aspirin and vamped W. I will not complain to the airline, I am used to it amp; it makes him feel better. Watched Africa unroll beneath us, empty, blank, ocher, the desert. We flew south-southeast, the land greened up underneath us, dry savannah, wet savannah, then true rain forest. W. grinned, said de jungle, recited Vachel Lindsay: then I saw the Congo creeping through the black, etc., in overly deep Robesonian voice. Not the Congo, but the Niger basin. Poetic license. The all men glanced over suspiciously.
We’re going to the Tropic of Night, I said, but he didn’t hear me.
Later, Lary’s Palm Court Hotel, Lagos
W. is right out, poor thing. Obviously, we landed. Usual stuff in customs and immigration, the guy looking longingly at my cameras and notebook computer; apparently it used to be quite bad here, but everyone is on good behavior since the new regime took over. Outside of baggage claim, two men from our outfit, Ajayi Okolosi, a driver, and Tunji Babangida, porter at the hotel. Ajayi said hello in English and I launched into my Yoruba greeting mode and slowly shook his hand: how are you; how is your wife; how are your children; how are your parents; is everything peaceful with you, and so on. Got big grin, language tapes work.
Outside, the usual scene at a third world airport, masses of poor people trying to grab a piece off the divine beings rich enough to fly. When they spotted Blondie, things got really insane, “cab, miss, cab, miss,” in my ear, trying to rip the backpack off me, rescued by Tunji. The car was a venerable Land Rover, and into this I was tossed together with my gear. W. was sitting there, looking stricken. Silence in car, squeezed W.’s hand. Our welcome to Africa, sad. Up front, Tunji messed w/ old tape player wired to the dashboard, and shortly the sounds of Public Enemy, top volume, song “Fear of a Black Planet.” Tunji checked to see how W. was enjoying this bit o’ civilization. Not much, hates that music. Tunji adoption of rap style from U.S., interesting, wonder how widespread, analogue to same among white teens. Search for cool universal?
Clouds of gritty dust, south on an expressway of some kind. Lots of cheap motorcycles, a few big, shiny Mercedeses with smoked glass, lots of yellow buses, military vehicles in numbers. Soldiers in trucks look like children.
Left the highway at a big intersection guarded by a white-gloved cop spiffy Brit-type uniform and whistle, traffic lights not working.
Central business district of Lagos is south of here, says Ajayi, on or near Lagos Island, and that’s where the tourists and the dozen or so tall towers are. We were going to Yaba, the real Lagos, much safer and cheaper, by the University. The streets narrower, heavily potholed, the big car lurched, I knocked against W. and laughed. He was distant and stiff, staring out the window; I wished T. would turn off that damn music.
Two of them are chattering away in Yoruba, of which I could understand hardly one word in ten. Over 300 dialects, musical language, though, talking sounds like singing a little. Streets lined w/ three-and four-story concrete block buildings, shuttered against the sun, painted white, every few streets a minareted mosque, or a church.
Passed a big street market. Ajayi steered carefully around knots of people, around stalls and stands selling food, drinks, cigarettes, raffles, clothing, shoes. The air smelled of garbage rotting, grilling meat, car exhaust, and something else, unidentifiable, high, sharp, slightly spicy, the base pong of the place. When I can no longer notice it, I will have settled in.
Lary’s Palm Court Guest House is a two-story white building, hipped metal roof painted a faded red. Our team has taken over the whole place, all ten bedrooms. Lary’s cooler than the street, dim, ceiling fans slowly stirring the air, worn wicker furniture, smell of cooking, peppery spices, fried meats, then as we marched to our rooms, disinfectant, wax, furniture polish. Decor amazing: in the reception area, large steel engraving of stag at bay, a litho of Jesus with children, breakfront with cheap souvenirs of English seaside, a dining room with four round tables, set with plastic-covered cloths, heavy, cheap silver and glassware, plastic flowers in vases?could be Blackpool, Brighton. Everything spotlessly clean, except for omnipresent tan dust. W. not pleased, said something about the colonial mind, complained about bath, toilet, in hall. He has not traveled much in foreign lands. I opened the shutters, found our window gives on a little courtyard, shaded by a big mango tree. There are two goats tethered there and a worn table, at which two women in bright dresses and headscarves are doing something with a mound of some vegetable. They looked up amp; saw me amp; waved, smiled amp; I waved back. I am going to like this place.
W. said he had a headache, took a bunch of aspirin and plopped onto the bed. I went downstairs. Mrs. Bassey, proprietor, has mien of the Queen Mother, speaks perfect English in an accent like a song, every sentence ending like a query?We serve dinner at six sharp? I decided to take a walk.
Down the hot, narrow, smelly streets, music everywhere from radios and what looked like dives, dark holes stinking of beer. A wide thoroughfare, across which was Yaba Market. Every dozen or so steps a young man would approach me, asking to become my guide, or trying to sell me something or steer me to a stall. I told each, no thank you, that would not please me, in Yoruba, which usually got a startle, sometimes a grin, and a comment too quick for me to catch. I found a moneychanger and traded dollars for naira, getting a little more than twice the legal rate. I bought a paper cone of something called kilikili, because I liked the name, and it turned out to be spicy deep-fried peanut butter, pretty good, and some gassy local mango soda. Yaba an untouristy kind of market?most stalls devoted to everyday stuff?plastic pans, hardware, dry goods, clothing (new and used), shoes, cheapo electronics, music tapes. Constant pounding of music, most of it interesting, beat driven?Yaba also a big nightclub district, lots of the musicians live here. Also market artists, some of them better than the stuff you see in SoHo, brilliant colors, abstracted natural forms?terrific! In central Asia the markets are segregated by goods?here apparently not.
Joined little crowd between a woman selling fish out of plastic tubs of ice and a woman selling lengths of tie-dyed adira oniku cloth, saw man squatting, bare-chested, dressed only in khaki shorts, thought he was doing some craft, but he was winding length of colored twine around a dog’s skull, chanting. To one side, the client?fat, elderly man in robes and pillbox hat. Shirtless man finished knotting up the skull, placed it on a dented tin bowl, took a brown hen out of a straw basket. He cut the hen’s throat, let the blood spurt over the skull.
Felt faint, not the sight of blood, but confronting sorcery after all this time. Market juju only, but still … repulsion and attraction both. Rite familiar from books. The fat guy is a moneylender or businessman. Someone owes him money, hasn’t paid. Now debtor will have dreams of dogs chasing him every night, he’ll go to a witch doctor so he can get some sleep and witch doctor will tell him to pay his debt, if it’s a just one, or if not, he can set up some countermagic. M. used to say that immersion in a different culture was like an enema for the spirit. Could be: I feel higher than I have in months.
SIX
Professor Herrera’s face registered surprise when Jimmy Paz walked into her office. Paz flashed his warmest smile and stuck his hand out and she took it with good enough grace. In Miami, when Iago Paz is announced, you don’t normally expect a black man to walk in the door. Paz was used to it, expected it, had grown to appreciate its disconcerting aspects. He did his quick cop take of the office and its occupant. Fifteen by twelve maybe, neat, organized, with just enough room for a chrome-legged Formica-topped desk, with computer and monitor. A chair and visitor’s chair in the same style, padded with orange plastic, a credenza in cheap institutional teak veneer, and, behind the desk, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, crammed with books and green cardboard reprint boxes, the contents indicated with red label tape. On a shelf in the center of this array, some family pictures, knickknacks of various kinds, a large plaster statue of Saint Francis of Assisi, brown-cowled, holding a rosary and a dove, the base wrapped around with green and gold ribbons. One small window, protected from the merciless afternoon sunlight by drawn steel venetian blinds. On the wall, diplomas: Clemson, University of Miami. A local girl, of course. Some framed photos, too, groups of people in explorer gear standing around with people wearing less clothes, lots of green foliage as background: the typical anthropology shot; also, framed antique botanical drawings of leaves, flowers, seeds, with Latin titles, something else in a frame on the credenza behind him, looked like a rosary.
The proprietor of all this was a woman in her late thirties, with blond hair, intelligent hazel eyes, reflecting a little unease now, Paz observed, which was okay from his point of view, parchment-colored skin made matte with careful makeup. She was a little heavy for her age, although not for her culture. Behind the desk, on the wooden floor-to-ceiling bookshelf, there was a picture of her with a darkly handsome, chunky man, looking younger and thinner. She’d married, had a kid, maybe?right, there was another photo, two of them, framed in silver, this next to
