I think I might have mentioned my friend Christiana on this blog a few times. It’s weird but until you meet her, you don’t really understand the vibrancy of the spirit she carries. Some people are just like that, their personalities are so alive and so rich that it sometimes seems surprising that a bodily frame can house such depth; you worry they might spontaneously combust from the power of what they carry. That’s Christiana. So because I see such greatness in her, I am always rooting for her success. She recently (finally!) decided to leave London; left her family, friends, fans and foes, and started her career and life over in America. Hello Brooklyn! Her experience is already so entertaining, her tweets struggling between ridiculous, righteous and ratchet. She recently wrote an article on xojane.com  on her journey so far. I am so inspired by her adventure, it’s such a reminder to me that often when we take a leap of faith, we are either taught to fly, or ground to walk is created for us. This move may not bring what she wants…but if I know God (and I do. Sort of), it will bring her what she needs. I can vouch for this because I have been in her position before.

My first night as a graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley remains etched in my mind. The problem, to be fair, started on the plane. I believe we might have been roaming over Boston from the Washington Dulles airport, when I was informed that there were no complementary snacks served on United or Continental (I forget which) Airlines. Unfortunately, I had forgotten my wallet in one of my suitcases in the mad airport rush. Needless to say, I arrived at the San Francisco airport about dead after an 8-hour mandatory fast.

Unbeknownst to me (yes, I just seriously used ‘unbeknownst’ in a sentence), my friend who was supposed to get me from the airport had dozed off and didn’t answer my frantic telephone calls. I finally tried her ‘emergency number’, it belonged to her friend, Andy. I explained in a hunger-humbled voice that I was Eki’s friend (yes, Eki I have put you on blast! Lol), and he came to get me. Suffice to say, my arrival on the West Coast of North America was announced by a disembodied voice disseminated about the 200-mile radius of San Francisco’s airport. It was a little disconcerting, I felt like a stubborn six year old lost in the mall. I didn’t know what Andy looked like, and he didn’t know me either, but the disembodied voice promised that I would be discovered if I waited by the payphones at the north exit of the airport and so of to the telephones I went…400 suitcases and all.

Andy turned out to be a huge, black guy, with the gentlest voice and most gentlemanly of manners. Sleeping Beauty was finally awake, and Andy handed me his phone to have her confirm that he was indeed a person known to her. Clearly Andy was on that Crime and Investigation channel ‘P’ from time. So off we went, chugging my boxes and my fine self along in Andy’s car over the Bay bridge. That was my first view of San Francisco at night and the first time I realised that it looks like Gotham city.

I hoped I’d be happy.

We finally got to Berkeley, I knew this by the amount of ‘Cal’ geared-up humans lining the streets even thought it was almost midnight. Students in huddles in the August heat having a gossip and a smoke in their bright blue and yellow ‘Cal’ uniforms. I tried to make conversation for most of the ride but my mind was far away. If you’ve lived in London, America seems so very foreign; the houses, the roads, the people, the mannerisms, the culture. Everything looked so big…and, so poor. America looks really really poor in many parts, I won’t lie to you.

I couldn’t help wondering if it was too late to attempt to go back home.

I finally got to my apartment. I flicked the light switch. No response. Say what now?! I ran about my tiny studio flicking switches while Andy looked at me from the doorway with concern. I finally turned to him and stated the obvious, “There is no electricity in my flat”.

Andy: “I know”
Andy: “There is also no furniture.”

Lol. Such a guy.

So uhhhm, turns out I had failed to read my lease properly. I was supposed to sort out my electricity and furnishing BEFORE I came. *Sigh*. How? The weeks before I came were spent preparing for my Big Leave; graduating from university and generally being 21 in the first blush of an English summer…can I get a Party in the Park scream?! Fahnks.

I didn’t have to speak, the dazed and despairing look in my eyes had Andy solemnly asking, “Do you want to just come along with me to Stanford and sleep at Eki’s? We can handle this tomorrow”. I nodded my assent and we headed to Stanford.

I still vividly remember lying on Eki’s bed in her dorm room at Stanford, still awake well into the night, worried and honestly, terrified out of my godly mind. All I could think was,

“What sort of mess have I made?!” I moved across the world, to a place where I know almost no one. Are tonight’s event a sign of what is to come? I think I might hate America! How did I think this was a good idea…I’ve never been away from my family and friends before! Oh hell, my Chi has abandoned me!!!Lol. WHY. DID. I COME. HERE…I WANNA GO HOME!!!”

I stayed awake for a while just meditating on the foolishness that tore me out of my comfort zone and forced me into new, uncharted territory. Why wasn’t my comfort zone enough??!?!

The rest of that first week was an experience in itself. My electricity remained unfixed for a week…and I am afraid of the dark. Hashtag WAHALA. At night, I would fall asleep with tiny tea lights spewed all over my apartment, beautiful but haunting… then wake up in a panic in the middle of the night, afraid that I had burnt myself alive. I would then turn off the lights and lie in the darkness, terrified. My classmates seemed so much older and smarter, my furniture didn’t all come in time, someone stole one table as I tried to cart the rest of the furniture up to my room, I couldn’t cook as I had no electricity and I didn’t want to spend all my money on chowing down artery-blocking American delights, I felt awkward at school because everyone seemed so serious and dressed so smart (you know the English summer lasts for all of 2 seconds, I wasn’t trained to ignore the sunshine and my desire for corresponding summer mini-dresses), I was a little anxious at the liberties American men took by literally “hollering real quick” when I walked down the street (“I like my Choclit DAARRRK!”, is not an acceptable chat-up line, sir! Lol).

I was hormonal, consistently oscillating between anxious and homesick and happy and curious. Yet, I did not give in to the emotions threatening to suffocate me…until the day I tried to put my Ikea furniture together. If there is a stereotype of the DIY damsel in distress/clueless Barbie, I am she! Ikea directions look like Math meshed in Arabic with a sprinkle of Hieroglyphics. On that day, my confusion was sure. The tools were heavy and didn’t seem to do what, in their masculinity, they promised me. They were heavy and I was both clumsy and clueless…and posed a danger to myself. I sat in the middle of wooden blocks, cushions, knots and non-corresponding bolts and just wailed like a negro slave on a boat to the Americas. All my pent up fear at leaving home, my worry that I would have the worst year and just die alone (yeah, I’m dramatic like that), my anxiety over living alone just crystallised in that moment and I felt doomed.

After that little ‘incident’ on my apartment floor, I dried my eyes, fixed my make-up and said to myself, “Self, you’ve let it all out…now get over it”. I won’t tell you how my bed got built (Hey, Mr. Corbin!) but suffice to say that the experience at Berkeley only got brighter from that moment onward. I figured, I’m here already so there’s no point pinning about what I left behind in London. I’m here so let’s make it count. And I tell you, every single day counted. In fact, our Dean’s simple advice to us at the start of the school year was, “DO NOT SLEEP!” Because the entire year passed by too quickly! Every day was better than the last; my personality, capacity and just my core self, expanded in ways I was not even aware that I had the potential to.

Recently I was talking to an interesting guy and he told me something really powerful. He said, “…life is about memories. If you stay in one place for 10 years, doing pretty much the same thing, that accounts for only ONE memory.” The brain doesn’t diversify individual occurrences within a larger, essentially similar memory. So, a lot of people die with only one or two real memories, because their adult life in its entirety is essentially a repetition of the same thing continuously. It’s like, the wheel is turning but the hamster is dead. I remember a discussion I had with my mum over the Christmas holiday as we strolled around Monkey Territory in The Gambia. She mused on how strange it was that Nigerians did not travel within Africa more, especially as Nigerians in particular always seem to be holidaying somewhere in Europe, USA or the Middle East (read: Dubai). We concluded that the issue is that African countries largely lack the shopping experience we crave. We are a material nation of mammonists and moneyed citizens. Building memories, totally unrelated to money or acquisition is totally foreign to us. Money over memories.

Stepping out of your comfort zone is automatically yet unconsciously creating a new and distinct memory. It is shocking; too abrupt for your brain not to register …this is why I can remember in detail, so many days of my year abroad in Berkeley. Life is worth it, it’s worth our taking bold moves and not living trapped by our own fears, failures and insecurities. I am preaching this to myself; I am so often trapped by my fear of failure that I tip-toe through life and sometimes prefer to be safe than sorry. This is why I applaud people like Christiana, people that walk in the light of their own truth. The truth is, there is so much more of the world to see, what are we waiting for?