₦airaland Forum

yuslik:
An American asked my friend whether we have air conditioners in Nigeria. The following is what led to the question and his reply to the guy.
So, I'm at a dinner three nights ago at a white professor's. About 25 of us. 20 students and 5 professors. I'm the only black student in the room, and like at every dinner table we are eating, biting, drinking, chatting and laughing. Everybody is busy trying to get off the formal mood we just had earlier this afternoon. I'm black, African, and the youngest folk in the room; so everyone is interested in me.
Fast forward. It's about 8pm. Everyone has a partner, and my partner is a tall white girl who is chatting me about my piece she read in VQR. It isn't long when this guy joins us. He has read the piece too, and liked it. Well not that I care if he didn't. Apparently, the girl I'm standing with is his girl. Both of them are Third Year graduate students. They talk about my accent, ask if I schooled earlier in the US. We are chatting: Chimamanda, Diaz (who will be teaching us in spring), Noam Chomsky, and Achille Mbembe. These and many careless things too.
Now, it seems this white guy is having a particular interest in me. He asks for my phone (iPhone 6 plus) and scans with his eyes, he stares at the room and back to me. There is a problem. But I'm not anxious because he has a smile. He has a bottle of beer in hand, he sips directly. I don't drink alcohol, I'm holding a glass of lemon juice (some funny tasty thing) I sip. We are laughing. We talk more.
Suddenly he looks at me and asks who gave me the iPhone and if I can operate it. It is a blow but I try to make him not see the impact on me. I'm hurt but not showing it. Dude goes ahead to ask if I feel privileged to be in America since I come from Africa. He asks if we have air conditioners back home. I look straight to his eyes to see if he was serious or just being mischievous. He is serious. Man, I'm boiling within.
Before I could say anything, his girl is back. They want to leave. He offers me a ride to my apartment and I shake my head. They leave.
I return to the group in the room, and chat up a prof. An old man. And even though we are chatting about a lot of things, my mind is on the white idiot who just left here.
I leave Jane Alison's flat. I get a ride with Michaela. I'm home and I can't do anything. I'm damn hurt. I opened my computer and go to my email. I got the white guy's email and this is what I said to him.
Hey Phil,
I hate to feel like a representative for anything or people or place but this night you make it so easy with your stupidity and incredible ignorance.
The truth is: I WILL not tell you or any other white fucker if we have air conditioners back home. It's not my job or role. The only thing I would say is this: we in Nigeria and Africa laugh, live, cry, die, invent, destroy, share, learn, grow, dance, sleep, Bleep, create, humanize and will never ask a white man if they have train stations in his country because we are a people truly uncomfortable with being ignorant.
I don't need a reply from you. To hell with you and your air-conditioned ignorance.
Michael
The next morning. Someone knocks at the door. It's 7 am. When I use the door hole to see, it's Phil. I turn back and walk to my computer. I have an 8am Skype appointment, don't have time for any kind of stupid Phil.

lanreni:
eehhm..sorry mr safe sex. may i disappoint you a bit?... THERE IS NOTHING AS SAFE SEX! you are either "giving" or "taking". at the end, no party is left thesame. you have either been added to, or subtracted from, and this goes beyond physical things. you figure?

Thirty-eight-year-old Wasiu, who worked as a vulcaniser, and his friend, Aderinto, a welder, reportedly came back from their workplaces in the Ebute-Meta area of Lagos State

lanreni:
Read my earlier post and stop confusing abstenence (control of sexual gratification) and celibacy. two different things. based on your theory, then why do people marry. if you should be free to satisfy yourself freely?
actually, it is outside human nature to sexaround. animals do that. adam and eve was d only creature of same kind, unlike animals.
or are you telling me that anytime you feel like it, you do it? as long as you believe in the almighty condom?
Guy, true education will teach you the consequences of the socalled safe sex and the benefits of saying no when necessary. you gain on all levels. i am. thats why i teach emotional discipline.

lanreni:
A lot of people get my comments wrong on this thread. Abstenance does not mean Ignorance of sexual education. My point is INDULGENCE has never and will never help any generation. ABSTENANCE is the solution. Do you know why rape cases are on the increase, its not because of abstenance (afterall that teaches you not to do that), its because of loose control through usage of condoms. in any case, with the rise sexual education and the use of condoms, HIV is still on the increase. why?
Bro, its not just fantasy, its what will safeguard d future generation. no condom manufacturer boasts of 100% safety. so why are we trusting a piece of rubber to do what we must do by ouselves. its like eating excessively and taking a special drug to cure obesity. indulgence is one dark road that plunges into an uncertain end.

lanreni:
so can i say your own addiction to sex is a mental defect. is not with your senses like the medical doctor you partake in it?
are you comparing the damaging effects of smoking with obesity? or didn't your own type of education teach you d difference between being fat and obessed?
the purpose of formal education is simple. it gives you the ability to ask questions like how? why? and what? if you can't ask questions about how condoms were and whether it actually protects, then your own type of sex or formal education is trash!
are you saying sex before marraige is better? or are the lives of those who are sexing before marraige now better than the lives of our parents who where virgins before marraige? the examples you mentioned. does it not occur to couples whether virgins or not? can you say authoritatively that those who sleep with each other before marraige have better sex lives than virgin couples? sis, go do ur research and acquire proper sex/formal/robust education. education teaches you not to copy the western world blindly.
by the way, sex is not marraige and marraige is not sex. sex is one aspect of the entire issue of mutual compatibility. how to know yourself, how to discover compatibility quickly and who to marry, how to live together in undestanding and fidelity is my own definition of proper education which has healthy sex education in it by default for singles and couples.
my point remains that d society and our own form of sex education only encourages looseness, without emotional discipline. thats deeper than just morality. if not, our religious leaders won't be sleeping with church members. ABSTINENCE, which you have learnt through understanding and mastering your emotions (sexual urge, anger, etc) remains the best. i am not condemning anybody, but this must be our collective goal if we want to leave better legaciesthan our parents.

lanreni:
well, i have seen well educated but stupid persons. you only need to check the news. for example, how do you explain why a medical doctor would be addicted to at least 2packs of cigarrette per day. his he not educated? does he not know the consequences? i will not be drawn to the argument of comparing USA & Nigeria because d margins of moral corruption are completely different. what is constant is that sex is sex and the emotional discipline not to indulge is thesame. we several talk shows on radio and on tv, sex education in schools, mosques and churches. so the problem i repeat is not mere education. the education must come with knowlege of emotional discipline. we know so much than our forefathers, yet the rate of rape, tenage pregnancy, baby mamas, beastiality, STDs, etc is on the increase.hope you get my point.

lanreni:
I beg to disagree. The problem of your generation is not knowledge, it is character that has messed up the value system. Ask a six year old of things like this and you will be amazed. Knowledge is bound to increase by default. You can't slow down that. What matters is the decline of value system that should ensure we always use the knowledge appropriately in improving our lives and society. What would you rather teach your baby? usage of condoms or abstinence? the former teaches a lack of selfcontrol while the latter teaches delayed gratification for future gains. you be the judge!

kennygee:
If you're tired of NL and can't handle the rules and bans, why stay tho? Go to LIB. Why waste time commenting?

lanreni:
SO OP, FAKE CONDOM IS WHAT IS MORE IMPORTANT TO YOU THAN FAKE DRUGS, FAKE GOODS, FAKE SERVICES, , FAKE GOVERNMENT AND ALLOWING FAKE GUYS F..K YOU? SMH.
SECOND, ALL THESE YOUNG PEOPLE THAT ARE MAKING COMMENTS ABOUT CONDOMS AS IF ITS A DEGREE COURSE, SHAME ON YOU ALL. SHAME ON YOUR GENERATION. A SIMPLE PIECE OF ADVICE: ABSTENANCE IS THE BEST..ALWAYS THE BEST. WHEN YOU ARE READY FOR A BABY, YOU DO. SIMPLE. ***spits on thread and walks away***

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AreaFada2:
You still do not get it. A language called bini does not exist. Sadly even Benin people make that mistake. Benin people sadly copy what the read in newspapers, written mostly by people who do not really much about Benin.

The Oba & Benin Traditional Council have made it clear that the modern form of the name is Benin, NOT Bini. But we rather listen to announcements made at Buckingham Palace in London than take not of local announcements.

A Benin person is Ovbiedo & a speaker of local language is Unu n'ozedo.
What I am telling you is Edo is both the tribe & language. You would not ask any Esan or Ora person before 1991 if he was Ovbiedo.

The generalisation of all people within what is now Edo State as Edo is a new thing.

If you check your philology text books, those other languages you mentioned in Ora PLUS Urhobo/Okpe, Isoko, Degema (in Rivers State) & some other minor languages in Southern Nigeria that you may never have heard of before, are called Edoid languages. Whether they sound similar to Benin language or not, depend on the lenght of time of seperation from the parent language.

In Benin you ask a person if he's Ovbiedo are you Edo person & if he speaks Edo. That has been the case for centuries. It is the creation of Edo State where people now try to, out of political expediency, to generalise other languages as Edo. Because most languages in Edo State come from same parent Edo language spoken around Benin City, it is also in theory correct to call them Edo languages.

I know it is very hard for people to accept that what they have known (or thought) to be correct lifelong is in fact inaccurate. But if you do not actively seek knowledge, you don't get it.

AreaFada2:
Actually the language of Benin people is Edo.

Originally Edo is both language & people. Oba Ewuare replaced Ile-Ibinu with Edo, after 1440 AD. Because (1) he perceived Ile-Ibinu slightly derogatory (2) Ile-Ibinu was a word said by Oranmiyan, a man who grew up outside Igodomigodo as Benin/was called before 1169AD. (3) To honour his loyal servant called Edo, who saved him from certain death as a prince, but Edo lost his life in the process.

The use of Edo to describe Benin, Esan, Afemai, Ika, and others is a very recent thing of political expediency. Precisely when Edo State was created in 1991.

Oba Eweka had to give up Benin traditional rights over Edo Central, Edo North, parts of Delta & parts of Eastern Yorubaland, as part of the conditions for the British to restore Benin monarchy in 1914.

With that, it was felt that calling it "Benin State" would tend to alienate other tribes. Though that would have been the obvious thing since Bendel was first coined from "Benin Province & Delta Province". Because Delta is tribe neutral as a name, it became Delta State naturally. In the 1980s, my Esan, Afemai/Owan & Ika friends would have sharply corrected you if you called them Edo.

Everything is politics in 9ja.

damocool:
they would gladly kill if the environment permits .. they hot up minor issues. in fact , I was dumbfounded when they were applauding bin Laden's attack on twin towers, hail killings of Christians up North, got really furious when laden was killed .. imagine , a grown up man, a sec school teacher threatened to call people up North to kill Christians because his brother was denied entry into exam hall because the guy came very late for exam. this happened years ago in OYE ekiti.. I think what really calm Muslims wahala in South is the fact they are not the majority, if not we would suffer same fate down here...

CallMeHope:
who said anything about "Edo language"?