Nigeria - Day 3
Skip Dieball
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| What an interesting day.....it
is the "rainy season" here, which we found hard to believe since
we've been here, until this AM. The storm came and lasted for more
than 8 hours. With limited "infrastructure," this creates a mess in
terms of traffic and drainage. Grid-lock is an understatement, but
we have had the good fortune of having some extremely savvy drivers
that negotiated the roads to our benefit of keeping to our busy
schedule. |
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Today we went to a small town called Kaytu, where we visited an
orphanage that takes in local children. Having limited experience
with this, both Steve and I were fascinated with the detail and care
given to the children. Many expats help support the cause, and our
host, Lindy Edwards, visits this orpahage quite regularly. The kids
know her well and you can see their excitement.
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From Kaytu we proceeded to
Lackey Market, which is a more modern marketplace where you can buy
souvenirs and other touristy goods. With the storm and continuing
rain, we were only a few of the customers and we had the vendor's
attention. It was fun and we saw some amazing art and other native
African goods.
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Lindy made sure that we
were on schedule for the purpose of our
trip....supporting the Lightning sailors. We arrived at
the Lagos Yacht Club precisely at 1:PM, to more rain.
It subsided enough that we were able to tune more boats
and even go for a brief sail (both Steve and I had been
in motor boats exclusively until this point). After our
sail, we reviewed the video from the previous day and
previewed today's drills.
We concentrated on Rig Tune
(Wednesday), Sail Trim (Thursday) and Starts/Marks/Strategy/Tactics
(today). We've had great interaction with these sailors, and they
are keen to learn more and more. There are five teams headed to the
Athens World Championship, and these teams are soaking in any/all
information they can get. Their equipment has been upgraded and
they have impressive goals for their Nigerian Lightning Team.
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The official kick-off to the
Nigerian National Championship was this evening (after our
on-the-water drills). The dignitaries for the event spoke, and
everyone had fun socializing before the big event. I would be
remiss if I didn't properly explain how effective this group has
been in securing sponsorship for their
event(s). North American
Airlines, which services African destinations through New York's JFK
airport, has been extremely generous. Heineken Brewing (in Nigeria)
is another major sponsor. They not only stepped up for the 2007
Nationals, but they have been sponsoring many of LYC's events over
the years.
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