I want to take a trip. In my mind, to places in a city l left three years ago.

I want to visit that big compound at the end of the street where I lived, in Abakpa, where the ancient locomotive chugged loudly in the morning, as I walked out to buy breakfast.

My regular breakfast was kosi or akara. I always called it akara, because I thought kosi was too bland a word to capture the delicious essence of the hot spongy brown akara. I remember how the lady would serve it out of the hot oil and package my usual fifty or sixty naira worth of akara into old newspapers and nylon bags. I was a regular customer, and I had earned her respect because of my almost daily patronage. Sometimes, I was rewarded with some extra balls of akara, other days, I was offered koko or pap…