Arrived - Yay!

15 October

Arrived at MSP airport at 5:15, secured boxes with duct tape, and proceeded to check in, which was a breeze; security line virtually nil.  Enjoyed a nice supper meal with Gary at Chili’s and proceeded to our gate, where boarding had begun.  The flight was uneventful.  I was seated next to a woman from Holland who was working on a special project at a company in St. Paul and she was on her way home for a week’s break.  She was quite distressed that our flight did not have a personal entertainment center, meaning that the TV screens were not in each individual seat.  The flight attendance explained that one must check to see that the aircraft is an airbus to be sure that one has its own entertainment center.  She was concerned that she would not be able to sleep.  I decided to forego the evening meal and went to sleep.  All was going well until the beep of the call system began ringing in my ears.  Who would have thought that the constant ringing of a call bell might be so annoying as to keep one awake all night?  Alas, it did.  Other than that, the flight landed exactly 8 hours after it took off. Gary and I made our way to a nice café for a great cup of coffee and a chance to check email and phone messages.  We arrived at our gate to Abuja and check in began soon thereafter.  The flight was uneventful.  I am sitting next to a lovely woman, Vivian Okeke, who is a Diplomat with the Nigerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. She is returning from a month in New York where she was visiting two of her four children, who attend University there.  She is of the Ebo tribe from the northern state of Anambra and she anticipates her next post to be Washington DC.  Oh, and this flight did have a personal entertainment center, I suspect because it is a daytime flight where most people stay awake.  The six-hour flight had plenty of open seats and landed safely after circling the airport for about 10 minutes due to another flight landing.

           

If you have ever traveled to California or Arizona, you may recall the distinct smell when you step outside the airport  - perhaps it’s the smog, or perhaps it’s their native trees and flora.  Nigerian, and all of Africa, also has a distinct smell, that of fire burning, as most Nigerians prefer to cook over an open fire.  We didn’t have the usual traffic congestion at the airport as our driver was waiting in a different area from years past.  We went through passport control with ease, collected our bags, found our driver, Michael, whose wide passed away unexpectedly and tragically last year while he was serving our needs, and made our 50 minute drive to the ECWA Guest House in Abuja.

We plan to worship Sunday morning at LCCN Nyanya in Abuja at 9:00a with hopes of departing at noon for Jos and eating our snack lunch along the way.  Weather hot and humid already!