I was born in Lagos and I’ve lived most of my life in this state. But in the last five years, I have always been open to any opportunity to leave this state.

In 2018, I engaged a lot of impromptu traveling out of Lagos. I would close from work and head towards Abeokuta or Ijebu Ode. I would wake up by 6am and still get to the office around 8:30am.

The surprising thing was I would still get to the office before a colleague who slept in Lagos and woke up earlier. That’s Lagos: traffic.

Last year when I was trying to get a new apartment, I actually considered Abeokuta first before I eventually settled for a part of Lagos, that we joking refer to as ‘outside Lagos’ at the office.

There’s no noise pollution and it was the best place I saw during my house hunting then. But the struggle is getting to the office in the morning and back home in the evening 😭.

And now I’m house hunting again 🤦‍♂️.

I was chatting with a friend recently and I told my guy that I won’t mind a little pay cut, just to work remotely from Abeokuta or Ibadan. It’s just for the sanity and it’s very important.

The bottom line is I could do anything to get out of the Lagos wahala.

A friend of mine was transferred out of Lagos a couple of years ago and when an opportunity surfaced for him to be transferred back to Lagos, he turned it down.

The chaos in Lagos is not it. I have only been to three other countries in Africa. And Lagos won’t still make the top three cities I’d love to live, in Africa.

Of the three cities (Accra, Nairobi, and Addis Ababa) outside Nigeria, I would go with Nairobi first, followed by Addis and finally, Accra.

Both Nairobi and Addis have good weather conditions, at least during the time of the year that I visited, July.

The little challenge for Addis is language. While most signs in the city are in both Amharic — Ethiopian language — and English, some are only in Amharic.

Although, all the three cities are the capital cities and I haven’t spent more than a night at a stretch in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja. I first visited Abuja in 2010 and only spent a night. I later visited last year and spent a night as well.

So I really can’t compare Abuja to these cities.

Even in Nigeria, Lagos won’t make the top three cities which will be Kaduna, Abeokuta and Ibadan in that order.

What are your top three cities? From the cities you have visited.