Snails and Equality
At lunch, two things of note occurred. First, they served snails as the entrée. I am not talking the little snails from your garden, these were monstrous chicken-finger sized snails from the jungles of the Congo. Wherever they were from, the Nigerians were all about them. There was no line for the continental cuisine today, which worked for me since I was not bold enough to commit myself to that much snail just yet. I ended up tasting some later, and it sort of tasted like a rubbery mushroom. I was not a huge fan.
But the real fun of lunch was the topic of conversation. Today, we talked about crazy ole’ America, starting with marriage. Statements like, ‘Americans change wives like they change their clothes’, and, ‘American’s don’t care about marriage like we do here’, and, ‘People in America don’t get married expecting to stay together.’ So I had to defend the pride of my Red White and Blue home. First, I clarified that like anywhere else, people in the US intend on staying together. Also, that these marriages are built on the same principles as most anywhere else, love, vision, and family. Conceding the fact that divorce is much more common in the US, I told them my theory about why. Basically, the dynamics of marriage are changing before our eyes. We are transitioning from a society that labeled the man as the driving force of a family, to one that is shared equally amongst both spouses. Before, women may have had ambition, but the opportunities were severely limited, leaving most women to rely on their husband’s ability to provide for the home (not to mention the social expectation of female subservience). This resulted in marriages where only one person’s vision trumped all others. What the man said was accepted by all other parties, it had been so in the past, it would be so now. But lately the momentum of change has peaked, where women of recent generations are ambitious WITH opportunities. Interestingly enough, this fact does not seem to have stifled women’s desire to get married. So now people are getting married and the marriages turn into that two-headed Hydra from The Odyssey. Two heads on one body have to focus four times as hard on growing in the same direction. Unfortunately, this is very difficult, and people end up ‘growing apart’ or developing ‘irreconcilable differences’. The two captains realize they can’t stay on the same ship, so something has to give. Basically, I told them that divorces were a consequence of the women’s rights movement. Women realize they deserve more, expect more, and refuse to put up with less. In time this will hopefully increase our marital standards. Equality is to blame.
They agreed, but then the conversation changed to testier waters. The men at the table said, ‘That is why it is better in Nigeria, the man decides the way of the family’. And the women said ‘Men have it too good here, it should be more like America’. Ladun explained, “In America, the man will cheat on you, you get a divorce, and you keep half his stuff. Here in Nigeria, the man cheats on you, get’s another wife, kicks you out, and you get nothing.” She was half joking, but the problem was illustrated. It is without a doubt that men still rule the family here like they did in the USA circa the 1950’s. This is sort of amazing, just looking at my office building I would say 50% of the engineers and employees are women, making good money. But that reminded me of a separate conversation I once had. I was telling someone how I would love to marry a rich girl, and I would stay home chillin and raising the kids (no diapers, cooking or cleaning though…we would have a maid for that). My coworker said that here in Nigeria, the girl would go and make all the money and then somehow the man would be the one controlling all of it, making the wife cook, clean, and take care of the kids when she gets home. Also a half joking response, but momma says, always some truth in jest.
Somehow the same lunch conversation switched to gay marriage, and how that is accepted in the states. It amazed me how against it they were, asking the most ‘ignorant’ of questions. Like ‘do you know any gay people, what are they like, aren’t they so weird?’ They made it seem as if there are no gay people in Nigeria, and I having seen some flamboyant displays in the clubs, I can say that is not the case. They proceeded to make me ashamed to say that I supported gay marriage, because they considered the idea to only acceptable amongst crazy people. I gave them the following history. When America was first forming, they hated certain immigrants (Irish, Scottish, Polish, etc.) and discriminated heavily against them. Eventually that changed, and it made the US a better place. Then they hated black people, and eventually that also changed for the better. Then it was time to look at women and decide they deserved equal treatment, again, a good choice. Now we look at gays, and say, if it worked for immigrants, blacks, and woman, why shouldn’t we give rights to gays as well? The point of my story was completely missed. Met with more, America is crazy talk.
Throughout most of this America bashing, I was thinking to myself, most of these fools only wish they could get to this ‘crazy’ country. The other thought, was, maybe this difference in thinking is why Nigeria is Nigeria and the US is the US. That lunchtime was certainly entertaining and enlightening, but it was also the only time that I felt like a stranger in a strange land.
But the real fun of lunch was the topic of conversation. Today, we talked about crazy ole’ America, starting with marriage. Statements like, ‘Americans change wives like they change their clothes’, and, ‘American’s don’t care about marriage like we do here’, and, ‘People in America don’t get married expecting to stay together.’ So I had to defend the pride of my Red White and Blue home. First, I clarified that like anywhere else, people in the US intend on staying together. Also, that these marriages are built on the same principles as most anywhere else, love, vision, and family. Conceding the fact that divorce is much more common in the US, I told them my theory about why. Basically, the dynamics of marriage are changing before our eyes. We are transitioning from a society that labeled the man as the driving force of a family, to one that is shared equally amongst both spouses. Before, women may have had ambition, but the opportunities were severely limited, leaving most women to rely on their husband’s ability to provide for the home (not to mention the social expectation of female subservience). This resulted in marriages where only one person’s vision trumped all others. What the man said was accepted by all other parties, it had been so in the past, it would be so now. But lately the momentum of change has peaked, where women of recent generations are ambitious WITH opportunities. Interestingly enough, this fact does not seem to have stifled women’s desire to get married. So now people are getting married and the marriages turn into that two-headed Hydra from The Odyssey. Two heads on one body have to focus four times as hard on growing in the same direction. Unfortunately, this is very difficult, and people end up ‘growing apart’ or developing ‘irreconcilable differences’. The two captains realize they can’t stay on the same ship, so something has to give. Basically, I told them that divorces were a consequence of the women’s rights movement. Women realize they deserve more, expect more, and refuse to put up with less. In time this will hopefully increase our marital standards. Equality is to blame.
They agreed, but then the conversation changed to testier waters. The men at the table said, ‘That is why it is better in Nigeria, the man decides the way of the family’. And the women said ‘Men have it too good here, it should be more like America’. Ladun explained, “In America, the man will cheat on you, you get a divorce, and you keep half his stuff. Here in Nigeria, the man cheats on you, get’s another wife, kicks you out, and you get nothing.” She was half joking, but the problem was illustrated. It is without a doubt that men still rule the family here like they did in the USA circa the 1950’s. This is sort of amazing, just looking at my office building I would say 50% of the engineers and employees are women, making good money. But that reminded me of a separate conversation I once had. I was telling someone how I would love to marry a rich girl, and I would stay home chillin and raising the kids (no diapers, cooking or cleaning though…we would have a maid for that). My coworker said that here in Nigeria, the girl would go and make all the money and then somehow the man would be the one controlling all of it, making the wife cook, clean, and take care of the kids when she gets home. Also a half joking response, but momma says, always some truth in jest.
Somehow the same lunch conversation switched to gay marriage, and how that is accepted in the states. It amazed me how against it they were, asking the most ‘ignorant’ of questions. Like ‘do you know any gay people, what are they like, aren’t they so weird?’ They made it seem as if there are no gay people in Nigeria, and I having seen some flamboyant displays in the clubs, I can say that is not the case. They proceeded to make me ashamed to say that I supported gay marriage, because they considered the idea to only acceptable amongst crazy people. I gave them the following history. When America was first forming, they hated certain immigrants (Irish, Scottish, Polish, etc.) and discriminated heavily against them. Eventually that changed, and it made the US a better place. Then they hated black people, and eventually that also changed for the better. Then it was time to look at women and decide they deserved equal treatment, again, a good choice. Now we look at gays, and say, if it worked for immigrants, blacks, and woman, why shouldn’t we give rights to gays as well? The point of my story was completely missed. Met with more, America is crazy talk.
Throughout most of this America bashing, I was thinking to myself, most of these fools only wish they could get to this ‘crazy’ country. The other thought, was, maybe this difference in thinking is why Nigeria is Nigeria and the US is the US. That lunchtime was certainly entertaining and enlightening, but it was also the only time that I felt like a stranger in a strange land.
posted by Anthony Jackson at 6:26 AM
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