This week was the final escape from Lagos, which had been in the works for a few years but took off toward the end of last year. I am not a young man anymore, so I cannot just pack up and leave when the spirit moves me. Not only do I have commitments to fulfill, but I also have stuff. When your stuff fits comfortably inside the trunk of your car, moving is about waiting until the sun goes down. When you need a truck for your stuff then you have to put some thought into it.
Baltimore has been my home for twenty years. I lived there longer than anywhere else so despite the harms of Charm City, there are some things I will miss. The thing I will miss the most is the look when I say I am from Baltimore. One time in Ireland I told some locals I was from Baltimore, and they did not believe me. They had seen the series The Wire and could not accept that I lived in what they saw. I showed them my license and some photos. They were terrified of me.
There are other things I will miss, like the constant sound of basketballs striking the sidewalk at all hours of the day and night. I exaggerate a bit here, but the thud of a ball hitting the sidewalk is like a weird metronome to the place. So much so that I created a special filter for my podcasts to remove the sound. No matter when I record, there is, now was, that sound of a ball striking cement. Oddly, Baltimore produces few college basketball players, despite it all.
Another thing I will miss is the shouting. The first time I was in Copenhagen, I experienced an eerie feeling the first day walking around the city. It struck me that the reason for this is the relative quiet. No one was shouting. The Danes quietly go about their business on the streets. If they need to speak to someone, they go up close to them so they can talk without shouting. Even on public transport the Danes are quiet, not Japanese quiet, but never shouting or blaring music.
Baltimore is the other end of the spectrum. It is perfectly normal for a man to stop on one side of the street and scream at the top of his lungs at another man on the other side of the street. At first it is to get his attention, but after that they will hold forth like it is perfectly normal for two men to be screaming at one another on the street, because in Baltimore it is normal. People also scream at each other from their house windows, open car windows and even rooftops.
One reason for the shouting, but certainly not the only reason, is the constant sound of alarms from emergency equipment. This is another filter I have created for recording podcasts that I may never need again. It is not just the police sirens, which are common, but other sorts of emergency vehicles. Often, I would see the local fire department take their trucks out and blast the sirens for no reason, other than to make a racket and drive the things around the block a few times.
Probably the hardest thing to get used to will be locks. In a place like Lagos, anything not locked up or locked down will be stolen. Even if it is worthless someone will pick it up and carry it away. When we had an office in the city, we would leave old computers on the sidewalk, and they would vanish. The only thing that did not disappear this way was dead bodies, but the scenes from Haiti suggest that this is something that happens in the next stage of social development.
For the last week I have been locking doors after I pass, because it has become second nature at this point. Yesterday was a nice early spring day here in the hills, but leaving the door open to let the air in was too much. Instead, I opened the window of the office so I could keep an eye on things. Perhaps in time I will forget what it was like to live on guard every minute of your life. I may now understand how men who did long stints in prison feel when they get released.
Something I am not sure I will miss is the general stupidity of the place. The best example of this is car inspections. When I moved to Lagos, I had just bought a new truck, but it was registered in the prior state. I learned I needed a safety inspection before I could swap plates. Getting a safety inspection on a new car seemed weird, but how long could it take? It took all day. The guy crawled all over the thing and even wrote up some things that came from the factory as questionable.
I asked the guy why he was doing this as in other states a safety inspection is just a walkaround to make sure every important bit works. The guy told me with compete sincerity that the cars were safer in Baltimore. He could have said it was the law or that his boss required it, thus acknowledging the idiocy of what he was doing, but no, he was fully on board with the policy. Baltimore combines the mindset of the postal clerk with the intellectual dexterity of the population.
One thing that Baltimore has that I have seen no where else is street walkers, by which I mean people who walk in the streets rather than on the sidewalk. You see it the most when it snows and the cars are less controllable. The locals will walk in the middle of the streets. Even in the summer this is common. They will saunter along in the middle of the road without a care in the world. Of course, they jaywalk at a pace that suggests they take pleasure in holding up traffic.
Finally, the last thing I will miss is the tropical summers. Starting in mid-June Baltimore turns into a jungle. Jungle as in weather. It rains almost every night and is suffocatingly humid all day. Yeah, it is hot and humid in the South during the summer, but that weather in a city is a special form of miserable. Baltimore is below sea level, so it is a concrete heatsink in the summer. In fact, the Baltimore – Washington area is a giant metro area plopped into a swampy jungle.
Lots of people reading this will say it gets miserably hot where they live in the summer, and that is probably true, but hazy, hot, and humid in Lagos is unique. I have been in the South in summer. I have been in Texas during a heatwave. I have spent August in Florida and that is about as close as it comes to Lagos. The big exception is Florida has the beaches and lacks the haze. If you want to know what Hell is really like, spend a summer in Lagos and you will sin no more.
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You are a different sort, no doubt about it.
2
Hmmm, well, it seems to have been a case of a plethora of noggers. Another thing I’ve seen besides the shouting and the paucity of vocabulary is the use of laughter as a filler (among noggers, that is), reminiscent of the doctor in “Idiocracy.” In fact, it’s quite easy to gauge the calibre of a person not only by the content of what he talks about but by the range of his vocabulary.
Living among noggers is desensitising, no question about it.
2
I still remember that Z-Man quote — his answer to the question why he chose to live in Baltimore of all places.
“I wanted to get a sneak preview of what future America will be like.”
6
Twenty years is more than a sneak preview.
1
Damn near a full-on career in military intelligence complete with 20 year letter.
1
True but after college age, “temporary” places to live have a funny way of becoming longer term. Moving becomes more cumbersome and moving between countries and continents, as I know several other readers here have also done, is it’s own special kind of hassle hell
1
It’s how he was able to save for his ranch in the mountains and Arabian horses.
A song for when you’re feeling nostalgic about Lagos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hz1orhaHPk0
1
This song works as well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jR9_wbTrInI
1
“swampy jungle”
Hence the swamp!
Be careful as you detox. Lagos withdrawl is real. 🙂
Ha, It’s no longer Lagos withdrawl., I’m looking foward to Z’s podcasts in West Virginia with “drawl”.
You need to do a follow up report in a few months on what your new neighbors think about “that single guy from Baltimore who bought the place down near Apple Holler”.
Despite spending all of my life visiting my ancestral family/ friends Up North, I’m still “Mow from Bug City”.
1
You forgot the /sarc tag, Z. Every one of those things you are going to “miss” after escaping from Baltimorgue is jogger-centric, but I admire your restraint in not mentioning the devils by name (or even by euphemism) even once, aside from referring to the place as ‘Lagos’.
We did not usually lock our house or our cars while living for decades on Long Island in one of the tonier, more secluded areas, for the absence of basketball-Americans was total. Now that we’ve relocated to a small town in Texas we are a little more wary, but it is still possible to leave things unguarded with some expectation of them not being spirited away in the night. For how much longer, Lord only knows.
Dunno how you endured that shithole for two decades. Talk about sleeping with the enemy! You must have had a target on your back every waking moment. The cacophony of noise – the shouting, the ball-bouncing, the tuneless rap shattering the stillness would have driven me postal.
Godspeed on your journey back to civilization.
2
Oh after a month or two you will.miss the smell of naggers. Just wait and see.
I live in Tampa in a fully Hispanic area. Even no English in Publix. I had a brainwashed freind of mine, not lefty but brainwashed enough say to me. It’s a hell of a lot better than living around blacks.
It must be the smell. You’ll miss it…
Z-Man’s parting message to the denizens of Lagos on the Chesapeake.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yL9Y24ciNWs
2
Best of luck in the new place Z, hopefully the “wildlife” will keep at bay as long as possible. Is it true that they recently lengthened a stretch of interstate to extend out of the swamp and into your new home state?
1
Your tale of Baltimore makes me glad to live in Vancouver, on the Pacific coast of Canada. Here the big problem is the rains. For days in a row, off and on it will rain. Then — this is winter — it snows and the cars and buses can’t handle it. They will skid. For some reason, during the warm summer months, all the mestizos of Latin America come to Vancouver. Not the purebred Spaniards. Not the whites, El jefe. The prosperous half-breeds who work as foremen for their white masters. Their jibber-jabbering of rapidfire Spanish and exotic looks give me a taste of what it must be like to live in the Sun Belt.
It is a beautiful place to visit – have been there when there is zero sun for days on end – which I suppose makes one appreciate the contrast when it is sunny.
Always appeared to me the masters were of the…Oriental persuasion.
When you make films/tv show in cities there is typically a police film/tv unit that is present on outdoor location shoots. On “The Wire,” that unit would tell the cast and crew that you must stay within a few blocks blocks during the shoot or else they could not protect them. I worked on the show once-location was the Inner Harbor-the stunt coordinator told me I was very lucky because that was the only safe and nice location they ever worked in. My Aunt lived in Bel Air, ~30 minutes outside of Baltimore and we’d visit every summer in the 60s-different time.
1
he thing I will miss the most is the look when I say I am from Baltimore. One time in Ireland I told some locals I was from Baltimore, and they did not believe me. They had seen the series The Wire and could not accept that I lived in what they saw. I showed them my license and some photos. They were terrified of me.
Well, that and your deep voice. 😏
Even though I don’t live around there anymore, Chicago went from:
“Ah, Chicago, Al Capone, rat-a-tat-tat!” (Speaker pantomimes firing a Tommy Gun)
To
“Ah, Chicago, Michael Jordan! Da Bulls, Da Bears!”
To
“Oh God! Chiraq? Chicongo? BANG-BANG!” (Speaker pantomimes firing a pistol)
The first time I was in Copenhagen, I experienced an eerie feeling the first day walking around the city. It struck me that the reason for this is the relative quiet. No one was shouting.
Gosh, I wonder what the big difference between Copenhagen, Denmark, and Baltimore, MD, USA might be? Must be the cold European winters. 😉
For the last week I have been locking doors after I pass, because it has become second nature at this point. Yesterday was a nice early spring day here in the hills, but leaving the door open to let the air in was too much. Instead, I opened the window of the office so I could keep an eye on things. Perhaps in time I will forget what it was like to live on guard every minute of your life.
Being born, raised, schooled, living and working around Chicago and Chicagoland I am stunned when I walk around my new neighborhood and see people leaving their garage doors open all day and into the evening, or kids leaving their bikes/scooters/sports gear (basketballs, footballs, etc.) lying around in the open. Pull that in places where I used to live (even “Nice White” suburbs) and someone would walk in and steal stuff from your garage or steal your kid’s toys. (I’m STILL pissed about the Big Wheel I lost when I was five. Stole it right off our driveway, the bastards! 😡)
Me? Everything is locked, even the car when it’s on the driveway and I can see it.
Something I am not sure I will miss is the general stupidity of the place. The best example of this is car inspections. When I moved to Lagos, I had just bought a new truck, but it was registered in the prior state. I learned I needed a safety inspection before I could swap plates. Getting a safety inspection on a new car seemed weird, but how long could it take? It took all day. The guy crawled all over the thing and even wrote up some things that came from the factory as questionable.
I asked the guy why he was doing this as in other states a safety inspection is just a walkaround to make sure every important bit works. The guy told me with compete sincerity that the cars were safer in Baltimore. He could have said it was the law or that his boss required it, thus acknowledging the idiocy of what he was doing, but no, he was fully on board with the policy. Baltimore combines the mindset of the postal clerk with the intellectual dexterity of the population.
One thing from Silly-nois I don’t miss is the stupid “Emissions Inspections”. Which are, at the heart of it, a kickback/slush fund for the state and repair shops. Not for nothing is the Inspection Station in Aurora, IL smack dab next to a repair shop that helpfully advertises they can “Help Fix Emissions Control Problems”.
Hell, as a teenager I figured out the scam. 😒 Your boy was looking for anything to send you to his buddy’s shop and someone would get some baksheesh. Besides, why hurry? He’s union, he gets paid one car or a hundred.
In closing, soon you’ll look at Baltimore as I look at Chicago: Returning there is like being forced to see an old girlfriend where the two of you had an ugly break up. Ugh, why bother? 😣 Hopefully unlike me, you don’t have family that continue to stay where you left and are obligated to see them.
Although roads go both ways folks. 😒
Much happiness and prosperity in your new home. And no getting back up on the roof!
5
“Of course, they jaywalk at a pace that suggests they take pleasure in holding up traffic.”
People who’ve never lived in a city like this don’t believe it.
See also:
Ability to determine:
“Who won’t pick up dog excrement when walking their dogs. With free bags and a waste bin literally 10 feet away.”
“Who will ride a gas powered scooter on a purpose built walking/bike riding path”
“Who will play loud music/videos without a headset on public transport. Including airplanes.”
Enjoy the countryside.
6
Absolutely true about Copenhagen being quiet compared to an American city. I think it’s true of most European cities north of the Alps.
I think it’s a good thing you moved. If something really bad happens with the economy, a place like Baltimore is not going to be a good place to be. A week of no electricity and you’ll see the first instances of Haitian barbecues. Facts about the state of affairs from the economy to culture and demographics, say that’s where things are headed
3
Copenhagen is the most relaxing city I have ever visited. I think the quite is a big part of it. The orderliness too. Helsinki is also a pleasant city. Obviously, there are reasons for this.
1
Whenever someone has to live in the belly of the beast, they either fanatically embrace the ideology of the empire as to why things are the way they are, or they become one of us. There is no middle ground.
Whenever I’ve talked to someone who made a Peace Corp stint in some hellhole, or volunteered to teach in an inner city school, it all followed the same pattern. There’s a certain type of person who stares into the abyss and can’t comprehend what he’s seeing, and it has nothing to do with their intelligence or honesty. Some people have such a strong moral consensus filter some thoughts are literally impossibly to contemplate.
5
I think what you’re talking about it the ability to think independently. Most people would probably agree that this ability is real, like acute vision or intelligence, and that it’s more than just an impressive sounding title that some odd thinkers flatter themselves with.
I have no idea how to quantity the ability to think independently. It can’t just mean agreeing with contrarian beliefs.
But it is still useful to discuss subjects that we can’t quantity. Talking about temperature was useful before we could measure temperature.
Most people would probably agree, but not say out loud, that men have more ability to think independently than women. But how would you convince the skeptic?
I’ll need a big flatbed trailer to move all my machine tools when we build our barn-diminium on the farm.
.
“…the Baltimore – Washington area is a giant metro area plopped into a swampy jungle”…
Literal and figurative. If ever there was an apt metaphor…
3
Why waste good land on them?
Don’t vacation in Baltimore.
And never go to a Haitian barbecue.
Weird sort of quiet national divorce going on right now. People are selecting where they live based on politics and beliefs. We went from deep blue NJ after the rigger 2021 Governor’s election and the vax mandate was going to cost me my job – to deep red South Carolina. While almost all the locals are some strain of “conservative”, many of the recent arrivals are thoroughly red-pilled having seen the beast up close and escaped.
Having spent my time in and near both Boston and NYC, I know that the opposite happens there – left leaning types flock to those places like they are the promised land.
When the breaking point comes, this mass migration may make finalizing the divorce less.messy.
2
It is good that you left before Haiti-style cannibalism became a new fashion in Lagos. Otherwise you could add another topic to your “things I miss” 🙂
Do you think white liberals will also accept the practice so that they are not called racist? They already went from classical music to rap.
1
I’m glad you made it out. I’ve been worried about you for the last 2 years, afraid that some depraved halfwit would get you before you could escape. My husband was in the foreign service, so we moved a lot, and one tip I got was to completely fix up one room in your new place. Get everything set up the way you like it, with pictures on the wall and everything, and move out ALL boxes. That way when you’re tired or stressed you can go to that little spot and feel like you’re in a proper home, not in a kind of halfway state. The mere presence of boxes makes everything feel unfixed and temporary, and adds to your stress.