The traveller has to knock at every alien door to come to his own, and one has to wander through all the outer worlds to reach the innermost shrine at the end. — Rabindranath Tagore, Gitanjali, XII.
Prior to the day of my departure, I had requested to leave earlier, but the patron of the small family of three that would host me advised me not to come yet – for our mutual safety. The Covid-19 lockdown was still very much in place and the virus was surging in Nigeria: Lagos as the epicentre, Oyo followed suit, and Ogun came third on the chart updated daily by…
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‘The music you travel with helps you to create your own internal weather.’ –Teju Cole; Known and Strange Things I: Confusion Na Quench It all began with an acute anxiety commonly associated with departures – probably it should be entered in a psychiatry textbook as travel anxiety, if it hasn’t been already. I had also exhibited the foolery of drinking a bottle of Pepsi late the previous night. The combination…
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Now, I am going into Freedom Park through its narrow entrance, with the stage not very far off by my right hand, enlarged photographs of some very famous people like the poets Wole Soyinka and Niyi Osundare, the YPP Presidential candidate Kingsley Moghalu, and a number of people who I do not know, but I’m sure are important people. I find my way around the big compound to the event…
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It is late on a Friday evening that I arrive in Lagos for the first time. It is from a six and half hour journey which I had begun around 12pm in Asaba, where I boarded a bus to bye-pass in Benin, and then another which took me through the midwestern route to Lagos. The city doesn’t welcome me warmly, or let me say I get an unusual welcome; before…
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Aspen, ponderosa pine, blue sprucepink glacier-cut rock, scree, ravensgrey jay, peregrine falcon, hawk. We climb to 11,000 feet in three days, camp at Lawn Lake for three days. Alpine tundra. Elk, bighorn sheep, marmot. Tileston Meadows, ticks in grass, rock face of Mummy Mountain. Binoculars show pink cracks in grey rock. Stoke gas stoves, play cards. Boil water, set up tarps, lay out sleeping bags, hang bear bag. Watch crescent…
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Title: Images of the Disconsolate Author: Yinka Elujoba Publisher: Invisible Borders Trans-African Project Number of pages: 35 Year of publication: 2017 Category: Travel/Nonfiction Images of the Disconsolate by Yinka Elujoba explores the metaphor of the road as a vortex of memories that can nonetheless be grasped through personal tales. This chapbook of travel narrative must first be understood within the context of the 2017 Invisible Borders TransAfrican project which focused on ‘Borders…
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But they that wait upon the Lord shall find renewed strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint – Isaiah 40:31 It must have been the thrill. Or the thought of it. Or both. Or did I see a picture somewhere? How did the thought even fly close to me, settle on me and mix with…
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Fortunate Traveller is a Nigeria-based travel journal that publishes and promotes itinerant narratives. We believe travel can be much more than just being away or on vacation; and we would like to hear more of black flaneurism and stories of travellers of all types. We want to curate an online travel masterclass based on these mission statements to engage seasoned travel writers and a new generation of travel writers, who…
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Title: Daughters of Salt Author: Amara Nicole Okolo Publisher: Invisible Borders Trans-African Project Number of pages: 36 Year of publication: 2017 Category: Travel/Nonfiction The complexities of everyday people connected together in the same country called Nigeria, and a blend of personal loss, the quest to find one’s true self informs Amara Nicole Okolo’s Daughters of Salt. The chapbook presents a clear semblance of people’s experiences and shows that no matter how remotely…
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Title: A Life in Transit Author: Kemi Falodun Publisher: Invisible Borders Trans-African Project Number of pages: 27 Year of publication: 2017 Category: Travel/Nonfiction A Life in Transit by Kemi Falodun is a chapbook of travel essay resulting from the 34-day journey she embarked on across Nigeria in 2016 under the aegis of Invisible Borders ─ an initiative aimed at ‘patching of numerous gaps and misconceptions posed by frontiers within the 54 countries…
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