Thursday, July 7, 2016 is a disastrous day I will never forget. My gorgeous grey knapsack “magically” disappeared into thin air after following pathetic protocol at the Igbo Efon branch office of bet9ja. Sadly, every effort to get my bag back availed me nothing. I'm still hopeful however. The Thursday in question was actually an egregious extension of the Eid al-Fitr national public holiday.

Allow me to clarify, my battery was way flat—on that fateful day—and I so desperately needed to call my mom as news had filtered in that she nearly fainted from the pain in her sorely swollen legs. In case it's unclear, my mom has a specific arthritic condition. Nearly cannot kill a bird (and it sure can't kill my mom), but the nauseating news had me overcome with panic, or more correctly speaking panic-stricken. This is the only mom I've got! Call me a momma's boy and see if I give a rat's ass!! I don't play with my mom; not even for a quarter of a nanosecond!!!

Without any ado, I asked around about where I could charge my phone, or rather pay to charge my phone. All fingers pointed to the bet9ja office on Igbo Efon—I was around New Road by then—and I figured they couldn't be wrong as all flies eat excrement.

On getting to the bet9ja building (ECCO PLAZA), I made my way up the few flights of stairs to get to the top floor where every evidently official operations occur. The security guard on duty politely prevailed on me to drop my bag before going in; much to my dismay.

In actuality, there was an apparent notice on the wall stating that customers couldn't carry their bags with them to tender their transactions. It became exceedingly explanatory why different bags were lying/sitting on the ground. Ultimately, I dropped my properly packed packsack with the other ones obviously and asked the security guard—who was sitting adjacent to my bag by now—where I could charge my phone and he swiftly showed me to a corner across the large room. Had a tough time maneuvering my frame through the crowd of people present at the time.

Finally got to connect my charger—with my phone—to an abnormally enormous electrical extension with like 400 sockets and like 80 million mobile phones plugged into every aperture available. Few minutes into charging and (for some strange reason) I become unconditionally uncomfortable with the whole betting environment—gambling if you will—and I'm unplugging my stuff and heading to where my bag was. That's when the drama began.

On getting to the supposed bags boundary, I couldn't see anything that looked like mine. I could swear some scales fell from my eyes in that instant. Am I temporarily blind? Am I in a trance? Am I being punked? These queerish questions (and so much more) plagued my mind per second per second. Felt like I was hit by a ricochet; like I was struck by lightning. And to make matters more maniacal, the security guard was now nowhere to be found.

Made for the stairs to see scumbag security shuffling up to his (seemingly) abandoned post. Gave him the 411 and he starts spewing absolutely annoying affirmations about how such scenario hadn't happened in the location, with the exception of an incident involving a missing iPad. Such a rush. I briskly brought the theft to the manager's attention and he suggested I go get a police report ASAP. The nearest police station was the one at Ilasan New Road, so I made my way there with breakneck speed.

Now, at the police station, it was a different ball game. There was a long line of people—citizens and expatriates especially—waiting to be attended to. Eons later, it was my turn to table my case and I did so with swift specificity. The cop at the counter copied the specifics I handed him on a shriveled sheet of paper before asking an officer whose most impressive physical asset is his bloated beer belly, to accompany me back to the bet9ja office where my bag was whisked away “mysteriously”.

Typically (and utterly unsurprisingly), when we got outside, this potbellied policeman took the time to inform me that I'd have to tender three thousand naira (₦3,000), at the barest minimum, before any assistance could be given to me. I wasn't anywhere astonished at all as my pleas of not even having chicken feed fell on the deafest ears. And if you guessed that this point was most likely the end of the road for me, you guessed correctly.

Still and all, the terrifying thing (for me) isn't about my missing bag per se, but the contents therein:

My NLT Bible (courtesy of my marvelous mom)
My International Passport,
My Original Degree (of BSc) Certificate,
My Original NYSC Certificate,
My Original WASSCE Result,
My Original Birth Certificate,
My Original Baptismal Certificate,
My Original WOFBI Statement of Result (certifiable, bona fide Living Faith members know what it is),
My Original WOFBI Testimonial,
My Original Believers Class Certificate and a couple of overwhelmingly ballistic books by the one and only Bishop David O. Oyedepo (Satan Get Lost!, Possessing Your Possessions, Breaking the Curses of Life, Making Maximum Impact, Conquering Controlling Powers, Understanding Vision, Understanding Financial Prosperity and Making Marriage Work) and the incredibly intelligent Sam Adeyemi (The Parable of Dollars: Proven Strategies for Your Financial Success, Build Real Wealth: Practical Steps to Regain Financial Stability and Ideas Rule the World).

Anyone with rational reasoning would apparently agree that these are absolutely priceless properties.

On the other hand, the tangibles with price tags that were in the bag before the diabolical disappearance are as follows:

•Ray-Ban Sunglasses•
Most specifically, the WAYFARER FOLDING CLASSIC. It comes customized with the GREEN CLASSIC G-15 LENSES. Cost me ₦12,000.

•An Aurora Blue Breitling CHRONOMETRE NAVITIMER Wristwatch•
This is an automatic STAINLESS STEEL watch with a price tag of ₦43,000 that came as a gorgeous gift on my 26th birthday. Problem is I never got to wear it, not even for once. Kept carrying it around and about—in my rucksack—with the hopes of landing a worthy buyer. FML.

•An Emerald Electric 1000 Watts Portable Boiling Water Heater•
This mobile masterpiece cost me ₦18,000. I'm a sucker for fancy quality.

•Lenthéric Lavender Eau de Cologne Spray 100ml•
Cost me a paltry ₦3,500.

•Double–Decker Stamp Set•
Contains violet and black Ink Pads. Also included is the Stamp Ink and Stamp Pad. This whole set sold for ₦5,000.

•A black pair of leather flip-flops with gold chains crested upon 'em (I think I have a picture of that somewhere). This lil' baby cost me ₦8,500.

•A black Sean John T-shirt which I copped at Wrangler for four grand. Lord knows that tee shirt swaggered sweeter than ₦4,000.

The bag also contained a miscellany of toiletries, keys to my mammoth Perry Ellis traveling bag, chocolate bars, and long-forgotten love letters.

In all candor, I haven't the foggiest idea if I'd ever see my bag again at this point. I've got to admit, it is horribly hard harboring hope in tremendously torturous times like this. And the extremely epileptic economy of this colossal country called Nigeria is in no way helping matters at all. Cash is tight these days and getting a job without the original copy of one's BSc degree does look like Mission: Impossible.