let my African man mentality rob me of the opportunity to have gone home. Just as I was reminiscing on my horrible decision, one of the young guys in the car met me and was like we should cross the road and find a vehicle even if it was to lap ourselves.
At that time, I didn't really care. I just wanted to be in the warm arms of my bed. We crossed the road and like Road Safety Officers, we kept waving at cars in an attempt to stop them and explain our plight. But it appeared we had missed our opportunity because no single car or bus or trailer stopped or even looked our way. Oh you're surprised I said trailer? Yes, I didn't mind at that point oo.
We went back to the bus with our heads down like a child whose favourite candy had been taken from him. I just basically gave up hope and went to sleep.
From the beginning I'm sure you already knew the end.
We got moving eventually around 10pm, at this point I wasn't even excited, I just wanted the journey over with. The new year came, the only thing that made me realize was the phone calls that kept flooding in, from my girlfriend to my mum to my friends...
By all parameters this ranks as my worse journey ever and the most unbelievable 24 hours of my life.
With these few points of mine, I hope I've been able to convince and not confuse you that, Haaaaaaaa! I suffer.
Image credit is Mine
