Getting Stuck In A Massive Traffic Jam In Lagos, Nigeria, 2012

Prior to visiting Lagos, Nigeria, we received many warnings from our friend Kunbi, our friend whose wedding we attended over there. "Nigeria is a great place to visit, but I don't want you to have any surprises," she explained. One of the things which she warned us about were Lagos' massive traffic jams or go slows, as they call them over there. Because part of Lagos is on islands and there are no through roads, traffic can get bunched up pretty easily. She even told us how it had taken her now-husband six hours to get to the airport when it's only a few miles away. Yikes! During our first few days in Lagos, we were lucky. It was Easter weekend so fewer people were on the road than usual. That said, it didn't take us long to get anywhere. Kunbi's mother drove us all over town without incident and we made it to the wedding with plenty of time to spare. It was on our last day that we got the full Nigerian experience. We'd asked our driver to take us to a market that Kunbi had recommended, only we couldn't find the location. As we drove back in the opposite direction, we found that the road that went alongside our hotel was clogged with traffic. We tried to get through for about 30 minutes, then decided to go back around to the highway. There, it was even worse. We soon learned that the President's wife was in town -- and there was a broken down car near the bridge. So the blocked off roads and car caused a backup that went on for miles and miles. It ended up taking us over five hours to get to the airport. I've seen some bad traffic in New York City, especially during rush hour, but never anything like this. It was chaos. Happily, we had food and water in the car. We also had a great opportunity to people watch. Whenever there's a slow down, the Nigerians treat the stand still as if it's a mobile market. Men came by the cars selling EVERYTHING! We could purchase food, magazines, clocks, jewelry, lawn furniture, vases .... a man even came up to our car with a cage full of parrots! It was a slow-going but fascinating ride. Fortunately, we had more than enough time to say good-bye to Kunbi's family and to make it to the airport without missing our plane. But the experience made me very glad that we don't own a car -- and made me appreciate New York City's vast transportation system.