Back in Lagos. Sigh.

14:37:00
I'm sorry. I am truly sorry. You must forgive me. Those two sentences are for the friends that I didn't tell I was leaving Manchester on the 15th of June. I would have if I could have, believe me! You see, I the traveler didn't know I was travelling until the 14th. If you must be angry at anyone then be angry at Papa Afam for it was he who summoned me. The Summoning went a little like this:

Enter Papa Afam and Yours Truly

Papa Afam: So when are you coming home?

Afam: I'm not. I'm staying in England until August at the very latest.

Papa Afam: But what will you be doing there?

Afam: Seeing friends, going on adventures, blogging... you know? 

Papa Afam: So you mean I'm supposed to allow you to frolic and gambol like an unhinged layabout?

Afam: Yes, I also expect you to fund my adventures.

Papa Afam: Is that right? Well, I've booked you a seat on the British airways flight to Lagos tomorrow. 

Afam: I suppose I'll see you tomorrow then.

You're probably wondering why I didn't tell him that he couldn't force me to board the flight. And he couldn't force me to board the flight. I was in Manchester and he was in Sokoto, a state in Northwest Nigeria and anyone who knows even the slightest thing about geography can tell you that there's far too great a distance between those two places for a human man to physically force another human man to do anything. But the power of money defies all the limitations imposed on us by our humanity. It wasn't for my love of Papa Afam that I didn't stand my ground and bargain, it was for my love of self. Experience has taught me that it is wise to keep the principal payer of bills and primary funder of fleeting dalliances as happy as humanly possible lest he come to the conclusion that you are an ungrateful turd, unworthy of even the slightest measure of generousity. And so it was that on the 15th of June, I found myself at Heathrow Terminal 5 performing my preflight ritual.


The flight back was uneventful, but there was a hiccup of sorts. I had left my wallet with my Residence Permit in it on a counter somewhere in Heathrow Terminal 5. I discovered this before we left London, but I Afam, being infinitely kind, considerate and foolish allowed the flight to take off before my wallet could be retrieved. The British Airways staff were all exceedingly unhelpful, apart from one star. I wish I could remember her name. She was quite literally the reincarnation of Mother Theresa. If not for her I might have slit my wrists from depression and self loathing. The rest of them handled me like I was a goat. But all of that is in the past and I Afam, am a man of the future, so British Airways when I fly with you again, treat me kindly. 

Our landing was one of the shakiest I'd ever had, but the people around me still thought it worthy of applause. I don't mind some applause if the pilot is deserving of it. Praising a pilot for an incredibly shaky landing is like making an ex-convict a governor. But they can't be blamed because they are Nigerian and if they've done the latter then why not the former? 

Now, at the Murutala Mohammed airport, before one goes into customs, one must descend a flight of stairs. There are two flights of stairs. One of them is an escalator that never works, so it is essentially a staircase and the other is a more traditional staircase with a machine for the safe and secure transportation of the handicapable. At the bottom of that staircase is a ramp, that the handicapable might wheel themselves away from the staircase safely. And even if fully capable individuals should walk down the stairs and not the escalator obviously intended for them, they shouldn't be so insensitive as to complain about the ramp that is so beneficial to those of us that are restricted to wheel chairs, but this isn't the case in Lagos. Sigh.

Happy Days,
Afam


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Maybe it's okay to not be in the Thisday STYLE magazine (FBOMBS A-PLENTY)

10:12:00
Right!! Let's get on with the show shall we?

In Nigeria, there's this very very very popular newspaper called Thisday. I'm not quite sure that Newspaper is a good enough term to describe all that they do, and they do do a lot.

Yes do do. It's a thing. Wrap your head around that. 

 Anyway, they've got this Sunday magazine called Style. It's generally quite good. Yeah, it goes down easy. The reading age could probably be about 7. No I'm not fucking with you, seven. But this is a quite good thing because the average Nigerian reading age is probably about five. Now you mustn't think that I mind these things, because I don't.

So the thing about the magazine is that they've got this catchphrase. It's quite a good catchphrase as far as catchphrases go. It's "If you're not in STYLE, then you're not in style." 

 At first I was quite depressed. Everytime I picked up the magazine I'd think, "damn you Afam, why the fuck aren't you in STYLE? You useless fucker!!" And thinking that about yourself isn't a good thing. No, it's quite a horrible thing. I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, "what a vacuous cunt! How important could appearing in a Sunday magazine be?" But so what? I am that vacuous and vapid. I've never aspired to anything more in all my whole life. Seeing my picture in style would give me a boner for years. I reckon I'd still have a boner when I was seventy because I saw my face in STYLE when I was 23.

But I looked at STYLE the other day, and I realised that you didn't really have to be in style to be in STYLE. I mean, the editors must be having a right laugh behind the scenes, because it's really just fuck loads of fan service. Take a look at one picture from this weeks magazine.


How is that a classic? Like really, how's that even anything? The jacket makes him look like he has boobs, and I don't mean bulging pecs like Henry Cavill's (THAT GUY'S BODY IS KIND OF OBSCENE!!!), I mean man boobs (moobs) like a morbidly obese person. The thing is he's far too skinny to have moobs, so the jacket doesn't fit him right. The trousers don't fit great too, but they're better than the jacket. And the shoes could have been in that Disney cartoon, Aladdin. Yeah, the one with the monkey and the genie, I haven't seen a curve like that since I used French curves in technical drawing. They aren't even half fresh like. They're battered and tired. And the hat looks like someone sat on it. How awesome would it be if someone sat on his head? That'd be a sight won't it?

So if that's the guy that's so in style that he's in STYLE, then maybe not being in STYLE isn't such a bad thing.

Happy Days,
Afam
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Notes on We Need To Talk About Kevin and Nice Guys

16:54:00


The beginnings are almost always the most difficult. I think I might have a fear of blank pages. They leave me in such a state of confusion that it is a wonder that I have written so many posts on this blog.

Mena had been suggesting that I read it for a year and a bit but I ignored her. You see, Mena isn't like all of my other friends, she won't suggest that I read Revenge Wears Prada, or The Confessions of A Shopaholic. She doesn't suggest that I read books that leave me exactly as I was before I started reading them, instead she suggests that I read earth shattering, mind breaking books that go down like flavoured water and remain in me like lead. As I write this, I'm in such a state of internal turmoil that I do not know what to do with myself. This is what We Need To Talk About Kevin does to people. 

The main character and narrator of the book, Eva Katchdourian, tells her experience of love and motherhood, through a series of letters to her apparently estranged husband, Franklin. It's about conversations that she should have had, and things she should have done, or could have done, and it's about that one question that parents are loathe to answer when their children do not turn out as they expected, is it my fault?

Readers of the book are quick to say that they dislike Eva, and that she was unfit to be a mother, but I found that I liked her. Her side of the story is so irresistible that by the end even her sternest critics cannot say that they do not understand her, or that they do not empathise with her. 

Two of the most spectacular lines in the book were:

"But any woman who passes a clump of testosterone-drunk punks without picking up the pace, without avoiding the eye contact that might connote challenge or invitation, without sighing inwardly with relief by the following block is a zoological fool"

So true...

and;

"whenever a woman describes a man as sweet, the dalliance is doomed."

This brings me to a topic that's been done to death, the nice guy versus the bad guy hingyjingy. 

Don't get fresh with me, hingyjingy is an actual word. It is because I'm a grown blogger and I can do whatever I want. That was awful. Forgive me. I'm a little rusty.

You all know the cliché argument that girls hardly ever offer nice guys anything but their friendship. Well, in my opinion this is true. It isn't true because nice guys are outclassed by douchebags and bad boys with motorcycles. It is true because, if after taking the time to get to know someone all they can think of to say about you is that you are nice, then you haven't done a very good job. Nice is just so blasé. It means that there isn't anything that's even remotely interesting about you. You might as well be a well trained West Yorkshire Highland Terrier and if she wanted that, she'd buy the dog and leave you. And that's all I have to say about that. On to the next post.

Happy days,
Afam

ps. we need to talk about Kevin is a must read
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The Nigerian Man is a PEACOCK!!!!

08:00:00
There are some things that we grow so accustomed to that we fail to see what it is about them that is odd. I realise that the phrasing of that sentence is a little strange. It might be comfortable for you to read it as there are some things that we grow so accustomed to that we fail to see what is odd about them. I cannot tell you which of the sentences I prefer. They both feel like my children and I refuse to choose between them for while the first one isn't very good looking it has such character, and while the second is very pretty indeed, it is also mind numbingly dull.

As at the summer of 2012 I had been away from Nigeria for 5 years. When I returned home for summer as I have done every summer since I was 12 (I went to a very good boarding school in Abuja that I am not quite ready to talk about), I noticed that Nigerian men were rather fruity individuals, wearing colours and prints that most men from other countries would balk at. While it is not uncommon for anyone to see some ridiculously stylish young men in the rest of the world, most of their eccentricities fade as they get older. The questionable items of clothing are sold to charity shops, where they are picked up by similarly expressive individuals. However in Nigeria, the flair never dies. There's no negative relationship between age and flair, like there is between youth and wisdom. It is quite possible that the flair increases as one ages, for when I was younger Papa Afam could very rarely ever be seen on a weekday without the quintessential black suit and tie, now he delights in sand coloured blazers, flat caps and straw hats. I think that this might be his version of a midlife crisis, but I cannot complain as he has yet to ditch Mama Afam for Eku Edewor, and he hasn't squandered his well earned money on an Audi R8. The thought of that fills me with dread. Such a car wouldn't last a second on the isolated war torn region that is the road to our family home. Even the bushmen of the Kalahari who generally have no use for roads would be wary of it. It is just that spectacular. 

For those of you who do not know who Eku is this is she. She has quite the lovely angle doesn't she?  

It is hardly surprising that Nigerian men are so fruity and foppish as several of our traditional forms of dress inspire a level of dandyism that is nothing short of extraordinary. Below is a picture of what we call the agbada. I realise that pronouncing the consonants g and b together is a task that European tongues find impossible. It's quite similar to how my mouth felt when my accent was changing. After  speaking for too long I would be left with the acute sensation that I was moving my mouth in a way that was wholly unfamiliar.


That is me, Afam, in an agbada. The agbada is basically a piece of fabric that is as wide as you are from wrist to wrist, and as long as you are from neck to shin. It provides one with the wingspan of an albatross. 

In the West it is customary that the eyes devour the woman before flitting to her right or her left to discover the sort of man she's ended up with. This is mostly helped by the fact that the woman is often the more colourful of the two. This isn't so in Nigeria. In Nigeria, the man presents himself as a beacon for attention, demanding the adoration of all creatures with his gaudy, unnatural step, and his overly manly sashay. When you add the agbada to such an equation the result is the human equivalent of a peacock fanning its tail.

Happy Days,
Afam

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Notes on the killers, Bruno, the gym and spanx... for men

13:08:00
The gym is an increasingly popular place in today’s day and age. I know it’s a little odd to say today’s day and age and not this day and age but I like the sound of it better. Coincidentally Day & Age is an album by the killers that I often play in the gym.




Where was I? Yes. As the world generally becomes as self and image conscious, as it is unconscious, the gym has grown increasingly popular. Very soon, I fear that there will be no one left with a distinctly average physique. People will either be slim, fit, toned and ripped or morbidly obese.  You cannot criticize me for this, as it hasn’t happened yet. Even if it doesn’t happen in the next 50 years there is still a chance that it might happen. However if the world should end, and we find that it hasn’t happened then I apologise for misprophesying .

I’m being really bad today. I apologise. This is long winded, even by my long winded standards. I find this funny. Only God knows what has become of my sense of humour. Because I seem to be unable to focus today, I’ll launch right into it. 

Men, there are two rules that you must absolutely obey when dressing for the gym. These rules are:

·      NEVER GO COMMANDO!!
·      EASY ON THE TECHIE GEAR!

I’ll start with the first rule, the never go commando rule. For the sake of simplicity, let’s call it the NOCO.
To go Commando means to allow your man parts free dangle in your trousers or shorts. (By man parts, I mean the parts that specifically make you a man. The source of your testosterone and your children)
Surely you can see how this is problematic. Say you went Commando in a pair of shorts and decided to use the treadmill. This will ultimately lead to a windmill of Bruno sized proportions. You’ve seen the movie Bruno haven’t you? You know what I mean don’t you? If you don’t, google “Bruno windmill” or “Bruno movie windmill”.  Or say that you decided to do some sit-ups on the mat. I won’t even describe to you what will happen. If you do not know what I’m talking about, stop reading and leave! Just go. This isn’t for you.



With the emergence of sweat wicking body clinging technology some of us have been guilty of going to the gym like we intend to compete in the tour de France or run the 100m with Usain Bolt. 
The problem here, is that everyone knows that you’re not. If you were you wouldn’t be in that gym, you’d be in another. As efficient, comfortable and slimming as they are, I suggest that you restrict yourself to one visible item of under armour per outfit. Of course you must keep in mind that underarmour is quite like latex paint. It will show those love handles and muffin tops if they are there. 

like so.

If you want to appear slimmer then do yourself a favour and get some spanx for men. Yes, these are a thing.   



Happy Days,
Afam


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Little Pieces Locked away in Tiny boxes...

14:16:00
I thought you'd be here so I went even though I had no reason to. I thought you'd find the randomness of it so endearing that you'd have no choice but to end up with me. But you aren't here and that makes the fact that I went so petty.

I thought the sight of me would be enough to force the affection out of you. But even if that were true, you aren't here. I'm confused about how I ever thought you could be here. It feels like a thought inspired by sinful levels of stupidity and self delusion.

There were quite attractive girls in quite attractive dresses. But they weren't enough. They couldn't be enough. Even the stars themselves couldn't twinkle, when placed next to you...

Happy Days,
Afam


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are you foreign, straight or kinky

00:10:00
As the natural hair versus everything else debate wages all about me, I, Afam have finally formed an opinion. You may think that this really has nothing to do with me, but I don't care. I'm Afam and my sanity is questionable. I've got a therapist and everything.

I'll be straight with you. I am a writer, and if you look very closely at the definition of writer you'll find the word penniless. I am not ashamed of it. It is what it is. However, I do not generally like to be reminded of this, so I do not like expensive weaves. All I see when I look at your Brazilian, Peruvian, or Indian, is my rent. Yes, you are wearing my rent on your head and it stings. It burns even more when I know that underneath that mane of unnaturally long and buoyant hair lies a perfectly decent head of hair. While that doesn't sound very good, it isn't the worst thing of all. Nothing can be worse than an expensive weave that comes out ratchet and raggedy as hell. That's just bad behaviour. It is unforgivable.

\ Double Bag. Triple bag? Shave it? Wear a hat? No. No. Fail of life. Your hair stylist is a devil. So you mean to tell me that this gurr took a picture of this with her own hand and put it on the innerwebs? Behold the most spectacular example of a self saboteur. Her bride price must be negative by now.

I quite like chemically straightened hair. I didn't call it a perm there, for the use of the word perm is ambiguous. I will not discuss why it is ambiguous because this is something that I assume everyone knows. Yes, the same way that I assume that everyone knows the meaning of idiot or retard. Straightened hair allows one to discern the holders of that elusive thing called good hair. This is especially crucial for me as my hair is the very definition of nappy. Every morning I am greeted by the sudden but not unexpected growth of a rice farm on my head. It would be evil of me to subject them to a childhood filled with broken combs and tears. As I am not evil, I aspire to better my gene pool via the inclusion of the good hair gene.

I adore natural hair. The exposure of a woman's natural kinky twisted locks inspire in me such feelings of devotion that I have to slap myself lest I become a slobbering fool. The fact that someone's chosen something so unconventional, speaks volumes of her character. At the very least you know that she isn't very concerned with the whispers on the wind. It could also quite easily mean that she isn't the most material person in the world, and this translates as someone who's prepared to work her way up with you. It belies a sort of independence that I find incredibly endearing.

However, you should only do what you're comfortable with, for if you decide to go completely natural and then descend into a bucket of insecurities about your appearance you only really have yourself to blame. Nobody forced your hand. At the end of the day it is essential that you put your best foot forward wearing whatever shoe you're most comfortable with. If you're a mess after shaving your head, no one will say that it was a brave thing for you to do, all they'll say is that you should pull yourself together as soon as you possibly can.

Happy Days,
Afam

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Notes on Blackness

11:12:00
Like Ifemelu, the protagonist of Chimamanda Adichie’s latest novel, Americanah, I wasn’t born black. I wasn’t black till I was 17. Before I was 17, Nigeria was my world. Nigeria was my life. It wasn’t that I was ignorant of race, it was just that it didn’t matter. We were all bound by a level of sameness that made identifying as black useless. Those who were not like us were regarded with a degree of awe, for they had an air of mystery that we lacked. They were pale, or cappuccino coloured and they were beautiful in their lightness, but their beauty wasn’t singular. We were beautiful too but in a different way; in a more familiar way.

I only became black when I was 17 and I moved away to Cheltenham for school. I embraced my blackness then because I had no other label to hold on to. I needed to be identified as something. I didn’t want their eyes to question what I was when they looked at me. I wanted them to know that there were others like me. But I wasn’t the black they knew, or rather the black they expected. They didn’t know enough about my brand of blackness to interact with it. They would say to me with the lights of humour dancing in their eyes, “I’m going to whoop that black ass.” They always said this in the typical African American accent, and I always laughed. They imagined this to be familiar to me, they didn’t realize that it was as familiar to me as it was to them. We had both learned about that black by watching television.

They told racist jokes that emphasized stereotypes that I was vaguely aware of, like the one where a man sees his television floating in mid air on a dark night and shouts, “drop it nigger”. They didn’t understand that where I’m from the policeman and the thief and the owner of the television would all be niggers. They toyed with the word nigger around me to see how I would take it. To see whether or not I’d get mad and raise hell. I could feel their surprise when I didn’t. They couldn’t see that the word "nigger" has no power over me. They didn’t understand that in a world where everyone is a nigger, there is no reason to call anyone a nigger. The history of the word hadn’t embedded itself in my DNA.

After watching Blood Diamond they would say, “Where is the diamond?” in a Sierra Leonian accent that always sounded more South African than anything. I would look at them and smile. I wasn’t that sort of black either. My history had nothing to do with diamonds or the lack of them. They told me they were going volunteering in Uganda and Tanzania, and I nodded. That too wasn’t my sort of black. It did not strike a chord of perceived kinship. I didn’t think, “Well done Tom, or Charlie or Jimmy it’s so good of you to spend the summer plastering walls and teaching English to those that are so like me”. Them going volunteering in Africa, was the same to me as them going volunteering in America or Iceland or Greece. I went to a thirty thousand pound a year school. While it is true that I got a scholarship, I didn’t get the scholarship because I needed it.  I would never need their charity. I had more in common with them than I did with the “poor” African children who needed their help.

Then they would say, “We had a Nigerian here a few years ago. His father was a minister. He was minted, loaded, absolutely swimming in it.” I would nod and ask his name even though I knew that I may not know who the person was. They imagined my situation to be like his; that we swam in the same pools of petro-dollars and government contracts and fifty pound notes. They did not know that I too, looked at the Ministers and their families and questioned their excess. They soon learned that my father is only an accountant, with a tax trail that cannot possibly boast of any irregularities.


 Everything else they learned, I did not say. I did not say because there was never any need to. They got to know me, the way only those that live together can come to know one another. They knew that after placing a few bad bets on some horses at the races, I couldn’t go to town for the rest of the month. They knew that I had other black Nigerian friends, and that I didn’t call them nigger. Living with them and saying nothing was perhaps even more effective than explaining every misconception they had for I am confident that by the time we left, they knew my kind of black and they understood that I wasn’t alone.


Happy Days,
Afam
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