ITS STILL ABROAD

It's funny, but it also taught me alot of Life lessons which I still Hold dear till this very day.

During my final days in secondary school, my dad mentioned that he'd wanted I and my elder brother to go study Abroad. You could imagine the excitement. I put in a lot of work into my final exams to make sure my result wouldn't be a problem. Alas!, Results came out and I had a flawless result.

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My dad was happy and the process to get an admission began. We initially picked The UK and Germany. But then, i got admitted to study aviation management in Germany. in the process of paying the fees and trying to get an interview date, my dad passed on. Due to the mourning and the burial, i was unable to meetup and had to forfeit the admission.

After this i got pretty determined that i was going to study Abroad, and i was going to do it on a budget or on scholarship sighting the absence of my dad. So, I enrolled to learn to speak German, because education is free in Germany once you can pass the language exams. I passed the language exams, and i started applying to schools. I applied to multiple schools and eventually i got admissions from three different schools.

I had to proceed to optaining a visa, initially the amount that was mandatory to have in a blocked account when i started applying was about N1.8M. But during this is time there was a change in Government, and Euro Skyrocketed and the amount became N8M. I was confused and tired, i had lost hope.

So i just quit trying and i was waiting to see if things would go back to normal. I started working, and also kept on doing my research Becausei swore that i was only going to study Abroad, it had to be outside Nigeria. It was during this time i stumbled on the fact that the Democratic Republic of Congo (D.R.C) was blessed with a lot of natural resources, Gold and diamonds especially.

I quickly reached out to my best friend and told him what i had just learnt. "Show me your friend and I'd tell you who you are" that is the perfect quote to describe the moment. He immediately said what i was thinking. Now my thinking was, we make our way into the D.R.C and join artisanal Miners in mining gold and then we sell it to raise enough money to fund our German dream.

We immediately started putting our things together, i told my family i was travelling, i lied about everything justto evade questions. I was still 18 at the time.

Then we set out, we didnt know anyone in the D.R.C. we had no contact and honestly, little money too. We got to the border and reality started creeping in, realized we didnt even know the way and we couldn't turn back. No, we WOULDN'T turn back. I had a cousin in Benin republic, so i reached out and he encouraged us to find our way to Cotonou. We did just that, and for 2 days after we arrived, I was unable to reach him. Eventually on the 3rd day he texted on Facebook and gave an address and we went over to meet him.

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After resting we realized it would have been a disaster getting to The D.R.C without knowing anyone because it was hard getting to Cotonou where I knew someone. 2 weeks later I decided to do something and I went to check out the schools, I found it interesting and decided to enrol.

I put a call across to my mom and I was truthful and explained the whole experience and what I had decided, she then laughed and said "Its Still Abroad". I laughed so hard, because I kept on saying i was going to study abroad and unconsciously, the universe had pushed me where I needed to be.. i eventually Did my Bsc abroad... YES ITS BENIN REPUBLIC, BUT ITS STILL ABROAD!!!!. Lol.

It's currently 12:10 AM, and this is my response to the midnight letters prompt #16.