IS THE GRASS ALWAYS GREENER AT THE OTHER SIDE?

Once, I was on my way back home, when a lady, whose face I could barely see in the dark walked up to me, seeking direction to a garden in my vicinity. Since the said garden was a stone throw from my abode, I suggested she tagged along so I’d show her to the garden.

As we walked the slightly steep road that leads to our direction, she told me the purpose of her visit to the garden at that somewhat late hour.

“It’s one of these old men that’s asked me to meet him there”.

“Ok”, I said and she continued.

“I came to Abuja seeking a job but there’s no way I can survive with a 40k pay here”.

“But some people are paid half or less of that amount and though it’s hard, they manage anyway”

“Forget that thing, they definitely have other means of income or maybe they have a free means to move around – to and fro their work places. Only today, I’ve spent more than 1k on transportation alone and I’ve only had a bottle of malt to drink”

“Well, thank God you’ve got a job already and I think forty thousand naira is fair for now. At least, it’s 40k more than the nothing you were earning before, pending when there are openings with better pay”

“And please, I haven’t been in town for too long, how do I get to the old parade ground from here?”

At this point, I realized she didn’t care much where our conversation was leading to and so I paused a while before giving her a description as to how to reach the old parade ground, after which I asked if she was going there that night as well and she said: “yes”.

Now, my imaginations were beginning to run wide and I told her the garden to which she was headed was not exactly at proximity to the old parade ground and that it might be difficult to get there after she has seen the old man at the garden.

“Shei I can take a taxi there, no wahala”

“Can’t it wait till tomorrow?”

“Ah! No o. My sister, I need money and money can’t wait”

“So, you’re going to get money from there?”

“Ehn. One of my colleagues hooked me up with a soldier and he asked me to meet him there”

“I see” I said.

There was an awkward silence thereafter. “What do you do”, she asked.

“I’m a corps member”

“You’re a corper and you’re just coming back from work?”

“Yeah”

“Hmm, where do you work sef? I meet corpers when I go out like this and have some of them as friends. They understand when I say 40k is nothing but you don’t seem to”

We had now reached the garden and I was glad to end the conversation but sad I had said nothing to make her rethink her actions.

Now less than three minutes away from home, I thought of the many who have come to the Federal Capital Territory in search of greener pastures and have found it almost impossible to make ends meet. I couldn’t help but count my blessings and thank God for them.

Then again, it’s saddening to think what fellow ladies do and become in the quest for money. All the more disheartening is the fact that it isn’t always a case of the inability to make ends meet but more to the point – an unhealthy desire to meet and live up to the so-called standard of the FCT.

If we would only realise that the grass is not always greener on the other side and understand that we do not have to throw away morals and go against our beliefs to get to the greener side...