Exploring immigration, life in New York, drumming, career passion, love, music and (my favourite) the spirit of Fela Kuti, I recommend this movie.
Browsing the archives for the Observations category.
Not altogether the ultimate reason for writing, it is possible that one of the perks is being able to make friends after just a few minutes of conversation. In my case, a cultivated reticence has kept my list of friends and acquaintances manageable, but like it happened again yesterday, I gave in to the delights of socialization and made a new friend.
I was at the Writing Centre where students usually get a half hour with the designated editor who looks through their papers in order to help them get it to the best possible form. A few minutes into our joint editing of said paper, he asked the question that I have now heard more times than any other: “You speak very well. Where are you from?” From there, the sequence of the conversations always take a predictable form.
“I’m from Nigeria.”
“Oh really? That’s great! How long have you been here?”
“Oh, less than two years, but not a consecutive stretch. This is my first summer in the country.”
“I like your English. Have you always spoken it?”
I say yes, explain why, and say a little more about the post-colonial situation of the continent and how most middle-class and/or educated section of the country speak both English and at least one other language from birth to adulthood.
“It is fascinating. Do people sometimes mistake you for an American because of how you speak?”
“No, I doubt it.” I reply “I think I always let out my identity too quickly before they form any such assumption. I think Americans speak differently anyway.”
“So what else do you do other than being a student? Or what would you do when you’re done?”
“I write, actually. I’ve published one collection of poems”
“Really?” His face lights up.
“Yes. I’ve also written some short stories. One of them was published last year in an anthology of some of Africa’s best stories.”
By now, I knew that the hope of spending my half hour working on my class paper had gone out through the door.
“And I can see it here online?”
“Yes,” I said, and got on his computer. Here it is, on Amazon. African Roar. The second short story in there is mine. It’s titled Behind the Door.”
“Did you write it when you were here?”
“No, fortunately.” I smiled. I live for little conceits like this. “I wrote it in 2008, I think, before I came here, but it was published last year.”
“I’d like to read it.”
“You should” I said. “I’d like you to. You’d have to order the book though. You can’t find the story itself online anywhere else.”
“This is fascinating. I’m glad we had this conversation.”
“Thank you.” I said. “I have a blog too. You should check it out.”
“Is that it, KTravula? Is that you in that video?”
“Yes. That was at a talk I was invited to give a few weeks ago. I’ve written on it since I got here. I started it mostly to record observations on the places I visited and the things I see.”
“That’s great. Have you been around a lot?”
“I have been to a few places. From Chicago to Joplin, to DC etc.
“Have you been to Principia?”
“Yes, I have. It was a beautiful place. I wrote about it too.”
“I’m impressed. So you like to travel huh?”
“Sometimes. It is fun.”
“Are your parents or siblings here?”
“Oh no.”
“Interesting. Have you been to Alton?”
“Yes, I believe, but as I remember it, it was a short visit.”
“There is a large statue of (I’ve forgotten the name now) close to the SIU Dental School in Alton. Did you see that?”
“Unfortunately, no. But I’ve been close to the Dental School.”
“Well, thank you for sharing with me. I’ll come to read your blog. I’ll get the book too. Behind the Door you call the story?”
“Yes.”
“I have a friend who started a blog but hasn’t been writing on it. I want to show her what you have, maybe she’d get motivated.”
“Thanks. I hope it helps. I try to update the blog as often as time allows. Do leave a comment whenever you come, so that I know it’s you. Nice to talk to you too.”
“Nice to talk to you too. You work at the Foreign Language Department. One can always find you there, right?”
“Yes, mostly.”
“See you around sometime then.”
“See you too, and thanks for the help with my paper.”
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This is an abridged recreation of the conversation that lasted about an hour of actually very productive tete-a-tete. I got very useful prompts on the paper I had taken there (at least before our conversation moved into a discussion about writing, travel, migration and family). Along with lessons on the proper use of comma, I also took away from there the name of a new writer, Ambrose Bierce, said to have lived in the time of Mark Twain and written a story called “The Boarded Window”. I promised the editor that I’m going to read it.
I’ve always wondered why my Indian friends were usually the most conservative. Growing up on Bollywood movies featuring crooked cops, handsome heroes and beautiful women with delightful voices, I knew that the country – if anything – was just as diverse, as unpredictable, as unique, as anyone else. Finding out that they had given the world karma sutra however prompted the questions of what went wrong between then when women knew and practiced (sometimes only within marriage settings) the secrets of sexuality and now where an imported religion (mostly Catholicism) defines their outlook on life.
One of my most defining perceptions of the American society obtained also through popular media while growing up is sexual liberation. Much more than what obtains in Indian movies, American movies gave us the concept of deep kisses with men to whom a woman wasn’t married, random sexual contact after a few dates, sometimes after a few drinks, infidelity portrayed beautifully as art sometimes eliciting sympathy from the vulnerable audience, and gratuitous violence. A little boy on the streets of Mushin today still assumes that all it takes to get an American girl is to take her to the movies a few times – all conditioned perceptions. The often conservative nature of the American society is thus a source of shock to the immigrant trying to figure out what just happened. The United States exports perhaps the largest number of porn videos to the rest of the world, has nudity and sexual jokes in most of its most famous non-porn movies, yet impeached a sitting president having, or for lying about, oral sex. Explain that to a seven year old. I never quite understood it.
So, there was Weiner the congressman who tweeted his genitals, and Schwarzenegger who fathered a child with the maid, then Edwards, then Gingrich. Sufficient examples in private and public life of the country I live in show just how liberally the most powerful people there take the sanctity of marriage that many of them have sought to define, and “protect”. It is thus always a surprise when a thing such as gay marriage becomes such a big deal that it has to take almost divine intervention to get passed in the country’s third largest state. Not to take anything from the efforts of the legislators and the activists who achieved what they did a few days ago in New York, my immigrant sensibilities took a few moments to process the fact and realize that the America I had envisioned/perceived since a very long time while growing up is just now coming out slowly of its own closet. And that this is why it all seemed so jubilatory (if that’s a word), and not that there was something really extraordinary that happened in the passing of the law by the NY city legislature. The contrast between what already obtains and celebrated in the country’s popular culture and what the society accepts and sanctions in its laws and public behaviour is going to be subject of much rumination for a long time to come – especially in the mind of migrating visitors like me.
Coming up next, who knows, maybe marijuana? Obviously, you haven’t seen The Hangover. At least now I understand why those who watch Nollywood movies outside of Nigeria expect all Nigerians to speak, act, and behave in a particular way. And what about juju. Don’t ask me. It is not recognized by Nigerian law either.
I ran into a few new accents during my visit to Joplin at the weekend. Some more than others I had to listen to three or more times before being able to understand at all. “You said what?” And, as always, it was as hard as ever to ask people to repeat what they’ve said without feeling guilty. My accent also became the subject of a few random stares, and eventual conversation starting prompts: “You speak good English” and a few more variants of the same compliment/curiosity. That was Lauren, the beautiful American from Tulsa who was excited to meet people from different parts of the world – especially from the faraway places like Nigeria and Benin where Mafoya and I come from. She thought that our accents sounded “different” but “cool”. Tulsa Oklahoma is about a hour and half from Joplin. And now, we have a standing invitation to visit there whenever we find ourselves again in that part of the country.
Who has seen Justified, the tv series featuring Timothy Olyphant? The accent that the preacher at the church service on Sunday spoke was similar to what I heard a lot from watching the series. Musical, a little slurry, and definitely pleasant to the ears, a distinct Kentucky-like flavour that delights a stranger’s hearing perhaps more than anyone else. Maybe a style of dressing too, but that’s beyond my specialty. But it is more understandable that those who live in rural, farm areas dress in a particular way, especially in the summer. And what do I know. I’m the guy who wore chinos rather than jeans to a work site.
Tulsa (Oklahoma), Topeka (Kansas), and Fayetteville (Arkansas) were some of the famous little towns from which the people we met came from, bearing gifts of the different ways of speaking and, no doubt, looking at the world. (PS: The writing on the garage door in the photo above reads U loot, we shoot. Click to enlarge. I won’t count that as just a kind of Joplin humour.)