Lift Etiquette

You know how it is; you are in a lift or about to enter one and someone is heading in the other direction.  Now in the UK there is a protocol for this sort of thing - I vaguely remember signs on the undergrounds saying something along the lines of 'Please allow passengers to alight before boarding'.  And in my day (I've entered middle age, so I'm allowed to say things like that) people in the UK generally complied.

In Nigeria things are, of course, different.  Three rules:

1.  When entering a lift, try to walk into the people exiting;

2.  When exiting a lift, gaze vaguely at unfamiliar surroundings wondering why it is not the ground floor.  Then re-enter the lift just before it continues downward thus inconveniencing everyone with an extra 5.3 seconds' delay;

3;.  Under no circumstances wash or use deoderant for 13 months prior to entering the lift.

OK, it's a gripe of mine, but to a certain extent I miss the superficial politeness of the UK.

Niceness in Nigeria

Sometimes one experiences an event that reaffirms ones faith in human kindness.  Yesterday evening; well, yesterday night; allright, this morning at two o'clock in a seedy nightclub in Lagos I noticed that my mobile phone was missing.

My mind raced through a slugdy drunken recollection of where I had been that evening and where it could have gone missing.  It could have been any number of places so I returned my attentions to fending off a particularly persistant night-fighter (working woman, to those of you not farmiliar with the term).

When I awoke this morning I revisited the matter and repeatedly called my mobile number from my spare phone - you can forget landlines, there are only 200,000 in a country with a population of about 1.3 million.  The lost phon rang, but there was no reply.  Which was heartening - had the phone not been ringing it would have seemed likely that someone had found it, removed the SIM card, and had no intention of selling it back to me.

I continued calling the number throughout the day, and at about 3 o'clock gave up.  Then, at 4 o'clock recieved a phone call from my lost phone.  I must confess I was expecting to have to pay to get it back or, more likely, be confronted with a barrage of pidgen english or Yoruba that I did not understand.  But no, a polite Nigerian voice informed me that he had the phone and would I like it back.  I thanked him profusely and (damn me) offered him some money to get it back.  "No, no" said he.  "Where are you, I will bring it to you."

And he turned up 20 minutes later and gave me my phone back.  No calls had been made from it, and all seemed well.

What a stunningly unusual example of honesty in a country renowned for its lack of that quality.  I take my hat off to that man.  I gave him a very healthy reward and will be writing to his employers (the British Deputy High Commission as it happens) to inform them of his honesty and pass on my thanks for his act.

What a good man!