Journey to Nigeria Pt. 4

During the pandemic Bàbá Jamel decided that our spiritual family would be taking a trip to Nigeria to visit his teacher and that this would be an opportunity for students who were marked for initiation into priesthood to do just that. I knew that this was something I wanted to do however, we were in the middle of a pandemic. I wasn’t sure if it was the right time for me to go. After thinking about it for a bit and talking to both Bàbá and my father, I decided to not put it off and instead go with my gut feeling which was, this was the time. In Yorùbá culture, initiation does not make you a priest, you are born one. I figured if this is in alignment with my destiny it will all flow together, and I wouldn’t have to worry about it. So, once we decided that we would travel in March of 2021, it was on like popcorn.

In the beginning, we had a group of about 10 people going to Nigeria with only 2 of us going for initiation, me, and my God sister Ṣelewa. We had some people flying from NY and others flying from the south, so we were trying to coordinate flights to get those who were leaving out of the same city to fly together. We started looking for flights and getting things together in late December, early January and it took a lot. Not only were we flying to Nigeria which meant we had to get travel visas, we also had to do it during the pandemic. There was no NY office. We were told we would need to travel to Atlanta just to process our paperwork. The paperwork was a big task alone, and we still had to get flights together. We spoke with someone who recently went to Nigeria and they told us what kind of COVID tests we needed, and how much money we needed to tip the authorities and random folks in Lagos (yes you read that correctly). It was a lot to deal with.

As time went on some people decided they were not going to go for various reasons. By the end of it all our group of 10 boiled down to 3, Bàbá Jamel and the 2 initiates, Ṣelewa and I. Bàbá and Ṣelewa would fly together out of Miami while I would be flying alone from NY. I eventually purchased my flight and then needed to file all of my paperwork. I started that process SO MANY TIMES because the website looked suspect. I just kept hitting snags or getting distracted and having to do it again the next day and the next day. As this is happening time just keeps on going. When I FINALLY finished my paperwork, I went to book my visa appointment only to find out the first available appointment was about 1 week before my flight to Nigeria. I’d never applied for a visa before. The website said it could take up to 15 days to process yet I only had about 7.  The only silver lining was that the appointment was in D.C. not Atlanta, so the trip was a bus/train trip, not a plane.

When I first saw this appointment date, I was ready to give up. For one day I was clear I was not going to Nigeria in March. It just couldn’t happen. Then on the next day I remembered what I said before, if this is all in alignment I don’t have to worry. I just kept on moving as if I were going in March. I traveled down to the DMV, stayed with my friend Nikki who was very supportive of the whole affair, made my appointment, processed my paperwork and went back to NY the following day to wait for my visa to be mailed back…within the next 6 days.

THEN Bàbá organized a virtual going away gathering for us EVEN THOUGH we didn’t have our visas yet (He did though). Ṣelewa and I were praying hard to get our stuff done. I had been praying for a smooth process for both of us for months at this point and now it was down to the wire. We were watching the visa progress report daily and things were moving. I had faith that we would get what we needed to go. I continued to prepare for the trip and attended our going away affair filled with hope. It was an amazing time. My mother and sisters were present, Ṣelewa was with her mother, and many people from our spiritual community were there. We sang and had many people praying for us to have a safe journey and amazing initiation. So many blessings were given and received that night.  I think it might have been the following day that I received my visa and Ṣelewa got hers a day after me with 2 days to spare. SMH.

We had all we needed to travel to Nigeria for initiation, all our paperwork, covid tests, visas, and the blessings of our loved ones. Now it was time for complete surrender and some jollof rice if we were lucky.