Registration

They said registration takes one day. They lied.

Nobody warned Sewa about registration.

Her mother warned her about boys. Her father warned her about “distractions.” The school website said registration was “a simple, streamlined process.” The admission letter said to come with her documents, two passport photographs, and evidence of payment.

Nobody said anything about the queue.

The queue started at the Faculty of Arts building, turned left at the car park, curved around the back of the cafeteria, and ended somewhere near the school gate. Sewa stood there at 7:45am on Monday morning, holding a brown envelope stuffed with documents, and tried to count how many people were in front of her.

She stopped counting at sixty.

“First time?” a voice behind her said.

Sewa turned. A girl. Short. Round face. Glasses that were slightly too big for her face. She was holding a folder so thick it looked like she’d brought her entire family history.

“Is it that obvious?” Sewa asked.

“You’re holding your envelope with two hands like it contains the ark of the covenant. Yes, it’s obvious.” The girl smiled. “I’m Chisom.”

“Sewa.”

“Sewa. Mass Comm?”

“Yes! How did you know?”

“Because this queue is for Mass Comm registration and I’ve been standing in it since 7:15 and I think I’ve aged three years.”

Sewa laughed. Chisom laughed. And just like that, in a queue that wasn’t moving, surrounded by two hundred frustrated students and one security guard who kept saying “form a straight line” to people who were clearly not forming a straight line, a friendship was born.

Zainab had told Sewa to come early. “6am if you’re serious. 7am if you like suffering.” Sewa had arrived at 7:45 thinking she was early. She was not early. She was late. The people at the front of the queue had been there since 6:30, some of them with flasks of tea and folding chairs like they were going to a church vigil.

The queue moved the way Lagos traffic moves. You’d stand still for twenty minutes, shuffle forward three steps, then stand still for another twenty minutes. Every now and then someone would walk past the queue and enter the building directly. Confident. Unbothered. Like the queue was for other people.

“Who are those ones?” Sewa asked.

Chisom adjusted her glasses. “People who know people. Welcome to Nigeria.”

By 10am, they had moved maybe thirty feet. Sewa’s legs were hurting. Her back was aching. The sun had decided that today was the day it would prove a point. A boy in front of them fainted. Actually fainted. Two people dragged him to the shade and someone poured water on his face. He woke up and got back in the queue. Nobody was willing to lose their spot. Not even for unconsciousness.

Chisom shared her biscuits with Sewa. Sewa shared the meat pie her mother had packed. They talked about everything. Where they were from. Why they chose Mass Comm. Chisom was from Nnewi. Her father had been a trader at Onitsha Main Market before things went bad. Her mother was a seamstress. Chisom had scored 289 in JAMB. The highest in her village. Her whole family had contributed money to send her here.

“If I fail,” Chisom said, chewing her meat pie slowly, “there is no plan B. There’s no money for plan B. This is it.”

She said it simply. No drama. No tears. Just a fact. Like telling someone the time.

Sewa didn’t know what to say. Her own parents weren’t rich, but they were stable. Her father’s civil service salary was small but steady. Her mother’s fabric business at Dugbe Market paid the bills. There was always food. There was always light money. She had never had to carry the weight Chisom was carrying.

“You won’t fail,” Sewa said.

Chisom looked at her. Smiled. “I like you, Sewa. You’re the kind of person who says things like that and actually means it.”

At 1:47pm, six hours after joining the queue, Sewa finally entered the registration hall.

It was chaos.

Students everywhere. Tables set up with handwritten signs. “DOCUMENT VERIFICATION.” “COURSE REGISTRATION.” “FEE CONFIRMATION.” “STUDENT ID.” Nobody knew which table to go to first. There were no arrows. No numbers. No system. Just two hundred students and seven tired admin staff who looked like they had been doing this for twenty years and had stopped caring fifteen years ago.

Sewa went to Document Verification first. The woman behind the table flipped through her folder, stamped two things, crossed out something, and said “next” without looking up. Fine. One down.

Course Registration. A man with glasses typed her name into a computer that looked older than Sewa. It took four minutes to load. He printed a form. Told her to sign. She signed. He stamped it. “Take this to Fee Confirmation.”

Fee Confirmation. This was where everything stopped.

The woman behind the table typed Sewa’s name. Looked at the screen. Typed again. Looked again. Then she looked at Sewa with an expression that said “this is your problem, not mine.”

“Your payment has not reflected.”

“What?”

“Your school fees. The system is not showing any payment.”

“But my father paid two weeks ago. He did the bank transfer. I have the receipt.” Sewa pulled out the teller. The proof. Her father had sent ₦187,500 to the university account from First Bank in Ibadan. She had the stamped receipt right there.

The woman looked at it. Looked at the screen. Shook her head.

“The system is not showing it. You have to go to the bursary and sort it out.”

“But the bursary is across campus.”

“Then you better start walking.”

Sewa looked at Chisom, who had come through her own registration without any issues. Chisom’s face said everything: “Welcome to Nigerian university.”

The bursary was closed.

A piece of paper taped to the door said: “BACK BY 2PM.” It was 2:37pm.

Sewa sat on the bench outside the bursary office and called her father.

He picked up on the fourth ring. She could hear his radio in the background. News as usual.

“Daddy, they’re saying the payment hasn’t reflected. I have the receipt but the system is not showing it.”

Her father was quiet for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was calm. Kayode Akinola did not panic. He processed.

“I paid that money myself. I have the bank confirmation. Let me call the bank tomorrow and sort it. In the meantime, go back to the bursary when they open and show them the teller. Don’t let them send you up and down.”

“Yes, Daddy.”

“Sewa.”

“Sir?”

“Don’t let this place overwhelm you. It’s just a system. Every system has a way. Find the way.”

He hung up. No “I love you.” No “I miss you.” Just instructions and confidence that she would handle it. That was his love language. Believing she could manage.

She sat on that bench for another fifteen minutes. The campus was quieter now. The registration rush had slowed. Students walked past in groups, laughing, eating, living. Some of them looked like they’d been here forever. Comfortable. Like the campus belonged to them.

Sewa didn’t feel that yet. She felt like a visitor in a place that hadn’t decided whether to welcome her or swallow her.

Chisom sat down beside her. Handed her a bottle of water.

“Did you eat today?”

“Meat pie. In the queue. That’s it.”

“Sewa. It’s almost 3pm.”

“I know.”

Chisom opened her bag. Pulled out a wrap of rice and plantain. “My mother packed three of these. I was saving this one but you need it more than future-me does.”

Sewa took it. Not because she wanted to. Because she had learned something today. In this place, you couldn’t do everything alone. The queue was too long. The system was too broken. The bursary was always closed. You needed people. Even if you’d only known them for six hours.

“Thank you, Chisom.”

“Don’t thank me. Just remember me when your payment clears and I need someone to help me carry my textbooks.”

Sewa laughed. Ate the rice. It was good. Not as good as her mother’s, but close enough.

Tomorrow she’d go back to the bursary. She’d sort the payment. She’d finish registration. She’d figure it out.

But tonight, sitting on a bench outside a closed office, eating rice from a girl she met in a queue that morning, Sewa realized something.

This was not going to be easy.

Not even a little bit.

END OF EPISODE 2

Next Episode: “The Way Things Work” – Nobody teaches you the real curriculum. You just learn.

Her father PAID. The receipt is RIGHT THERE. But the system says no. If you’ve ever dealt with a Nigerian bursary, you’re already having flashbacks. 😂💔 Share your own registration horror stories in the comments.