Electricity wahala, new naira notes kasala, fuel queues gbege and the hullabaloo balablu upcoming elections are the many heavy punches landing on the faces of the average short tempered, thin patience, sun roasted, intensely frustrated Nigerian all at once. I mean, there are days you feel this country is a punishment for a sin you committed in another life. It's almost as if you were so bad there, that they sent you here to learn your lesson and believe me when I say you haven't learnt anything because as a Nigerian you also have a short memory, that explains why you voted in this current government.
let's start with the queues at the bank. For some weird reason I had been getting away with not going to the bank to get money as people have been gifting/paying me in cash. 2,500 naira here, 3,000 naira there , and all in new notes. A few days ago I had the unfortunate luck of going to the bank. I got to the bank and the queue was scary. From afar it looked like a war torn zone where the survivors were scrambling for leftover bread from a dumpster which in this case is the ATM section of the bank (or the entire bank if you ask me)
I joined the queue of sweat drenched men smelling like a mixture of damp clothes, water soaked newspapers and the insides of a couch that once housed rats, rats that are now dead and decaying. The smell was enough to end my life but I thank God for grace and mercy that said a big "NO". It was definitely not my time to exit this space.
As if the putrid smell from their sun grilled bodies wasn't bad enough, some people would occasionally sneeze or cough out in the air. Mind you, this atm section is in an air tight room with no windows. Just the entrance door that was kept open. It was air conditioned but that didn't make any difference cos believe me, the NCDC would need to do a viral sweep of that place considering the level of bacteria going about in the air. From time to time I would bury my head in my shirt so as to breathe in "good" nice smelling air and someone from the queue would tap me on the shoulder to apologize for coughing over me.
I'm a lowkey gemophobe so you can imagine the horror. The queue started from outside the ATM room. It was one queue that splits into two once you make it past the door. I won't mention any name, but the bank is the color you get when you mix red and yellow. Their buildings from outside usually look really nice and frankly I just loved the bank until they recently started to frustrate me 🙄 anyway, back to my story...
...once you make it past the door, you're greeted with a stronger more putrid smell which now carries a hint of poorly scrubbed tongues that have most likely been bathed in brukutu.
Here, you meet people arguing with eachother on who came first and who belongs to which line, those who are already angry and looking for a fight from anyone, those who are already in active heated arguments and looking at you for support (bruh rest! I don't even know what you're talking about, I just got here), those who show up from nowhere and swear that you're standing in their spot, the old people with "my daughter Abeg allow mama enter your front Abeg" and in my head I'm like "me too I be person future mama, allow me dey for my spot abeg" and then the latest billionaires...P.O.S Attendants.
As I stood in the line quietly, I observed everyone as is my M.O. (let me just say it here now, Nigerians can STARE!!!!!!! They look at you like they've known you from another life). Once I made it past the door, I picked a side. After about 40 minutes, the money finished on my side and the security guard alerted the bank officials to top up. This took another 30 minutes and withdrawals continued. The queue was moving sllllloooowwwwwwwwllllyyyyyyyy and in about 40 minutes, the money finished again. At this point, I wished I had joined the other queue. Some people who were on the other queue had made withdrawals, left the bank and returned to meet me at the same spot ( of course you know they'll be P.O.S attendants ). Some would withdraw, go to the back of the queue and sell the money...
...yes, you read that right.
Two hours later and 8 people away from the machine, the money finished again. By this time the bank had turned off the lights and there were no staff available to put money in the machine. I almost cried.
I wondered what my life would have been if my mother had married the white man she said had approached her instead of my dad. I would have been living in saner climes and not standing at the ATM, knocking knees shaking like shereke, smelling like 100 poorly washed people with only 200 naira in my wallet. I looked so sad that the driver of the uber I ordered gave me 3,000 naira cash (I transferred it to him sha)...
Comments