Fourth Day in Lagos

Today, we visited Mr Azih's daughter in Lagos. The CultureGram for Nigeria mentions "visiting" as one of the primary leisure activities in Nigeria:

"Visiting plays an important part in maintaining family and friendship ties. It is common for Nigerians to visit their relatives frequently. Unannounced guests are welcome, as planning ahead is not possible in many areas where telephones are not widely available." (CultureGrams, World Edition, 2008)

I think the CultureGram is a bit outdated, as many people, even in rural areas, have cellular phones, but it's certainly true that unannounced guests (me) can be welcome. Mr Azih's daughter and her husband, Valentine, welcomed me into the house for lunch, and I even had the chance to watch a Premier League football (soccer) game afterwards at a local bar with Valentine.

If visiting is the most common leisure activity in Nigeria, then watching EPL football matches would be a close runner-up. Since not everyone is blessed with cable television, people gather at local watering holes, which usually have televisions, as well as chalkboards outside the door listing all the matches of the day. (See picture above.) Here, people (men, especially) watch the games almost religiously, and most will have a particular team they are rooting for, as can be seen from the plethora of "Gunners for Life" and "Billionaire's Club" bumper stickers that can be found all around town. (For those of you who don't follow English football, that's Arsenal F.C. and Chelsea F.C., repsectively.)

Visiting friends and watching soccer games. I think the Nigerians have gotten life down.

(N.B. In case you're wondering about the match, the Hotspurs played an amazingly tight game against Liverpool, and won 2-1.)