Tender Mercies Realized

Our official Nigeria blog is now up and running. We will be living in either Yola or Jimeta, so the blog address is JOYmeta.blogspot.com. There is also a link on the right. She has promised to take an active updating role in this one. It is possible that that will eventually become the new and official family blog. We'll see. We'll let you know before we abandon this one.

LDS in Nigeria 1: 1960-1980

From News of the Church,  Feb1980, "A Miracle Precedes the Messengers," Janet Brigham.

African Christians in Ghana (green) and Nigeria (orange) had been writing to the church since at least 1960, asking for more information, for "holy books," and for any opportunity to learn more about the Church. While I was in Nigeria, my hosts noted that the two most popular types of book that you can find everywhere and anywhere are religion and self-help (aka get rich). Visa problems kept the Church from sending representatives until August, and then Nov 1978. Within 14 months, there were 1700 converts.

And the friendliness of the people in Ghana and Nigeria compensates for other difficulties. The couples reported to President Spencer W. Kimball: “We have never been anywhere in the world where it is so easy to engage a stranger in gospel discussion—opportunities [are] at every hand. One need not go from door-to-door—just have your tracts ready. Even busy people walking on the street will stop and talk. Workmen on construction jobs carry the tracts in hand for long periods of time. If you go by an hour or so later, it isn’t unusual to see them reading” (see Ensign, May 1979, p. 106).

The first missionary couples found a people who had been heavily prepared in many ways to receive the gospel:

Africans learned of the Church from other Africans who had studied in the United States. They came across some missionary pamphlets. No one now knows how those pamphlets got to Africa in the 1950s—but the effect was remarkable. Many who read them recognized the truth. Then—independent of each other and without knowledge of the other’s actions—several groups of blacks in both Nigeria and Ghana started their own religious organizations, patterned after the Church. However, visa problems prevented representatives being sent to officially establish the Church.

The groups built small meeting-houses and met regularly. They copied organization, doctrines, songs, and titles after the Church, as much as they were able to discern from the literature they received. Occasionally they had contact with members of the Church visiting Africa.

The Africans even proselyted. One man, after a stirring spiritual experience, “was constrained by [the] Spirit to go from street to street … to deliver the message which we had read from the Book of Mormon and from the pamphlets.” Despite some “persecutions” and sometimes being labeled as an “anti-Christ organization,” the “missionaries” were undaunted. 

“We persisted with the word and won forty people that day even to the admiration of the Muslims around,” one man reports.

Among the many letters sent to Church headquarters asking for more light and knowledge was this on

"We here are the true sons of God, but colour makes no difference in the service of Our Heavenly Father and Christ. The Spirit of God calls us to abide by this church and there is nothing to keep us out.”

The author of that letter, Anthony Obinna, was later to become the first black western African baptized and called as branch president.

AUN

I've seen a sketch of what AUN is going to look like, and it's pretty nice: 20 main campus buildings, bunch of dorms and other facilities. Some people look at it and think it's already there. When they get there, they ask, "Where's the rest of it?"

This is the building with most of the teachers and classrooms. I'll be on the second floor.





Across the way from it is what I'll call the administration building. The library takes up the left half of the bottom floor and there are other admin offices throughout it, but the President's office is in the other building. HR, finance, and other offices are across the street mingled with the international school.

That's about it so far.

There are dorms to house the ~1300 students. There's a cafeteria and a vehicle maintenance shop for the fleet of AUN shuttles to take me to work.









They are building a new library. From one day to the next I could see progress being made on it. I think the next one they are building after this is the real admin building. Each of these will then free up more space in the building I've called the admin building for teachers and classrooms. According to the sketch, both the buildings that are currently up are for classrooms.

Speaking of classrooms, here is one. The current department chair was teaching a review session during the 5/6 week summer term. I was surprised how relieved I am to discover just how casual their business casual is. Here I've been ramping up my wardrobe and getting used to tucking in my shirt and all the rest ... I can wear my Hawaiian shirts to work!

One last look at my future office on the way out. There's this really long driveway to get the gate, another indication of the big plans the Founder (former Nigerian vice-president) and American University have for the campus they hope will become the greatest university in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Nomnomgeria

I thought I had already shared this with you, but I guess I hadn't.

I enjoyed the food in Nigeria. This was my breakfast at the hotel. Starting at the top and going clockwise, that's a wedge of pounded yam (dry) standing in the place of a hash brown, boiled potatoes (teeny), boiled eggs, your standard buttery roll, and fried bananas (yum!).

I think I had fried bananas 3-4 times in the 3-4 days I was there. We're talking staple food. Add to that banana bread and hearing about multiple banana recipes and I know there are bananas in Nigeria. I mentioned once upon a time on my work blog that Ugandans eat about 3 times their weight in bananas every year. I figured that I eat Joy's weight in bananas, but not mine. That may change out there.

The chickens and cows are a lot leaner than ours, so even though there is chicken and beef, you get a leg-thigh combo at it looks like wing. There's a lot of fish. A lot.

Apparently you have to know the right places to shop for food. There are plenty of people willing to sell you meat, for instance: they carry it in baskets in the hot sun all day to wherever you will buy it. So you talk to your friendly neighborhood expats or your cook or someone and they'll get you to the safer, higher quality meat. I was thankful I had brought dental floss with me because the meat was remarkably good at fitting between my teeth.

Or you come here to the University Club (members only) for drinks and dinner. Restaurant meal - $6.50. Two pools and a jaccuzzi, weight room, volleyball, tennis courts. Nice place. Friday is pizza night. Saturday there are vegetables you can't find otherwise, likes broccoli or eggplant. They play some games, mostly just hang out and chat.

One of the trusted places is a store called Luka. Luka's was described as "a Walmart inside a 7-11." The place, as you can see, is packed tight. My instructions from Joy were to find out what foods they had, and I figured the fastest way to do that was to take a lot of pictures. So I went around every aisle taking pictures like these of everything on the shelves.

It's also a little like Cosco in that, if you see something you want, you get it because the odds are it won't be there next week. This candy was brand new, for instance. A month or two ago they got in some Christmas treats.

Cereals, spices, rice
Deodorant, makeup, nail care
Shirts, hot pots, sandals
More bug spray than you can imagine
Bread, eggs, water, juice
Canned veggies, canned fruits
Heinz, Mayo, Mustard,
Bleach, furniture polish, carpet cleaner...
The list goes on and on.




I had to explain to just about everyone I met what in the world I was doing. The store owner behind the counter was also mighty curious. I explained that I was coming back in two months to live and shop there and my wife wanted to know what they had. He was satisfied.

For contrast, the video shows a few seconds of driving through the "modern market." It's modern because it is newer than where the old marketplace was. You pay 20N to get in (~12 cents) and then it's small stalls packed in TIGHT. Food, clothing, fabric, electronics, movies, you name it.

The family I was staying with mentioned that the one time living in Yola is not cheaper than living in the US is food. Particularly if you want to buy all the Western brands from Luca's. Calculating from what they spend, it might be a little cheaper for us overall, but it's also clear it'll be another dietary transition for us: carbs are cheap and plentiful, meat also plentiful, but the fruits and veggies are much further between. That, and you shouldn't use the tap water to wash your veggie.

Exciting News: Going to Nigeria ... again!

While Derrill was in Nigeria this week, he confirmed to the president of the American University of Nigeria that he would be coming to work there for the next three years. We have a job to look forward to!

"In Nigeria," says Joy obviously. "So we're moving there."

I was impressed while I was there with the friendliness of the people, how eager my colleagues were to have me there, and the real opportunity to do some good in the world.

We have been quite coy about all this online up til now. We didn't want to jinx anything by sharing too many opinions publicly online before a deal had been made. Up until the decision was reached (D hadn't finalized it fully in his own mind until Sunday night and told the president on Monday) we had been in contact will several other possible universities, each interesting in their own way.

Even though we have been silent online, "we have been thinking and praying about this decision for a long time." It's a pretty big step for us, and not one I think we had predicted going into this job market. But we now feel it's the right step for us now and are looking forward to it.

Baby Lavinia appears to be very excited to share about Nigeria. She's jumping all over inside Mommy.

"I have been feeling like we might end up going to Nigeria since before Derrill went to Nebraska in March. I had told Derrill that Nebraska or Nigeria sounded like the most likely for doing the kind of teaching he is interested in doing right now. Then Nebraska fell through pretty quickly."

Each additional school that contacted me for an interview really disturbed Joy, who wanted the uncertainty ended. "Ya! I kept feeling like we were going to go to Nigeria, and then I would be really stressed about Nigeria for a few days, and then I would feel peace about Nigeria, and then I would feel stress about it again. That's what I did for the last two months."

People have asked us if we're excited. My typical response was that, yes, that was one reaction we had. Fear was another. There were many others. Several of our concerns had to do with the fact that we will be the only members of the Church in Yola. Even if Nigeria is prone to civil disobedience and conflict, the conflict is in other states of the country: Adamawa state where we would be is very peaceful traditionally and calm.

Now that I have been there, however, I can just say "yes." I'm excited. The overwhelming answer from the Spirit as we've prayed about the decision has been peace, and not just general warm fuzzies, but specific reassurances about specific concerns. After all, anywhere you go there will be challenges. If God wants you to learn something, like patience, He can accomplish that in NYC just as well as Nigeria.

"Oh, I don't want to live in NYC! Sorry, but Nigeria doesn't sound too bad compared to NYC. Apologies to anyone who lives there. I am not a city person. Nothing personal. I wouldn't want to live in Lagos either..."

"Especially since Derrill made the decision, we have had continual peace instead of just moments of peace. Satan seems to be a little concerned about us going. I was in a lot of turmoil the few days before we made the final decision, to which I attribute Satan trying to sway me against the decision."

"Some of the reactions we've gotten from people as we talked about this have only reached the fear part. And some people have been very excited for us and talk about what an adventure it will be. We feel the weight of all of it and know that Heavenly Father will help us to overcome any challenges in getting or being there -- known or unknown -- as we know we'd have challenges anywhere we are in the world. With God, nothing is impossible."

Yola is way on the far east on the river that runs into Cameroon. Lagos is in the far southwest. Nigeria is 2.5 times as large as California. There is an LDS temple in the south east near Port Harcourt.

This is a picture of the inner court of the faculty building where I will be working. I'll be on the second floor.

The family I was staying with kept asking me how I was in my decision process after each trek to see something on my list -- housing, shopping, the town, the school, etc. Every time they asked, I had been feeling just a touch overwhelmed. I answered I was still in information gathering mode and needed some time to process. Once I wrote my thoughts down to share them with Joy -- assuming the internet connection would work -- I felt a lot better.

It's not necessarily going to be easy. That's not the point. Knowing a lot more about some of the specific challenges involved, I'm confident we can deal with them and find a lot of happiness there in Yola.

First Impressions of Nigeria

I already had written this email at the end of my first evening in Nigeria, only to have the internet crash on me and never get this computer back online until I got to the Newark airport again ... whereupon the post I wrote was lost. So I'll try this again.

I flew out to Nigeria Thur-Fri to visit the American University of Nigeria so I could scope out the area and the job they had offered me. There are only so many flights between the capital, Abuja, and Yola so I got to wait overnight. This is what I saw as I stepped out of the airport.

My very first impression looking out the airplane window was confusion. Abuja is the capital, right? So where is the city? I saw red dirt, patches of green grass, some trees California would be proud of, and shrubs. Where is the city? Finally we flew over some blue-roofed houses with brown dirt roads, but it was just a collection of buildings, not a city. Where was the city??

Turns out, I guessed right: the airport is 45 km away from the capital. While I waited for my ride, several taxi drivers offered their help, one of them offering to let me use his phone to call my ride for ~70 cents. A friendly guard let me call for free and I was soon picked up by AUN staff. They were trying to help two other people also heading for Yola, but the 4:30 flight got canceled. So they waited around to see if they were going to create an 8:30 flight, but that idea also got canceled at 7:30. So we three hung around the airport and at a nearby restaurant for three hours before we all gave up and went to the Top View Hotel.

Mentioning the Top View to AUN-affiliates produces very interesting reactions, mostly along the lines of "oh yes, I tried the haggis once. That was memorable." I'm not entirely sure why. Okay, so the bathroom faucets popped off in my hand. They popped right back on again! Okay, so the bathroom comes with its own water heater for the shower. So did every other AUN tub/shower I saw. And the size of room is at least twice as large as anything Europe has offered me on a work trip, plus a wide screen TV.

The more memorable thing is that Nigerian beds surprise Westerners. The pillows are not made of rocks. They might be made out of softened wood. That means I pretty much loved them (good, firm pillows!) The beds are also pretty firm. Supposed to be good for you, right?

The internet worked, the food was good and ample (see my last post), and I got an amazing 10 hours of sleep after my sleepless flying.

Traffic on the interstate connecting airport and city was ample. In addition to the massive traffic going to the airport, there were pedestrians all over, enough that in one place they had set up an impromptu marketplace: postcards and pictures, shirts, one stand consisted of a large umbrella with brassieres hanging from it, people selling food.... The interstate was in fine shape, though there's also a lot of roadwork being done so there were a lot of road splits and mergings. There are far more motorcycles on the road, not all of them use their lights, and they drive about like our motorcyclists do which is to say you really need to watch out for them. The main driving difference I observed was that the dashed white lines that separate lanes are regarded more as suggestions than laws, there are no posted speed limits, the use of turn signals is nil, and stopping for police can be optional. In other words, it felt safer than driving in New York City. The roads themselves, in Abuja and Yola, were in far better condition than I had been led to expect, with only one major pothole on the main road. Non-main roads are another story.

Random Prices 1

Right now, the $/Naira exchange rate is about $1/N150 (or $6.50 = N1,000). For our own future reference, here are the first handful of prices I've found: