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It was a hot Wednesday afternoon. I needed to buy groceries at the popular Ebeano Supermarket inside the Ikeja GRA, Lagos State. Outside the gate of the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, Ikeja, I decided to board a minibus to my destination.
But I quickly alighted when the driver announced that the fare was N400. I thought the rate was absurd. The trip used to cost far less.
That was when I decided to take a bus from Ikeja Underbridge to NITEL bus stop, from where I would then trek to the supermarket. That would cost me only N200. This was around past 3pm.
I got in and sat down beside the driver.
In no time, the rickety yellow bus was filled with worn-out and tired faces, and then we left.
In a short while, commotion erupted from the back.
One of the passengers, a dark-skinned man, had shown the driver his destination written on a sheet of paper. When the conductor arrived at where he thought was the address, the man protested that it was the wrong bus stop.
He heaved loudly and shook his head with force while making unexplainable noises. He refused to come down, pointing forward that his destination was still ahead.
This was when we got to know that the man was dumb but could hear.
In no time, we got to know that he was going to a place where a foundation was running a free-eye care outreach. This was when he shared a piece of paper showing the details of the event.
On the sheet of paper, we saw some directions and a name scribbled, ‘Nurse Immaculate, Ogba PHC, Onigbongo Maryland.’
He pointed to the paper, pointed back in the direction of Ogba, which was behind to the right, as though he was saying that the nurse told him he must get to Maryland first.
When he didn’t come down after insisting it was still ahead, most of the passengers told the driver to take him to Maryland and drop him off so he could find his way since he didn’t believe the conductor.
On a sheet of paper, he wrote, ‘I am going to Onigbongo for an eye outreach,’ pointing forward with hopeful eyes.
“Shebi the conductor stopped you at Onigbongo and you refused to come down, what do you want me to do for you,” a fair lady sitting beside him hissed at him and looked away.
But he insisted, pointing to the note that explained that Nurse Immaculate from Ogba PHC told him he shouldn’t get down before reaching Maryland.
“Someone needs to go with him so that he gets to where he is going,” another passenger advised and looked away.
Everyone on the bus was too tired to care.
So, I wrote on a sheet of paper, asking him if he knew where he was going and he answered, ‘Yes,’ showing me the address again. He sat there, helpless but defiant, clutching his papers and gesturing for someone to understand.
My heart ached as I imagined his isolation—unable to speak and misunderstood.
Despite the voices offering countering opinions, the man clutched his papers with determination, gesturing for someone to help him reach his goal.
By this time, we had passed where I was supposed to alight and were now at the Army Cantonment, Ikeja.
When the bus screeched to a halt, I decided to guide him back to Onigbongbo.
I observed as he came down that he was a dark-skinned man of average height, impeccably dressed in an orange polo. He put on a pair of well-ironed black trousers, a white fez cap, and peeling white sneakers that did not take away the elegance in his appearance.
He clutched a bulky black purse in one hand and held a thick notebook in another hand, from where he tore out pages to articulate his thoughts in full.
Even though he was dumb, he was not a brief speaker. This man wrote his sentences in full and was not easily swayed by people’s opinions.
After hours of moving around, we arrived at the outreach venue.
But alas, the crowd had left. We met some tired-looking health workers sitting under the canopies, away from the biting afternoon sun.
A woman, the last patient, laughed with joy after getting a pair of new glasses.
But for my companion, the doors were already closing.
“You came late. As you can see, we have finished,” a nurse said dismissively, barely looking up when I said I had brought someone for the outreach.
I pleaded, explaining his condition and the challenges he faced just to get there; but their responses were unflinching.
As we spoke, he brought out his medical file, a document filled with evidence of his worsening eyesight, the recommended surgery he couldn’t afford, and letters soliciting funds for surgery.
From his file, I found that his name: Odion Abumhere, a 54-year-old man.
Skimming through his files, I saw that he was recommended for trabeculectomy surgery for glaucoma.
There were letters soliciting funds for the surgery of his advanced glaucoma from LASUTH, which cost less than N200,000 and addressed to a Redeemed Christian Church of God parish at Orile-Agege.
Since January when the letters were written, he has yet to get any help and now he has just lost a chance with the free outreach.
I could only imagine how hopeful Abumhere had been to get to the venue and find some hope or help for his condition.
In desperation, I spoke to two other health workers whose answers remained the same: he was late and the outreach had ended and there was nothing they could do for him.
Abumhere was beside me, pointing repeatedly to the nurse’s name on his paper, his eyes begging for recognition. No one cared to come close to him or even look at the name he was pointing at.
In my desperate pleas for a listening ear, frustration bubbled within me that if I was able to articulate what I had in mind and no one cared to listen to me, how much more this man who couldn’t speak and was going blind.
My eyes welled up with tears from my frustration with their lack of empathy towards him, as I imagined how many times he might have been treated this way.
As we stood, Abumhere brought out his medical file from the purse and attempted to show it to the female healthcare worker, who didn’t bother to even glance at it.
After a while, they suggested I meet their leader.
I walked up to her, a dark-skinned woman wearing a blue dress and spotting an afro wig that exposed her tightly pulled hair beneath.
Without looking up from the numbers she was scribbling, she said, “They’ve told you there that you came late. Today is our last day, what do you want me to do?”
I explained to her that I wasn’t aware of the outreach, and I was only helping a physically challenged man that I met on a bus and would appreciate any help she could offer.
Abumhere sat down and scribbled on a small sheet of paper that he had glaucoma and cataracts and needed help; he pointed at his eyes and handed the note to the woman.
“We have been here for several days and you came today. Why?” she asked me.
“We can’t even perform any surgery today. The outreach has ended,” another health worker chipped in.
I watched as hope drained from Abumhere’s face when he heard her. His face crumpled in despair, his shoulders slumping under what he had heard.
“I understand,” I told the nurse.
“What options does he have? Is there anything you can give him?” I begged.
As I spoke, Abumhere signed a rotating cycle three times to the nurse, but it was lost amid misinterpretation by myself and the head nurse.
I couldn’t understand what he meant. He had so much to say, but could not.
He took a sheet of white paper to write. That was when I noticed how bad his sight was. He could only write when he did as though he was looking at something adjacent.
He had a beautiful handwriting with a fairly good command of the English language.
However, due to his bad sight, sometimes his sentences ran into one another and he wouldn’t notice. Whenever he wrote, he asked me to read it aloud for him.
He showed the woman his medical report, pointing to his eye as if he was asking for help with it.
I told the head nurse that he had cataracts and glaucoma, which he wrote on a paper and gave to me.
“There’s nothing we can do now, and nobody will even do surgery today. Nobody will even do surgery on that eye for you. He can only manage it,” she said in a matter-of-fact tone.
I turned to the man, who was now seated facing the woman, and told him that the outreach was over.
“I am sorry, Mr Abumhere. We arrived late,” I said.
I watched as his face fell. He looked as though he would burst into tears. I could sense his hopelessness.
I was touched by how much this man I know nothing about had suffered and turned to the nurse, who wore a serious face. I asked if there were any medications they could offer him.
By this time, workers were listening to our case; they could not help but be sympathetic to the man.
As we waited, a health worker brought four medical ziplock packs with some medicines.
Dangling the packs in front of me, she said, “This one is for glaucoma, this one for cataracts. Take this one morning and night. Take that only once a day.” Then she left.
Before Abumhere could finish writing his questions, all the health workers had climbed onto a waiting long bus by the corner and drove off.
He became angry all over again.
Then he started gesticulating again to me and pointed to what he had written: nobody wrote the names of the drugs for him, so how would he know what medication he was going to take?
I told him we would find a way.
Then, I remembered there was a pharmacy nearby just after the popular EKO Hospital and we went there.
As we walked along, he stumbled on some stones on the road and held my hand to support himself.
The pharmacists graciously helped us find the names of the drugs. Then, I wrote them on the drug packs except one they didn’t know what it was.
Even after we Googled the drug using various descriptions on the tablet, the name of the drug remained elusive.
The pharmacist raised a concern with one of the drugs when she said the Vitamin A given to him was the wrong one and advised him to take them to his doctor to confirm they were right for him.
As we sat at the pharmacy trying to decode the medicine, Abumhere, who I found to be meticulous, asked that I count the number of tablets in each pack and write it on the pack.
He was worried that if he took the medications as he was asked to, they would finish quickly and he didn’t have any way to refill them, he said in a note he showed me.
After about an hour at the pharmacy, we were asked to leave. We had spent a lot of time there and their boss might start questioning our presence, they explained.
I understood but the man wouldn’t have it.
He wrote a long epistle on a sheet of paper, quoting Hebrews 9:27 and asking them to exercise patience because it is appointed unto man to die once and after death judgment.
After a while, I told him it was time to go. He told me not to worry, that he too did not want to miss the day’s Bible study programme, Digging Deep. He is a member of the Redeemed Christian Church of God.
As I made to hurry him to leave the pharmacy, he wouldn’t budge until he was done. We left and he opened his purse and showed me some blisters of Vitamin A he had been taking, sighing randomly. I couldn’t understand anything he said, so I nodded.
As we stood waiting for a bus, I gave him some money for transport back and his face lit up like that of a very happy boy, but he wouldn’t collect it.
He tore out a sheet of paper and asked, “Where did you get the money from? What do you do?” I told him.
He wrote his thanks and prayers on a sheet of paper. I read it out loud, and he smiled.
I prayed for him too, put him on a bus, paid for his fare, and bade him farewell.
As the bus pulled away, I imagined the barriers faced by the physically challenged and the strength of those who refuse to let the world overlook them.
In his defiance, Abumhere embodied a resilience that challenged the indifference around him.
