Journey To Nowhwre

Chapter 1: Who was Maria.

“Tell me everything you have been doing since you came to Europe,” Austin said.

I didn’t remember how many times he had asked for that information in the past but right there, i felt it was time to open up to him.

He was right there beside me on the bed. We were in Stockholm Sweden and it was during the winter.

I had met Austin back in Lagos in 2006 at the Lekki Beach. I was with Juliet my friend when he walked up to us.
One thing had led to another and we eventually introduced ourselves.

There was something about him that was very difficult to understand, He seemed too cold and confident and also seemed to have had answers to every questions.

After our time in the beach, He had come up to where i packed my Toyota Rav4 Jeep and continued talking to me even when i stopped answering his questions.

We eventually started dating but knowing that i was returning to Italy soon, i thought everything was going to end. Little did i know it was the beginning of us together.

That was how i met Austin, the most intelligent and the most dangerous man i ever met in my life.
Austin Azubuike was never scared of anything. He lived his life like a programmed robot, planning his way to the end before starting anything.

My name is Maria. Not my real name because i had to change the name. The kind of work i did in Europe warranted that i changed it. Not just me, but all the other street girls.
Yes, i was a street girl. Not that i wanted to be but that was where i found myself. Not just me but over 95% of all the Nigerian girls that came to Europe during that period.
Only quite a few of the girls came for academic purposes. And even at that, half of them eventually ended up in the streets.
The central Europe was not meant for African girls except that the parents lived there to support you.
The purpose was mostly that the Nigerian men, who were supposed to be taking care of most of the girls, also came to Europe for the same thing; money. There was no way for them to hustle and share the money with women at the end of the day.
For that purpose again, there was only one thing left for the girls to do; hustle too.
European system had no special provisions for African women. The same law that guided men also guided women.
Deal on drugs and go to prison. Most men who had no hearts to deal on drugs ended up doing other jobs such as loading fridges and tyres for business men who came from Africa. Some resorted to stealing and some did whatever thing that could fetch them money.
That was the fate of the Africans who traveled through the deserts to Southern European countries for greener pastures.

I was born in Ekpoma, Edo State Nigeria in 1981. I was only 18 years when i was taken to Europe.
I first came to Italy in 1999.
I had just failed my second attempt at Jamb and couldn’t get admission into the University.
I was angry that i was going to wait for another year before another Jamb. Therefore when the offer to travel abroad came, I took it.

“I don’t know why You always ask this question. You have seen and helped many Edo girls in Europe and i am sure you know what they all did. We all did the same thing Austin, all of us” I said.

I knew he wanted to know more. I had been with him while he questioned some of the girls he had rescued. It had always been the same routine; What they did before they came to Europe, How they came to Europe, why they came to Europe, what they did in the past and all that.

I had been with him and watched as he helped these teenage girls. At a stage, i wished i had met him when i newly came to Europe but i was there long before he came.

I had decided to open up to him, although he already knew most of the things about me.

I was Born Angela. When i was young, my mother told me that i looked like an Angel; therefore she had given me that name.

I graduated from Secondary School in Uromi in 1998. After failing My Jamb exam in 1998, i waited for a whole year at home before re-taking the same exam. The result of the second attempt was also bad and i didn’t know what to do with myself.
Then she came.
Aunty Pamela. She lived in Lagos Nigeria and had a small boutique in Surulere.
She said she wanted to send me to Europe to live and work there.
Her offer took away the bitter memories of Jamb and to make things better for me, my parents encouraged and supported me to follow Aunty Pamela.

We traveled to Lagos and went to where Aunty Pamela had her shop. I spent a few days before i was told that we were going to Ghana.

As a teenager, I was trilled with such news as going to a different Country.
However, when we were smuggled into Porto Novo through Ogun State, i knew that it wasn’t going to be all rosy on the way to wherever i was going to end up.

Back in Edo State, women who traveled to Europe were making waves. We had heard so many news about how they picked up cars in the streets and how it was generally very easy to become rich over there.
We saw it as a blessing for any family to have one daughter who lived in Europe.
What baffled me was how our men were not the ones who went to Europe to make the money.
In other tribes i knew, it was men who struggled to make money.
Even in Ekpoma and Benin where i grew up, over 95 percent of the shops were owned by men, especially the Igbo men who were blessed with trading occupation.
But i couldn’t understand why it had to be Edo Women who were preferred to go and make money in Europe. But i wasn’t going to ask questions. Maybe the gods preferred women to men over there.
I didn’t know much about the World but since there was Television, I knew that the World was a big place.

At a stage, all these things didn’t matter anymore. What mattered was that i was going to Europe to make money. How i was going to achieve that wasn’t my troubles, someone was taking me there and it was her responsibility to make sure i made the money.

We got to Porto Novo and slept in a hotel for the night.
It was the beginning of my journey to Europe.

Posted: at 2-02-2016 09:06 AM (8 years ago) | Newbie

3: Journey To The Unknown.

Arlit was a large town North of Agadez. That was the next place we found ourselves.

The next man who came to pick us up was from Libya. He was light skinned like the Europeans and spoke French too.
I didn’t know how they were all connected to each other but that route had the largest human trafficking cartel in Africa.

Due to Language barrier, we had no conversation whatsoever with our new driver.
He was also on a rickety Land Rover loaded with water and Gas.
Nina and I were suddenly alone again with a new stranger.
The other two girls were handed over to a different crosser who had his own Land Rover.
The Agadez was a large meeting and exchange point where the Libyans came to pick up the girls.

At Arlit, we rested and waited for the night. According to the rumour we heard in Agadez, the Government of Ghadaffi arrested people traveling to Italy and jailed them.
The information had created fear and Panic in us and the worst was that we couldn’t even ask our driver any question.
I even wondered whether the Niger Republic had any kind of government at all.
Agadez was filled with foreigners, mostly Nigerians, Malians and Burkinabes. There were a few Ghanaians and Ivoriens too.
It wasn’t just girls anymore, there were also equal or even more number of men there. All waiting to go to Europe through Libya.

It was 9pm when we left Arlit and headed North towards Libya. That was the longest Journey of all the Journeys. We drove the whole night and only stopped when the driver added petrol to his Pickup in the middle of nowhere.
It was difficult to sleep in that condition because we not only feared we could be raped or killed, we also feared the government forces could attack us.

On the morning of the following day, we entered a small city inside Libya.

The driver drove into a compounded and asked us to come down.
We followed him to a house inside the compound where his wife, who understood some English words, explained to us that we would leave the town again in the night but with a public bus. She said it would take us the whole night and half day to get to Tripoli from the town.

They gave us more bread and some kind of meat pie to eat.
The wife showed us the bathroom where we cleaned up and changed clothes.
She showed us a room to rest and wait until our next journey.

We relaxed and even slept and waited for our next journey to the unknown.
I wondered if Italy was in Heaven to warrant people embarking on Such dangerous Journeys.

When we woke up and walked to the sitting room where the woman of the house was watching Television, she chatted us up.

“You are in luck. Sometimes people’s vehicles break down in the desert and they die”

“Die, why can’t other people see and pick them up on the road?” i had asked the woman.

It was then that she gave us a shocking news.

“Because there is no road in the desert. Every driver just guess the direction and follow it. Its all sand and seconds after a vehicle drive past a point, the strong Breeze closes the tyre tracks and its all middle of nowhere again” she laughed.

I continued asking her questions. “But how does your husband know the way to here”.

She looked up at me. “He doesn’t know. He only guess like other drivers. He missed the road sometimes and end up having to go in rounds. If you travel the road in day time, you see people in far away walking or driving in different directions. But its good money for us”.

The good news according to the woman, was that we had gone through the worst parts.
We were taking normal buses to Tripoli in the night and we were going to drive on tared roads.

In the late afternoon of that day, the family fed us again. I didn’t know how much they were paid and who paid them but i gave a lot of credits to whatever ring that was responsible for crossing us through the massive desert. They knew what they were doing.

It was 6:30pm when we left the Wada town and took the night bus heading up to Tripoli.
Most of the passengers were from other countries. Some were there for trading business; especially the Igbo men.
The two people i chatted up inside the bus said they were from Onitsha Nigeria and were going there to buy vehicle spare parts. They also said they came through Kano State instead of Burkina Faso.
They made the Journey easier for us as we all talked deep into the night before sleeping off.

We stopped in a small town outside Tripoli and took a private car to an already paid hotel room.

In the hotel alone, we were about 6 Nigerian girls, all waiting to be taken to Italy.
The man who took charge of us spoke English very well despite being a Libyan. He told us to call him Ali.

That was how we eventually found ourselves in Tripoli.
The city was very beautiful with flowers and clean roads.
They were many Nigerians there as well, some selling drugs while others did whatever job they found.

The hotel Manager came to our room after four days and asked for our names. When we told him, he said that a call came for us from Italy.
We followed him to an office underground and waited for some minutes before the call came again.

The female voice asked if it was Aunty Pamela that sent us there and we agreed it was her, she told us her name was Aunty Philo and that she was calling from Napoli in Italy.
She was friendly on the phone and asked how our Journey went.
She told us that someone would come down to Libya before one week to arrange for our travels. She also said that our hotel bills had been taken care of and that we shouldn’t be scared of anything.
Before she cut the call, she told us that the manager was responsible for our food and that he has been paid in advance. She also said that the manager would give us 100 Dollars each to use to buy things for ourselves.
That was a good news because that was the first money that we received since we left Lagos. But of course they knew that 100 dollars won’t take us anywhere.
It was just to show us that everything was rosy up there in Italy.

Posted: at 2-02-2016 09:12 AM (8 years ago) | Newbie

This is serious o.

Posted: at 5-02-2016 02:30 PM (8 years ago) | Hero

Interesting

Posted: at 6-02-2016 05:00 AM (8 years ago) | Gistmaniac

When is the part 3 of the movie coming out?

Posted: at 11-02-2016 12:23 PM (8 years ago) | Hero

wow wonderful

Posted: at 6-03-2016 02:46 PM (8 years ago) | Gistmaniac