The photo above shows a traffic jam in Lagos, Nigeria, one of the most chaotic cities in the world. So chaotic that the Nigerian federal government abandoned Lagos and moved 450 miles away.
When I visited Lagos for Christmas in 1972 it was still the federal capital. A friend of mine who worked at the US Embassy got me invited to a garden party at US Ambassador’s home. The party was not a diplomatic affair; it was a Christmas gathering for the Embassy staff.
When I arrived at the party, I started mingling with the other guests.
I was in a group of five standing by the swimming pool, when the Ambassador’s wife came up to us and started talking. She talked about the Kennedys. She got a wistful look in her eye as she mentioned that whenever the Kennedys had garden parties, fully-clothed people would get pushed into the Kennedys’ pool.
I looked around. All of her party guests were fully-clothed. Five of her guests were standing by the pool. Was she hoping to achieve some glamour by mimicking the Kennedys? Did she think that the success of her party would be measured by the number of guests that got drenched in the pool? Was she inciting us?
A little later, I was by myself when the Ambassador’s wife came up to me and started talking. She repeated her wistful-eyed spiel about fully-clothed people getting thrown into the Kennedys’ pool. I realized that I was the only non-Embassy employee at the party. I was the only person who would not jeopardize his job by throwing someone in the Ambassador’s swimming pool.
Did she want to be thrown in? Was she inciting me?
I wavered between granting her wish and behaving decorously.
Decorum won out. The Ambassador’s wife stayed dry. Everyone stayed dry.
But the Ambassador’s wife may not have been looking for glamour. She may have been looking for levity. She knew that the newest Embassy official and his wife would soon arrive at the garden party.
The new official had recently finished his training at the Foreign Service Institute, apparently an honor graduate with a promising career ahead of him. His first assignment: Lagos, Nigeria. He and his wife had just flown from Washington DC to Lagos a few days before the garden party.
An Embassy van met them at the airport and drove them to their new home. On this short drive through the streets of Lagos, the new official’s wife flipped out. The chaos was too much for her.
The new official and his heavily-sedated wife arrived at the party. The tone of the party turned somber.
People stared at the woman who could not bear the chaos of Lagos, a chaos everyone else had adapted to. People stared at the man who, because of his wife, could no longer look forward to a promising foreign service career. We all felt sorry for the unfortunate couple.
Maybe we should have pushed people into the swimming pool. We would be standing around in our wet clothing, joking about being drenched.
The Ambassador’s wife knew that would have been a lot nicer party than a group of people in dry clothing staring somberly at an unfortunate couple.
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NOTE: Doug's best stories have been collected into a book: Puppy Out Of Breath. Price = $11. You can purchase a copy at http://www.puppyoutofbreath.com
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