Run Ali Run!

Following up from our previous blog, we continue 2 weeks after our first Astra Zeneca vaccination. Although we only had one, we experienced that it gives you much more confidence in what you do on a daily base. By now we are in this edition of our blog almost totally back to our good old life from before Covid-19, because in the meantime we got our second vaccination. #fullyvaxxed. Who would have thought that we would get them in Nigeria? We are so thankful.

Currently Covid exists sporadically in Nigeria. Number of identified cases is approx. 100 per day in a country with a population of close to 210m people. For some unclear reason it looks (so far) that Nigeria is escaping the disaster that happened in countries like Brazil and India. I read a very interesting article about it in an international journal for infectious Diseases, which explains/claims reason is high level of cross-reactive antibodies from blood samples collected from population of sub-Saharan countries. Or in simple words, probably there has been a previous corona type of virus in this area. But with all news nowadays, I am not sure if it is a hoax or not, but for me it explains perfectly why so far Nigeria is spared from Covid19.

When we are indoor at, for example supermarkets, when we enter a restaurant or are at the office we all wear facemasks. However, since Nigeria is due to its climate, an outdoor living country, going out for dinner is no issue. Going to the beach, to the beach house, playing tennis it is all very well to do, and meeting our friends, we do mostly outside.

We started tennis again 2x per week with Kenny on Tuesday and Saturday. We have a small group now with Patrick, Dennis, Marc, Thomas, Viv and me. We check every time who joins and we play for 2 hours 2x 20/25 minutes each. Normally we are with 3 of us. On Saturday Dennis also joins and then we have dinner with him at our place. Dennis is now in his last months.

Mathilde and Dennis came at almost the same time as we did to Nigeria. Mathilde was ordered by Total to move back to the Netherlands when Covid started in March 2020 and has not been allowed back yet by them. Dennis his contract in Nigeria will end in July. He got a new job at Total in Denmark after the summer. So, we had his farewell at the Heineken Beach House two weeks ago. Viv and some of her friends went to a glass factory using recycled glass as farewell presents for them. Very nice glasses and vases but also some local specialties…. see the photos down below.

We had a great day with all his friends there also Mathilde joined via facetime and shared good stories and some farewell gifts. #sayinggoodbyeishard. Chief Julius is upgrading the Beach House. Adding bedrooms and bathrooms, building a new bar and put in new furniture. When Viv is back at the end of the summer, we will go there with some friends to stay overnight. It was a great day, but unfortunately Viv fell badly and twisted her knee just before we left the Motorboat Club. It was badly bruised and swollen. She can still not properly use it and will have it checked back in Europe. We hope it will be okay.

Alright back to Lagos. Sometimes on Saturday morning we go to Godaif to have morning coffee with Thomas & Babette and watch Julie have swimming lessons. Afterwards the swimming teacher walked by and said hello to Babette and asked if we were Babette’s parents. Hahaha, we felt so old. From now on we call them our children and grandchild.

A short anecdote about safety shoes: I went to the opening of the Sales Training Academy of Nigerian Breweries on our Lagos Brewery site. On site you need to wear safety gear including shoes. Since I prefer to have shoes with only have been worn by my sweaty feet, I have my own pair. So, arriving at the brewery I entered the premises, when the guard told me that I should put on safety shoes. I told him I was wearing my safety shoes. He responded while looking at his own shoes that they had safety shoes also for me and that I should go with him inside to changes shoes. I showed him by stepping on my own toes that these were safety shoes….. and he responded that there were safety shoes inside. I tried again by stamping on my other foot that I was wearing them and then I noticed that the rubber of my shoes was flying around…. Turned out that half my soles had disintegrated due to storage in a not ventilated office for a year and that I had been walking on my socks. Of course I went inside to change shoes .

We also went several times to Landmark Beach Club, which is a great place close to Eko Atlantic. It is managed by Stefano and Fatti. They also manage the Green House Club which is the new name of what we used to call the Heineken House. By now we know him pretty well so he had a special surprise for us when we booked a table for Sunday. He arranged for us and our friends, a very nice private area with small pool and personal waiter. Great time with lots of cocktails and fun.

On a more serious note, Rob’s boss Jordi will be leaving next month. His successor and his wife came for a pre-visit from Egypt. We showed them around to give them a good impression, Landmark Beach, NB Beach House, Shiro, the Green House Club, Cilantro, Slow. Viv took Micky house searching. Rob focussed more on the dinners. At the end of the week however we had seen more than enough restaurants and bars. For the Lagosian our favourite restaurants for now are RSVP, Vanilla Moon, Z Kitchen, Shiro, Izanagi, Cilantro, Slow, Nok, Orchid House and please send us suggestions to add to our list of places to go to.

Hugo finished his final version of his thesis and has submitted it and is now waiting final grading. He has been accepted for his second master in International Affairs and Governance at St Gallen University in Switzerland. He’s very excited about this and the apartment searching has started. It includes a semester in South Korea or Japan.

Noa went to Austria to the Backyard (our house) to work on her thesis for her master as well. She is in the middle of it and planned to submit it by July. Robin worked from there during the weekdays. It was nice to see each other longer than they normally do. They went out for runs together, they trained with their personal trainer together. During one of the many long weekends, you have in spring, Armin and two friends came over to the girls. Armin has build this waterslide track in the garden (see previous blog), this time he built a two stores house for Ayo in the garden! I’m so curious what Ayo thinks of it. It’s massive and really well done with carpet inside too, all for our posh little doggie Ayo! #Ayothedog

Noa’s still working on the recovery of her broken elbow from the mountain biking accident in Austria last year in August. For this she needs to go 2 times a week for physiotherapy in Bad Kleinkirchheim. Since her driving license from Canada is not yet valid in Europe, we bought her a mountain bike…. On June 10th she called Viv on Facetime. On her way to the physio, she fell with her mountain bike (again). Luckily, she wore a helmet. She got back walking home with Viv in her hand on Facetime. Viv called the physio to cancel the appointment and to asked where and how Noa could see a doctor. She gave a phone number of a doctor. When Noa was back at the house she herself called the doctor, he then told her she had to call for Rettung/ambulance. The ambulance came to her at the house to fetch her and bring her to the hospital in Klagenfurt. The same hospital as last year and even the same room. She had a concussion, and she’s badly bruised and had huge scratches and had to stay overnight at the hospital. Conclusion: Noa is now known as the only Dutch person who cannot ride a bike. #ridingabikeisnofun #ambulanceridetohospital

She travelled back to Switzerland last weekend and again needs to be in quarantine for 5 days, this is school’s regulation not Switzerland’s. Friday, she has her final practical exam and this needs to be done at school. Saturday the day after her exam, she’s travelling the 12 hours back to the Backyard again.

As I started this blog, we have received our 2nd vaccination. So, we are fully protected. We had some fun here about the decision process on how the EU would track people that have been vaccinated. After a very long and nightly meeting the solution of the EU was to create a document based on a QR-code. Good news is that since end March when vaccines arrived in Nigeria this was implemented here directly. The good thing is we all see big progress in vaccination in Europe and USA and we hope when we get to Austria we will be able to travel freely. Our objective is to make it to the Formula 1 in Spielberg. Hopefully we can go. It is not sure if we can get tickets though. #formula1MaxVerstappen

We are not the biggest football fans however when the Dutch team's playing we do like to watch the match with a group. Here you see us watching the first match at the Green House Club. #UEFAEURO2020

Next to the economic and political situation, insecurity is a big issue here currently. I believe you all know that the economy of Nigeria is heavily dependent on dollars. Main source of dollars is oil production and the second one is what the Nigerian diaspora from other countries is sending home to support their families. But the population is growing much faster than the GDP (average earnings per inhabitant) which means that poverty is growing faster. So, there are a lot of unhappy, frustrated Nigerians that need food to survive. The political situation is for me a strange one. In 2 years’ time there will be elections again. They take place every 4 years, but apparently, the behaviour of politicians is that around now, these elections start to impact the way forward already. This happens with everything in Nigeria in a positive way; for example, certain high visibility projects suddenly start to move forward (to show results) but also hard needed decisions are not taken anymore. Strange decisions are taken like currently banning Twitter. And then the overall safety situation; On daily base we hear about robberies, shootings, kidnappings on individual base but also of school classes. In the past, Boko Haram did the latter but now it is a source of income of gangs (ransom paid). Murdering out villagers by Fulani Herdsmen and revenge taken curfews in certain States in the East. We have militancy groups in the Niger Delta, in the North, we have Boko Haram. Most of it was always far away but lately it comes closer. Car robberies in traffic jams, kidnappings are happening now in Lagos as well. Our cars have safety glass so we are relatively secure. But as an example, Ali, one of our drivers was commuting home by car to the outskirts of Lagos 2 weeks ago and he ended up in a traffic jam. He saw that cars in front of him were attacked and robbed. So what do you do when this happens….

You take your belongings and your car keys, leave the car, lock it, run away on your flip-flops to the houses or bushes and hide and look what will happen. So, he did like just all the other drivers and passengers behind him. When the robbers discovered there was nothing to get anymore, they moved to the traffic coming from the other direction. The good thing was that the traffic jam was also solved, and they all got back in their cars and drove home.

Welcome to Nigeria, welcome to Lagos, the Centre of Excellence!

#staysafeeveryone