HangOut Nigeria United Kingdom

 I recently had to move to the United Kingdom (London to be precised) to do a Masters Programme in Advance Computer Technologies (MSc). I arrived the United Kingdom (UK) on the 11th of October 2022 and I would like to talk about how travels are done here in that you would need to travel to hangout and subsequently discuss in other post a few places one could hangout based on the central theme of this blog.

                                                              Typical Itinerary

 

The blog describes places where you could hangout in Nigeria in case you pay a visit to Nigeria, but always keep in mind that movement is one of the characteristics of a living thing. Even as we are going to be blogging on things that are  Nigerian related, you need to read this so you could move around the UK (using London as a case study) easily without spending too much on Taxi and Uber Services.

The city of London have a local government body responsible for most of the transportation service in London called TFL (this is an acronym for Transport For London) you could read more about them on there website TFL for details about there services. They provide a card called Oyster Card which allows one to journey on train (rail road) and buses with the card funded.

 Movement in London is pre-destined in the sense that you do not need to know the area where you are going, just know where you are and your final destination. If you do not know the address and you are given a postal code, all you just need to do is to punch in the postal code. Because of the Location Based Service (LBS) of google map that is on point in London, it recalculates the fastest route to where you are going. All you need to do is trust the map.

 

 You might want to go from Tottenham Court Road to Romford and it could Calculate and route you through Newbury park or through Liverpool Street or through Snakebrook. No matter the route that is recalculate, it would take you to your destination. 

When I reflect on how people place absolute trust in a map and find it difficult to have faith in God. I wonder how fast technology is advancing. The road to your predestination could be rough or could look like a Detour, but it would take you home some how. 

So when I arrived the airport (Heathrow Airport) in London, I went to the transport service and was given an option to take a taxi directly to my destination or opt for an oyster card. My travel itinerary was printed for me if I decide to use the card then I thought to myself, though the taxi service was quite expensive but I could afford it and I'm not a stranger commuting on Taxis and Buses or trains but the Oyster card was strange to me and I needed the experience. So he gave me the itinerary and warned me it was going to be stressful. I always being a believer in Lamentation 3:27 ("It is good for a man to bear the yoke while he is young") and also I love to gain a new experience, like the general cliche', "no pain no gain", so I took the oyster card, it was more than 75% discount off the amount I would have paid for taxi and coupled with the fact that I get to gain experience and have something to blog about, I took the card.

Well, it was stressful as warned, even trying to understand the sign seems like rocket science. In my country (Nigeria), you don't have to read any signs, if you are going somewhere you have a person shouting the bus-stop of where you have to go we called them Conductor in Nigeria. Because of there manners, there are called Agbero but in yoruba language it is pronounce Apero and it literally translates to Conductor. In the UK, there is nobody shouting for you, you need to be at the Bus top and at the right Bus to your next stop. if you are going to newbury pack from Tottenham court road, better not be on the train going to Epping make sure you are at the train going by Newbury park.

If you want to keep track of you money on your card, better know the fair for each of the transport and have an estimate how much it would take you round your trip, if the unit on your oyster card is finished, you wouldn't be able to move from the train station or take a bus. But the good news is there is an alternative.

When you get to the UK and you have friends or cousins in the UK, just forget about them because the UK doesn't allow you to bring in excess luggage (I mean to make another person to be a burden to you). You just have to learn the hard way, but for my readers, I would put it out here so you could know how to maneuver your way around in case you need to recharge your oyster card or alternative payment system. When you hear cashless policy, I think it plays very well in London.

You could have extra cash which should be a confidence to travel, the confidence can be dashed if you don't know what to do. I remember then when I do journey by road to my university (where I acquire my first degree) in Nigeria from Abuja to Calabar (Cross River State). We pride ourselves in having extra cash in our pocket, in case there is a problem with the Bus, trust me, the chances were high then, all you need to do is get extra cash in your pocket to take another Bus or vehicle to your destination. Anywhere you are that a vehicle ply, as long has you have cash in your pocket, you can get to your destination. But in London is not so.

If you run out of your unit on your Oyster card, you need to go to a train station and recharge the card with a cash machine. The good thing about the cash machine is that you don't get to deal with a human being, they sometimes like to transfer aggressions or insult your ignorance or feel like they are better than you because they have the Job of sitting at a machine. You just go there, place your card at the machine, it would show you your unit balance, then ask you to punch in how much you want to add to the card. When you do that, you would have to insert your cash to the machine.

Peradventure you don't have cash with you maybe because you don't have a UK account yet and you are out of GBP (Great Britain Pounds Sterling). If you have a domiciliary account of any currency, thank God mine was USD card apart from Naira, you could just use the card contact-less on where you place your oyster card and you are sure to proceed on your journey. If you also want to learn how to pay with TFL click on the link provided above.

So get used to seeing hangout post that is of Nigerian culture in the UK, like most of the festival, we shall also be checking out the Halloween festival in the UK celebrated on the 31st October, checking out where a typical Nigerian can hangout and cool area like the Nigerian Restaurant. Well I took a nice Palm wine from a Nigerian Kitchen yesterday and good Afan soup. If you want to know more about palm wine, read it up here it's one of Lirix Enterprise post that ranked well on google search engine. 

Would be posting on a good Nigeria restaurant in London tomorrow, so if you are yet to follow our blog, please do now and don't miss out on a places to hangout or where you could meet Nigerians. So in that note see you tomorrow.

Cheerio !!!