The morning rush hour was bad, very bad. I have been in Lagos all my life and I have seen traffic gridlock but that misty July Wednesday morning was simply soul wrenching. Not to say being stuck in traffic wasn’t my fault, you know what they say about giving excuses; especially if you are a corporate staff of a time-conscious org and you happen to have an appointment with the boss at 9:00 am in the same morning.
So, there I was stuck in traffic by 7:15am along Ikorodu road heading for Victoria Island. “My gosh…Gordon will kill me” I remember blurting out those over 20 times that morning. Mr. Gordon Kirchowsky is the Head of Operations of our multinational company with a branch in Victoria Island Lagos, Nigeria-My boss and I am the Human Resource Manager who is to make a power point presentation to Mr. G. Kirchowsky on the workforce restructuring that we had only recently concluded at the organization. The issues I was to present bordered on: Who was to do what…The experience, qualification and training required and I had just 15mins of the 1hour 30 minutes of the morning session to do that.
In all this, I couldn’t help reminiscing in the mist of my storm; “Francis is a perfect gentleman and yeah…it was high time I had a man in my life”. I bet those thoughts were out loud and it all started with a blind date on a mobile app (…did I say blind date, well yeah)….I will tell you, (lol) dis gist plenty o.
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So like I mentioned I work as a Human Resource Manager and well my name is Bimpe Ajayi-and don’t even ask ‘cause I’m not telling you how old I am. Anyways, because my job entails managing people, I had to devise a ways to maintain a steady two-way communication with my staff (…trust me, emails and intranet don’t always work these day). I use instant messaging mobile apps a lot; any of the platforms that my staff members are active, I use it. Be it the Whatsapps, 2gos, BBMs, Wechats and I must say Palmchat (…will tell you why in a moment).
Instant messages are hard to resist (ladies you know now); once that beep comes in, you just kind of pick up your phone and reply almost without thinking. So my staff can’t resist infos or notices etc I send across to them through these platforms. As for Palmchat, I developed a personal attachment to the platform. Remember when I said I was stuck in traffic running late to work and had a marathon presentation to make to my boss?
I drifted mentally into a two-minute or so daydream; where I saw myself in the arms of my new found love, Francis dancing to the slow rhythms being played by a high life band at La Tropicana resort. He was about kissing me; slowly closing in like on a Close Up TV commercial when…’honk, honk’ the car behind me shattered my daydream and threw me right back into reality. I am actually in a stupid traffic and heading late to work for a presentation which I hope will go down well. I picked up my phone and spent Francis a ‘Hi dear’ on Palmchat and of course he replied almost instant with ‘sweetie I stuck in traffic…bumper to bumper’
It is funny how I so clicked with Francis, I met this sweet guy on Palmchat and sometimes it feels impossible. I didn’t say it, but why I was running late to work that Wednesday was because I spent such a good, good time with Francis the night before (hey, not quite what you are thinking…not yet). It was close of work and I wasn’t minding sitting out a little while before embracing my mattress, so I chatted up Francis on Palmchat and told him to meet me at Radisson Blue. That was to be our second real meeting; you know, face to face not online. Our first real date was at the Leisure Mall, Adeniran Ogunsanya street Surulere and it wasn’t a bad one except that, you know, I didn’t know what to expect and quite honestly, stuffs were running through my mind like: ‘I hope I am not making a stupid mistake leaving my house to meet some guy I don’t know?…. I hope the mall is safe and nobody will be stalking me or something? And I am buying my drink, no free drinks…thanks’. With all that going through my mind, our conversation was kind of stale; it lacked energy and was completely cautious but all the same, I could tell he was a sincere guy. Like when he blushed (he has such cute dimples on his cheeks by the wayJ) and said that our meeting was his first blind date, I could tell it was not only his first blind date but his first date…and guess what happened next? (…seriously I can’t believe that I am living my fantasy)
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We basically struggled to break the ice, so we started by sharing our likes and dislikes then our individual experiences. He kept saying ‘…back in school that was when I met this girl or that girl’. So I knew I was right, he was a cute rookie; barely knew anything about relationships. I picked up my phone and sent him a message on Palmchat:
‘Don’t worry dear, I don’t bite…it’s my first date too’.
He simply cracked open and laughed his embarrassment away, that was the peak of the moment and when I fell in love with him. He replied on Palmchat:
‘Thanks dear, I didn’t know it was so obvious…Jblushing face’.
How did I meet Francis? Ok, are you a Palmchatter? If you are then you must have seen the Look-Around feature, right? Cool (if you ain’t a Palmchatter…er, I guess you just have to imagine itJ). I live at Alaka Estate just after national Stadium at Surulere and yeah, one boring afternoon with my friends I was playing on Palmchat with the Look-Around feature then I saw him, he was also within the Estate but I didn’t chat him up right away-naa, my friends Tonke and Mimi coaxed me. They won’t let me be; we were all bored and just didn’t know what to do. That is after of course bringing Mimi out of her sulky mood; she had a fight with her man a night before and we were kind of resolving the issue at my place. That was when they turned on me to get myself a man.
They knew I wanted one and my loveable friends never made me feel bad about my failed relationships (guys if you’re reading this, I love ya…#hugs). It was actually Tonke who suggested ‘we’ (in this case, ‘we’ means ‘I’) try the Palmchat Look-Around feature, that it is cool and since one can really spot the spot the person one is chatting with if close, it won’t be such a bad idea to try a blind date. So, voila I did (lol) hit on Francis using the Look-Around feature and …my god, he responded.
It is been a year and 4 months I met Francis Usoh; a civil engineer with Messrs. Julius Berger and life has been quite a fantasy. Yeah I had been quite bothered; I wasn’t getting any younger, at 32 I felt sometimes that ugly feeling of having missed out, you know, not being part of the lot anymore-old bloody cargo (lol). But it is funny, I am standing in front of the mirror dressed up in a wedding gown, this is the fourth gown I have tested and it still feels like a dream. Well, Francis after the last Valentine night while he was dropping me off sent me a rather…well (chest heaving) interesting message on Palmchat. He asked me to marry him; I looked at my phone, saw the message and tears swelled in my eyes. He was still driving with his face on the road like he didn’t just set the fire within me. Of course I replied:
‘I will Frank, I will…Jblushing face’.
He looked at his phone; saw my reply and heaved a deep sign of relief and then he smiled and turned around and kissed me (if he had crashed our car kissing me, I bet we won’t have noticed). I can never forget that night was; it till causes a stir within me how I met my hubby on Palmchat.