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It was in 2011 when Facebook was in its 7th year, and we were still trying to fully grasp what the world of real-time social media interactions was about. I had stumbled upon a post that would change how I thought about stars or travelling. It was a picture of the sky as a spread of multiple colours –green, orange, black, blue– with an enchanting hue that reflected the sparkles of the stars. I thought it was an edited picture and paid lip service to it, thinking that it was too beautiful to be real. Four years later, I would see a compilation on Facebook, listing top hundred things to do/see before you die, and the lights were there – this time north and south – glistening. But it was not just the lights I fancied, it was how the stars spread like a bed of diamonds. All my stargazing experience, I never thought I would see something that beautiful in Nigeria. Not until two years later. I had just created a travel group with my then ex-girlfriend, and we would routinely pick a few friends to visit new places together. On this visit, we chose a little town called Patigi, in Kwara State, North Central Nigeria. The only things that have been written about Patigi always talk about the little town’s fishing prowess, and how they used to host an annual regatta to show off their superior fishing and swimming abilities. We went during the harmattan season, and we were not expecting a lot of activities. We only wanted to see the rivers bordering the old town, the people, their food, and experience their culture. The universe is an artist, and it plays the finest songs even at times we least expect. I had travelled to another State two days before our visit, and the rest of the group had to leave without me. My partner waited, and we travelled together two days later. Because we left the City of Ilorin – the Kwara State capital – late, we would get to Patigi around 10 pm. The town’s silence sent cemetery shivers down our spines. Our phones were low, and we were yet to find our hotels. We were deeply engrossed in getting a motorcycle to take us to the hotel that we did not notice at first that we had not needed any flashlight to find our path, despite how late it was – and the obvious absence of electricity in the town. A flood of realization hit me, and I looked up – to the most beautiful sky I had ever seen with my eyes. It was like all the galaxy came here to hide at night. I stopped walking, and could not stop admiring the beauty I was enchanted by. The sky had a grey hue that reflected the stars like the northern and southern lights, but it lacked the green and blue. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen – and I have seen the pyramids of Giza. The stars were like tiny Christmas lights hobbled together on the largest Christmas tree – only that the Christmas tree was the sky, and the lights will be on for all the three nights we spent in this little town. We went there for the fishes and the water, but we found an answer to the question; where do stars live after retirement. I – we – didn’t expect to find this gathering of beauty in a town revered for what it does on water, and not for the magic that shrouds it, but we did. And that magical memory would live with us forever.