With Love from Jikwoyi

Whenever I travel to Abuja, I stay at Jikwoyi. Jikwoyi is a satellite town in Karu local government area of Abuja. It is a border town and a bike ride is enough to (unknowingly) have you in Nassarawa, a neighboring state. I have been there! It wasn’t funny. While many people feel you would miss out on the whole posh, cultured Abuja experience if you stay at Karu, I love Jikwoyi for its unpretentiousness and the organic life experiences it offers.

I have had many experiences thanks to Jikwoyi.

The good.

The bad.

The hilarious- like that one time I ran after an along* in a raincoat shouting for my change.

But the most recent and most thought-provoking happened in a salon close to my aunt’s house. A stoic and graceful Yoruba woman runs the salon. Her voice is antithetical in its calmness and animation. It was late evening. The sun had long set and the cold tiles were a sharp contrast to the hot air the fan swirled around the room. The TV droned in the background, filtering in diary conversations of BBN housemates with Big Brother. Down to only two customers, me and a woman that wanted feed-in braids, the hairdresser slowed down to match the pace of the evening.

In my journey with experiencing, I observe people’s faces, nervous tics, changes in demeanor and voices, but most of all…