THE JOURNEY SOUTH
Part 2: The Night Bus, the Highway Ghosts, and the 9th-Hour Grace
When the euphoria of passing my JAMB exam finally settled, reality hit me like an ice-cold bucket of water. I stood staring at my 258 score, breathing a sigh of relief, completely unaware that this was merely the tip of the iceberg. Up until that very moment, I had no idea that the University of Port Harcourt required a Post-UTME screening exam for admission. I had naively assumed that passing JAMB was the final golden ticket, the ultimate hurdle to cross. But the truth came crashing down: I had to travel down to Port Harcourt, Rivers State, a city over 600 kilometers away that I had never set foot in, a city whose stories I only heard from afar.
My aunt broke the news to us on incredibly short notice. Suddenly, the quiet rhythm of my days in Jos was shattered into a flurry of panic. There was no breathing room to process the news, no time to sit back, ponder options, or craft an elaborate plan. She instructed me to head down to the park immediately and make inquiries about the cost of boarding a bus down to PH. My chest tightened as I stepped out of the house. My heart rate spiked, pounding against my ribs with every step I took toward the street. The reality of traveling was no longer a distant thought; it was happening right now.
I made my way straight to Mikel Obi Park, named in honor of the legendary Nigerian Super Eagles captain and Chelsea midfielder who grew up in Jos. Walking through those park gates felt like stepping into a strange, living storybook. There, sitting outside in the open yard with a small circle of men, chatting and sharing laughs, was Mikel Obi’s father. The physical resemblance to his international footballer son was so striking, so unmistakable, that I actually paused in my tracks. For a brief second, my anxious mind was completely thrown off by the surreal contrast of seeing the father of a global sports icon sitting quietly in a dusty park in Jos. Shaking off the distraction, I swallowed hard and stepped into the ticketing office. A young lady sitting behind the desk greeted me and directed me toward a booking agent named Moses.
Moses was a man of average height in his late twenties, carrying a calm, easygoing demeanor that immediately offered a moment of quiet relief to my frayed nerves. Seeking a sense of ground and familiarity in the middle of my anxiety, I approached him in Pidgin: ‘Senior man, I hail.’ He chuckled warmly, looking up with a relaxed grin, and responded, ‘My guy, how far?’ I asked him straight for the travel fares to Port Harcourt. He broke it down without hesitation: ₦17,500 for the larger computer buses and ₦18,000 for the Sienna minivans. We exchanged phone numbers, and I promised to return the following week after locking in a travel date.
My initial master plan was simple: buy a ticket for Thursday morning, spend the day on the road, arrive in Port Harcourt by evening, and settle down before my Friday 7:00 AM screening at Uniport. It felt safe and manageable. That was the plan until my Aunty UD called my mum around 1:00 PM on Wednesday afternoon, completely shattering my schedule into pieces.
‘The journey is far longer and more unpredictable than you think,’ Aunty UD warned over the phone, her voice heavy with tension. ‘If he leaves on Thursday morning, he risks spending the entire day stuck in highway traffic and missing the exam altogether. He needs to move today!’ To cushion the sudden panic, she reassured us that she had already reached out to a distant relative living in Port Harcourt, a relative whose name escapes me now, confirming that I could stay at her home upon arrival.
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Seconds later, my phone rang. It was my mum. The sheer urgency and sharp, trembling anxiety in her voice made my stomach drop instantly. ‘You have to travel today,’ she insisted, her words rushing out as if every second mattered. ‘Call the park right now and find out if you can catch an evening bus, or we will have to figure out another way immediately!’ Her panic transferred directly into my blood. My hands shook as I dialed Moses, my voice pleading as I explained the sudden emergency. To my profound relief, his steady voice came through the receiver confirming there was an evening bus departing that very night. A heavy wave of temporary relief washed over me. When I relayed the news to my mum, I could hear her breathe a long, emotional sigh of relief on the other end of the line.
Fortunately, I had started packing my bags earlier that morning, so I didn’t have to scramble through my clothes in a frenzy. But inside my head, everything was spinning at breakneck speed. My emotions were tumbling wildly, swinging from calm preparation to sudden panic, then to a fleeting second of relief, and finally settling into a deep, heavy, suffocating dread. I pulled myself together, whispered an earnest prayer, hopped onto a commercial motorcycle, and rode to the main junction where I flagged down a Keke Napep (tricycle) straight to the park at Gada Biyu.
As the tricycle zipped through the noisy, dusty streets of Jos, a heavy, knotty feeling twisted deep in my gut. It felt as though I was watching a movie of my own life unfold on a screen, completely powerless to stop or control the next scene. I was being thrust toward a night bus, the single most terrifying ordeal I could ever imagine.
Stepping into Gada Biyu Park that Wednesday evening was one of the most terrifying moments of my entire life. I hadn’t traveled out of Jos in over twelve years, but far worse than the unfamiliarity was the silent, paralyzing trauma I carried inside.
The last time I took a long highway journey with my father, heading down to Aba, Abia State, our vehicle was ambushed by armed robbers near Okigwe around 4:00 AM. Gunshots shattered the quiet night. A bullet tore right into the body of the bus with a deafening metallic screech. Though police checkpoints were nearby, we were robbed at gunpoint in absolute horror. I was just a child, but the terror was burnt into my soul. I remember the days that followed: food tasted like dry sand in my mouth, and every sudden loud noise made my heart jump out of my chest.
That childhood nightmare had left a permanent, unhealed scar on my psyche. Combined with the relentless news of highway abductions, rising insecurity, and kidnappings for ransom sweeping across the country, walking toward that night bus felt like stepping directly into a fiery furnace. Every breath I took felt thin and heavy. My mind screamed at me to turn back, but my feet kept moving forward.
Yet, despite the gripping fear, the relentless pounding in my chest, and the ghosts of Okigwe whispering in my head, I handed over my money, cleared my ticket, and climbed aboard that bus. I swallowed my terror, took that monumental leap of faith, and held tightly to the quiet, unshakable conviction deep in my heart: God was with me.
