Monday morning in Abuja and we need to get connected.  My mother is most probably having a mini heart attack wondering if we are ok.  So we go down to the concierge who tells us we might get some at the little shop at the hotel.  Nothing is easy here, so of course they don't have.  Then she tells us to walk down the road a bit until we see two guys sitting under an umbrella and we'd be able to buy some sim cards there.  We started walking and I said to Bataleur that we hadn't announced ourselves to the embassy, what if we got kidnapped or something, so we turn back.  Back at the hotel, the concierge tells us that it's not far to walk and it's quite safe, so off we go again but with one of the hotel staff to guide us.  After about 15 mins walk we get to the two red umbrellas.  They tell us to sit down but as we arrived I noticed two guys with big guns sitting there.  So now we're trying to look at anything other than these two with the guns so I decide to watch the traffic while Bataleur negotiates.  They didn't have micro sims so the guy decides to cut them to fit our Iphones and he cuts them all wrong.  By that time they'd already registered them to our name, so we had to cough up the dough and leave with sim cards that didn't work.  I managed to cut mine some more and got it to work. Bataleur's one was to far gone and he just cut right through it, NGN500 down the drain. 

Traffic here is nightmarish.  While Bataleur was buying the sim cards, I sat and watched the traffic as I said earlier.  There are no rules.  It seems if you want to make any kind of turn or overtake you just blow your hooter.  So you have the sound of hooters going all the time.  Then there were two lanes, one for incoming traffic and the other for outgoing which was fine but the incoming came from left and right and a car breaks down right at the junction.  So now everybody has to manouvre around the broken down car and then to top it all a tiny guy starts pushing a wheelbarrow laden with wood up the road and stops right opposite the broken down car to unload some wood as it was too heavy to push up the hill.  A lot of honking happened there and some cars decided to divert over the pavement.  It was classic, I just had to laugh. 

One good thing - At least nobody tried to rob the sim card guy else we would've been in the middle of a gunfight.  Oh and the hotel looks really good at night with the lights on, very pretty. Almost forgot to mention that it is the loneliest time for me when I can't chat to my family and friends.  I have no idea how I managed before without the internet and WhatsApp.  Well I know, I didn't travel then so most probably didn't need it but that first few days in a foreign place with no connection, is the pits.  I'm so happy to be able to chat to everybody again. That's one major good thing, at least we could get connected even in Abuja.