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A
childhood friend recently paid us a visit from England.
It was a visit both families had waited anxiously for six months or even more.
It was going to be a perfect re-union even though he and I saw each other about
three years ago in Nigeria.
That was before he relocated to the United
Kingdom through the High Skilled Migrant
Programme (HSMP). Since then we have been able to communicate only through
telephone and e-mail.
Although
he supposed to have played a very important role during my marriage, having
been the major link between my lovely wife and me, but before the day of our
marriage, my friend had left Nigeria
for greener pastures in UK.
The birth of our baby should have been another opportunity for us to meet, but
again circumstances stood our way. Then we were sure it was going to be his
first birthday for the re-union but again our son’s birthday almost coincided
with his son’s. He couldn’t make it...
I have
chosen to go into details about our relationship in order for the readers to
know how significant the visit of my childhood friend, Kola Akande, to Hungary
was. Before he came to Hungary,
I had briefed him about the population of Africans in Hungary.
He was perhaps curious to know how many he’d see or meet. He was actually counting
them before returning to his base in Manchester
where I suppose Africans are residing in large numbers.
Kola
Akande arrived in Budapest
on a Saturday night and departed on a Friday night. He spent six good days with
us. My friend is a good sleeper, perhaps it was the reason we couldn’t go out
on the first three days. By the way, Sunday was a special day we had chosen for
him to meet our family friend, Ling Edina. So it was on Wednesday we went out.
And it was
that day he met the first African in Hungary.
Unfortunately, it was not a pleasant experience for him. The first African he
met in Hungary
turned out to be a cheat. I won’t say a disgrace because I think he was only
trying to maximize profit, and it didn’t matter whether the victim or victims
are his own brothers. Business is business and a casual brother is another ball
game. Na brother solidarity we go chop for obodo land?
This is
how it happened. Akande needed a charger for his Nokia phone. He had
miscalculated by thinking that the socket we use in Hungary
is the same as that of United
Kingdom’s. In UK
they use three-way socket while we prefer two-way socket in Hungary.
So he couldn’t use his charger. In order to make use of his phone, we must get
a charger otherwise he won’t be able to communicate to the larger world, a
thought akin to being extricate from the universe. It is as if the world stood
still before the advent of the mobile phone and other electronic gadgets.
As a near
perfect host, I was indeed going to go the extra mile to provide this elusive
charger. Ordinary charger had become something so significant for my friend to
further enjoy his stay in Budapest.
I was so worried as if it was more than ordinary charger. I became emotional by
questioning why European countries, upon the shout about One Europe,
had failed to provide similar socket all over. I must have been operating under
an emotional misconception resulting from incorrect reasoning.
Whatever
you think, it was on this premise we set out on that Wednesday afternoon to
search for the Nokia phone charger. It turned out that the charger is not
scarce at all, for we found it in the first shop at Deák tér underground. I had
a sigh of relief. I honestly do not know why I was so apprehensive over a
charger that is as common as mobile phone itself. At this point I was so happy
because our African brother was right there in the shop to sell it for us.
Akande was happy too; he had finally met an African brother.
We
exchanged the usual African brother’s greetings. Although we are not friends, I
had met this guy a few times in the street, and each time we did commune unlike
certain African brothers who would turn their eyes in the other direction in
order to avoid saying, "Hello". And these brothers do end up feeling
abashed when you eventually say the hello that seems so heavy in their mouth.
This is a story for another day.
Sorry for
the digression o jare.
"We’re
looking for a Nokia charger 502," I said immediately we had finished the
salutation.
"Em,
it is FT 5000," said our African brother firmly.
"FT
5000!" Akande almost screamed. A Chartered Accountant, prudent as ever
might have calculated the sum in pound sterling. "Bablo, let’s leave it.
It isn't worth it. It’s only three pounds in Britain
and it shouldn’t be more than FT 1000".
"It’s
expensive because this phone is new in Hungary,"
our African brother countered.
Akande had
started leaving the premises before another guy, an Arab, said that I should
pay FT 3000. I would have paid but Akande insisted we try another shop.
Akande was
very disappointed judging from his countenance. We took the underground to the
Western Railway Station called Nyugati Pályaudvár. We went straight to the
ground floor where we saw some vendors dealing in mobile phones. We entered a
kiosk managed by a Hungarian. He showed us two different types of the exact
Nokia charger we were looking for. "There’s original and there’s
fake," he explained in broken English. "The fake is FT 1000, the original
is FT 2000".
Akande
gave me a look of I told you so. The one that our African brother wanted to
sell for FT 5000 or FT 3000 resembles very much the fake one. Akande chose the
fake one because, according to him, he’d use it for only three days. We were
happy we didn’t allow our African brother to outsmart us. The charger did not
disappoint us but the only African man my friend met in Hungary
did.
2008
copyright mysmallvoice@yahoo.com
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Authors 
Posted by Robot| 13.02.2008 11:37