Las-gidi, Eko-Ile, No man’s Land, Africa’s New York; my city has a lot of names.

Yaba, Ikorodu, Lekki, Badagry, Ajegunle; my city has a lot of personalities.

We see in colour, we dream in colour; our world is a world of vibrant and mad colours.

What is the colour of Lagos?

I know the colour of Ibadan with its rusted tin roofs and more than a fair share of mud houses.

I know the colour of Benue with its lush green farms and its muddy brown rivers.

I know the colour of Kano with its light brown sands swept in by the wind from the fast approaching Sahara desert.

But what is the colour of Lagos?

Is it the yellow and black of the commercial buses that ply its mainland routes or the white and green of the buses that cruise its island roads?

Is it maroon and cream like the uniform of the ever sneaky LASTMA officials or just plain black like the uniforms of the ever greedy trigger happy police officers always wanting the green twenty naira note?

Is it the blue green of its algae filled waterways or the dark green of army personel whose fingers are always itching to smack some sense into wayward drivers?

Is it the shimmering silver of the Lekki-Ikoyi toll bridge or the darker metallic tone of the third mainland bridge?

Is it the dark red of the ever delicious Suya or the copper colour of very crispy akara best accompanied with brown on the outside white on the inside soft Agege bread?

Is it the vibrant red of the Gala sausage roll wrapper or the rich golden colour of the ever famous La casera?

What is the colour of Lagos?

We see in colour, we dream in colour; our world is a world of vibrant and mad colours.

Lagos is the maddest of them all.