THE SPONSOR OF MY BICYCLE SPARE PARTS IS COMPANY PRODUCING FINE BICYCLE SADDLES
www.abi.com.pl When I was in Yaounde, my couch surfing friends told only bad stories about Nigeria. In the Nigerian embassy the officials were asking why I wanted to suffer so much but the following days were to show that it is not so bad here.
Just the next day, as a welcome to the area, I got picked up by a plain clothed police officer for investigation as to who am I and so on. They told me about the security situation in the country and that I should be careful. These kind of "interrogations" happened a few times, with more or less the same irritating fashion.
However, the most interesting part of the country was to come. After I went across the river on the ferry (motorised canou) in a small town called Ibi I got to very impressive area. There were mud houses, villagers working in the field, bad roads and very little traffic. I was the top attraction whenever I arrived, and felt very secure. By far the most interesting part of the region was the colorful and shy nomadic cattle herders. Women belonging to these tribes travel on foot at least 20-30 km daily to sell their milk in exchange for other food and household products. I must say they are the best of Nigeria as far as I have seen.
Further on I entered the Jos Plateau. An elevated area with a cool climate where farmers are cultivating more european-like vegetables.
The surrounding landscape started to become very rocky and picturesque so great for photos, but to my bad fortune it is the rainy season so not much opportunity for photos later on when I stopped due to low light. The landscape reminds me of the frontier between Namibia and S.Africa with it's sharp rocky peaks but of course this area is much more green.
The descent to Abuja was very pleasant since I was going down most of the way and I had a lot of time to look around.
Unfortunately the food here did not make a good impression. Bread packed and manufactured in some big cities is not edible. Even flys do not wont to eat that stuff I have noticed!! In the majority of places if you are lucky you will find an omelet, some artificial tea, rice with some goat or beef. Very chewy!!
Sometimes you can find Jam and Eba or Fufu which is similar to South African Pap.
No sweet treats, no fried meat, sometimes some fish.
Cameroon, although I was not enthused by the food available, at least had Baguettes!!!
So, after my first week touring through the country I got to Abuja, or rather the outskirts. It is a protected town in which the President is trying to solve their crisis. Is it really in trouble or just black man's laziness and a lot of talk about problems instead of doing something!! Or maybe they should have truly honest elections??? But IT IS AFRICA do not forget about it!!
I'm not!!