₦airaland Forum

Thats naija for we people

I WILL never forget the day I agreed to have a talk with a friend who was on the verge of ditching her husband for another married man.

“I am tired of giving birth to ugly children”, she snapped when I broached the subject, telling her my mediating was at the insistence of her husband, who was also a close friend. “My daughter is so dark I feel for her at times as there is the possibility of her attracting only ugly men. 1 am dark, my husband is dark. You have seen the new man yourself, he has lovely children. Let me also have children 1 can be proud of for a change!” So she left and eventually had three children by this other man.

I wished I could say they are as ugly as the ones she had with her first
husband, but no. They are quite attractive and athletic, and she was proud of her feat! Her husband also remarried, of course. “And his new set of kids are even uglier than the ones I had for him,” smirked my friend. Lately, I learnt both of them were thinking of going back together since they were not properly divorced. I thought the idea absurd. I would have termed it impossible, if I hadn’t heard it from the now bitter father of her ‘lovely’ children, her second ‘husband’.
When she phoned a few days later, I told her of the ridiculous rumour I heard about her first husband coming back to her. “Don’t mind the jerk, he’s just jealous,” she said of her now ex-lover, “By the way, Jide (her real husband) is here and wants to talk to you.” “Are you back together” I asked him incredulously when he came on the phone. “Of course, we are!” he actually sounded happy.

“That stupid man is just an opportunist who wants to spend my wife’s money. He can talk until his face muscles burst, 1 am back with my wife. You tell him that! Let him try his luck elsewhere.”

It is true really, that some of us, dark or light, prefer light skinned mates so we could have “pretty babies”, that is why skin lightening creams and horribly concocted local bleaching soaps still sell; though they are now advertised as good for making blemishes fade rather than for lightening the whole complexion.

Jennifer was a dark skinned beauty in her secondary school days and had her share of boyfriends – though not particularly spectacular ones. She travelled abroad and came back ten years later almost as white as the next white; sporting multi-coloured hair extensions and wearing green contact lenses! “When you are abroad,” she said later, ‘You experience a lot of racism because of your skin. It got worse when I discovered that even coloured people were also picky. Being rejected by blacks because your skin is cocoa and not cream, ebony and not olive or because you are short with kinky hair instead of tall with wavy hair hurt.

“Back home, I’ve discovered that my investment in changing the colour of my skin has more than paid off. It didn’t come cheap either. Apart from very costly injections I paid to slow down the pigmentation of my dark skin, I have to keep on using expensive creams and lotions. I look in the mirror and I like what I see. It is money well spent. And my confidence has had a great boost. In this part of the world, it is often the ‘yellow pawpaw’ as those with very light skin are called, that reap the most attention. I mean, if someone was described that way, there was no need to say that person was good-looking. It was a given that light was lovely. It is up to those with darker skin who have to now prove themselves.

“It is a general belief that dark-skinned people often don’t take time to groom themselves – but that is not true. When I was darker, I really put in more effort than now, but it seldom showed. If we want to be frank with ourselves, we would admit that light skinned girls get picked up first – either as dancing partners or lovers. We shouldn’t be fooled by the “Black is beautiful” mantra, that died with the seventies!”

Little wonder then that men too have jumped into the “yellow-pawpaw”
bandwagon with glee! Few years ago, a prominent lawmaker that was impeached in one of the Northern states proudly defended his bleached, ‘glowing’ well groomed skin, and said it had nothing to do with his efficiency. How true! But there is a limit to how far you should compete with your partner in the bleaching department!’

A colleague’s husband works with a big advertising agency and he is one of their top officers. He grew from fairly light-skinned, to albino light. “It was a bit embarrassing trying to talk him out of his stupid obsession with his skin but tried, I did” confessed his wife. “He didn’t listen to me, of course. He did look better as he made the effort to slim down to compliment his new complexion – until he over-did it and spotted black patches all over his face and neck.

An entrepreneur and philanthropist, Mrs Bolaji Fati staunchly believes that Nigeria can surmount its numerous health challenges if more people voluntarily engage in medical outreaches.

The Executive Director, Moses Adekoyejo Majekodunmi Foundation, MAM, which has in the last three years provided sustainable interventions in the areas of education and healthcare for rural dwellers in the country, Fati had an encounter with Feminista.

What have been your findings in the areas you’ve covered so far?
We’ve realised, from our outreaches, that the medical needs of Nigerians are enormous. Government talked endlessly about the millennium development goals, but this does not reflect in the places we go to.

We see vulnerable children with malaria symptoms, cough and all sorts of ailments that are constantly part of their growing up. Then, we realised we needed to make our intervention one that has the backing of the Nigerian government.
The fact is, everyone has to work together with government to find lasting solution to the medical needs of the poor in this country.

This, we can achieve by partnering to set up community health centres and sending volunteers to work there.

Medical outreaches
Since inception in 2012, MAM has carried out medical outreaches in rural places like Ibeju-Lekki and Epe in Lagos State while similar interventions were conducted in several communities in Ogun State. A challenge we however have is in the area of personnel because most of the volunteers(doctors, nurses, medical laboratory technicians, pharmacists) are supplied by the St. Nicholas Hospital in Lagos, while we buy the drugs and plan the scheme of work for the entire outreach.

Scope
Prior to any medical intervention during our outreaches, we give a ten- minute general counseling and health talk before administering drugs.
How many persons do you attend to per programme?

We are well equipped and can attend to over 800 people per programme. But the number varies, depending on the need of the people.
You trained over 40 out-of-school-girls recently in Ogun State. Tell us about your work in the area of education?

Yes, the foundation has carried out several educational empowerment programmes for girls. Recently, over 40 out-of-school-girls in Ogun State were engaged in training workshops where they were tutored on how to make stove wigs, confectioneries and drinks. At the end, cash donations were disbursed to enable them start up and become independent entrepreneurially.

Scholarship programme
Presently, we are working towards sponsoring underprivileged children from primary to university level. It will be based on the academic intelligence of the child, though.
We are starting from primary five pupils to monitor and find who possesses the required criteria, potential and intelligence. It must be an indigene from a host community with lack of capacity to go to school.
Teachers’ capacity building
Teachers’ capacity building workshop was also conducted in Lagos and Ogun states recently. This programme saw over 60 public school teachers per programme in attendance. New innovation in teaching method and technology were introduced to enhance teaching aid against the obsolete method in public schools.

Advice to policy makers
Even as we seek to enhance quality of lives through education, I will appeal to policy makers to formulate policies that would lighten the load of the poor in this country.

Since the inception of Nigeria’s Fourth Republic in 1999, compared to other Assemblies, the 8th Senate stands heads and shoulders above others in many regards.
Senate President, Bukola Saraki, well known for understanding the need to engage the electorate and young people in general via social media, has spread the fever across the Senate, infecting his colleagues.
Using various social media platforms judiciously, Saraki has encouraged and achieved a robust legislature-citizenry interaction and has consequently, driven the roots of Nigeria’s democracy even deeper.
When Saraki took office on June 9, 2015, he pledged to reform the Senate and make its processes more transparent, inclusive and visible.
Since then, he tasked the Committee on Rules and Business to develop an e-Parliamentary system that can be employed at Senate Plenary sessions.
The arrival of the then much anticipated Ministerial list sent by President Muhammadu Buhari was first announced on the Senate’s official social media platform, a move that would have been frowned at in the last dispensation which treated media in any form, like a disease.
Before the just concluded Ministerial screening, the Senate President through his Special Assistant on New Media, Bamikole Omishore, in a statement on October 11, 2015 offered a warm hand of friendship, not just to the media, but even to the citizens.
Omisore announced that Bloggers and news organizations interested in Live Blogging or Live Tweeting, or even those interested in plugging into the livestream of the Ministerial screening were to contact the New Media Office of the Senate President for entry passes to the National Assembly, and the Senate gallery.
Anyone familiar with the National Assembly of old, would know that this is one of the most difficult parts of doing business there – the Pass..
“This screening will create an avenue for Nigerians from all works of life to partake in governance, as the bridge between representatives and constituents will be bridged; with Senators asking questions sourced from Nigerians on Social Media.
“Additionally, the submitted resumes of candidates will be made available in the public space for Nigerians to examine,” Saraki had said.
Nigerians were not left in the dark as Saraki allowed more participation from Nigerians by taking questions from the public via the official handle of the Senate, @NGRsenate.
During the screening, the National Assembly TV station which previously had been left to gather dust was the source of information for different media platforms, which tapped into the feed from the TV station. The Senate’s social media accounts also gave real time updates that served as good material for many Media houses.
The resumes of the nominees were presented to the public before screening to enable those that knew the nominees, raise objections. There was a balance of working to get the President’s nominees passed and at the same time making sure Senate was not a rubber stamp.
A novel innovation was the provision of a sign language interpreter throughout the plenary sessions. Nigerians were able to know virtually all the names of their Ministers and were able to make contributions on social media.
Before Saraki, operations of the National Assembly were shrouded in secrecy.
The Senate’s official Twitter handle was abandoned; the Facebook page moribund and the citizenry knew nothing about legislative activities.
Saraki recently “flung the legislative doors open,” introducing social media networks for citizen participation in the ongoing formulation of the 8th Senate’s legislative agenda.
He encouraged individuals, civil societies and Non-governmental agencies to send in their recommendations in order to achieve what he describes as “a robust and citizens driven legislative agenda.”
He called for input before the final draft of the Legislative Agenda was completed adding that citizen submissions would guide the affairs of the Senate throughout his tenure.
“I enjoin you to forward your contributions to spass.legal@ gmail.com including your name, phone number and location,” he said.
Saraki’s open door policy stands in clear contrast to his predecessor David Mark who called for social media censorship in 2012.
“Social media has become a threat to the ethics of media practice and good governance because of its accessibility and absolute freedom. Every freedom carries a responsibility. Even in the advanced democracies, where we all agree that good governance is practiced, there is no absolute freedom,” Mark had said.
Continuing, Mark expressed the belief that “there must be a measure to check the negative tendencies of the social media in our country.

I’m in my early 20s and in love with a 28-year-old man. He has a good job and he is quite nice to me. I always feel that any girl who is not avirgin should not
marry him. We have been together for a year and he has promised marrying me but he doesn’t know my past deeds. I have this innocent and youthful look and he would never know that so far, I’ve dated 12 guys and I’ve had seven abortions. He has planned our marriage for December and I feel guilty not telling him what I had done. I feel that if I tell him, he could change his mind and break up with me. I don’t think I can get another man like him. What do I do? Tell him and lose him? Or keep quiet and get married?

Though I would advise you to ask her at your own risk. Don’t say later that auntyji’s advice got you beaten up.
But before you go ahead with that, I want to ask why do you care at all? Like seriously. Do you think she is also wondering about your virg*n*ty? Ever thought how can you prove you are a virgin? I don’t think so. I am surprised that even in this day and age, perfectly sane men are concerned about such things.
The truth is that medically it’s impossible to confirm a girl’s virg*n*ty. Or for that matter, even a boy’s. In some cases there is a thick hymen detectable inside a woman’s vagina. But then a lack of hymen is not really a sign of $exual experience.

Stretch
The hymen is a layer of skin around the opening of the vagina. It doesn’t usually cover up the entrance completely. And you don’t have to ‘break through’ it the first time you have $ex, just gently push through so the opening in the thin skin stretches wide enough. It can also be stretched or torn by playing sports or using tampons.
And yeah, my brother did douse some ketchup on my honeymoon bed sheets. But that’s another story, for another day.

Myth
I know somekalmuhedoctors have started a booming business in ‘restoring’ hymens and ‘creating’ virg*n*ty. But they are just fortifying a myth and playing with your minds. Waste of time, money and emotions, I say.
Meri mano toh, don’t even expect every girl to bleed at first intercourse. Just like you are not expected to stay hard the entire night! If she doesn’t bleed it doesn’t mean she has had $ex before. Just that her hymen is very stretchy. And you have been nice and gentle!

Talk
Don’t complicate your relationship (and compromise $exual pleasure) by over-thinking about such things. Enjoy what you have and spend your energy in pursuit of love and pleasure.
If you have doubts, I suggest that the two of you should talk things through. But does virg*n*ty matter? I don’t think so.
-lovematters

1. He is Very Shy About Touching You
He asks for permission before touching your body… A guy who has had s£x at least once will not be so shy of touching a girl. In fact shyness towards the opposite $ex reduces in men who have been intimate before. You cannot completely say a guy is a virgin just because he is shy about being intimate, but it’s a strong sign. So if a guy is shy about touching you, especially at the private and intimate body parts, it shows that he is still a virgin.

2. He Dresses Awkwardly
Most virgin males tend to have an embarra$$ing dress sense. This is usually so, because they believe they don’t have much reasons to pay attention to their dressing because they’ve not experienced what s£x is like. This usually begins to improve the moment they meet the girl they like but even at that, it is still noticeable to the smart ladies.

3. He Kisses Awkwardly
That a guy is a bad kisser does not mean he is a virgin oh. But if a guy kisses awkwardly, in a very shy manner, it’s almost a sure sign that he is a virgin. If a guy is pretty good at kissing you can be sure that he is not a virgin no matter what he says. Kissing takes practice and people get good at it with experience. Another sign to look out for is whether he closes his eyes while kissing, most virgins tend to do that a lot. * lol..

4. Usually Quiet, Shy, and has poor social skills
Male virgins are usually quiet, reserved and act in a feminine manner. they have a cowardly behavior, appear pa$$ive in interactions and have poor social skills. Male virgins are also timid and shy and usually do not know how to ask a lady out and make out with her. A lot of them would rather ask out a lady on the phone or through social media than face to face.

5. He Has a Very Quick Orgasm
If it’s his first intimate experience in love making, he is going to orgasm quickly. Some virgin guys tend to Erupt even before entering or as soon as they enter. The first experience is always a nervous one for a guy because he will be constantly thinking about how he is performing, and he will get aroused at the slightest act of intimacy on your part causing him to Erupt quickly. Guys with experience can control themselves a lot better.

Gone are the days when an average young lady anticipated being graced with the title of Mrs Somebody. Nowadays, there is a growing trend of young girls being proud to be dating a married man/sugar-daddy. Aside from the scandalous Toke/Maje/Anita saga, Former Governor in Nigeria reportedly beat up his wife recently in London because she confronted him for impregnating his mistress.

This same man publicly displays his love for the young girl he has been dating since she was 18yrs of age.. He showers her with the finest things of life whilst treating his own wife with disdain. In day to day life, so many women suffer in the hands of their husbands, you will see men spending all their earnings on women outside but refuse to pay their own children’s school fees.

This is what I find so disheartening… Morality is so unpopular in our present day. But.. who is to blame for this new shameless trend? The “seductive” young ladies or the men who have trained them to believe it is more rewarding to be a mistress. Share your thoughts..

So why do black women have bigger but’s? It does seem true, watch BETA or MTV sometime and you will notice the trend as well. Even music is and has been exemplifying this theory for years. For example listen to music from the late ‘80s-‘90s “I like big butt’s…” or “Baby’s got back…” Ask the men out there what they are attracted to sometime. I don’t think you will find many that are going to say “I like a flat boney bu’tt”. Couple this with TV and Movie Culture and you will see this trend is on a drastic rise. We used to have analogue TV with big @ass and now we have flat screen tvs… (lmfao) But why! There are many, many theories regarding the question “why do black women have bigger but’ts”. We will look at just a few ideas out there.

Lolx

Hmm