Nigeria beyond Jalingo!

Early on, I experienced a changing perspective as I transitioned from Boerne, to Wilton, to Lagos to Jalingo to small villages. In traveling first to Umuahia, Abia State and then to Owerri, Imo State for her convocation, I have gone back in the other direction. Jalingo has become my new “normal” and consequently, my new standard for comparison. Let me tell you, I am so glad that I have been given this opportunity to travel! It is helping me to understand why Nigeria is considered the place to be in Africa. Though there are still infrastructural challenges with running water and electricity, it is completely different from Jalingo! Here are a few of the most notable differences that I’ve noticed so far:

There are trash cans! That’s right, it took me nearly 4 months, but Abia and Imo states have public trash cans and encourage their populace to keep the city clean. It was delightful! Driving down the road in Imo State, I saw no less than 4 different buildings being painted while multiple others had messages painted by the government that it should be painted by the given date. Consequently, buildings looked good and were upkept! I saw sidewalks and paved roads…incredible! People were busy. There were not throngs of people sitting outside businesses watching the world go by. Other women, besides me, were wearing pants (trousers)! Businesses had Christmas decorations up!

Now, while these observations may lead one to believe that I am enamored by these more developed cities and now feel a sort of disdain toward Jalingo. That would be an incorrect conclusion. While it is exciting, refreshing and enlightening to see a new part of Nigeria, I still love my life back home in Jalingo. As I’ve found to be true everywhere, people are what make a place great and my friends and “family” back in Jalingo are the best in all of Nigeria! It’s been so heartening to be receiving calls, texts, and “flashes” (you call a person and hang-up when they answer…yeah…in the US, we’d call this prank calling…here they see it as a way to let a person know that you’re thinking of them without using much credit) from my friends back in Taraba.

I feel like I can appreciate Jalingo for the place it is, but the challenges come when Taraba is the only place that many of the residents have been exposed to. It’s difficult for people to strive for progress and development when they are used to their current conditions and aren’t aware of the possible benefits of alternatives. I really think that trash cans would be a good first step! :)