Day 20

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls (as our pilot from London to New York would say), our last blog day.

Mary graciously accompanied Haleigh, Aayush, and Chika to the airport this morning, which as of writing this about to land in New York, was like 21 hours ago. Not too many interesting things today, except Aayush got asked if he and Haleigh were siblings (?) and we were forced to pay some people some of the last of our Naira for helping us fill out these forms but they didn’t actually even help us. The airport was also incredibly empty, we didn’t wait in one line. There were I swear at least 10 security checkpoints, sometimes 5 feet apart from each other, and Aayush had to confiscate his nail clippers in Nigeria and then his toothpaste and shaving cream in London, and we both had to dump our water bottles again like we did on our way here. We determined security for connecting flights must be a pretty chill job because someone at another airport has done all the work for you, but that didn’t stop the security person from taking 10 minutes to check each flagged bag. We were both in middle seats for the first flight, but don’t fret Aayush did get his long-awaited pastry for his success in the crossword competition, a nice salted caramel brownie. Also there was a brief face time by Amber, who was very much wanting to meet Aayush. The woman next to Haleigh on the first flight was next to her on the second flight but the flight was fairly empty so she moved to an aisle, very clutch. With three airport meals and four different snacks, this was the most food we’ve eaten in one day in the past three weeks.

Don’t worry, Mary’s day was infinitely more interesting than ours, and she sent me her whole blog post before we even landed so enjoy:

This was probably the earliest morning for Mary, Haleigh, and Aayush, with the alarm going off at 5 AM. Surprisingly, Chika woke up pretty easily and then we gathered Haleigh and Aayush’s stuff downstairs as they prepared to head back to the US. Haleigh and Aayush could sleep on their flight but unfortunately, this was just the start of Mary and Chika’s day.

Mary and Chika headed back to the hotel and Mary hopped in the shower, soon followed by Chika. We checked out of the room and got to the HEI office around 7:45 AM, which is much later than we go usually. Still no one was there except Vivian. We got all the supplies ready for the training and only ordered one Uber this time.. much different than the two usual Ubers we order. We arrived at the training site, the Police College of Ikeja, right next to the city mall we had visited a couple of days ago. Although the trainees showed up fashionably late and we didn’t get to start the training until about 11:30 AM (in comparison to 10:45 AM), everything went well. Mary was predominantly with the in-person trainees in an outside classroom. They were all very engaged in the breakout sessions and asked many thoughtful questions about being a first responder. They were smiling and laughing any chance they could. And then unexpectedly, the TOT had to step out so Mary had to teach the remainder of the class. Still, everyone asked thought-provoking questions and were passionate about expanding the program to other Nigerian states that were in more dire need of first responders. This was just a perfect example of community members from distant places still thinking about and trying to help better one another. All in all, Mary would say this was a perfect training to end her experience on.

After the training ended, Mary saw a guy with sugar cane so she bought some to take home to her family. They’re gonna be so excited, she just knows it. And then of course Mary dragged Chika with her to Center City mall to do some last minute shopping, but it turns out that Chika was the one to do last minute shopping. We first went into ShopRite, where Mary bought meat pies and some fries to eat before her flight. The attendants were so nice and even agreed to hold Mary’s suitcases for her while we did some shopping. Mary then tried to get that cinnamon roll Aayush got a few days ago but they were all sold out. The cashier told us to come back tomorrow, shocked when Chika told him that Mary would be in the United States tomorrow.

Anyways, we then went into this store that reminded Mary of Target. Chika spent about an hour there. She bought some cute pens, containers, and a travel sewing kit with a handle that she kept being indecisive about buying. There were like 5 different sewing kits and she couldn’t decide if she should get the one with a handle because it didn’t come with scissors or get the one of the others that didn’t have a handle but did come with scissors. After they finished shopping, or at least Chika finished shopping, they both headed to Coldstone to get Mary’s final going away dessert. Mary couldn’t eat the ice cream in the store because Chika’s generous friend Samuel agreed to drive me to the airport and then take Chika home, so that we wouldn’t have to Uber. The drive was honestly smooth with little to no traffic. Mary even learned that Samuel used to study civil engineering but decided to switch to computer science, which is what he’s currently doing. Mary didn’t get to say a proper goodbye because the police at the drop off gate rushed all the cars to leave as soon as they dropped the passengers off.

Mary’s not usually worried about getting to the airport on time but when she got there and saw how long the line was, she was thankful she had 4 hours ahead of her flight. Some greeter pulled her to the correct airline line to stand in, which was then followed by two employees pulling Mary to the Delta sky priority line. Once she got to the point where she could drop off her bags, she was told she should’ve been in the Air France line. Mary was utterly confused as her boarding pass was on the Delta app and had a big Delta logo on it. I feel like they should make that more clear. Anyways, Mary headed to the Air France line, which was SIGNIFICANTLY longer than the Delta line. After about an hour of waiting, one of the same employees that pulled Mary to the Delta sky priority line earlier found her and brought her to the Air France sky priority line. Mary didn’t question it, she just went with it. Then she went through immigration and security, and even got stopped for her electric toothbrush. Don’t know how that would happen because she thought she’d get stopped for the food she had but she didn’t. oh well. then she went to her gate and everything was smooth sailing from there. See you in Paris!

Thanks for following along for the past three weeks and we hope to be back soon! I never learned how to say bye in Yoruba, so we’ll stick with goodnight - e kú alé!

Actually surprise there’s more, after Haleigh posted the blog yesterday, Mary had quite an unfortunate adventure with her travel back home:

Mary landed at Paris CDG airport at 8 AM, then had to run to her next flight as it was leaving at 9 AM. In this hour period, she had to go through customs and find her gate. Somehow, when she went through customs and security, she forgot her MacBook and iPad, only to realize once she got to Atlanta.

She frantically called the Paris airport and they told her to just fill out this online lost and found form. She filled it out and then emailed all her professors to let them know she will be empty handed for a few days RIP. But she realized there was nothing else she could do so she just tried to forget about it. She got onto her flight to Pittsburgh and was just excited to see her family. Once she got off the plane, she headed to baggage claim where she was told that her checked bag was lost. Just when she couldn’t hear any better news. It’s okay, apparently it should be delivered soon. Hopefully I get everything back, wish me luck. I know it’s been a crazy ride but thank you for sticking to it and following along! See you next time

I was debating making this accidentally blurry picture a metaphor for how our time in Nigeria went by in a blur but that was too cringey but I guess I still included it anyways (it’s 2 am WAT, my brain capacity is limited ok)

“It was everything I expected and more”

The plane had this super cool tail camera to watch our flight that Haleigh was mesmerized by

Taken 30 seconds before we realized we were in the wrong customs line and a 45 minute wait turned into 10 minutes

Chika carrying Haleigh’s stuff to the airport door like a champ at the very early hours of 6 AM.

The outdoor in-person class that was highly engaged and reflective!

Quick post-training pic goes hard

Last pic with HEI Mary :(

Chika walking away as she gets caught red-handed for claiming she doesn’t want to buy anything but then buying way too much.

The insanely long Air France like that Mary had to wait in, before getting to go to sky priority.

Mary saw this in Shoprite and had to get it. They call it mich mich in Egypt, it’s so sweet and yummy

Iykyk

Of course Officer Tomi coming in with the Snapchat videos of Mary’s group being so happy and bubbly!