It is always a thing of joy to go back to the place of your birth and do something meaningful and beneficial to the community. Mariam and I had the privilege to travel with the Minnesota based Mercy International Mission’s 2016 Medical Mission to Southwest Nigeria, late September to early October. A variety of (free) medical services were privided to almost two thousand individuals during the weeklong event.

Our flights were carefully booked – Minneapolis – Schipol Amsterdam (Delta); Schipol Amsterdam – Lagos (KLM); Lagos – Paris (Air France); Paris – Minneapolis (Delta). Of the four legs, the KLM Amsterdam – Lagos flight was the most pleasant. Interestingly we would hear from other Mission volunteers that they had had not so good experiences with KLM in the past. Well, this time, ours was different. The flight crew was very courteous and very caring. They displayed warmth and friendliness that exceeded our expectations.

The only one time I traveled to Lagos through London Heathrow I had a harrowing experience. It was horrible. A flight cancellation (bad enough) was followed by a tortuous effort to find a place to eat and sleep for the night.

It’s always good to enjoy transcontinental flights for the sake of the money paid and the time spent. Thanks to the KLM flight crew, we had a memorable time. The three other legs of our travel were also good but not close to the Amsterdam – Lagos by the Netherlanders.

One related thing I won’t horridly forget: I signed up for a mobile WiFi from one of Nigeria’s leading mobile carriers, MTN. It worked well for just a few days and stopped working. Customer care advised that I took it to a retail store for check-up. A little too late by the time we were heading back to Lagos. BUT, while it worked, we watched the full first Presidential Debate between Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton and business man, Donald J Trump on September 26. It was incredibly well displayed on my Microsoft’s Surface Four laptop. The debate was second to my primary need to do official work with the laptop during the mission trip. Not so shabby.

The pictures here were mostly taken during the Mercy Medical Mission in two locations – Osi Ekiti and Iye-Ekiti.