LagosLivesOn: A journalist's journey through street photography

Look at this photo. A man sits in front of a makeshift shop on a busy road, smoking a cigarette and holding a bag. He seems calm and detached, as if in a different world from the traffic and hustle behind him. What is he thinking? What is his story?

These are the questions that drive me as a street photographer and a journalist. And it's also personal. That's because street photography reveals my soul. Sometimes, the subject, like the one in this image, reflects my own challenges as a journalist. To ignore the distractions, such as keeping up with the Joneses, I must trust myself, set my own standards and work for impact, not applause, as a freelance multimedia journalist. Street photography is my constant therapy. I will share more on this in subsequent posts as part of a seven post series on LagosLivesOn.

Lagos is the city where I was born and raised, where I started my career as a multimedia journalist. It is a vibrant, chaotic and diverse metropolis. It has everything from skyscrapers to slums, from luxury cars to okadas, from modern malls to traditional markets. It is a city that never sleeps, where people are always on the move, hustling, surviving, dreaming.

But Lagos is not the only city in Nigeria. There are many other places to explore, to learn from, to tell stories about. That is why I embraced an opportunity that allowed me move to Abuja, the capital city, where I live and work mostly now. Abuja is different from Lagos in many ways. It is more planned, more organized, and more peaceful. But it also has its own challenges, its own opportunities, and its own stories.