You can’t romanticize a place like Lagos without reckoning with its chaos. And you can’t claim Brooklyn without fully embracing its contradictions. Together, these two places—the city of my birth and the one that raised me—have shaped me in ways that feel both fascinating and frustrating, much like a complicated love story. It’s not a neat narrative with a soundtrack by Sade and sweeping third-act apologies. It’s more like an endless tug-of-war: a love/hate relationship with home that I’m still learning to navigate.
Let’s unpack it.
The Lagos That Lives in My Bones
To grow up in Lagos is to know life in all its Technicolor extremes. It’s school uniforms crisp with starch on Monday mornings, and the din of Danfo buses by afternoon; it’s the joy of a cousin’s wedding one minute and the stress of NEPA taking light (read: power outages) the next. Lagos doesn’t ask you for permission to love it—it demands it, messy parts and all.
Moving to Brooklyn at eight was like being torn from one noisy city and dropped into another, but the rules were different. Lagos wasn’t polite about its flaws; Brooklyn, I realized quickly, preferred a more passive-aggressive smirk. Where Lagos offered endless “aunties” and “uncles” to fill gaps in your parents’ discipline, Brooklyn gave me concrete stoops and subway rides where I learned more from strangers than I ever expected. Lagos left me rooted in vibrancy; Brooklyn taught me how to hustle.
Yet, every time I visit Lagos—which, admittedly, growing up, wasn’t as often as I felt it should’ve been—I'm hit by a mix of pride and irritation. Pride that this sprawling beast of a city has remained mine, despite the distance, and irritation because Lagos, much like a stubborn ex, hasn’t changed for me. The traffic snarls still dare you to leave the house late. The heat is still relentless. The charm is still as sharp as ever. It’s hard to hate, but harder to love. Sounds like someone you know?
Enter Brooklyn—The Love Song and Side-Eye
Now, Brooklyn... oh, Brooklyn. It’s the impossibly cool friend you can’t turn your back on, no matter how much it tests your patience. I arrived at eight, squished between siblings, and was immediately overwhelmed by everything: PSAs on the subway, corner bodegas selling everything from plantain chips to lotto tickets, and accents that transformed words like “coffee” into “caw-fee.” As a kid, it felt rough around the edges, sometimes even standoffish, but somehow, it still hugged me tightly when I leaned in.
Brooklyn gave me Biggie and brownstones, bagels and block parties. (Let’s not talk about how I didn’t try an everything bagel until college, though. Tragic!) It gave me the first pangs of teenage love—the I-can’t-breathe kind of infatuation—and also the crushing realization years later that some connections aren’t meant to last. Ironically, it was in Brooklyn classrooms and libraries where I read Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, learning that some contexts—whether familial or geographical—resist simplicity. Or resolution.
Yet, I often catch myself resenting Brooklyn. Its gentrification leaves me clutching at memories that feel endangered. That mom-and-pop Caribbean spot on Nostrand Avenue where I once bought beef patties? Gone. The sneaker store I’d saved up months of allowance for? Replaced by an overpriced home goods boutique. This is home, but increasingly, it feels like it’s trying to push me out.
Embracing Brooklyn requires practice. It’s like dating someone who talks too much during movies but is unbeatable at Scrabble—you deal with the quirks because the foundation is solid. I may wince at $9 oat-milk lattes now, but if you ask where I’m from, I’ll proudly tell you, “Brooklyn, baby.”
Dating While Torn Between Worlds
Relationships have taught me that explaining my dual-identity dance to potential partners can be... tricky. On paper, my backstory sounds romantic: “Oh, you’re Nigerian-born but Brooklyn-raised? That’s fascinating.” But when the rubber meets the road—say, during a heated debate about whether The Lion King is “a universal classic” or a misplaced narrative about Africa—you realize how differently people piece you together. I’ve been asked why I don’t have a thick Yoruba accent (as though accents are genetic) and why I can still crave jollof rice over brunch but also eat dollar pizza after a night out without blinking. My answer? Because having two homes doesn’t mean having to choose.
I once dated someone who swore by the suburbs. Her family’s holiday dinners were Norman Rockwell-esque—potato casserole, polite small talk, stress over where to seat Aunt Linda. Meanwhile, I’m used to tables laden with egusi soup, boisterous relatives arguing over the best soccer team, and kids dancing to Davido songs while their moms yelled to keep them away from the bubbling stew. The relationship didn’t last. Not because I didn’t respect her love of her “quiet corner of the world,” but because I realized I can’t live in constant denial of the grit and color that shaped me.
Honoring both Lagos and Brooklyn in my relationships means introducing people to both sides of my story. Over dinner, I’ll tell you about Brooklyn summers and their uncanny ability to smell like both fresh rain and too-hot pavement, but I’ll also laugh at how Lagos traffic forces you to turn on your full “Survivor” mode. (Pro tip: Never make eye contact with the hawkers unless you’re ready to negotiate for that plantain chip bag. Once they see you, it’s game on.)
Where the Heart Really Lives
Home, I’ve discovered, is less about geography and more about feeling tethered to the spaces that shape you. Lagos taught me resilience and resourcefulness; Brooklyn gave me adaptability and swagger. Both gifted me their flaws, their joys, their contradictions. Didn’t Aristotle say something about how love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies? I like to think of my connection to these two homes in much the same way.
Do I love them equally? Not always. Lagos disappointed me when its infrastructure failed my loved ones. Brooklyn irked me for pushing working-class families to the periphery. Sometimes the flaws loom larger than the love. But just like in a long-term commitment, you stay because of the wholeness they create in you.
The Takeaway
If you’re like me, straddling two worlds, know this: you don’t have to hide parts of yourself to fit in where you are now. Every piece—whether it's your accent, your favorite foods, or your stories of first crushes—matters. Home doesn’t have to be perfect to feel like love. It’s not about picking one place over the other; it’s about finding how they both live in you.
So yes, I still hate when Brooklyn’s gentrification robs it of its charm, and Lagos’ gridlock makes me question my circulation levels. But in the quiet moments, when Sade’s “By Your Side” plays on a random playlist and conjures skylines from both cities, I remember why I keep coming back.
