One of the happiest days I spent in Lagos this time around was, as mentioned below, a trip to Abeokuta, a smallish town under the great red rocks surrounding the town.



It is also the centre of cloth-production for a kind of batik which is only found there, and across the rocks above the town are great swathes of cloth drying in the sun. After the apparent soullessness of Lagos, this town with life and colour brought welcome warmth, as well as a chance for me to have a break from organising.

We were honoured with a tour of Fela's parents' house, which started with an incredibly lively and enthusiastic talk by the guardian of the house. Under a canopy rented for the occasion we drank cups of earthy-tasting palm wine from plastic buckets, though we all drank as much as we could bear and tipped the rest into the grass which was growing up around the house. We were then treated to a choral demonstration, which left us all speechless, such was the earnestness with which this tour was being carried out.



Next we were taken on a hasty visit of the school that Fela's parents founded, the church where they are buried, and some other churches that also went by in a blur. Tunde drove the bus from place to place and we and armed Ibrahim were shepherded in and out of the bus at great speed. We had said we were in a hurry, typical white people, so we were taken at our word. "Hasten yourselves," shouted Balinger as we tardily looked around the church yard under the wide-eyed expression of the church caretaker. "You musn't be tardy."