A passport adrift, the owner, a gift

Goodbye passport!

“Please, respect me.” That is what she said from the bedroom where she had sequestered herself, having been seen from the car park barely half an hour earlier by my partner as he picked up a passport that appeared to have been flung out of a window on one of the higher floors of our apartment block.

I know people can be going through a lot of things, unexplainable or inexplicable, but it is impossible to fully understand the issues people face. I say this because it was an utterly bizarre situation.

Brian, on returning to our apartment this afternoon, saw a document land in front of him. He picked it up and realised it was a South African passport. As he examined it, he scanned the façade of the apartment block to see which window it might have come from, and in the corner of one window, he saw a lady; he waved to her, and she waved back. He even waved the passport at her, and she must have been waving goodbye to the passport.

No online footprint

I saw the passport, and it became clear how important the document was; it had a recently obtained Schengen visa with a year’s validity. We thought whoever might have lost that passport would be in turmoil once they realised it was missing. We searched Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter/X, and Instagram but found no sign of the person.

If there was ever a time you needed a searchable online presence, it is now. We contacted our apartment landlord to find out how to share information with the residents of the building, and meanwhile, Brian went up to the apartment where he suspected the lady he had waved to was. No one came to the door except a young man claiming to be her brother. It was not definitive enough for us to give him the passport.

No proof of ownership

So, we went back up with him in the hope of confirming that the lady he saw earlier was the rightful owner of the passport, but she refused to come out of her room. However, while we were speaking with her brother, she made the statement quoted at the beginning.

Obviously, as gentlemen, we had no intention of invading her privacy or causing her distress; at the same time, we could not part with the document without a secure transfer to the owner or a responsible authority, such as the facilities management team of the apartment complex. In extremis, we will have to hand the document over to a police station.

The facilities management team suggested we put the passport in their letterbox, but it was insecure; we simply did not have the heart to part with the document that easily.

Consider the reasons

However, it made us question why the lady was not eager to get her passport back and whether she had deliberately thrown it out of the window out of pique or total disinterest in the visa, which had been obtained for her against her wishes.

This brings us back to the idea that people might be experiencing much more than a seemingly great opportunity suggests. Maybe she is afraid of travelling to an unfamiliar place, and I understand how daunting that can be.

Then there are instances of young women being forced into criminal activities, either as victims of human trafficking or acting as drug mules. You can never tell. Losing a passport like that might even save someone from an unimaginable fate at customs or border controls abroad.

Perhaps, the best course of action is to hand the passport over to the police so they can assist her if something suspicious is occurring. We tried to help as considerate Good Samaritans, but found ourselves in a difficult situation, and honestly, just surrendering it to the police seems the simplest solution.

Postscript

We had a torrid night, thinking the worst of the situation that the lady might be under the influence of criminal gangs who might attempt a home invasion to demand the passport, before teaching us an unforgettable lesson.

We also decided to take the passport to the nearest police station in the morning. As I called an Uber cab ride when I stepped into the elevator to see a Frenchman ask if we were in a numbered apartment.

He happened to be the husband, and he showed me the identity card of the lady on his phone. I invited him into the apartment, and as he was narrating his helplessness at the plight of his wife, he broke down.

She had thrown the passport out of the window and had some as yet undiagnosed mental health issues, which her parent attributed to some spiritual gift she has. Well, every gift is under the control of the gifted, that is scripture without equivocation. If your gift controls you, we are a different territory of personality disorder and whatever that entails.

We advised him to seek the best professional and medical help he could find, and he should approach this as a Westerner rather than trying to understand the cultural differences that might handicap him.

Having handed him the passport, we heaved a sigh of relief. On our return home, there was an ambulance in the car park, and we saw the husband in the lift with the medics. We have no idea what might have happened; we just hoped all would turn out right.

Thought Picnic: My perception made me choose South Africa

Probably the blog I wanted to write

When I began to write the blog about the 28 years since I last left Nigeria, I had another blog in mind, but as blogs go in my world, the narrative takes on a life of its own as each idea and construct begins to find attribute and reference to other ideas, events or people, by which time I have digressed to the point of writing an entirely different story.

Blog - My last 4 weeks in Nigeria, 28 years ago (The business angle)

Even as I have a concept I want to write about here, I am beginning to see deviations from the main topic, yet, I would rather let a blog take a freeform than shoehorning it into the strictures of an academic paper, which it is not.

Indeed, I like South Africa

I have just returned to Johannesburg from spending the New Year in Cape Town. It was my intention to visit South Africa for about 3 months, but a number of events concerning my health meant I could not plan so far ahead due to restrictions and advice regarding my medication and a procedure I had in November.

I got quite perturbed about the thoughts of South Africa to the point of self-flagellation, I was already regretting that I had let myself down in realising what had become an earnest desire. Then, whilst I was yet in Germany on a business trip, just 11 days to when I had planned to travel, I made the decision, booked my flights and hotel accommodation, and that was done.

Normally, I would have gone to Gran Canaria for some winter sun, though the last time I had winter warmth and sunshine was when I was out in India in 2011. I spent the Christmas Day visiting the Taj Mahal for the second time and what an experience it was.

No fuss consular services

The choice of South Africa was simple for me, I had been twice before, three years ago and I had a general idea of how to get around. When I travel, holding a British passport confers many privileges to certain countries, I do not have to apply for a visa, fill in odious forms and join incessant queues at consulates or embassies to visit the country, time is precious.

My visit to India for a month-long course was fraught with all sorts of officialdom and difficulty, I had to visit the visa office thrice, paid the higher price because my parents were Nigerian, even though I had lived 21 years without break in Europe, but I was in the Netherlands. Basically, I was not being treated as a European once I was resident outside my home country.

If I were in the UK, the visa would have been issued within 2 days, but living in the Netherlands could have my passport with the Indian visa processors any time from 5 days to 8 weeks. I was beside myself in anxious contemplation, unsure of what would be the case, it was eventually issued within 5 days.

Colonial hangovers that endure

India like Nigeria has a colonial carry-over of an unwieldy civil service, the sector is a leviathan, untamed, unreformed and completely inscrutable. Every requirement from the government institution is laden with red tape and unnecessary paperwork that exacerbates inefficiencies and inconveniences. The system serves prebendalism, neopatrimonialism, corruption, graft and malfeasance with no consequence or recourse for redress.

Though I would like for the need to visit countries to be hassle-free, if not visa-free, I appreciate that the UK and Europe do not necessarily grant the privileges to many of the countries I desire to have easy access to.

I remember when leaving Nigeria, my passport was seized by a heavily pregnant lady for no reason than to attempt to extort money from me. I cannot say I was street-wise enough to appreciate what she required of me as she walked away with my passport with probably the view of distressing me until I came to the kind of senses, she expected me to have.

Thankfully, there was a friend with me who knew how to work the system, and some 30 minutes later I was reunited with my passport after I believe a bribe had been extracted from my friend.

People doing their jobs

When I travel, I have expectations and requirements, I hate the fuss, I like officials to be honest, diligent and forthright, doing their jobs as opposed to doing their bellies and that is why I carefully choose where I want to visit and sadly Nigeria has not appeared on my itinerary because I probably would have cause to turn back at the airport and board a plane back to my home in the UK.

When visiting South Africa, I am not accosted by touts or dealers, there is usually someone to pick me up from the airport to my hotel. No one is trying to inveigle their way into my confidences and burden me with life stories that are no concern of mine.

For good service, I would tip generously and be on my way without getting badgered.

Nigeria is not South Africa

Despite the concerns about xenophobia that have arisen in recent times in South Africa, I have carefully chosen where to stay. In Johannesburg and in Cape Town, these places are conveniently exclusive and offer good quality safety. I am smart enough not to venture out to strange places without escorts and I would use the Gautrain in Gauteng for the major stations and to the airport. Uber always comes to the rescue, to take you anywhere and extricate you from strange places.

I am not of the opinion that Nigeria works that way, you read too much of egregious abuse by officials ready to take advantage of you at every turn from when you access the consular services abroad, through passport control, the customs and the journey to your overpriced hotel which is priced for access rather than for quality.

There is no doubt I have lived too long in Europe to begin the consider the prospect of inconveniences, especially with travel. Yet, I doubt Nigeria would be fixed enough to suit the standard of customer service I have grown accustomed to for almost 30 years.

Nigeria really is not South Africa

Furthermore, it goes without dispute that South Africa on the surface is a more emancipated and organised society, the institutions appear to work, the checks and balances are robust and when tested, they endure. I have my rights, the freedom of will, of beliefs and the kinds of engagement I choose, are protected.

In the months that I was about to leave Nigeria, I was being blackmailed, I refused to pay up and told the blackmailer to do his worst. I guess him having to explain how he came upon the information he planned to use against me kept him guarded. Unusually, I was also ready to have him rumbled if he attempted to besmirch my name. I probably would not have been able to sustain this for a long time, but it worked then.

There are other anxieties that bother me about Nigeria, it comes with a sense of foreboding like that feeling I used to had when I saw our house from the top of our street. A sickening and debilitating gut feeling, almost paralysing in function. I just faced it when it would have been more comforting to flee. I have promised myself, I would never put myself in a situation that appeared to overwhelm my rationality out of purpose, duty, commission or omission.

Yet, on any planned visit to Nigeria, I guess one would have to dare to be a Daniel and just do it. For since my father got on Facebook, each publication of my travel exploits has had him comment asking when I would include Nigeria in my itinerary. If only Nigeria were another place, it just is not and that, I am sorry, is a shame. Perceptions matter always, it would take a lot to change my perception that visiting Nigeria is just as easy as planning to visit South Africa.

Your comments on a postcard. Thank you.

The Terminal

We caught up in Frankfurt after 27 years.

The Learning

Almost a fortnight ago, in the midst of the media frenzy that accompanied a blog written about me, I heard from my sister that she was about to travel to the United States. I congratulated her as she admonished me for allowing the public spectacle that followed my story.

In very stark terms, I made it clear that the decision was mine to make and the consequences, whatever they might be, were challenges to be faced as they came, all considerations taken on board.

The exchange was a bit terse but friendly, and I basically kept a low profile after that. On the Saturday following, we were in a bit of a quandary; travel agents in Nigeria were angling for their commissions at the expense of getting an affordable flight ticket. As the hours went by, the prices of the tickets were rising such that they were becoming unaffordable.

Airport choices

Meanwhile, a useful app that could provide an insider's view of flight scheduling and pricing, OnTheFly, was not available in Nigeria. I did consider transferring my frequent flyer miles to her, but there were limitations to the number of miles I could give away, and there were other restrictions on buying tickets on behalf of others outside Europe.

Her first choice would have involved a 26-hour stopover in Doha; the question then arose about what to do with a long layover at the airport if you did not have a visa to exit the terminal. The Doha Hamad International Airport has quiet rooms for a limited time at a cost. All looked tentative.

There were options for a stopover in Istanbul via Turkish Airlines, and were it not for the strictures of time, flying out of Cotonou, Benin or Lomé, Togo would have shaved almost a third off the cost of the ticket.

Trigger response

Apart from a contribution, all I could do was hope and wait for the best. As dusk approached, I received news that a flight had been booked on her behalf from the US and there was a 10-hour stopover in Frankfurt; she was flying with Lufthansa.

I didn't give it any thought when I learnt of this development, but once I told her, it dawned on me: if she were coming through Europe, I would see her. Europe is my backyard, so to speak, and so I got into planning my trip.

I requested her full itinerary, from which I could determine what terminal she would be flying into and whether she implicitly had a transit visa to stop over in Frankfurt, considering she did not have a Schengen visa (SchengenVisaInfo.com). [A lowly company apparatchik sent me an email 8 years after writing this blog to update the text reference from Schengen Visa to what it is now. Most such requests I usually ignore.]

Then I had to determine if I could traverse terminals in the airport without having to go through immigration. Having a US visa implicitly gave her transit rights through Frankfurt Airport.

Terminal woes

On my side, I normally use SkyTeam flights, but that would have landed me in the Schengen immigration control area, leaving Manchester with stopovers in either Amsterdam or Paris. The only way I could avoid this was to fly directly from a non-Schengen Area UK to Frankfurt; it meant changing airline alliances to fly Lufthansa.

Other domestic issues required me to return on the same day rather than extend my stay through the weekend as I might have done in other circumstances.

Fortuitously, I asked for the day off, booked my ticket to arrive in Frankfurt at 9:15 AM and depart at 9:45 PM, which meant I could print out both boarding passes double-sided for my outward and return journeys.

My sister would have arrived in Frankfurt at the same terminal just under 3 hours before I did. When I arrived in Frankfurt, I was told to go to the Z gates, having arrived at the B gates of Terminal 1. I boarded the SkyTrain that linked the gates and found myself at a security checkpoint.

Sheer luck

On tendering my boarding pass, after some hesitation, the teller noted that my departure would be from a Z gate. I didn't even know that, not to mention my being 12 hours early for my departure. I was let through.

I made it to the Z gates and determined my sister would leave from gate Z15. I had not seen her Facebook message, and posted an announcement to have her meet me at gate Z15. I did a quick scout around the gate without seeing her, and as the announcement went out on the tannoy, I waited at the gate whilst scanning my Facebook messages.

The reunion

'I am waiting in front of gate Z15, where are you?' I wrote. I stood looking around like a meerkat sentry. She appeared from the thick of the crowd: my sister, whom I last saw almost 27 years before. All the while, I had been unsure of how emotional I would be; there were no tears, just lots of hugging, and I was very happy.

There would have been much to catch up on, but we decided to cherish the moment instead. My other sister responded negatively from Nigeria on Facebook that she was not the one who was supposed to be meeting. Yes, we have pranksters a-plenty in the family.

We called home, had a meal, took some pictures, found a place to recline and catch a nap, and spent almost 8 hours together before I watched her board her plane and depart for the United States. By the time that was done, I checked to confirm my boarding gate; it had been changed to the B gates. What luck.

Traipsing through another security check, a couple of hours in the lounge, I was back home just before 11:00 PM. It was such an emotionally charged day that I took Friday off. Mission accomplished by the accident of fortune and the blessing of opportunity and means.

I've wanted to write this blog for days.

Thought Picnic: Wearing an Incredible Smile to India

Smile!

There probably is a prayer that should cross one’s lips even you are not a spiritual person. “May my face continually light up with a smile and laughter fill my mouth with all the joy that it brings.”

That is the way I felt when I collected my passport this afternoon from the agency that handles visa management for the Indian Embassy in the Netherlands.

As I had written before in a blog about my experiences without directly mentioning India, I am planning on attending courses in India before the year runs out.

It means nowt to them

Now, by holding a British passport, I thought I would be insulated from the bureaucratic insurmountables (sic) of other citizenry but I learnt a good few things in the process.

I do need a visa to visit India, no matter what I want to do there, I do not get treated like a European citizen even though most Indians visiting mainland Europe would in terms get a Schengen visa.

However, what really got to me was the idea that my British citizenship by birth along with a British passport could count for almost nothing if your parents are Nigerian.

Head spinning hoops

Whilst one can appreciate their need of ancestral facts with regards to people of Indian heritage seeking to acquire Indian citizenship, it should really not extend to those whose countries have already processed and affirmed the status of their citizens.

Apart from the hoops that one had to leap through with regards to the right visa to apply for which for me started as a tourist visa, then a business visa until we settled on an entry visa, all of which included 5 visits to 3 different locations trying to ensure all that was required was done, I had to fill in a supplementary form and pay an extra fee predicated on my ancestry.

Of days, months long

Altogether, the processing an entry visa according to the website site could take up to 8 weeks, the filling in of the supplementary form, another 10 days and there was every reason to think one would be marooned in the Netherlands without papers for a good two and a half months – some bordering on the untenable.

I wrote to our consulate about the matter of my citizenship and I did get a reply; something along the lines that it is good to know that this is happening and that it will be forwarded to some department. My response is still in the draft folder; I really could not be bothered any further.

Yearning, waiting, hoping

What I knew I want to happen beyond where I had control to influence things was the abundance of favour spiritual and temporal, there wasn’t much time left and the closer we got to the time, the dearer the flights become.

Each day, I checked the online tracking service not sure of what other status to expect apart from the fact that my application had been sent to the Indian Embassy in The Hague. Late on Friday, the status had changed signifying I should come to collect my passport but no indication as to whether I had been granted the visa.

One did suspect, if the who process took 6 working days, they probably had looked at all the documentation I submitted and decided there was no need to pursue the ancestry issue.

Phew! That was a race

In some cases, I could content I had one of the most complete applications for my type of visa, besides all the documents of self-cognisance and a local government document indicating when I arrived in the Netherlands, the training firm sent a letter of invitation, their certificate of incorporation and their licence to trade with exceptional status.

The visa is like none I have ever seen before; it looks like my passport identity page with machine readable information and my picture with particular detail about my mission – not for the faint-hearted.

Now, I have just a few days to get things ready for a month-long trip which would be intensive training and examinations in readiness for 2012. I had better start packing; at least, I have already been to the pharmacy to replenish my supply my pills.

In all, I am thankfully for how this burdensome process is looking hitch free and putting a smile on my face.

Satan's hand in human stupidity as church splits

More Henry than Luther

If I were to compare and contrast the events that have engulfed the Anglican Church worldwide with other seminal changes and schisms in history, I see more of King Henry VIII [Source - Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia] than I see of Martin Luther [Source - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia].

The common thread between them is I find people who have become so cantankerous in seeking their particular brand of fiery bigotry that insulates the church from those who need it allegorically aligned to Henry VIII’s desire for a divorce on not siring a heir – for which he usurped church authority from Rome to achieve his own ends.

Indulgences are what align these people with Martin Luther; in short, we have been indulgent of people whose goal is to pretend to doctrinal differences in order to break up the church.

Breaking away

After the congregation for the schism completed their sojourn in Jerusalem, unwelcome as they were by the Bishop of Jerusalem, they launched a new faith movement called the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (FOCA) [Source - Conservative Anglicans form global network | World news | guardian.co.uk], I could suppose this is an exclusive club for the indoctrinate with no allowance for those who have not become holier than thou.

The works of Satan

However, what I find so utterly annoying is the tendency to attribute sloppiness, lack of planning and out right arrogance to the work of Satan.

Bishop Akinola was refused entry into Jordan from Israel a fortnight ago for visa irregularities and he claims that was satanic [Source - Lambeth Conference not for us – Akinola – Nigerian Tribune].

Looking at the requirements for entry between Israel and Jordan [Source - Jordan from Israel], there is free movement after a number of conditions are satisfied one of which requires the visitor have a visa to enter both countries have them appropriately stamped from the country of departure regardless of whether to have a diplomatic passport or not.

Sloppy and disingenuous

Bishop Akinola [Source - Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia] or his handlers failed to make those simple arrangements and ensure that he would have free passage for his itinerary.

I would suppose the Bishop might have tried to drop names or pull rank, but that is what the Nigerian Embassy should be sorting out if anyone knew what they were doing.

To attribute such sloppiness and lack of effective preparedness to Satanism is just completely out of order and disingenuous to say the least.

Somehow, they save their scruples by quickly switching their coven to Jerusalem where having decided to split from the church they have now decided they would not be attending the Lambeth Conference [Source - The Lambeth Conference Official Web site].

I doubt if they would be missed and it might well turn out a more spiritual meeting helping the church to become more relevant to its community.

But, if homosexuality has so much a strength and potency to split the church, I present both sides of this schism a different dilemma.

Wherefore the Beatie family?

Mr. Beatie was born a female, underwent treatment to legally become a man but retained his female reproductive system. He conceived through artificial insemination and so recently gave birth to a healthy baby girl [Source - Transgender "man" gives birth - Yahoo! News].

Who of the clergy in the finery of their robes and the erudition of their theological schooling would find the Christianly compassion to blessing the child at her christening, baptised her when she comes of age and confirm her when she is knowledgeable about Christianity?

Would Mr. Beatie, his wife, Nancy and the beautiful baby girl be welcome to worship in your church?

Cyclone Nargis: The death knell of the military junta

Time to act

Just as nature abhors a vacuum the humanity of our tortured earth has to begin to abhor despotic governments that care more for entrenching their regimes rather than rising up to the challenge of the government they portend to run in service of their people.

This is no time to highlight the hypocrisy of America’s criticism of Burma having failed to perform when Hurricane Katrina struck, we should take the lessons from that event to realise that a quick response to disaster, calling on all resources available to the global community is the only way to alleviate present suffering.

No relief from suspicion networks

With a stranglehold on government for 46 years and a network of spies with a extremely paranoid aversion to foreign interaction, one would have thought that network serve any purpose in disaster relief but it really serves no useful purpose for succouring suffering.

It just beggars belief that the military junta are incapable of helping their people and would not relent in their obduracy to accept ready help from professional disaster relief agencies to help their people.

Referendum trumps disaster relief

100,000 people have probably died from effect of cyclone Nargis and we can expect a similar number to die from the tardiness to get relief to them – there are dead bodies floating in the water and on land and I do not think the people are anywhere near the point of organising themselves to start mass burials.

They must be smarting from the outrageous dereliction of duty of their government to address their predicament when their help and support is most needed.

The absurdity of it all is we have a disaster of epic proportions, the worst that has ever hit Burma and they have set their priorities for a referendum to take place today – the army has been deployed to monitor the referendum rather than do disaster relief.

Their end is nigh

The military junta has no doubt lit the fuse that would lead to their terminal decline, their referendum and stranglehold on government would not save them.

Having not ever learnt to mobilise their huge army for civil activities, they can never have the logistics to manage this disaster, where their visa offices should be running in overdrive admitting foreign aid relief professionals, they have been closed for public holidays not to resume till Tuesday.

Appeals falling on deaf ears

Meanwhile, the pictures on my television leave me amazed that there is no groundswell of utter condemnation from the so-called friends of Burma – where has the compassion of humanity gone?

This attitude leaves all disaster relief agencies in a quandary; their appeals are failing on deaf ears because no one believes their donations would get anywhere near the suffering Burmese because of those nasty generals.

Change and regime change

There is ever good deed in charging those generals with crimes against humanity and every good cause to engender regime change just as should be done for Zimbabwe and North Korea.

We cannot continue to countenance the suffering of our fellow mankind brought on my other men for their gain much as we should have the greater cause of ridding our world of all governments that lacked the expressly given mandate of the people they assert rule over.

The uprising that would sweep the military junta of Burma from power would be bloody but they will go so much for what they did by failing to do what they should – no people can allow such idle despots to continue to rule over them for much long, a year or maybe more, but they will go and good riddance, it would be.