Fire fire everywhere

When it rains it pours or in this case when your friend reports a fire in their home, they all do.

I just get fed up of hearing bad news sometimes and for some reason I am hearing alot about the near misses of dear and loved ones from fire.

I have found in Nigeria that along with general musings about how the infrastructure is just not up to par there is a very real failing of the state to protect its citizens. I am not exaggerating when I say I live in fear of quite a lot of "what if" scenarios due to a lack of emergency services.

I will not go into details but I did have a huge medical emergency occur at my house, the likes of which I hope to NEVER be involved with again, and when the boy called the emergency services we were told to get the person to the hospital our selves aka no ambulance service. I think I have already waxed lyrical on the lack of police protection, so you are totally on your own with anything like a home invasion, kidnapping or car jacking and will defo not have any kind of CSI type investigation to find the culprit and get justice. Woe betide us if we ever have any type of natural disaster in the Lagos tristate area coz we are not equipped to cope. Then I go to FIRE. I am yet to see a fire truck whizzing by me to help anyone in need (certainly no hunky men in uniforms and defo no sales of fab calenders) and have often witnessed the 'stand around helpless, solution to people losing their livelihoods etc

I heard about an office block that was left to burn for days till it was all over, still not sure my friend was not exaggerating this however.

What is winding me up though is the general consensus that the reason for most of these fires (proven fact in some cases) is the fact that our electricity supply is so bloody unreliable. Its not so much the switching on and off (sometimes up to 6 times in 15 mins!!!!) Its the variation in voltage. This has led many, myself included, to invest in all sorts of nifty devises that promise to surge protect your electrical gadgets, some of which are very dear to our hearts (RIP hot pink IPOD). What are you supposed to do however if the electrician who wires your house in the first place is some sort of yahoo who does a piss poor job and thereby is accessory to the attempted slow roasting of you in your sleep!!! Like I said I live in fear and ardent prayer!!!!!

P.s. don't get me started on my gas cooker and training my staff on how to use the fire extinguishers!!!