When I read the description for this prompt, I started thinking hard about the craziest car trip I had experienced and at one point I couldn't think of any until I remembered Lagos. In Nigeria, you can't talk about crazy road experiences without mentioning Lagos state, that place is definitely the king of all crazy road experiences. I guess the reason for that is because of the large population of people living there and most parts of the state being surrounded by water, which means that some parts have one major road in and out of them.
I stayed in Lagos for just a month back in 2022 for my industrial training. Me and my course mates were posted to a federal research institute and we were provided with accommodation in Ajah while the institute was in another city (Victoria Island). We managed to get a bus which takes us to the institute every morning and brings us back in the evening. We always left the house very early because of the crazy traffic on Lekki-Ajah road, and sometimes we spent more than an hour stuck in the same traffic we were trying to avoid.
During this time, the whole country was in the middle of fuel scarcity and it was even worse in Lagos. The fuel scarcity contributed greatly to the serious traffic experienced in Lagos, considering the queues at most filling stations extended out to the roads. On this particular day, our bus driver called to tell us that he wouldn't be coming to pick us up because he couldn't get fuel for his vehicle. We were at the institute 😐. We decided to take series of public transportation and find our way back to the house and I thought it would be as easy as getting a bus in the city where I grew up (Benin).
We got to the bus park where we would get a bus or cab (or even wheelbarrow 😩 we had no choice) and we met a huge crowd, everyone was waiting for a bus. Our leader who is a typical Lagosian girl advised those of us not used to that lifestyle to fight our way into any vehicle that comes or we will never make it home. A few minutes later, a bus came to the park and everyone swarmed it. Come and see me fighting like crazy just to enter a bus, something I have never done all my life.
I managed to get a seat and despite the cramped nature of the bus, I had one of my coursemates sitting on my thighs. It wasn't shocking because we were all prepared to do that if it came to it but the crazy part was when we realized that a complete stranger was sitting on one of my friends’ thighs 😂 and this was a full-grown man that was wearing a suit. “Oga what's the meaning of this na, please come down,” that was what I heard that made me turn to see the funny incident.
The man started pleading for my friend to just manage the situation for now and he would soon get to his destination - that was a lie 😅 My friend has no choice but to agree because even the bus driver didn't even care about the whole thing. We ended up in traffic after traffic and after a while, I could no longer feel my legs anymore, considering how cramped the bus was and I also carried someone. We managed to get to Lekki and got down from the bus, then we were faced with another big problem; getting a vehicle to take us to Ajah, but that's a story for another day.
That day was the worst road experience in my entire life. I grew up in Benin City and have never struggled to get on public transportation but just one month in Lagos and I have fought my way into a bus several times (I only talked about the craziest one). I had PTSD after I left Lagos and would sometimes try to fight my way onto a bus in Benin 😅 I keep wondering how people remain sane while living in Lagos, the road experiences alone are enough to drive anybody crazy, but I guess they have gotten used to that lifestyle.
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