I was at the Ilorin National Museum over the weekend in company of a few friends one of whom had just happened to be in the town by chance.

One peculiar characteristics of this museum is that it is housed in the same compound as a bar, eating joint, and a hairdressing salon. The signboard at the junction close to the museum itself had the name of the museum written in equally small letters as the other services offered in the premises.

It’s not altogether a bad thing. On the one hand, the presence of a bar might actually be a better attraction to the building than the content of the museum itself. From the patronage of the bar, it was clear that there is some complementarity at work there. The museum was closed because it was a Saturday and we couldn’t get to see the contents.