Showing hospitality

Hello everyone, am happy to participate in this contest to share my own opinion about hospitality but before I start I have something fun, a video to play first. You can tell me if there's anything you learn from it in the comment section.

Hospitality in my own understanding is welcoming someone, offering help or support to someone, or a stranger particularly. A simple explanation is someone offering a stranger who is stranded a place to sleep at night or food to eat and any possible help to make him feel relieved. There is a a different way of showing hospitality depending on the needs of the person.

Helper becomes a victim.......it is common in Lagos state here as this is what I have been seeing and hearing frequently. Let me show you an instance:

If someone is stranded and asks someone for directions in the night, 90% of Lagosian will not answer or respond to the person as they belief that it is a trap. People share experience on how this ended in robbing. After directing the person, he became unconscious and later recovered. The next day, he was robbed of his wallet and phones.

Someone asks you, "What is the time on your phone" . 90% of Lagosian will not respond to as it is also a holiday. The one I witnessed was after responding to the person, a few seconds later he could not find his phone again. That is how it ended.

Beggars begging for money on the road. 80% will ignore as most of the beggars are ritualists. Looking for someone to lure them into their trap. Some people prefer buying them snacks, and they should eat instantly instead of giving them money. I witness this when my customer wanted to help a bigger, but he could not find anything to buy at that spot. He refused to give him the money. When I asked about his action he said: "you do not know this people."

Is it the one I help a guy who is from my state to find a job, and he ends up robbing the woman? You help someone with your phone to make a phone calls not knowing he has been track my government and it referred them to your place? So many instances. You can see that even to help someone now is risky. Or should I share about helping a man because it was raining, and he stole bottle water from my shop?

If you are the one what would you do? Still help?...... Of course, you will be more careful. The same thing to me is not that it is not good to show hospitality even when it turns out with bad results. In my own opinion, I know everyone are not the same, having a negative experience with one person does not make everyone a suspect (but with I have to be careful). Living in just an area, I have to protect myself first. I show hospitality sometimes, but do not blame me if I react rudely sometimes. I do not see everyone as bad people, but I also consider that I do not do anything that may cause harm to me. This is my opinion though.

Oh yes, it's hard to forget. It has been about 5 years now, but I can still remember the family. When I said am proud to be in JW family, I did not just say it to make mouth. For me, I have been hearing about how Jehovah witness show love their members though I never experienced it by myself until I traveled out from my state.

Now before I continue the story, one thing about Jehovah witness is that there is no partiality, discrimination, tribalism. We believe that we are one from different backgrounds and tribe. That is why if you travel to another country and a meet Jr member, they will welcome you in irrespective of your language, tribe or country.

My first traveling was in 2020 when I traveled from AKWA IBOM to Lagos in search for green pasture. You can imagine leaving your family members, your friends, your relatives and love one, relocating to another place. It is not an easy decision. So my first week in Lagos, I met some Jehovah witness from Lagos congregation and I introduced myself to them. They recommended a nearby Kingdom hall which I can attend our mid-week and weekend Christian meeting.

On my first attendance, the kingdom hall was beautiful, quite bigger than the one in my state. But before I continued, I was staying with my brother, who was working as a chef back then. So on Sunday, he will prepare to church, and he would return in the evening around 5pm. So I have to wait outside for him as our meeting is just 1h 4m(9:00am-10:40am).

Continuing from the story, I went to the kingdom hall and I attended the meeting. After the meeting, I joined others in cleaning and tidying the environment. I met lovely brothers and sisters, and they welcomed as if we have met somewhere. I felt safe and relaxed. Instead of going home to wait outside for my brother I decided to use that time to joined them in the preaching work in their territory, telling people about what the future hold for all of us.

On our way, I was introduced a man who is from my state. Oh, man......we shake hand as we embrace with each other. His name was ETI-UFAN (Good friend). That is how I made friend that day, he took me home, introduced me to his family. I met his mother, his sister. They cooked, we ate in fact I ate to satisfaction. Lagos is a dangerous place (a Lions den) but I felt safe with them. I relaxed till 5pm in the afternoon and the guy later escorted me to my place where he met my brother.

Since that day I realized the true love in Jehovah's family. Though I moved out of the area after 2 weeks, I still remember the hospitality they showed me that day. If you're the one will you allow a stranger into your house?

For me, I will say depending on the instance. In my personal life, I want to help but.......who knows what the stranger has in mind. Is his mindset genuine? I meet different people every day since I work along the road, and I have different opportunities to communicate with them.

Did I mention giving a stranger your phone to make a call? Oh, yes, I think I do. Just today, I met this man who came to buy a snack. So I directed him to a place to it. But I noticed his response......."gone are the days when you can go to a call center and make calls," I looked at him (of course, I knew that he needed a phone to make a phone call though he could not ask directly); he then looked at me and said: "I know what you will say, but please help me out." I asked about why he does not use his phone, and he explained he does not have a phone, and he came to the area to find an accommodation for his new job as a driver.

I could not help as I asked him to call out the number. He did, and I dialed it, but unfortunately, the person did not respond. I tried about 2 numbers, but they were not available at the moment. He was happy as I tried to help him, and he thanked me for helping him.

To show hospitality does not have to be something we would get a reward in return though sometimes the person might decline to reward us. So I think it is not good to do something with the mindset that...... I will need help, and the person will help me in return. No, it should not be done that way.

Showing hospitality is a way of making someone feel safe with us, and it can be in different way(the one I did are); lending a phone to make call, helping them in ordering a taxi (bolt, Uber) online, a shade to relax because of sun and showing/helping to get cold drinks in a hot weather.

I will not do all this, maybe at the end they should dash me some money (though sometimes most of them always do, but I rejected). I do it as a way of showing humanity love to people in a little or small way I can. I think it counts for hospitality, is it?

Cc: @steem4nigeria