Driving past a dead body on the side of the road was a decidedly pedestrian experience growing up in Lagos. I remember one occasion when I was either 8 or 9; I had broken my left arm for what would be the first of two times in my life. I don’t know if it is reflective of where in society my family was at the time, but my hand was fixed by a local bonesetter in Ajegunle. Fixed isn’t the right term, because all the woman did was massage my arm in the most painful way that she could and inject something into my bicep that left it swollen for over a week. I would eventually be taken to a different bonesetter, located in Kirikiri, Apapa. A neighbourhood that’s slightly adjacent to Ajegunle but very different. From my house in Surulere, I took the same bridge to both Kirikiri and Ajegunle. It was on that bridge that I often saw lifeless bodies. Saw them with a regularity that I never even thought to ask about it. I did not act the way a child might, pointing and questioning. I did not need to ask, I knew.
If you were to word associate with Lagos, one of the first and perhaps most frequently occurring words would be ‘traffic’. This was the case when last year, I was doing a podcast documentary about Lagos. One of the stories that made it to the episode was about someone who had spent 6 hours on a trip that would on a different day take 20 minutes.
Lagos traffic goes in the same direction twice a day. In the morning from the mainland to the Island (where the main working district is located) and in the evening when everyone returns to the mainland where they live. For my first job, I used to be in that traffic. In the mornings, I would wake up at 5, have my bath and drive 3 hours to work on the island. I’d do the same thing on my way back. Every day, I spent 6 hours in transit. This traffic congestion is such a staple of Lagos that on days where for some inexplicable reason the roads were empty, I would be worried. Glad, but worried.
Clockwork traffic isn’t why Lagos has the reputation it has with traffic. It’s the sporadic traffic jams that give Lagos its name. Traffic jams that come out of nowhere. Traffic intersections that leave the Warden confused, standing in the midsts of cars going in all directions, not sure where to start or who is wrong.
In Lagos traffic, no one is wrong because everyone is wrong. I often sit in my car lamenting my principled nature of not moving with the crowd. All around you in Lagos, people ignore traffic rules and drive selfishly. To not drive in the same lawless fashion is to always get the worst of it. But I tell myself that without principle, I have nothing.
Traffic isn’t unique to Lagos. The confusion of traffic in Lagos is perhaps only matched by a few other cities but the existence of traffic on the scale it exists in Lagos is not strange. Traffic jams are a feature of big cities.
But Loudness is unique to Lagos. Lagos is loud. The cars are loud. Drivers use the horn the way I check my phone: simply just, not because there’s something there. The people are loud. Nigerians have a reputation for being loud, Lagos is where they are loudest. If you aren’t loud enough in Lagos, no one will hear you and everyone wants to be heard in Lagos. The generators are loud. Generators in the houses and the offices and the little kiosk that sells everything and in the barbing salon and the game centre that’s also a football viewing centre and in the back of the truck with dancers. The generators are everywhere and so the noise is everywhere.
Being exposed to noise levels of up to 55 dB for prolonged amounts of time leads to annoyance and irritation. Levels above 70 dB lead to hearing impairments. The average noise level of many parts of Lagos is 90 dB +/- 15dB.
Lagos is dirty. I have a story that might turn your stomach a little. Growing up, I lived in a story building that had about 15 flats of two-bedroom apartments. Each apartment housed a family. With only 4 members, my family was one of the smaller ones. You might not think about it but a very important logistic of such an apartment building is sewage disposal. Every couple of years, our septic tanks would fill up and eventually start to overflow. It was always a few weeks before the sewage truck came to extract the shit. What would happen is that every morning, on my way to school wearing a white shirt and green shorts, I’d have to jump my way around spilt shit.
One foot here
Oops that was close
Wait, can my leg fit in that small space?
I hope I don’t slip.
I went to private school with children of Lecturers, Businessmen, Politicians, people I imagine did not have to jump through shit on their way to school.
Living in Lagos is to constantly manoeuvre your way around the filth. I might be blowing it out of proportion when I put it that way but there are places in Lagos where that sentence applies very literally.
The population of Lagos is disputed. I have in my mind that the population of Lagos is somewhere around 20 million. This is a number that the New York Times quoted as far back as 2012. The World population Review currently puts the population at 15 million. 15 million is the most widely quoted figure. This makes Lagos the most populous city in Nigeria and second in Africa (although there are places where Lagos is quoted to be more populated than Cairo.) Whatever the actual figure is, one thing is clear, Lagos is crowded.
While there is a dispute about Lagos’ current population and where it ranks globally, there is no dispute about its future. Lagos is projected to be the most populated city in the world by the end of the century. It is one of the fastest-growing megacities.
People seem to be attracted to Lagos even though the city is so unattractive. Over 100,000 people move into Lagos every year. There are sources that say that number is monthly. The Lagos Governor quoted it as a daily number. Lagos is currently ranked 139 out of 140 habitable cities. The only city ranked lower is Damascus in Syria.
Why would anyone want to live in this place?
Why do I live in this place?
One answer is that Lagos doesn't have the appeal now that it has had much of my life here. The first time I had the option to choose living elsewhere (for Uni) I chose Lagos because I liked the familiarity. The second time I had the choice to move (just after Uni) I stayed in Lagos because I had a job lined up that at the time I needed. It was my Nysc year, I spent 3 weeks in camp in Mangu Plateau state and a couple of days in the city of Jos. Enough days that I knew I liked the city even though it was so different from Lagos.
It being different from Lagos is noteworthy because I quite love Lagos.
I love the people. I love the Island. I love the art where I can find it. I love that it is wild. I love that it is unpredictable in a very predictable way.
What I love most about Lagos is the speed. I love that it is so fast. That it carries you with it, as long as you let yourself be carried. If you attempt resisting the speed of Lagos, it will push you to the ground and step all over you.
I have this saying that I coined a few years ago.
Almost dying in Lagos is just Tuesday.
And I love that in Lagos, beyond all the chaos, I can also find these moments
My biggest regret about Lagos is that you cannot find these moments enough and I feel like I am at a point where I want more of those moments.
If I do leave Lagos, I know that I will miss it and miss everything that it is. I don’t believe there’s any place like Lagos.
Lagos can only happen in Lagos
