Thomas Katta’s fears come to life on first day in Lagos

06 Feb Thomas Katta’s fears come to life on first day in Lagos

Every of Thomas Katta’s fears came to life on the night he arrived in Lagos!

For many years, the mere mention of Lagos had sent a chilling sensation up his spine; fear fuelled by the stories he had heard as a child of the vast, crowded city. He’d been told that ghosts from the country’s rural areas migrated to Lagos, expanding the crowds beyond the city’s natural capacity.

Those tales of wandering spirits, many with evil intentions, had made Thomas promise to himself that he would never venture there. But as he grew older he dismissed such folklore for what it was: a collection of stories to stir up a little boy’s vivid imagination. Now, as Thomas stood on the Oshodi pavement in the roughest part of Lagos’s, watching the endless human traffic in the dark night lit by the bush lamps of aggressive traders, he could not help but wonder if there really were millions of ghosts milling about in the city that night. Ghosts with evil intentions.

Thomas had also heard rumours that commuters in Nigeria’s biggest city did not wait for buses to stop before they jumped off. Those rumours were quickly confirmed when moments earlier, eight other passengers leaped from the rickety vehicle while it was still rolling. Thomas watched them knowing he’d come to the end of the ride from his home town of Moso and would have to join them on the violent streets of Oshodi, one of the city’s notorious crime centres.

He jumped from the bus believing that only a cruel conspiracy of fate could have brought him to such a dangerous locale at such a late hour. He had tried to give himself plenty of time to arrive during daylight. He had left Moso early in the morning for the three-hundred-and-fifty-mile ride, but the bus on which he had been travelling had broken down three times. The driver kept reassuring his passengers that they would arrive long before nightfall but the last delay came at dusk as they rumbled towards the outskirts of Lagos. The driver had shrugged and directed them to the yellow mini-bus that would deliver Thomas, and all his fears, to Oshodi.

Oshodi was a loud, all-embracing collection of wooden stalls, offices, restaurants, and bus terminals. Aggressive street hawkers had taken over the pavements, forcing the stream of people onto narrower streets where they competed with vehicles and motorbikes for the right of way. The noise was so loud that Thomas thought, only half-jokingly, that this was his first encounter with hell. He stifled a smile and continued pushing his way through the tight, teeming streets.

“Hey, mister!” a voice called out. “Those are nice clothes you’re wearing tonight. You need a nice watch to go with them? I’ve got the best styles, imported from all over the world. Come on over here and take a look!”

Thomas tried not to smirk at the hawker’s invitation. He remembered the aggressive advertisements in spam e-mails about ‘original’ replicas of Rolex watches. Once again, he kept a straight face and forced his eyes forward.

That, of course, did not stop the voices on the street from calling out to him.

“Oga! Oga! Help me with small change to find some food to eat. God will bless you and your children.”

Thomas felt his heart sink as he heard the young boy scampering behind him. Oga meant ‘boss’. He knew he was no one’s boss, and he had no kids, but the agony in the little boy’s voice was heartbreaking.

“Please, Oga! All I need is a few coins to buy something to eat for me and my little sister!”

Thomas was a teacher by profession, so he had encountered many young children who lived without such basic necessities as daily meals and clean clothing. Despite the fact that he was in dire need of all the money he had on his person, he was tempted to reach into his pocket. Before doing so, he drew a deep breath. This is Lagos. I’m being watched. He knew that if he were kind enough to help the boy, he would immediately find himself besieged by a mob of children, all desperately hoping to benefit from his generosity.

As much as it pained him, Thomas stared straight ahead, ignoring the boy’s request and determined not to catch anyone’s gaze.

Maintaining tunnel vision on the crowded Oshodi streets was difficult, and in some ways perilous. Waves of bodies in furious motion zipped in front, behind, and around Thomas. Everyone was in a hurry, and they had no kind words for anyone who got in their way.

“People move fast in the city,” a gentleman had told him back in Ife, where he had been teaching. “The faster one moves, the more likely one will stay out of trouble, assuming one wants to stay out of trouble. Some people don’t, you know. Some people seek out trouble. They thrive on it.”

Having no desire for trouble, Thomas quickened his pace. The cool breeze from an earlier rainfall helped move him along, but it did nothing to quell the nervous trembling that he worked so hard to disguise.

Over the few yards he’d covered, Thomas had received nasty glares from at least three people with whom he had accidentally bumped shoulders. His attempts to nod courteously were rebuffed, and he realised that in Lagos it was every man, woman, and child for himself.

“Be aware of your bag, sir,” an older woman whispered as she passed by. “Hold on to it carefully.”

Thomas was too scared to turn to the woman, and he tried not to appear conspicuous as he clutched his old black bag tightly under his armpit. Too much obvious vigilance was likely to attract attention. The bag itself had little value but its contents comprised his entire wealth, which included his educational credentials, a few items of clothing, and the small sum of money he had saved during his eight-years of teaching in Ife.

Thomas had been told where he could catch a bus to Ajegunle, where an old friend had offered to put him up, but it was now past nine o’clock, the sky was dark, and numerous people had warned him not to enter the terminal after business hours. You could get lost in the bustle of daytime activity, but when the crowds were gone, local hoodlums were known to prey on anyone who made the mistake of entering the terminal alone.

Thomas quietly wished he was already on a bus and on his way. Unconsciously, his pace quickened, and it was all he could do not to break into a full-speed sprint. A man running down the street, especially one fiercely clutching a bag, was likely to attract the wrong kind of attention.

As he turned the corner, he heard a loud voice.

“Nice bag!” The tone was sarcastic. Sinister.

Out of instinct, Thomas spun his head around to find the source of the remark. He immediately regretted this. As he was looking in one direction, a large hand firmly gripped his arm from behind.

“Give it up!” The voice demanded in a nasty whisper.

Thomas managed to jerk his arm free, then ran as fast as he could toward an intersection. Beads of sweat bubbled up on his forehead and rolled down the side of his face, soaking his collar. His stomach churned every time his foot pounded the wet ground. His pulse roared in his ears. He’d run only a few more yards when he felt a hand on his back. It grasped his damp collar and pulled him backward. Thomas’s legs buckled and he fell to his knees. The next thing he felt was the sting of a cold steel blade under his chin.

“Drop the bag.” The voice had become brisk and business-like, with no room for argument. The order was given by someone who appeared to have made many similar demands in the past — and who was uniquely skilled in the use of his switchblade.

At that point, Thomas was willing to heed the man’s demand, but before he could control his trembling limbs, the bag was ripped from under his arm. In a blink it disappeared from his grasp, clearly the work of a master thug who had mugged people many times before.

Thomas heard footsteps as his attacker raced away, but when he was finally able to glance upward he knew he would never be able to identify him. He barely caught a glimpse of the back of the thief’s head as he vanished into the crowd on the other side of the street. Thomas’s best hope was to rely on the kindness of strangers — if kindness actually existed in Oshodi.

“Stop that man!” he cried out. “Thief! Thief!” His voice trembled with desperation as his frenzied shouts echoed in the dark.

“Ole! Ole!” a voice responded.

Other people began shouting as well, and Thomas, who knew Ole meant ‘thief’, was relieved to get help from people moving through the city streets.

“Thief!”

“Stop him!”

Thomas heaved a long sigh. Perhaps the people of Lagos were not as indifferent to the plight of strangers as he had been told.

Just as he was about to jump to his feet and join a posse assembling to reclaim his stolen property, he felt a sharp pain in the right side of his ribcage. The blow sent him sprawling back down to the ground, where his shoulder slammed against the concrete. When he managed to look up, he saw that the posse had descended on him, beating him viciously.

“Wait!” Thomas yelped as he raised his hands in a feeble attempt to ward off the violence. “Please! No!”

“Thief!” The voices continued to scream. “Ole!”

“It’s not me!” Thomas tried to shout over the fray. “I’m not the thief! The thief stole my bag!”

Thomas had no idea whether they heard him. It might not have mattered anyway. The crowd had wound itself up into an angry, ominous frenzy. With each passing second, Thomas felt his chances for survival diminish. Punches from tightly clenched fists pummelled his face and arms, and kicks from steel-toed boots crashed into his ribs, thighs, and shins. His left eye was swelling shut, and he could taste his own blood as it burst from his split lips and dribbled into his mouth. He continued to scream, begging for mercy, unsure if he was actually making any sound. But by now he sensed that nothing he could have said would have convinced the furious mob to halt its attack.

Thomas lost all desire to fight. Resistance had proved futile, so in an instant he allowed himself to let go, to accept his inevitable demise. His body continued to absorb the ferocious blows, but the pain subsided, as if he had transported himself out of his mortal form. The screams of the attackers rose to an ear-piercing whirl, then dissolved into a freakish silence. Thomas could see people’s mouths moving and their limbs flailing, but he could no longer hear any sounds. Through his right eye, he caught sight of a hefty man standing over him, lifting a large stone up in the air. As the man prepared to hurl it onto his head, Thomas quickly shut his good eye and braced himself for what he was sure would be the death blow.

He waited for his suffering to end. Then he waited longer. When he felt no sensation of the stone crushing his skull, Thomas wondered if he had already died.

His lungs heaved, and Thomas realised that he was still very much part of the world. He squeamishly pried opened his right eye, then tried to open the left one as well, but the massive swelling of his face prevented it. Thomas had no idea what to make of the situation. The blows had abruptly ceased, and he thought he heard the pounding of dozens of pairs of feet racing away from him, down the street.

“On your feet!” a voice ordered gruffly.

Thomas turned his head further to the right to try to locate the source of the command. Suddenly, a man’s hand clutched the front of his shirt and yanked him upward. Thomas’s knees gave way, and he would have landed flat on his back if not for the man’s fierce grip. The hand was beginning to rip the shirt right off his body and he could feel fingernails digging into his already battered flesh. Thomas did his best to lock his knees and stand by himself.

When his right eye came back into focus he saw that it was two tall and heavily armed policemen manhandling him. He instantly understood why the mob had dispersed so quickly. Those people had no more desire to wind up in police custody than he did. As the policemen placed their vice-like grips on his arms, Thomas could not help but wonder which fate he feared more: being beaten to death on an Oshodi pavement, or tortured in a prison somewhere in Lagos.