A Letter From The Airport 🛫

When people tell me I have not lived my best days, do they not also say I have not seen my worst?

Lagos

It’s 4:37am and I’m currently sitting in the waiting area of Murtala Muhammed Airport. One might think because the day is still in its early hours, Lagos would just be waking and processing its thoughts. No, the city is already in full swing.

On the way to the airport, as the dim headlights of my uber were doing their best to light up a dark road, I noticed people in corporate clothes, clutching their bags and walking briskly to the bus-stop with eyes darting around in the dark, scouting. With each step, choosing to brave the dangers of the city in exchange for a livelihood. 

This human uncertainty is what tickles Lagos itself. Everyday, it knows it's going to swallow someone up, what it doesn’t know or even remotely care about is when or who. It makes that decision purely on a whim.

Lagos is not planned. Chaos is woven into the very fabric of its seams. Everyone who chooses to stay in this city knows that. Yet, when another person is swallowed, we tut our tongue and say, “this Lagos is a deathtrap sha”

Still, we don’t leave. Because like those people in corporate clothes, we’ve made our choice.

I close my eyes, shutting out the city and its dangers.

When I open them, I’m sitting at the airport.

---

Waiting Room

The already full waiting area is getting even more crowded as more people walk in with bags, sit on the cold metal chairs and wait for their flights to be called.

Everyone is distracted by some form of entertainment. Well, at least almost everybody.

Some people have a book, others scroll endlessly on social media. Some are typing away at a laptop and others are entertainment for children who are a few seconds from bursting into tears.

Except the old man directly in front of me. His thoughts seem to be enough entertainment. His eyes are fixed on the boarding attendant, almost willing her to start boarding.

His left leg tap the ground repeatedly, it is clear he wants to be on that flight already. Give him the option of teleporting and if he is not a superstitious man, he’ll take it.

His last child, who also doubles as his best friend, is bleeding out on a hospital bed. He knows he will love the boy she just birthed the minute he sets his eyes on him but the shrieking boy is not any of his concern right now. The doctors, nurses and all the medical personnel present in the delivery room will make sure he is well taken care of.

Right now, all of his thoughts lie with his daughter. He knows that she’s not had an easy life. Her mother left them when she was barely three. His sons knew how to get by without their mother or at least, they quickly adjusted but not her.

During a storm, she’d wake up in the night and feel around the dark room he shared with all his kids. She’d continue to tap around for the hairy legs of her father. In that moment, as lightning lit up the world, he’d see her face, fear glistening in her large eyes.

Then came the loud rumbling thunder and she would shut those eyes just as quickly as she ran into his arms. They would hold each other until morning.

His thoughts leave to settle on when she was 7 and came back from school with tears and dust caked on her chocolate brown face. Between hiccups, she’d tell her father how her classmates didn’t let her into the dancing group because her hair was not always well-done.

The part she didn’t need to say was, if she had a mother, she’d not have to rely on her father’s unskilled hands. Because he knew that already. As he wiped the tears, he asked why she had sawdust in her cornrows and she said like her brothers, she tried to fight but unlike them, she lost.

Our old man has now taken his eyes off the boarding attendant. They are glued to his phone. As he removes his glasses, I see the mark beneath his left eye. 

It was her 11th birthday and she was spending it from the hospital again. He had promised to buy her a cake but this was proving to be a challenge as he had spent all the money saved up on hospital bills and medication. Lost in his thoughts, he pulled the wrong lever at the factory and a conveyor belt lashed at his face.

I do not know what our old man saw on the phone but as he raises his eyes, I see resolve in them. He is bringing his daughter home. I also see sadness in those eyes. Eyes that, somewhere within them, already knew the work they had cut out for them once they reached their destination. 

Lagos had struck again.

Those eyes knew the man who Lagos had given to his daughter, who had coerced her into moving away from the safety of her family, had done something sinister to his baby girl.

Our flight is announced over the speakers and our old man limps to the queue. He bravely holds back tears and walks towards the most heart-shattering loss but also the most beautiful gift.

I don’t board immediately because I like to wait out the queue, so I close my eyes.

---

The Journey

When I open them, the flight is almost taking off and I’m strapped in. The air hostess says something to me that I do not hear. I look around to find the man. I do not see him.

Maybe he was further down.

Or maybe he does not exist and this is my anxiety personified.

When people tell me I have not lived my best days, do they not also say I have not seen my worst?

However, like that flight landed safely in Abuja and I walked through the airport into the dry cold air, there is a tiny reassurance that whatever it is waiting for me, I’ll get through it.

If you’re currently wading through a period of uncertainty in your life. Or maybe you’re in your waiting room. Regardless of where you are right not, this is my letter to you from the airport.

You're going to take off and there will be turbulence but you’ll come out at the other side, whole.

Hang in there. You’ve made it this far.

🖤,

Hauwa.