My father was strict as regards his Mercedes Benz car, and the best I could do was move it forward and backwards in the compound. My brother and I did not hesitate to get a mechanic to repair the Mercedes Benz the day my brother scratched it while attempting to drive the car.
When my mother bought her Honda Accord car in 2009, it was an answer to my youthful exuberance, as I knew I was going to eventually bully her from driving the car. I was in my late twenties then. I never went to a driving school as I had engaged myself in observing drivers whenever I was in any commercial vehicle. Driving my mother’s car was quite easy since it was an automatic, and I had tested my father’s manual car in the compound prior to the moment my mother’s car arrived. I got a learner’s permit, and I became my mother’s personal driver since she worked in the teaching hospital that I was a student at.
Within Ilorin city, where we are based, traffic had never been an issue, and so navigating the car had little challenges, although I did not escape scratches on the car occasionally.
Three years down the line, I had to make my first long-distance trip with the Honda car. I looked forward to it, as I always enjoyed traveling but never had the opportunity to be the driver. It was my elder brother’s wedding that was to be held in Okene, Kogi State, Nigeria. The journey was a four- to five-hour drive, and we took off quite early. We hired a bus to convey friends and well-wishers from Ilorin to Okene, and I followed the bus as a convoy with my brother, mother, and her friend through the Ekiti State route.
My mother kept praising me for driving so well when we got to Okene, and the driver of the bus equally acknowledged my efforts in keeping up. We had a successful wedding occasion on the same Friday we arrived and on the following day, Saturday. Wedding occasions in Nigeria can last longer than planned as Nigerians love attending them. Our plan was to return to Ilorin on Saturday after the wedding occasion, and efforts were made to tidy up all necessary things that could cause us any delay. Well, as much as I hurried the groom’s mother (who, incidentally, is also my mother) and her friend, we could not meet up with the bus that led us into the Okene from Ilorin. The bus had to leave us behind since we were not ready and the bus passengers would not wait any longer.
I was quite unhappy as my confidence was already shaken, although I knew I would still have to drive the Honda car home. We eventually hit the road some minutes after 4 p.m., and I drove as fast and carefully as I could. I knew the road to the point we exited Okene town, and we began to ask for directions to our destination—Ilorin. I knew there was an alternative route to Ilorin other than that which we took, and we were warned not to pass through it earlier as the road was dangerous (because of frequent robbery attacks, especially at night) and equally bad to drive on because of numerous potholes.
The funny thing was that I kept seeing landmarks and signposts I assumed I encountered while coming to Okene through the Ekiti route, and this confidence geared me further. It was not until after about an hour on the wrong route that we realized and agreed we had missed our way, and we were already on the long and lonely route known as Egbe road. It was saddening and frightening, but we drove on as dusk already knocked at our door. The road was so filled with potholes that we could count the number of times we drove a kilometer without encountering any significant potholes. My mother and her friend kept praying, and I occasionally observed their lips when I turned to look at them.
About two hours into our lonely journey, where only a few cars were encountered, it was about 7 p.m. when the car fell into a deep pothole and we heard some disturbing noise emanating from the car. My heart skipped a beat as I knew trouble loomed. We parked the car and realized the silencer of the car had cut and dragged on the ground. At that point, my heart bled and frustration was written all over me. We were very fortunate to have that incident occur beside a community situated along the road, and we managed to get someone to weld the silencer back into position.
It was already too late for us to continue with the journey, and even the members of the community advised us against taking such a risk. We were ushered into a missionary home, where we spent the night at the pastor’s residence, and the pastor’s family was kind to us even as strangers. I felt really pained that we had to spend the night on the road despite our efforts to reach our destination that same day.
We continued our journey the following morning after dawn, when we were certain it was clear of danger. The journey back home took us about three hours because the silencer was not properly fixed (engaging roadside artisans or mechanics does not usually yield optimal results). We got to Ilorin a few minutes before 10 a.m. Later in the day, I took the car to a welder I was familiar with in Ilorin, and he brought out the whole car silencer and fixed it properly.