To Ask or Not To Ask: That is the Question

As I've lived in Nigeria, I have learned there are certain things you don't ask or say, especially to a new acquaintance. Things that are perfectly reasonable to ask or say to a new acquaintance in the U.S. This also works in reverse, as there are certain things that Nigerians will say to me that are perfectly reasonable here but if you would say in America, they would be completely unacceptable. I've collected quite a number of these cross-cultural quirks, so I thought I'd share some of them with you.

Things you shouldn't ask a Nigerian, especially if you're meeting them for the first time:

~"How old are you?" This is kind of impolite in some situations in the U.S., but not in the way it is in Nigeria. I don't know the age of the vast majority of people with whom I have interacted regularly for the past five months.

~"How many children do you have?" This is seriously taboo. If a person would answer that, it's almost as if they're saying that is "final." Even though they may only have 2 now, they may want 4, but if they say, "I have two," then it's like that's it. Done. No more will come. I believe it's linked to some old-school traditional beliefs, though I don't know anymore than that.

~"When are you due?" Never ever ask a pregnant Nigerian lady when she is due. This is terribly offensive. Again, I understand it's linked to some traditional beliefs about stating things before they're certain, saying things out loud and thereby giving demons a chance to do funny things (some believe), etc. This is something that even close friends don't ask one another.

~"How many brothers and sisters do you have?" We would totally ask this in a first conversation in the U.S., but it's not something you'd ask that quickly in Nigeria. It's not "relevant" or "fair game," and altogether too personal to ask when you first meet someone.

In general, we Americans ask a LOT of personal questions the first time we meet someone. A lot. So if you're meeting a Nigerian, just chill out with the question asking, and instead talk about sports, politics, or generalities about their life (e.g., How's work? or How's your family? rather than Where do you work? or What does your brother do?). Let people offer information rather than asking for it. Americans view asking lots of questions as showing interest and trying to get to know a person better, but Nigerians see it as suspicious behavior and think, "Why do they want to know this??" In general, Nigerians prefer to get to know someone by observing them, spending time together, or experiencing things together. Again, these are generalities about both cultures, not absolutes, but good to keep in mind. 

And for my Nigerian friends, here are some things you might want to refrain from saying or asking if you're in America.

~"You look like you've added weight." You can't imagine how frequently people say this to me in Nigerian. It seems Nigerians notice even small changes in the way people look, and it's perfectly ok to comment on it, as a totally 'matter of fact' statement, not in any way judging. Well, maybe some people are judging if they say it behind your back, but if they just say it to you, it's rarely judgmental. But yea, don't do this in the U.S., it is extremely rude. You can tell someone they look like they've lost weight, but not added. It's also common to ask people how much they weigh in Nigeria, and this would also be taboo in the U.S., unless it's a close friend.

~Asking a person about their acne/pimples. Even the word 'pimples' is not a word we use in the U.S., but it seems to be the preferred word in Nigeria.  As with so many things, we try to find 'nicer' words. Ah, the number of people who have asked me about my pimples! But it's literally not something you ever ask about in the U.S. Unless it's a mother to her child. Off limits.

~In general, men commenting on women's appearance. Now. Of course if a Nigerian guy my age who is intersested in dating me comments on my appearance (in a positive way), it's fine. I'm talking about older men commenting on younger women's appearances, especially in a professional setting. It's totally commonplace here, and I literally think all of my male coworkers/supervisors have commented on my appearance at least once. But in the U.S. you have to be super careful because people are super sensitive about sexual harassment and at the faintest whiff of sexual undertones, you might find yourself with a lawsuit on your hands. When you had perfectly benign intentions, and, as a proper Nigerian man, were just appreciating and celebrating the beauty of a woman.  

~"What church do you go to?" If you know someone is a Christian, it would be fine to ask. But unlike Southwest Nigeria where most people are "Christian" (or at least they would call themselves so because they go to church on Sunday), there are large portions of America where only a small percentage of people are Christians. Even if you're in a place with lots of Christians, religion is just not a "first conversation" kind of topic like it is in Nigeria. Again, assuming you don't know if the person is a Christian. Then again, if you have an evangelist's heart and want to share Jesus with everyone you meet, go right ahead, but just know that it may come across as a bit abrasive.  

~Interdigitating. This is a word I made up the first time I experienced it in Romania. One time we were all circled up before dinner to pray, and a Nigerian guy friend was next to me, and as we all joined hands, he interdigitated. You know, like the kind of hand holding that couples do, interlacing fingers. Not something guy and girl friends do. At all. Ever. It caught me totally off guard, and I was terribly confused at what it meant and if he was trying to 'send me a message.' When in actuality, it meant nothing, and it's just totally normal. Nigerians are affectionate in some ways that Americans aren't, and hand-holding (even interdigitational hand-holding) is quite common between men and women who aren't a couple, as well as between men. It's just part of the culture. Unfortunately I did not know this, and I am sure I blushed the first time it happened. Thankfully everyone was praying at the time and likely did not notice, and my confusion was shortly cleared up when I asked another Nigerian friend about the matter. But just to save any other Americans some confusion, be careful about your interdigitating.

With that, I will bring this post to a close. Hopefully this will help prevent a few misunderstandings and cultural snafus. If you can think of other questions or sensitive topics to add to this list, please feel free to post a comment!

Lagos Adventures

I went to Lagos for work as part of a team doing a study on healthcare waste management and injection safety. It was a national study for a large international organization, and it involved visiting 10 hospitals in Lagos State and interviewing a variety of environmental and health officers in the local and state governments. I was supposed to be there for a week, but due to a number of delays in the work, I ended up staying two weeks. And what an adventure-filled two weeks it was! I could probably write a novella from all that happened, but I will just share a few highlights.

First of all, Lagos is pronounced like you're saying the words lay+goes. Not lah-gohs. Think of Legos (a children's toy in the US), if that will help you remember.

Secondly, I heard more about Lagos prior to visiting than any other city in the world, possibly with the exception of Istanbul (which I still haven't visited but sincerely hope to). The most common adjectives Nigerians had used to describe Lagos to me are stressful, loud, dirty, chaotic, rowdy, and congested. Great reputation, huh? People talked about how fast-paced it is, how there are constantly people everywhere, how bad the traffic is, how there is something going on 24/7, how intense it is, and how you can pretty much get anything you want there. Lagotians say they thrive on the energy while non-Lagotians say they can't stand the place.

All this sounded a lot like NYC to me.    

The adjectives, the descriptions, and how two people could look at the same place and one would say it energizes them and another would say it drains them. NYers look at the chaos and intensity of the city and smile, while non-NYers grimace.

I thought for sure after living in NYC that I would do just fine in Lagos.

I thought wrong.

It was probably the most stressful two weeks of my life. Which is not to say I didn't have great experiences, learn a ton, nor that I can't look back and laugh at the absurd experiences. But alas, it was seriously. intense.

Now, a fair amount of the stress came from the nature of the work we had to do. As I said, it involved visiting 10 hospitals (where we interviewed 3 individuals) and interviewing local and state officials. They were spread out across the State (Note: Lagos is a city, but it's really a state), and the traffic situation made it a logistical nightmare. There were a number of other challenges with the work that I won't go into, but suffice it to say, doing the work in the Lagos environment was challenging.

Another portion of the stress was transport related. It's legitimately absurd to get around Lagos. By any mode of transportation you name. If you take a car or taxi, you'll likely sit in traffic for at least an hour to get anywhere. If you're going a long distance, it could easily be 3, 5, or 7 hours depending on the time of day. On more than one occasion I overheard someone say they left for work at 5am and didn't arrive until 11am because of traffic. If you take one of the forms of public transport (various kinds of buses and marwas), you have to figure out how to navigate the routes (no maps), and you will likely be crammed into a small hot space with far too many other people. If you walk, you have to be super mindful of your person and possessions (though that's the case everywhere all the time). If you take an okada, you have to pray fervently that you don't die.

So.

With those options, you can imagine it's a tad bit stressful, particularly for a newbie.

During my two weeks in Lagos I utilized all of the aforementioned modes of transportation. Our team supervisor had a car, which I rode in when I was working with him (we would often "divide and conquer," so sometimes I was with him and sometimes with the other gal). On those days we usually sat in traffic for 2-3 hours. When working with my other teammate, we didn't have a car, so we would take public transport. We took many small buses (something like a 15-passenger van), though never the large ones or molues, as well as marwas (essentially motorized rickshaws for 4 passengers). Here is a picture of the small buses, one from within the bus, and another from inside a marwa.

 

 

 

 

And then there were the okadas. A necessary evil, in a way. Given that they are not regulated, and any dude can just decide to buy an okada and drive people around on it (with or without training) they're incredibly dangerous. Even if they were regulated, the roads are terrible, and offensive driving is the way of the Nigerian driver, so you're quite vulnerable sitting on the back of a motorbike. Without a helmet. However, they are incredibly useful if you want to get places with any amount of timeliness. They can glide through traffic jams and really pothole-y roads that are difficult for standard vehicles to navigate. There were times when I got somewhere in 20 minutes on an okada, and it easily would have taken two hours in a car. Given the time constraints on our work and the logistical issues of going all over the city, it was a helpful option. Though they're trying to ban them in Lagos, as you can see in the pictures above, they're everywhere. I counted that I took 20 okadas over my two weeks. Just for good measure, I took a photo with the first one.

 

Yes, my first okada ride in Lagos was at night. 

Moving on. Since we had to go to hospitals all over the city, I saw a ton of Lagos. Imagine having to go to 10 hospitals spread out across Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn, and the Bronx. Yea. Lagos consists of the Mainland and the Island, and almost all of my work was on the Mainland. For those who know the city, I did work or spent time in Surulere, Mushin, Ikorodun, Ejigbo, Agege, Osodi, Ladipo, Imimu, Ojota, Yaba, and Ikeja. Not sure if they're all spelled correctly, but alas. Here are a few pictures so you can see some of the different types of houses and cars, as well as the ubiquitous garbage and satellite dishes. Of course, this doesn't even remotely begin to cover it all, just a few places that were of interest to me.

I only went to Lagos Island to interview one individual at the Health Service Commission, and it was on my tenth day in the city. It was literally like going to a different country. I had heard that it was this completely "other" place, a land of smooth roads, tall buildings, fancy stores, and big houses. I didn't go into the residential areas, but you can see even from these few pictures that Lagos Island is a radically different kind of place. 

To get to the Island you need to cross the Lagos Lagoon over one of three bridges. We went across the Third Mainland Bridge to get there. It's about 7.5 miles (or 12 km) long! While crossing to the Island, on your right you can see a slum called Makoko, essentially a fishing village on stilts in the Lagoon. It's an informal settlement, and the government recently destroyed many houses giving only 3 days notice to residents. I learned about Makoko a few years ago on a BBC Documentary entitled Welcome to Lagos. I have issues with the documentary because the three-part series essentially shows the three worst areas of Lagos, as if that "defines" Lagos. It would be like doing a "documentary" of New York City and highlighting a neighborhood in the South Bronx, the garbage dump in Staten Island, and the worst neighborhood in Brooklyn. Not exactly representative. In any event, I was interested to see it in person. It's far enough from the bridge that you can't get great pictures, especially while in motion, but here is one, as well two pictures of a neighborhood in the swamps along another one of the bridges. As with any major world city, the contrast between the vast wealth and immense poverty is striking.    

 

 

Lest you think my time in Lagos was all work and no play, let me close with a few of the more fun adventures I had while in Lagos. The first week I stayed at the family compound of gal on my team, and there were lots of kiddos between the ages of 6 and 10 living there. I had a lot ton of fun playing games with them and letting the girls play with my hair.

While staying with that family, I attended my first Nigerian funeral with one of the brothers. We didn't attend the service or burial, just the celebration/party, at which there were easily 1,000 people. Lots of music, lots of dancing, lots of food. For funerals there is most often a fabric that is chosen and you can buy it and sew it into any kind of attire and wear in solidarity with the family. It was fascinating to see more than half of the people wearing the same fabric!

I also attended a Sallah celebration. The hallmark of this celebration is each family slaughtering a ram (to represent the ram God provided to Abraham in place of his son). Driving around the city that day, we saw loads of rams being slaughtered in front of houses, as well as rams tied outside houses waiting to be slaughtered. In this case, I believe several families had come together and purchased a cow. But they still put a ram in front of the house, as well. I have a closer picture of the skinless dead cow, but I'll just leave you with this less bloody one.

As you know from my last post, I also enjoyed a lot of wonderful food in Lagos (including at the funeral and Sallah celebration). One that I didn't mention was puff puff, my favorite Nigerian snack. Delicious fried dough. These women make it fresh every morning and were kind enough to let me take their picture to remember the deliciousness. 

 

So, that ended up being a bit longer than I intended, but like I said, it was still a fraction of all that happened. Now that I've actually been to Lagos I can attest that everything people said about it is true. It is stressful, loud, dirty, chaotic, rowdy, and congested. But if you can manage to sort through all that, it's also a thriving, dynamic, and fascinating place, with adventures around every corner. Perhaps some day I'll go back and experience life on the Island, but I'm glad that the first time around I experienced Lagos as I did- in all of its gritty glory.

Nigerian Foods- The Lagos Edition

So I went to Lagos for two weeks for work. It was a completely intense time that I am still processing, and about which I will hopefully write more at length. For now I want to write about the food.

My first day in Lagos was the one day I was treated to some tastes of “home.” In the form of a cheeseburger and fries. My first in four months. It also included a latte, but I’ll just show you the proof of the burger. I know what you’re thinking, “Was it any good??” Well. It was reasonable. Not great, not bad. But after four months, reasonable is great to me!

I love ofada rice, a local rice that is not processed like typical white rice. It has such an interesting flavor, and it’s often served at big weddings/birthdays/funerals. I’ve eaten it a few times, but never photographed it. I enjoyed it thoroughly.

A common Nigerian breakfast is boiled yam and stew. It is not distinct to Lagos, but in Ife I usually eat breakfast on my own, splurging on American cereal. In Lagos I was always with Nigerians, so I ate this several times. Really tasty.

I love food at Nigerian parties. I also love the pots used to cook food for Nigerian parties. Big massive pots. Cooking jollof rice and fried rice. I attended a Sallah celebration in Lagos and saw these wonderful pots of rice, and then ate the deliciousness (with salad and ram):

In Lagos I also ate pepper soup several times. Pepper soup is a clear broth soup that can be made with fish, chicken, beef, ram, anything. They use specific spices to make it, and the point of the soup is that it’s very very spicy. Like the kind of heat that makes you sweat. I love it. And Nigerians are often concerned when I say I want some, as if I don’t know my limits. I politely explain that I like spice, and I would love to eat some. At the Sallah celebration they made ram pepper soup. My portion had liver, lung, and shaki (the white stuff), which is intestine. I was down with the liver and lung, but I was not so much into the texture of the shaki.

Another night I went with some friends to eat catfish pepper soup. Freshly killed and prepared for us! Probably the spiciest I’ve eaten, and very yummy.

In Lagos I ate a new swallow- lafu. It’s like amala, but white. I can’t remember if the stew was okra or egusi, but the meat was leftover Sallah ram.

I also at suya. One of my favorite Nigerian foods, and one I’ve eaten multiple times. It was great to eat it in Lagos!

I tried a number of new snacks in Lagos. The first was cocoro, made from corn. It originated in Abeokuta, the capital of Ogun state, which is next to Lagos state. We went there briefly, and I ate some cocoro while there. The word cocoro has two meanings, depending on the tone. One is the snack I wanted, the other is “insect,” which was not what I wanted, but apparently what I asked for. Oops. Thankfully they gave me the right one. It tastes somewhat like Fritos, but less salty and greasy.

Then there’s Coconut Chips. Ubiquitously sold by street hawkers in Lagos. Since we sat in traffic often, I was frequently tempted to buy them. Seriously delicious. I could eat them every day.

And finally kuli-kuli. I tried this once before, but since it’s mostly made in the North, it’s not easy to come by in Ife. However, in the melting pot of Lagos, it’s easier to find. It’s made by frying ground peanuts. Another one of my favorites, for sure. 

That about does it for the Lagos Food Edition. Though I miss my “typical” food from home, I’m certainly glad that I have so many wonderful and delicious options in Nigeria!

Hiking Erin Ijesa Waterfall

 I have wanted to go to Erin Ijesa since I first heard about it during my early days in Nigeria. A waterfall with SEVEN levels you can hike? Yes please. I googled around to try to find pictures of the place, but barely found anything. I asked around to try to get a sense of how intense the hiking was or how big the waterfalls were, but most people had never hiked past the first or second. A few said the hiking was really intense, but since hiking isn't very common here (among people I know, anyhow), I wasn't sure how to judge that. Now that I have been, I wanted to write about it, in case others want to get a sense for the place before going.

We went on a Saturday in October, and it was still raining heavily most days. I obviously don't have any first-hand comparison, but from what others said (and what it seemed like to me) the waterfalls and rivers were full, and the place was really crowded. Even just walking up the path to the first waterfall, there was water coming onto the path, and flowing vigorously.

As I mentioned earlier, there are seven levels, each with a waterfall, and you can hike up the mountain to see each of them. There is a simple path to the first one, and it looks like this: 

 

To get to the path to the second level, you have to cross through the river (as the guys behind me to the left in the above picture are doing) and then climb up steep rocks. It's not for the faint of heart, that is for sure. Nor those who have a problem getting dirty. It was muddy and wet, and I was using all my limbs to get me up. Here is a picture of the climb from below:

The climb is completely worth it because the second waterfall is the best, in my opinion. It's the biggest and most intense. And extremely beautiful. There were entirely too many people there for my liking (and mostly drunk college boys at that), but it was still striking:

Apparently most people stop there. The hike up to level two scares off a good number of people. Unless you really want to hike, it's definitely not conducive to any kind of casual approach. It turns out the people who told me the hiking was intense were right. Of the 40+ in our group, only 8 of us wanted to continue. Four guys and four girls, and all but two of us did it barefoot. I know, I know, Africans are used to being barefoot, but it was seriously impressive to me.

So the deal is that there is a main path you hike up (not altogether well marked, I might add, and none of us had done it before), and then at each "level" there is a path that branches off the main path, going back DOWN to the next waterfall. You climb up to the next level only to climb down to see the waterfall. Then back up to the main path to continue up to the next level. Thus, it's essentially double the hiking. At level 3 we didn't go all the way down, because it was REALLY far down, and we want to preserve our energy for the "long haul" and ensure we could get as high as possible. Here we are part of the way down the climb to level 3:

Level 4 was different, in that it was a smaller waterfall but still really powerful and beautiful. We hung out there for awhile playing in the water:

We continued hiking up and when we got to the path off to Level 5 continued upward. Several of us were set on getting to Level 7, but many of us were very tired by this point, and so we wanted to try to go as high as possible and not expend so much energy going all the way down to each waterfall. We came out one a more flat grassy area and walked along a path. It was 3pm and the sun was extremely hot. After a few minutes we met several people coming the opposite director who said they walked for an hour and saw nothing. We were slightly confused because we hadn't seen any paths for 6 or 7, but since we were clearly at the "top" of something and walking away from the water, we turned around and went back down. We also knew that there is a village at Level 7 (I was so intrigued!), and there was clearly no village. Thinking maybe the path to 6 and 7 was at Level 5, rather than off the main upward path, we headed back down to investigate. On the way I noticed an amazing view through the bush. I called to everyone to come take a look. We made our way through waist high grasses to see this:

And managed to find a perfectly positioned rock to take a picture all together:

Truly worth it!

Back down at Level 5 we found a total mess. Trees had fallen all across the river and there wasn't even really a waterfall that we could see:

With all the debris, there was no other path that we could see, and since we had no guide and none of us had hiked it before, we had no choice but to end our journey. We returned to the main path and made the long descent back to Level 1. Though we didn't make it to Level 7, I think we did a reasonable job! Though I'm not sure exactly, I believe the total hiking time (up and down) was about two hours. We were wet, tired, dirty and sweaty, but it was so so worth it!

I was also sore for about three days afterwards! If you have hiked past Level 5 before, please leave a comment sharing how you did it and where the path is. Erin Ijesa is a wonderful and beautiful spot, well worth a visit, and well worth the hike!