Everybody loves and wants to hear me talk about how I managed to win an award with my Nysc personal CDS project…… of course it’s a good tale to tell. But the success story will never be complete, if I fail to mention some of the challenges I faced in the course of the project.
Just like I said in my earlier post, that to win award with a CDS project, the project must be a tangible and life-touching one. In case you missed that post, u can see it here: What award-winning personal CDS can i do as a corper?
One of the challenges I will never forget in the course of the project, was the day God helped me escaped from the hands of kidnappers.
Though I was posted to the commercial city of Aba in Abia state, I was doing my project with some groups of farmers in two villages that is about 3 hours drive from Aba. It wasn’t my first time of going to the village. In fact, I have being there supervising the project for more than a couple of times.
But on that fateful day, I left Aba a little bit late than normal; I left around 2pm, going to have a meeting with the village king together with his chiefs. So getting to the village around past 5pm, we couldn’t have more than two hours meeting again because it’s getting late and I need to return to Aba that same night.
There was no available bus going from the village to Aba again, since nobody will be willing to travel on such road at that time of the day. But for me, it’s a must I return to Aba that night.
As fate would have it, I finally found a bus going to Aba after waiting for almost two hours without any bus. And at that time, it was now 9:45p.m.
Seeing a bus was a great relief for me, so I quickly jumped into the bus before I could realize there was nobody in the bus I just entered; it was only me and the driver. So I sat at the front with him and everything seems harmless to me.
In not more than 100 meters drive, another huge and agile man stopped the bus and joined me at the front of the bus, putting me in between the new man and the driver. At this point, my mind has already being telling me things are no longer normal.
We kept moving, and it was now around 10:25p.m when the driver suddenly decided to change course and refuse to take the normal route I always know that leads to Aba from the village. He claimed he knew another shorter road that can take us home faster, since it’s already late.
I objected to the decision, but I can do no much since the other passengers had already agreed with the driver. And I must tell you, at that time we are now four in the bus because the driver had picked up another man on the way.
I already knew am in trouble ……… “wahala dey”. They need no prophet to tell them that am a stranger. Even the kaki jacket on me could state clearly that am a complete otondo to the area.
I begin to pray within me that God should please save me from the danger I just put myself. Not quite long, the bus stopped in the middle of a lonely and quite road as the driver claimed he wanted to ease himself. My heart was almost ripping out of my chest and all the terrible scenes I had ever washed in movies begin to crawl my mind.
We entered into the bus again and continue the mysterious journey, we reached a comparatively big village. Suddenly, I came up with a plan that saved my life. I just shouted in the midst of my strange neighbors… “STOP…. STOP the bus!!! Am no longer going!!”
They were amazed and were asking me the reason for the sudden change of mind. But I kept shouting till the bus stopped. I was able to do this because I know if anything wants to happen, I may be rescued by the villagers. And I believed that was also part of why they stopped the bus. As the bus stopped, I quickly dashed to the front of the bus, straight to the plate number and begin to type the number on my phone and saying aloud…
“ I no dey understand wettin you guys dey do again. But I must tell you i no be ordinary person…” After taking the number, I told them we can now continue.
As we were going, I was calling my friends in my native dialect, that am about to be kidnapped and they should just listen as the next things I will be saying in English is to scare away the kidnappers.
I begin to say something like….
“Yes. I will send the plate no of the bus to you….. so help me track the person that registered it and store the information you got, in case anything happened to me”
“Pls switch on the retro-monitor to track and monitor where I am right now, and inform Dad about everything…”
As I continued those calls, I notice a sense of fear in their conversation and my heart leaped for relief; it seemed my trick was working. All of a sudden the driver said he just remembered that the road we are treading is under construction and won’t be good we proceed along the road. So he had to switch to a new route entirely.
I laughed inside of me and also gave thanks to God for the salvation He just granted me
Thanks to God, my little trick worked and we arrived Aba safely around 2p.m.
THANKS
Heeee
ReplyDeleteI thank God 4 ur life o, Corper Ajayi.
And am also happy u finally was able 2 win an award wit that ur project.
Congrat bro.
Thank you...
DeleteThough i don't know who you are...
U are appearing as anonymous