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Travelogue
Minna
We got to Minna at exactly 2:20
on Saturday. My impression was
that of a very beautiful city and the
inhabitants looked very friendly.
Hausas, Yorubas and Nupe tribes
dominated the environment. It
was in Minna, I discovered that
Hausa people are experts when
it comes to hawking drugs in the
public. Before now, I had thought,
even without any evidence, that
such trade was the exclusive
preserve of itinerant Igbo drug
vendors in Lagos molues. How
wrong I had been all along. On
this day, one very persuasive drug
vendor convincingly offloaded
drugs that were meant to cure a
variety of ailments ranging from
skin diseases, appendix to high
blood pressure and cancer. From
Minna to Zaria, no fewer than six
hawkers stood up in my coach to
tell us how efficacious their drugs
were. At the end of it all, many
people purchased several kinds of
drugs from the marketers. How
about NAFDAC surveillance in
the trains?
We however, waited in Minna
for 40 minutes before we moved
to Kaduna through Gwagwada.
Kaduna
The rail track leading to
Kaduna from Minna is needs to
be improved upon. Apart from
the poor topography, the route is
characterized by several bridges,
rivers and large waters which the
train has to meander through. I
remembered we passed through
the Kaduna River, Shiroro Dam
and many others like that. Finally,
we got to Kaduna by 7 pm still on
Saturday. I was shocked to meet
Kaduna in a rather sedate state.
The entire railway station was very
dark and there was no modicum of
life at the station where we stopped.
I was disappointed because I had a
completely different expectation.
However, we waited for 30 minutes
in Kaduna before we moved
on. We pulled through Jaji an hour
after we departed Kaduna, passed
through Regachikum and finally
arrived Zaria by 10pm. Zaria was
half asleep, half awake when we entered
the city. Their mood however,
did not bother me at all because I
did not expect much from Zaria after
Kaduna. After Zaria, we moved
on to Chalawa before we finally
anchored Kano City by 1:30am
Sunday morning.
Kano
Although, it was already 1:30am
Goodluck Jonathan met Kano
awake and vibrant that Sunday
morning on September 20, 2015.
Kano train station was busy,
beautiful and bubbling; our arrival
further lightened up the station.
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