About Me
- Funmi Iyanda
- Lagos, Nigeria
- Funmi Iyanda is a multi award-winning producer and broadcast journalist. She is the CEO of Ignite Media and Executive Director of Creation Television
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Drive through News
Yesterday was impossible in Lagos. The traffic was a ferocious monster snaking through the length and breath of the city spewing deadly carbon monoxide into the beleagued lungs of the benumbed dezidens. I would not bother to mention it if it was not truly monstrous and if I did not suspect that this was no rare occurrence but our new reality. This is obvious from the sheer number of traffic managers on the road and how diligent they mostly were and the fact that there was no major accident, just a few older cars tired of the exertion, packing up in protest. The fact is there is no getting away from a radical imaginative solution to public transportation. The fact that most of the cars on the road usually have only one passenger or a passenger and a driver speaks volumes. Lagos will not be able to patch and manage for much longer, the city is busting at its seams.
Since I was stuck on the road most of the day, I did a lot of newspaper reading and news reports listening. Usually, I take the news in bits and pieces as news getting can be traumatic. I am either annoyed at the base level of journalism, the banality of the report, the horror of the stories or the arrogantly/criminally naive, and ill disguised, the efforts at fooling, insulting, bullying or cowing the populace by politicians, civil servants, religious mind benders and corporate crooks that most news reports reveal. At the end I am either debilitated with helpless or blinded with anger, both wasteful emotions.
The News in full
Since I was stuck on the road most of the day, I did a lot of newspaper reading and news reports listening. Usually, I take the news in bits and pieces as news getting can be traumatic. I am either annoyed at the base level of journalism, the banality of the report, the horror of the stories or the arrogantly/criminally naive, and ill disguised, the efforts at fooling, insulting, bullying or cowing the populace by politicians, civil servants, religious mind benders and corporate crooks that most news reports reveal. At the end I am either debilitated with helpless or blinded with anger, both wasteful emotions. The News in full
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
7 comments:
I love the way you write. "The traffic was a ferocious monster snkaing through the length and breath of the city spewing deadly carbon monoxide into the beleagued lungs of the benumbed dezidens" Wow!! I keep reading that sentence again and again.I see the picture you paint with your words.I was in that Trafic too for over 3 hours and I couldnt have expressed the feeling better.Talk to M.@ Farafina and let him publish your writings sharp sharp.
I have come to a conclusion that Lagos traffic is caused by supernatural beings. These spiritual entities cause drivers to swerve away from imaginary potholes, halt at imaginary traffic lights and stop for imaginary pedestrians. These spirits come and go at will. LASTMA folks needs to stop bothering themselves about things they can see but instead they should concentrate on things that are unseen.
Yeah, the lagos traffic! What baffles me was that, you people in lagos will continue to tell us that it is that hustle and bustle of traffic that makes Lagos what it is. Those of us that stay far away from Lagos panic when you paint lagos traffic the way funmi does. I can confirm again that I hate Lagos.
Instead of judging the city of Lagos & it's traffic to be doomed, I can interpret this 'culture of congestion' positively.
In Lagos, traffic jams are such an overwhelming feature of the city that they have become a key marketplace. When the cars stop, the trading begins.
the ubiquitous traffic jam; lulled in congestion, captive to the road's breadth, is always thriving with entrepreneurial activity.
For Funmi, it's "Drive through News". How enterprising of you?! lawl!!
@ Comrade:
Hilarious! You might have a point there...
well written. thank God for mobile phones. at least u can contact people now to let them know why you are going to be late. i do hope the situation improves. God knows how people cope if they have to do a number 2 after 3 hours of crazy lagos traffic! God help us.
@nonesuch, no mind muktar, a prophet is ....damn that is immodest ko:-)?
@comrade, you don come again o.
@twinstaye, hey hey, monkey no fine, him mama like am;-).
@nigeria politricks, abeg sharrap:-), so says the man in his jelenke atlanta pad/office who had a brilliant holiday (plenty jollofing) in 9ja at christmas without calling cyber friends;-)