A Trip to a New Life

In order to assure a great life for his children, my great grandfather took the risk of travelling and settling down in another country, leaving all his family behind. Back in the 1940s, Nigeria faced an economic crisis which pushed many people to travel from one country to another.The price of food rose, and appropriate shelter became difficult to find. Crops including vegetables and fruits barely grew, so people could not harvest anything at the end of the month. Because of that, the women had no goods for their market business and life became really hard.  My great grandfather was one of those people who decided to leave the country for a better future and he decided to find a business in Benin. His business idea was to import spices from Nigeria to Benin, and he was pretty successful in his job. However, my great grandfather’s choice had many effects on my whole family throughout the generations.

My grandfather had adequate financial stability to be a great and wealthy man. Indeed, my great grandfather’s business was successful and generated a lot of money, so when he started having kids,  they could go to school and acquire knowledge, which was uncommon to most people at that time. My grandfather was then very educated and could do something else than manual jobs. In addition, because my great grandfather was wealthy, he knew many well off people too, and he would take advantage of his connections to help his children. My grandfather had the opportunity to start a car business with the help of friends of his father, so he didn’t really struggle to make it in life. My father never failed to tell us that story

because he always admired his grandfather. My great grandfather had effects on my father too. 

His action had a psychological effect on my father, so he served as a model to him. Thus, my father never hesitated to take big risks because he always had that mindset and said that if his grandfather could travel all the way from Nigeria to Benin to satisfy his family’s needs, then he too could take such risks. Seven years ago, he bought lands in Nigeria and planted palm trees and he then constructed a factory where he refined the oil, packaged it well to then sell them in some countries, like Burkina Faso, Benin and Togo. He is also planning to expand the countries he sells his products to. His business is not yet known by everyone, but he is going step by step until he reaches his goal. 

Finally, another effect of my great grandfather’s choice is the division of the family. The members of my family live between Benin and Nigeria. I have been to Nigeria a couple of times to meet my cousins in order for us to get to know each other. However, most of the members of the family have never been to Nigeria or, on the other hand, to Benin. Therefore, most of my family members do not know each other to such an extent that once, two of my cousins almost married together because they didn’t know they were related. Indeed, my male cousin was on vacation in Cotonou two years ago, and by chance he met my female cousin at a party and they got to know each other. A year later, they decided to marry and meet each other's family. Unfortunately that is when they discovered they were related.

My great grandfather took a great risk, and it mostly had positive effects on the family. My grandfather transmitted a lot of his knowledge to my father who in his turn is very fond of his grandfather’s courage and bravery. However, the only disadvantage, if I may say so, is that the family is not united due to the geographical distance between the two countries. I always joke to my family about this part of our story by saying à toute chose malheur est bon, which means in English, every cloud has a silver lining, because the Nigerian crisis was at the end of the day a good thing. The trip to the new life my great grandfather took was a perfect choice for his whole family.