Friday 12 September 2008

Visa to where?

09/09/08
This is an amusing something that happened to me at the airport as I set out on my own journey to Celebrate Africa.
At the Virgin Nigeria counter I handed my passport and ticket to the attendant. As he quickly flips through my travel documents he fixes me with an exasperated and impatient expression and demands “where is your visa?”
“Visa? I mouthed wondering why I needed a visa. He returns my passport to me and replies in Pidgin English, “Aunty, if you no get visa you no fit go!”
He immediately signals to the next person behind me to come forward. “Visa to where?” I asked in a very bemused tone and he goes “UK Visa”, “if you no get am, you no fit go”.

I smiled and told him I was headed to Dakar and therefore didn’t need a UK visa. He literally took a step backwards, looked up sharply with a shocked expression on his face and answered me in thick Yoruba, “ehn, then why did you dress like people going to London? You should have said all along that you were going to Dakar”. His colleague at the other counter quickly adds, “We know people wey dey go Dakar when we see dem”

What?! That had me almost doubling over in laughter; so the next time I’m travelling, I have to go to the airport to get the dress code for each country I visit.

10 comments:

Unknown said...

Oluchi no come kill persin wif laugh o! "Why u dress like persin wey dey go London"? Nigerians go kill persin sha! I guess its what makes us unique! So tay u fit tell where a persin dey go by im dressing. lol thats priceless.

Red Sapphire said...

Virgin Nigeria sef...their service is sometimes crap.If i were the one i would have vexed.Very rude dude.
aahhh den rude sha

ShonaVixen said...

LMAO...wow dress code for each country..very funny Virgin staff!!

mingus said...

Still lafing as I write this! Shows the mentality of some of our 'people' at the airport, be they airport staff or various airline staff. I suppose id you had wanted to play this out, you could have acted as if you did not know and I bet somebody there and then would have collected 'egunje' from you to 'help' you. Silly people!

!!Estella!! said...

Are you kidding me?!!!

Wow!

harrison said...

lollolol, i bear you pain sister; i encountered a similar problem in monrovia. i was on my way back to the states standing in line to board my flight when the custom officer came up to me saying "why are you doing in line, didnt i tell people of your kind not to be messing around here when serious people are trying to board their flight? it was suprising to me. so i handed him my passport which was American by the way; he looked at me in awe and said "big brother im sorry, but the way you are dress do not look like someone coming from America". i had on jeans t-shirt and a jacket looking really casual. so i guess in africa if you are traveling there are different dress code for different countries.

Anonymous said...

When in Rome, do like Roman, In Africa, wear African dress. (What you wear in Peckham is no man business).

Anonymous said...

OMG! That was hella funny! So Ticket Counter peeps don turn Visa "by attire" officials...Na Wa!

@ The Ogwuegbus... Keep doing what you do best! Kudos!

Anonymous said...

Sheesh, why didn't he read your *ticket* before asking about visas? That is not fair. Once I was changing planes and the Lufthansa guy wished me happy birthday - he read my papers enough to even notice my birthdate, and this guy didn't read your papers enough to notice your destination?!

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