yaya rua
on Fantastic Voyage (Nigeria), 09/Sep/2010 16:57, 34 days ago
Just around the corner– nowhere near an old Trebor factory – is a little road, connecting our hillock ridden, semi-aquatic track with the main road (which perpetually threatens to become river instead). This charming thoroughfare can be known as either Rat Alley or Shitty Alley, depending on how profound the stenchis, how polite the company is, and how desirous of an entertaining rhythm you are.Even with the limited knowledge you currently have of this place would probably suggest that it isn’t an ideal first date venue. I’ll paint in some more details. The road may well emerge when the dry season has kicked in for several months, but for the moment it’s fairly hard to imagine: any surface basically consists of mud, household rubbish, or shit and the remainder is either puddle or swamp, depending on where you draw the line. To travel along it, we walk along one fairly broad stretch of wall, hop over a channel to proceed on a single brick-thick section, then hop over again when we come to the concrete blocks surrounding a transformer (or many; I have no idea what a transformer is, to be honest. One of the drawbacks of them being constantly in disguise) before finally gracefully pirouetting over an oozy stream and onto the main road. It’s an ideal place to meet someone and spend the time you’re waiting for them to negotiate the varied walkways to work out what the appropriate greeting is.On the whole, it doesn’t smell as bad as it probably ought to – although there’s a little section in the middle which for some reason is pervaded by an overpowering stench. Think Avernus in the Aeneid: not with impunity do oyibos venture there. And the wildlife, while highly present, isn’t invasive. Many bitsof green do twitch ominously with rodent-like shudders as you pass, and when you nearly fall into the channel – particularly when half drunk in the dark – it’s difficult not to imagine little red eyed sharp toothed scurrying across your feet, and furry beings swarming up your legs.But what’s really – really – brilliant about this place is how incredibly, richly alive it is. Most of the time here there’s some noise knocking around: insects, birds, children singing hallelujah repeatedly at six in the morning, neighbours playing the worst hits of the Backstreet Boys at top volume and on triple repeat when you’re in bed with malaria. That sort of thing. But along Shitty Alley, every last blade is quivering with vitality. Lizards flit along the walls and cock their heads as you pass; gorgeous little birds – about the size of wrens, but with a much more balanced shape– like a finch – painted in a dusky red hop cheekily about and peck at I-don’t-want-to-know-what; chickens rustle about the piles of rubbish as they slowly produce the eggs we’ll eat as pancakes the next day; goats and cows walk through the slush slowly and patiently, enjoying a fair old nibble on the variegated shades of lush greenery.But by far the most stomach-churningly cool bit of fauna pops out at dusk, and some stay out all night. They’re fireflies. Not in the wyrd fyr on flode style of fire: nothing creepy, and I don’t really know why they’re named after fire: some profoundly unimaginative entomologist in operation there. Their glow is like starlight: hard, white, and pure – blazing out, utterly alien, entirely disinterested, and intensely beautiful. It’s a leaping joy to see them – such that you want to drop your voice and speak in a whisper.I wouldn’t say that it’s worth setting up camp in Shitty Alley just to see them, but it is pretty bloody good. Just like it’s not really worth moving to Nigeria just so you can spend a week trapped in your home with malaria, no running water, no computer, and neighbours who just can’t get enough really crap really loud music. But it has its compensations.