Nwanyioma's Journal

Spending Christmas 06 in Nigeria was a wonderful experience and a very atypical holiday for us. We left here on December 19th knowing we had quite a journey ahead of us. My x husband's (Levi) oldest brother (Godwin) and his wife (Rhoda) had purchased the tickets for us. The best available fare to Lagos required a double connection in Cincinnati and Paris and would require a connection in Paris and Houston for our return trip. The village where we would be staying is more than 8 hours away from Lagos. There are two cities with airports reasonably close to the village. Unfortunately, one of those airports is under construction and closed. Tickets for the airline and airport (Owerri) we had to use couldn't even be purchased here in the US. So Rhoda made arrangements with some of her sister's children who live in Lagos to get the tickets for us and meet us upon arrival.

We had to spend the night in Lagos anyway because we were arriving after the last flight to Owerri. So we stayed with Rhoda's niece. Everything was well orchestrated for us.  Rhoda and Godwin had left Connecticut the week before us, so they’d be waiting for us when we got to the village. It was raining in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area the day we left. That delayed our flight for over an hour. We were worried about missing our connecting flight to Paris. Thankfully several other people were making the same connection so they held the plane for us. Then since we were late leaving Cincinnati we were late arriving Paris. Once again we were blessed because another family of 4 on our plane were connecting to Nigeria and they held the plane for us. I had been warned that getting around Paris’ Charles deGaulle airport is a bit involved/awkward when you have to change terminals. That was a hassle, but we made it! This was my first time flying with Air France. Their service was pretty good. I enjoyed listening to all of the in flight announcements in French and seeing how much I actually understood before they translated everything to English.

I was disappointed to see that Lagos still looks like a forgotten city. I honestly believe that when the capital was moved from Lagos to Abuja it really was forgotten. It’s crowded and dirty and made me happy we’d be far away in a quiet village the next day. We traveled for part of three days…leaving here on the 19th, arriving Lagos on the 20th and flying to Owerri on the 21st….but it was worth it when I saw Rhoda’s face once we got through baggage claim! The drive from Owerri to the village was about an hour. In the city the streets are paved but there are no traffic signs…so that was a bit maddening. Outside of the city all of the roads are dirt roads. It’s been very dry there lately so dust is everywhere (you’ll see that on a picture of a car in my photo album).

Rhoda & Godwin kept our visit a secret so everyone in the village was very surprised and excited to see us. I’m sure Ikenna was borderline overwhelmed by all of the attention! One of his cousins virtually tackled him when she saw him. He was 9 months old the last time he had been to Nigeria…so it was a great homecoming. Ikenna’s father was very well loved by his family, friends and acquaintances. His death last year was a shock to everyone. They were very disappointed that Ikenna and I weren’t able to make the burial. I’m sure some of them didn’t think we’d be there for the memorial service this year. So it was a very good thing. I was especially grateful for how wonderful everyone treated me.  When you are divorced, you don’t always get warm and fuzzies from your former in laws. But over the course of our visit much was said about tradition. Since I am the mother of Levi’s only child, who is a male child (very important in their society) and since I never remarried or had any other children, my position within the family is almost heightened. One of the traditional leaders told me that they don’t recognize divorce over there and he told me that I am a citizen there as though I had been born there. They actually expect Ikenna to bury me there 

We had a surprise waiting for us. I expected to have Ikenna constantly by my side since we didn’t really know everyone…didn’t really know our way around and because we don’t speak the dialect (although everyone who has been educated speaks the Queen’s English). I felt bad for him that he’d probably be hanging around with a bunch of adults since there isn’t really anyone his age in the village. But Rhoda and Godwin’s youngest son (Egwu) who lives in Maryland had decided to make the trip to support Ikenna. Ikenna loves both of Rhoda and Godwin’s sons. Although they’re twice his age, they’re more like older brothers to him than cousins.  So Ikenna had someone he looks up to, closer to his age to hang around with. Also one of Egwu’s childhood friends who had always wanted to see Nigeria (after having lived across the street from them while growing up)…..decided to accompany Egwu on the trip. So Ikenna had two guys to hang out with, play football, talk sports. It was wonderful. Egwu and Andre arrived two days before we did and flew back to the US 3 days before us. Ikenna was a little down when they left.

This entry could become very long, so I think I’ll stop here and share my pictures here. I will probably do a separate entry later in my Nigeria journal and talk more about the day everyone was invited to Ikenna’s house for the unveiling of his father’s headstone (Levi is buried on his property….they don’t really have cemeteries)…the day we went to the palace to visit with the Eze (he’s the traditional ruler who wanted to meet Ikenna and participate in turning over Levi’s property to Ikenna) and the day everyone assembled at the house to witness Ikenna officially receive his father’s possessions (this was not only done verbally but he also received a bound document with a list of all of his father’s land properties). I'm over my jet lag, butI have a cold..so that entry may take a few days.

The picture at the top of this entry is one of my favorite photos from our trip. It is Ikenna with his uncle Godwin. As the first born male child, according to their tribal tradition, Godwin became head of the family when his father died in November of 1991. Their father was a polygamist. Levi and Godwin's mother was his first wife. She had three sons. Godwin, Gad and Levi. There was a very special bond between Levi and Godwin. I know that Godwin sees a lot of Levi in Ikenna. He loves Ikenna as if he was his own child. I've always known that. But this experience of seeing how much care Godwin has taken to see that Levi's things were preserved for Ikenna...how well he documented everything and the way he talked about him whenever he introduced Ikenna to the church as well as to people in the village...well, it brought me to tears a couple of times.

My camera battery didn't last as long as I had hoped. Although I only got about 50 pictures, Andre sent me the 100 pictures he took! They are in this link:
http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/104604.8d087de83fe
My pictures in the AOL album will be larger if you view the album as a slideshow; but you might not get to see the captions unless you just view the album and manually advance the pictures.

Album name: Christmas'06 @ Ikem Nvosi Isiala Ngwa Nigeria West Africa 49 pictures shared