When I got into the overcrowded danfo at Ojuelegba the sun was already very heavy in the Lagos sky. The voice of the conductor sang, "Yaba! Yaba straight!" and his hand drummed on the yellow bus.
I sat down near the window, the one which would not close in exactly, so that the wind smacked my face. My footwear, some battered old black sneakers whose sole was wearing away, lay on the rusty floorboard.
On the opposite end of the table was a man I was not acquainted with. He was wearing a clean white shirt neatly ironed and shiny brown shoes which reflected the sun. He was looking at my sneakers and his eyes were there too long and then he looked at my face. I had his judgment before he said it.
"Young man", he said, was pushing forward a little. "Why have you such tattered shoes, sir? Does that matter to you how people regard you?"
I almost laughed. Instead, I smiled. "Ogas, should you walk a mile in these shoes you might know."
He raised an eyebrow. "Is it not only fair to strive and purchase new ones?"
I had not even time to reply when the bus headed forward. The travellers moved, moaned and caught hold of the rails of the seat. One woman who was carrying tomatoes in a large nylon bag complained that she felt like the conductor had stepped on her toes. Lagos was a very fast-moving place.
I looked at the shoes of the man. Superior leather, smooth, hard. Then I began to think how many miles mine had borne me.
I have been having these sneakers since I was in my last year in university. They had taken me through morning lectures with my empty stomach. They had trailed me to my first job interview and I was made to wait four hours in a hall full of people and they told me, "We will get back to you."
They had taken me home in the rain with no money to get any transport. And just last week they drove me up and down through the muddy streets of Mushin when I assisted my friend in carrying goods to his store.
"Oh, Oga", I lastly said, "you can see only the shoes. You do not see the road they have travelled".
The man chuckled. "That is poetic, yet you cannot deny the importance of appearance."
I sat up and stared out the window at the traffic, hawkers pushing in between the vehicles, children perched on top of trays of groundnuts, policemen signalling drivers to stop. Lagos himself was in constant motion, incessant.
"Far have your shoes gone", I said to him.
He sat back with a smile which I had thrown him into a trap. "These ones? Italy. I purchased them there on a business trip. Comfortable, expensive. Worth the price."
The conductor cried out to change, beating the money against his palm. Somebody in the background began complaining of being overcharged. The fellow opposite me did not pay any attention to it, but it seemed like a sound that could not reach him.
I said, "Business trip", I tasted it. "How many miles do you know I walk to be able to have a chance of one?"
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He didn't reply immediately. Now he was looking at me, and not my sneakers. perhaps it was the tone of my voice.
"Young man, what do you do?" he asked.
"I majored in computer engineering", I said. "At the moment, though, I do a little freelance work. Repair computers, create shop websites. There are occasions where I work with my friend at Mushin."
"And what do you hope for?" His voice became soft and it was as though the conversation had moved into a more serious lane.
I looked out the window. One of the boys, bare-footed, ran across the road with a bag of sachet water, and avoided cars like a nightmare. My throat tightened.
"Hopefully", I thought to myself, "these shoes will get me into an office where I can at last sit and not walk. On that particular day I will purchase some shoes not because I need them to live but simply because I like them."
There was a moment of silence, which was not the norm in Lagos bus. The tomato lady throttled her throat and said, "Na so life be."
The opposite man was examining me and in the process, his hand was touching the smooth surface of his polished shoe. Then he sighed.
"You are probably right, perhaps," he said to himself. "Shoes are not all about appearances. they are round about where they have brought us."
The bus stopped at Yaba. The bus driver pounded the side of the bus shouting, "Last bus stop! Come down, abeg!" The passengers got out, huddling through the door. I got up, shaking off my trousers and moved out into the afternoon sun.
The man followed behind me. We were walking together, in one place, just a few seconds, with our feet on the same rough surface. His black leather scraped the sidewalk; my sneakers made more of a worn, treading noise.
Reaching the roadside he stopped. "Young man good-bye, may your shoes aid you," he said.
I nodded, smiling. "And may the roads which mine have trod be known To yours."
So we went our separate ways, each of us being driven along by our respective shoes, our respective lives. But during the brief ride at least we had strolled together a little way.
The story beautifully shows how appearances can hide real struggles. The battered sneakers weren’t just shoes they carried memories, effort, and dreams. The man’s shift from judgment to understanding was powerful, reminding us not to judge without knowing someone’s journey.
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