Why I Will Own A Private Jet When I Grow Up

When I grow up, I will own a private jet and it is not because I want to show off or because I want to feel like a superstar. It’s simply because just like food, shelter, cars and clothes, private jets are no longer a luxury but a necessity in Nigeria. Keep your hairnet on, hear me out first.
Two weeks ago, I had to travel to Zaria from Lagos. I could have gone by road, but given the length of time the trip would take, I decided to go by air. I had a few things I needed to accomplish in Zaria before I would return to Abuja and I had too little time. Now, Zaria has no airport so it meant I had to fly to Kaduna and then make a road trip of at most an hour to get to Zaria. Not a problem, I could manage that.
My brother booked me an Arik flight to Kaduna that was earlier than the Aero flight (I always fly Aero. They have consistently been good to me) and so, I got set for the trip. The flight was for 2:00pm. I hate waiting, especially at the airport; so if I can help it, I never get to the airport more than an hour to my departure. Anyways, that lovely day, I got to the airport at about 12:00pm and told myself it was only a two hour wait so I would be fine. I got to the check-in counter and the lady told me my flight had been moved to 5:00pm. Shoot! I almost passed out. I looked at her and she had on a straight ‘I don’t care how you feel’ look and said something about the airline sending out text messages to that effect. I sighed. If I’d gotten the text message, would I have shown up at the airport 5 hours before? Was the house in Lagos chasing me? Or did Lagos airport suddenly have free wi-fi?
Anyways, I went through the check-in processes and took a seat in the departure lounge. I slept, woke up, read Sally’s E-book (which is really awesome btw. Sally writes the best stories. No wash. Follow her @moskedapages), slept some more and soon it was 5:00pm. Oh, might I add at this point that network sucked at the airport. I could neither make nor receive phone calls and BBM and Whatsapp were totally out of the question. All I could do was send text messages. And even those were delivered selectively. Plus the text message they supposedly sent out came in only a few minutes to 2:00pm. Sigh.
Oh well. I congratulated myself on the remarkable feat I’d accomplished- waiting at the airport for 5 hours without dying. Like I said, I hate waiting particularly when the wait is indefinite. I’d barely finished congratulating myself when they announced that the flight was moved to 6:30pm. Lawd! At this time, I was weak. Too weak to throw a fit. So I just sat and watched as people tried to start a fight with the officials. My dad had sent a driver to Kaduna airport to pick me up. When I saw the way things were going, I contacted him and told him to send the driver back. No point keeping someone waiting there indefinitely. Plus I’d met a family friend who was on the same flight and who was also going to continue to Zaria.
We didn’t start boarding till 7:00pm, didn’t get into Kaduna till about 8:30pm and somehow I didn’t get home till about 10:00pm. And when I got home, here’s what I had to say to myself. “If I had calmed down and jejely taken a bus, shebi I for reach house before 10:00pm?” Na wetin oyinbo people dey call ‘more haste, less speed’ na him be this one.
It’s important for me to mention also that no flight at the Arik terminal that day was on schedule. At least not from the moment that I got there. I spent a total of 7 hours waiting for that flight and all their flights within that period were delayed.
Then only this week, my younger brother had to make the same trip and again we bought him the same Arik ticket. (We never learn abi?) He needed to go back on Monday and apparently that was the best flight option available. Arik moved the flight from 3:00pm to 2:00pm and eventually cancelled it. I think they said the Kaduna airport was shut down. He was asked to come the following day. Today, it rained and he had a few other logistics issues. The flight was for 2:00pm and he ended up getting to the airport just at about 2:00pm. They said they were done checking in and after much talk, they charged him N3,000 to get on the flight.
Here’s where it gets interesting. The flight was not on schedule! They charged him 3,000 extra for a flight that wasn’t even on ground yet! He eventually left Lagos at about 4:00pm and called me about an hour later to say they were in Jos. It was not even a direct flight. So imagine. Seeing that he was late and the flight was late too, shouldn’t the two “latenesses” have cancelled each other out? Apparently not.
When I complained about Arik and kept praising Aero, a friend of mine told me it was because Aero had not shown me pepper before. I got to hear stories of 7 hour flight delays and 3 hour flight delays by my beloved Aero contractors and I was just weak.
So you see why I will own a private jet when I grow up? It’s not effizy, only a necessity. Apparently, I can’t trust Nigerian airlines to take me to my destinations in time and in safety so I might as well buy my own private so I do not miss important meetings when I grow up. And I know I will have lots of important meetings.
Yes, I’ll also like to have a private jet so I can fly my family to wherever it is they want to go to and not have to worry about them missing important occasions.
P.S, I learnt an important lesson of recent about using images even from google, that’s why there’s no image for this post. I haven’t bought my private jet yet otherwise I’d have posed with it and put the picture up. Beht soon enough sha
Yougeecash (@Oge_writes)