Ostentatious Adolescent Display

I know it's been a while since the last post, I would make excuses for myself, but truthfully I have been lazy.  

Being Christmas, tourist season, time off work to straight chill during the day, good friends, great banter, I have gone out quite a lot. Well quite a lot for me anyway. But... something has struck me as being very odd this year in Lagos. The Lagos vibe is still the same, the same crew of people are in town, new clubs have opened, new restaurants, bars, pubs, the old faithfuls have refurbished, to cut a long story short things are popping off sha, but something is not quite right! Odd! Ok, let me not sugar coat anything, Lagos has been a bit DRY!!!!!!!!! Yes you read right! Dry, Dullin, Boring, Wack, Ko dun!

This got me thinking (and most of my tweeps would know this) IS IT ME? OR IS IT LAGOS? Does everyone feel somehow bored when they go out either to a club, or to someones BBQ? I still don't have the answer to that question, and it's not really relevant, cause I think I've worked it out, I found my own answer. It's not Lagos at all! It's me! It's you if your anything like me! 

Life in Lagos is all about OSTENTATIOUS ADOLESCENT DISPLAY!!!!!! Whether you are 50 married with kids old enough to meet u in the club, or you are 16 and your parents have just started letting you hit rehab with an older cousin, brother sister. The reason you love to go out in lagos is because you want to be seen, you want to pop the bottles, have the hot chicks on your arm, be grinding with one fwine guy, you want to show off your JBL dress, you Audimer watch, you want people to look at you, admire you, you want people to want to be you, you want to be the pivot around which the world rotates (or at least the pivot around which your friends (people that sit on your table) rotate). You have something you want to show off, you are seeking relevance, you have to make noise, everything you do must be POW!!!!! Let's call a spade a spade, you are attention seeking. Actually let me take that back, cause this is just my opinion based on observations, you may not be attention seeking, you may genuinely like to stand in an over crowded club drinking a 9k bottle of champagne which u paid 30k for from the bottle, while at the same time trying to dance to a song you can barely hear through a crappy sound system. Different strokes for different folks. However I call it ostentatious adolescent display. Just like a pubescent teenager feels the need to inculcate himself or herself by doing wild, out there, loud, uptown, theatrical, OSTENTATIOUS if you like things,  so to do Nigerians feel the need to, as the yorubas would say do "fahri", show off all in an attempt to be noticed, to be recognised and celebrated amongst their peers, seniors, juniors, gbogbo won. One small island off the coast off one small state, in quite a small country, with 16 million egos competing against each other for attention. "I fit pop bottle pass you" "My car engine big pass your own", "my table get people wey pass your own", "my cloth get thread count pass your own" "my shoe get red colour under am"... Lagos life is wrapped in fanfare and pageant ... It is damn OSTENTATIOUS, it is ADOLESCENT, and it is all unnecessary DISPLAY!!!   

...so Lagos hasn't changed, Lagos isn't any duller than it was last year, I have changed, I have grown out of the need to "display", if the club is hot, the waiters are long, the music is whack, the ladies are tacky, the men are uncouth. Why stay, just to "feel among" ... I have a well nourished iPod, surround sound speakers, a good bunch of friends...  So DEUCES!!!!!!

Xoxo.

Made In China

Welcome to the Age of the "Made in China Chick" .... Fake Hair, Fake Nails, Fake Eyelashes, Glued, Stitched, and Appended to their bodies somehow. A fantastic work of art, exotic, beaurrrriful, but this is the "Made in China" version ... Like your average made in China products, designed to solve the problems that the original authentic version couldn't. Just like the mobile phone with 2 sim cards that can double up as a credit car, thermometer, speedometer, baby monitor you name it, it Does it. "Made in China" Hair can withstand any weather condition (I honestly think the architects in the New Orleans area, could've learnt a few tips from the hair technicians in ATL, even hurricane Katrina couldn’t move one strand out of place), "Made in China" Nails can cut through a 7 foot steal wall, "Made in China" Eyelashes have nothing on any camels lashes, "Made in China" Chicks are far superior to your average African Chick... Front row at every event, Limited edition (one of the only 2 made) bag, hottest man on her arm, Always seen at the BA lounge at MMA on her way to an even hotter party off shore, Living the life you could only dream of... Don't you just want to be a "Made in China" chick. Today your dream has come true. 5 tips to becoming the “Made in China” version of you. Bigger, Better, POW POW POW:

1. “Fix” a weave. Preferably Brazilian. If you must Indian hair will do. Synthetic NO WAY, DONT DREAM OF IT!!!!! Without this hair you will never make it as a Lagos bix girl. Plan your social extradition if you haven’t got this in check. To take your place as a real bix gel! You should probably choose a top salon.. so u can schmooze with the elite. If you have a fab weave from Yaba, you still may not cut it
2. “Fix” your nails. No stick on’s, strictly acrylic, please ensure these are filled out at least once a week, it really isn’t cool to have the undergrowth showing.
3. “Fix” your eyelashes. Come on gels, why would you even step out of your house without mini fans appended to your eyelids, its Hammatan, fix up look sharp. Lashes should be individually glued on, it’s so 2008 to have a whole row put on
4. Dip yourself in Acid to lighten your skin tone. Black is beautiful; (only to white folk), if you wanna make it big in Lagos, at least 3 shades lighter.
5. Finally Dress the part. Patent Leather LV bag is really a must. Red will speed you right to the top of the A list crew. Platform stripper shoes, The tightest body hugging dress, all your tits out, cellulite showing, paired with the most ostentatious earrings you can find at your bend down market. Always remember your outfit must make noise for you to make news!!!!!!

Total transformation. Now you are set for some action under the mistletoe.

CAUTION!!!!!! Just like "Made in China" products often spontaneously combust, the "Made in china" chick must be prepared for unplanned misfortunes:

• Stick on Nails may drop off into your glass of wine
• Eyelashes may get caught in your boyfriends jumper, leaving you with one eye on point the other like a copse
• Worm eggs in the Indian hair that was sacrificed to a god may hatch and worms may bury themselves under your scalp
• Your skin may be left patchy or transparent, akin to that of a wall gheko

Disclaimer: I am not hating, after all they are your nails, that is your hair, your skin really is that tone, those lonnnnnnnnnng lashes are yours. After all you paid for them. And not Naira. DOLLLARRRRRRSSSSS baby! Lagos BIX girls!!!!

I LOVE Lagos xxxxxxx.

I love Lagos... I really do.... Nowhere like it in the entire world....really nowhere!!!!!!!

Yes we all moan endlessly about NEPA, water issues, TRAFFIC, zero service culture, etc etc. But we LOVE it, you love it, I love it! We're all crazy about this place. It's like a drug addiction. Lagos is our crack house, and all the people in it are our "pusher-men" ...

After what was possibly the worst day for me this year (ok I'm exaggerating, I do that, I'm a drama queen) I was so tempted to just log onto the blogspot.com and RANT. Like a full on session about how this place was one tragedy short of hell. But I took a step back and thought about it, I thought.... Where else on Gods earth is like Lagos?... Where else can you...

....
• Fix a hole in a plastic bucket
• Drive the wrong way down a road without anybody batting an eyelid
• Be stuck in traffic for 8 hours! Get to the front of the queue and find NOTHING
• Find traffic lights that create more traffic than if there were no traffic lights at all
• Be serenaded by the beautiful sound of over 700 horns at the same time on your 530 a.m. commute to work
• See people eating a meal of pounded yam and ogbonno at 8 in the morning (the n*kk* started his day at 3 or something absurd, na 'im lunch be dat)
• See a motorbike (okada, I was just trying to form posh babe) carrying a passenger who is also holding an okada in his hand ... No jokes my mum saw that once
• Go into an office and find hens and cocks running around (where I was initially posted for NYSC… I have photographic evidence)
• Have a full blown conversation with someone in questions. They answer your question with another question
• Find people that have stolen money from the state go and give their testimony at church
• Attend a wedding where you know nobody, you just hear say party dey, chops go plenty, champagne go plenty, babes go fine, so u branch the place, make u check am out for yourself, traffic full for ground anway
• Heck… Be a bridesmaid to someone you have never met in your life
• Be told that you are looking really ugly today, go and 'fix' your weave back or “should u be eating that, you have really added”
• Go to the hair salon and be ditched mid perm cause one 'aunty' society big girl has walked in hermes birkin in hand, belly hanging out, Brazilian hair has seen better days, chipped nails, wallet full of cash and her tip will be bigger than yours
• Have uninvited guests on Christmas day, who will whack your turkey or goose well well, burp, and leave for their next victim, without even bringing common bottle of wine. Actually where else can you have guest call around unannounced any day… Eko Ile
• Find the majority of the population living in one area but working on the complete other end of the city. Come on please banks move some of your head office operations to the mainland. Don't sink the island for us
• Hold a full time job, but your source of income is selling Victoria secret bras in the work loos
• Go into a meeting and first hold praise and worship, and opening prayer before you start talking business. I'm not treading on any toes here, I am crazy for Jesus too, but how's about that is bloody unprofessional and actually a bit antisocial
• Believe God that you will do your MBA at Harvard Business School, but you ain't never opened up that GMAT book and the exam is tomorrow. God isn't baba lawo, cut him some slack, open your books, stop being lazy
• Use two words to describe the same thing ... Toast bread, Glass Cup, Computer PC...
• Drink chilled red wine
• Pop bottle after bottle of champagne on a regular "I was just chilling at home, nepa took light, so I ya ri-ed and decided to touch rehab" night. Seriously even the guy way de make the champagne for 'im back yard no sabi shack the thing like we sabi am
• Tell a beggar on the street that the one u don give am all these days don too much, time don reach way 'im self suppose give u something, and the guy will produce you some cash. My driver got N200 once. Huzzzzzler
• Have a 5 minute conversation with someone, and know what their last name is, their mothers maiden name! Where they went to school (Eton darling), who their friends are, what their last names are, their bank balance, their holiday schedule, how many times they've been to the cartier polo, how the grand prix was, how they just received delivery of their 2011 Range Rover Evoque (they were the first in the world to buy it), How their dad sits on 18 boards of the top performing companies in Nigeria, How they paid 4000 pounds for their stirrup irons ... Name dropping is a skill here, and I guess what better way to cross someone off or put them on a potential suitor list
• Build property with no parking facilities but expect people to pay hundreds of millions on purchasing it, and actually make the sale
• Where else can u chop belle full with ur friends, then tell them e be like say u don forget wallet for house. Please if your having dinner with me bring ur wallet ooooo. I love Lagos but gold diggers are not my idea of fun
• Find shameless social climbers, hang on social mountaineers, their skills are so intense they can climb Everest within seconds, u sef no go know say they don jonze you (like that song "abi them want jonze you) .... Your ass got punk'd
• Meet a guy today and he has Err'thing in check, u date the guy he is lurvin you offffffff, you’re his world, the sugar in his tea, the epa in his garri, then next thing you know you get an invitation, homeboy is getting married to olubukola or ifunaya or Nadia ... Yes u saw correctly, No that wasn't ur name on the invitation.... Dagger to the heart
• Find grown men, that are still living with the rents, partying every night, no day job, but their still boasting that their wallets are bigger than yours
• Price a 10k item down to N500

And lastly i'll leave you with the greatest of the reasons why I LOVE my city...

Where else can you Meet the poorest, most unfortunate people who life has kicked, punched, slapped, rained on, but they still have so much faith and hope that "one day e go better" in the face of adversity us Lagosians push through, we are relentless, we are strong, we are hard working, and most of all we are HAPPY and fun to be around.

EKO ONI BAJE

I know this is prob a bit geeky but, let's all get out in 2011 and VOTE, we can't make Lagos a better place, if we don't have the right people to spearhead change.

Note to the tourists.... with love

So its that time of year again, where there is a real threat of Lagos island sinking due to the massive influx of "tourists". Though most of them carry green passports neatly hidden in Smythson passport holders they could give even the Queen a complex. The Queen of England that is, not the Olori of Ife. For us now 'native' Nigerians, our stomachs are already churning at the thought. So I thought I'd write a note to these tourists, to help us endure them this festive season. This is written in the nicest possible way, cause we were all on the other side not long ago, and I only imagine that our predecessors had the same issues with us.

Oooo shall I do bullets or numbers. Numbers I think, will be easier for our foreign mates to remember when they are about to commit these crimes.

1. Number ONE. (I am even repeating the number so its sticks) please guys if you remember nothing else, please remember this one. DO NOT COMPLAIN ABOUT HOW HOT IT IS. Its Africa guys, the tropics, if you are shocked that its hot, then I just don't know what to say to you really. Maybe you should've checked the weather forecast before you boarded your BA75 or is it 74, and if the temperature was not to your liking, you should've booked a ticket to Russia, it’s not hot there. Either way you are here now, so deal with it, and don't give us a weather update every 5 mins. We know IT’S HOT. Might I suggest Clinique blotting paper, Keihls deodorant, and a car with a good AC.

2. Under no circumstances should you drive. No no no. Yes, you don't need a license, there are many cars at your disposal, but just don't do it. You cannot handle Lastma, and we cannot handle the traffic you create when you have stopped traffic to speak grammer to them. Take it easy, you’re on vacation, sit back let Mr. Ola, or Mr. Salisu do the driving

3. Do not speak Fone to your driver. Believe me it is akin to speaking Chinese to a 2 month old baby on life support in General Hospital, they won't understand what you’re saying and they have far bigger problems than decoding what you have to say. You just won't get to where ur going. We all know you went to the best schools out there, you have lived overseas for your whole life you don't need to stress it, take it down a notch and speak to them in a way they will understand.

4. Well this one may just be a matter of opinion. So you can feel free to disregard. Rehab, Reeds, Bachus, Caliente, or whatever other hot spot there is, is most definitely not the after party for the Oscars, we don’t need to come out in our Oscar best. It’s really not necessary, you may think we’re hating, we’re really not, it just seems a waste of good clothes. However if you decide to wear your million dollar preen dress, and your 8000 pound Alaia shoes, and someone spills their power horse and vodka all over you please do not launch into some long chat about “OMG my dress was so expensive, my shoes were limited edition, how am I going to replace them” ... you can’t, just shouldn’t have worn them innit

5. While on the topic of clubs, i should slip this one in there. And this is especially for my very funky cousin. BLACKBERRYS and iPhones. This isn’t rocket science, and us natives fall victim to this too. Do not dangle a chunky juicy piece of grilled meat in front of a starving refugee. He is hungry, if he see’s it he is gonna go for it, cause he wants to eat, hunger don catch am. That iPhone 4 get as e take fine, but do not flaunt it, the people you are trying to impress with your hot accessory have been on the apple website, and we have all saved up to buy it. Sooooo put it in your bag, a clutch if possible, and keep it under your arm, only bring it out when absolutely necessary, like when you need to call Mr. Salisu to drive to the door.

6. Do not give lavish tips. Once you start you have to keep it up. Let me give an example here. My brother once tipped a driver 7000 Naira for a night out. To you foreigners this is only 30 quid, the same you would pay Addison Lee to drive you from your Chelsea homes to wherever people go to these days. But in Nigeria this is, and i am not kidding someone’s rent for 3 months, and up till last month it was the minimum monthly wage in Nigeria. To you it’s nothing, but here it is lavish, lets keep our money in our pockets ladies and gentlemen. Ladies you can use that to buy yourself a drink at the bar as opposed to trying to catch some fellas eye and get him to bring out his cash, gentlemen, get a mani / pedi and a haircut, God knows that after all that sufferhead abroad you need it. Moderate Tips also apply at hair salons, nail bars, parking spaces etc. Be kind, generous even, not stupid.

7. Do not air your lives at nail place or nail studio. I cannot tell you how quickly that stuff will fly around Lagos. This is the age of blackberry messenger, whats app, and gchat. Your ‘story’ could be in Bangladesh in SECONDS. For those of you who are searching for husbands, it’s not a good look to do a SWOT analysis on the potentials in such a public place, if you must please do it over the phone, otherwise you may be back on Virgin Airlines with a fat lip and not a fat rock. The biological clock is ticking don’t hinder your chances with this faux pas.

8. Lunches. I work daytimes, so this doesn’t affect me personally, but i’m gonna help my fellow natives out. Do not pass running commentary about how the food is awful, and when you were at lunch at Nobu you had far better tempura, and how the packaging of the water is awful. Its really not cool, nobody is gonna give u points for having been to Nobu, and knowing the differences between Bonzai and Nobu. We’ve been there too. And we accept that Nigeria is still a developing country, we can’t expect 5 star dining. If u don’t like it, don’t go there again, get ur cook to make u something, or just eat suya. You cant go wrong there. Not sure if this falls in the same category. But do not launch into conversations with street kids about why they are not in bed, or not at school, the likelihood is that they don’t have beds or schools ya know, lets be a little considerate.

9. Ladies feel free to sample our local content men, because let me not lie, men that live in Nigeria know how to treat their ladies, they will wine you dine you, put you on the VIP table at Rehab, and show you a good time. Kate Middelton soon to be Windsor, won’t have anything on you. But please please please do not moan to us when you are not receiving any calls from them after the holidays. Because like I pointed out earlier, Africa is HOT they just needed some foreign blood to cool them off a bit.

Men, when you see a native Nigerian lady, however tempted you are ... JOG ON ... We are hardened, we need men, not lady boys.

I think i’m gonna stop at 10, cause I actually need to get back to work...

10. Do not ask us how we survive living here. That’s a silly question really isn’t it. The people that are living here are not monkeys, they are people too. And hang on, you lived here at some point before you got the visa in the green, so evidently it can be done. We do not feel slighted that we live here, it was a choice, we have visa’s, green cards and red passports too, so don’t look down at us, we are not moved.

Have a great Christmas holiday. You will be hearing more from me more over the break.

Also please check out Xtreme Sports Nigeria’s opening on the 18^th of December. Go hard or GO HOME. www.xtremesportsng.com

Xoxo.

The decor of my mind

As much as I appear totally with it and cool when it comes to technology, I am quite the opposite with social media, internet etc. etc. , just never really understood it. I’m not sure what this whole blogging thing entails, what I’m meant to write about, what’s inappropriate, what’s funny, what’s not.

I think the safest way to start is by describing what exactly the blog is about???? Actually I don’t really know myself.  People are constantly telling me “You should really have a blog” so I guess I thought, why not, everything is worth a go. I think secretly it is just their way of saying “This babe u sabi talk, free us and channel all this random banter to a blog”. I’m not offended, got that thick skin. ;-)

As the title suggests I guess the blog will just be my random banter, thoughts, views, and generally just sharing my very crazy journey through life in Lagos. Sounds a bit drab, but will try my hardest to keep it exciting.