Host Homes - An Introduction

By Tolu

As we left the Crystal Palace Hotel and Abuja in general behind, a little bit of trepidation filtered into my mind. I was nervous about a few things and what the next three months would hold for me. Would I make an impact or would I just go and waste mine and everyone else’s time? Would I be a pain with my mood swings and would I be able to bring up ideas and general stuff like that? However one of the greatest fears I had was regarding my host home, the place that would be my home for the next 3 months. The idea of staying with total strangers was also frightening as I was not used to staying with people that I am not comfortable with (trust me extended family members rarely make the cut) and I have no idea what they look like, their temperaments, hobbies and so on.  

We arrived in Lafia and made our way to the YMCA office where we were given some necessities like mosquito nets and filters as we waited for our host parents to come get us. The first person to arrive was a reverend father and he was introduced to his wards, which ended up being Patrick and Samuel, while we were still whispering and making jokes about it. Some time passes and Emma calls my name and tells me to come meet my host mom. As I moved towards them I felt like an orphan up for adoption hoping that I would be liked instantly and there would a connection or something. I reached them and a smallish middle aged lady bestows a smile on me and I mumble a greeting while doing a mini curtsy (something I learnt to perfect as a Yoruba girl to prevent lectures from overbearing relatives and their archaic views about respect). Despite my initial reservations she pulls me in for a hug and in my head it felt like we were off to a good start. Claire was also introduced and she asked if we were ready so we packed our things said good bye to the team and we were off.

After a 5-10 minute drive we were at our destination and I was impressed, until that moment I had also harbored fears that I was going to live in a shack but this house was definitely lovely. We walked into the house and we were given drinks and asked to rest for a bit before we were shown our room (which was detached from the main house popularly known as a boys’ quarters in this part of the world). We dropped our luggage in our room and headed back to the main house where we worked on our host home agreement. This went well, almost too well in my own opinion (So much so that I felt it necessary to add that we should review the agreement monthly). Then we started the question and answer segment and I learnt that the Chubes (my host parents) had 3 kids (a 26 year old, a 23 year old and an 8 year old) and 2 “foster” kids (a 28 year old and a 19 year old) They were civil servants and even though the husband worked in Abuja he was around for the weekends (which I later discovered meant he arrived late Saturday evening and he left before noon on Sunday).

After all the chatting we retired to our room to rest but less than an hour later Leah (the 8 year old) comes knocking that we should come and watch some television in the main house and we obliged. While we were doing this I pondered how the reality of my host home was nothing like I had imagined and how welcoming everyone was being. Later on the dad arrives and the introductions start all over again, along with the intense questioning (thank heavens our host mum helped answer most of the easy ones). After this we made our escape to our room, alas relief was nowhere in sight because 5 minutes later our host dad knocks and promptly tells us that he feels we need our personal space, especially Claire, but we graciously declined saying it was part of the experience and we prefer to be together. After trying to get us to change our minds for another five minutes he finally accepted that we meant what we were saying, however he was back again in two minutes with a mobile phone saying it was for us to make international calls because prepaid tariffs were higher and that was post paid, again we declined. Seeing our helmets he asked if either of us could ride a motor bike saying he would buy us one so that it would be easier for us to move around. Again we had to decline, saying it was against the rules (by this point I was already feeling overwhelmed).

The next day we went to church with the family and our host mum was really pleased that, despite the fact that we had different churches which happened to have branches in Lafia, we wanted to go to her church. When we got home the host dad was gone, however we stayed in the living room and bonded with the family. They are so nice and I won’t lie I had serious doubts and reservations about such kindness but it’s been three weeks now and if anything they are much nicer than I first thought. My host family have been very wonderful and they treat Claire and I like bonafide members of the family I have a feeling I would break my no crying and mushy stuff rule.