Andrew Made It Into London Town By A Whisker.

I was curious to know what transpired between Andrew and the immigration official who flagged him down for a search, so I asked him to tell me what actually happened.

This is his how he explained the incident: “I guessed the stress was visible on my face,” he said, “but I just can’t help it. I am always easily stressed up. After the immigration formalities, I thought that was it, but then I saw all the other plain-cloth officers with dogs and I panicked.”

He paused for a few seconds and then continued, “When one of the officials flagged me down and requested to search my hand luggage, I immediately remembered the second passport in my bag and felt it was all over. I opened my bag and started a silent prayer. As he started searching my bag, he was also asking me questions about what I came to do, where I will be staying and how long, but my mind was firmly on the contraband document in my bag.”

“Then I stared as he pulled at the pair of trousers where I kept the passport;” Andrew carried on, “I knew instinctively that I have to do something to distract him or my journey to Britain will end right there. He finally got the trousers on top of all the other clothes in the bag and was about to poke at the pocket. I acted swiftly and allowed my original travel documents to drop from my hand into the bag. That distracted him momentarily; he stopped, obviously not suspicious of anything, picked up the dropped documents and started flipping through the pages. The moment he asked me what I do for a living, I grabbed the opportunity and started singing like a canary enthusiastically.”

“I told him I am a doctor, and currently working at the staff clinic of a commercial bank in Nigeria. That seemed to automatically have an effect on him because I noticed a change in his countenance. I haven’t met anyone who does not respect a doctor. I knew telling him that I work as a banker will not generate the kind of respect I wanted. He finished going through the documents, gave them back to me and looked me straight in the eyes as if to say, ‘doc, I don’t believe you are here on holiday, but I am giving you the benefit of doubt’. He finally smiled, told me to have a nice vacation as he gestured for me to move on. I felt dizzy as the blood that had initially drained from my brain appeared to rush back. I slowly and meticulously put all my stuffs back in the bag, trying to appear unruffled. At this point I was fully controlled and knew God had saved me by a whisker. I finished, thanked him and briskly moved on.”   

The taxi guy was now getting impatient and wanted to know if I am ready. I asked Andrew how he’s moving. He didn’t have a clue but said he has two contact phone numbers, one from his best friend and the other from the son of a man he met through his sister’s husband. The cab man placed a quick call to Andrew’s best friend and it kept going into voice mail. We waited for another twenty minutes and it was the same thing. Andrew finally agreed for the guy to call the other number. The guy picked the call. Andrew spoke to him and the guy said his dad already told him to expect the call. He agreed for Andrew to come down to his place. The cab man wrote down the address; it was in Holloway Road, North London.  

We both followed the driver. As we got out of Heathrow, I felt London’s cold weather for the first time and instantly fell in love with it. It was unusually dark outside, although time was just about 5.30pm. Our cab drove out into the cold and breezy London night.

Andrew was quiet; he appeared lost in thought as he stared into space. I was getting down first, so we exchange the addresses of our contacts and their phone numbers since we don’t have any contact number of our own yet.

We got to my contact address and my friend came out to meet us. There was the usual introduction and handshakes. I shook hands with Andrew again for the last time as he went back inside the cab and wished him all the best. As the cab was about to drive off, Andrew called me, gently pulled my head towards him and spoke directly into my ears in low voice.

I watched as the car drove off; I have only met this young man but I really liked him. I didn’t think much about what he told me until I got back to Nigeria after my three week’s vacation.