Life can be a bubble sometimes, a puddle at other times, a sparkle yet at another time…

Life is a complete package. Lagos is too.

When a friend saw the picture below on my social media status, he asked if it were recent and I said it was taken the previous day in Oshodi and he seemed shocked. He had seen glittering pictures of the complex glass and steel Oshodi transportation hub, a side of this colourful Lagos bubble and one symbol of the city’s modernization. Oshodi is one of several.

When he realized how recent the picture is and that it was taken from where the modern hub is, he asked: will Lagos ever change?

It was a question that surprised me. People get it all wrong. The real Lagos is not the ship-shaped landmass dotted with Lagoons you see on the map, it is not the high rise and shanties or the endless snaking traffic, no, that is not Lagos.

You see, all the things built, they are like caked heavy makeup on a rough, pimpled face. Lagos is Lagos.

Lagos is a defiance of the norm, a group of people who show life what it is. Lagos is a movement, a feeling, a way of life, a spirit. Lagos is 20 million people who defy odds and paint life in different shades…dark and bright, ugly and beautiful.

Lagos is not necessarily rough, it is not plain, it is not dark… Lagos is rouge!