how walking with lions helped me walk through cancer
It was the summer of 2021. And we were at the Cap Vert Peninsula. Seated inside a restaurant at les Pointe Des Almadies.
I hoisted myself onto the low wall separating the restaurant from the Atlantic Ocean and sat on it. Knees pulled up and arms folded across, I stared mesmerised at the beauty as the evening sun messed with the waters.
Streaking its rays across the surface which purred idly like one being caressed by a lover.
We sipped Bouye and Bissap while we waited for our A la carte seafood. The Senegalese somehow found a way to combine both drinks [baobab & Hibiscus] into an exotic blend. In Northern Nigeria where I grew up, we drink them separately.
Dinner over. And a little bit of sightseeing, my friend dropped me off at the hotel.
Later that night, my phone rang. 
“Did you see what I sent on WhatsApp?”
“No. Let me check”
“I saw this and I know it is your type of thing. Maybe you can talk to them?” her message read
The only thing I could make out of the flier was that it was a Safari plus the amount in USD. Then it was at 6am the following morning.
I was still staring at it piecing my basic French together when she called back.
“But babe I do not understand French. Moreso, this tour is by 6am the next morning, they must have closed out”
“Send them an email. Forward it to me for translation and if you really want to do this, then let’s do it”
It was a back and forth. The tour had closed off. Accommodation booked with the resort for the weekend. Tourists paired in rooms. If I wanted to come along, there was an extra late charge in addition to paying extra for a solo room. I jumped on it. Afterall, I had no plan.
And that was how I had one of the most adventurous weekends ever. Click here for link 
In that single weekend was packed a safari. In addition to crossing the Atlantic to a tourist village in the interior where the oldest Senegalese woman lived. Overnight stay at an exotic resort nestled by the Atlantic Ocean – this included kayaking, fishing and sumptuous 3-course meals. When I got back to my hotel room on Sunday night, my memory trove was richer.
Little would I know the part that weekend would play in my life in the following years.
Nevertheless, as I faced off with the battles this phase of life presented, that memory served as an anchor. On days when I could barely put one leg in front of the other; when I came close to ending it all, my mind would call up the triumphant feelings of walking through the jungle with the lions, that feeling of squatting beside them and touching them. It felt like God saying
“child, you already walked with the lions and they did not consume you, so what is this one?
