http://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2013/dec/04/nigerian-rescued-sunken-boat-trapped-atlantic-video

I can't start to imagine how he must have felt. Thank God he is still alive. His family must be praising God like crazy now !

create a profile on that website, and start flirting with him online. When he is ready, send him your pic. See his reaction.
If both of you are mature enough, you can take it as an opportunity to laugh about it and put a little bit of online flirting in your relationship. If he is mad that you are flirting online and sending your pic to strangers, confront him.


that is if you have time on your hands. You can also go the easy way, shout and give him trouble until the guy get some sense into his head.

All my friends who spaced their children with 2yrs or less where either stay at home mom or stopped working for years. Some prefer it that way, they focus on the kids when they are small and later go back to work (or don't). I also wanted to have my kids close together... before having one Staying at home is really not for me and it is tough enough to handle full time work + kids, so giving more space was a must.

To each their own, I think it also depends on the number of kids people want, their professional/financial situation can change in between children, and also the health of the mother when pregnant/nursing.

Well, my sister did it. She used to express her milk during her break at work and morning/evening so that the nanny could bottle feed her baby with her milk. As for me, though I did express my milk a few times, I am not too comfortable with it, I always worry about the hygiene. Expressed breastmilk is extremely fragile and can turn bad very easily, so I chose to give powder milk when I am at work and breastfeed when I am at home. I noticed that, that way, kids tend to drink more at night when mama is there, but it worked really fine for me. No pressure to express breastmilk, I can go out/come back late without worrying about what my kids will eat and still breastfeed them too.

coogar:

$240/month shouldn't be expensive if the two of you are into full-time employment. of course, he would be willing to pay 75% upwards of the cost of hiring a maid. a less-stressed wife is a bonus!

Well, I've budgeted it, and as long as we pay for daycare/nanny, housemaid would take too much of our savings. I'd rather save up for my kids' future than pay for an help that wouldn't be necessary if we both took our responsibilities as adults and parents.
I mean, if he offered to reduce his personal expenses to pay for an housemaid, I would probably agree, but things being the way they are, I will not push him to do it.

That being said, figures thrown by nairalanders living in the west always surprise me, nobody I know around me has enough money to pay for a housemaid, and most of my friends/family are into full-time employment with kids, and I don't mean minimum-wage jobs.

coogar:

$15 per hour is expensive?
she comes on a friday/saturday and she cleans the house thoroughly(for 3-4 hrs). it would be a weekly appointment and since you live with your hubby alone, i really don't think the house would be that untidy. hire a maid and save yourself the stress.

We have kids. when it was only the two of us it wasn't a big deal. And yes, $15*4hrs*4weeks -> $240 a month, IS expensive. Unless [i]he [/i]pays for it with his own money. or at least for half of it.

coogar:

why don't you hire a housemaid?

Because we live in the west and it is way too expensive.

I am much more patient, and I can work much more. What used to take me days takes me only hours now. It also made me at the same time stronger (I can stand for them no matter what), and weaker (I cry more easily, and am more easily moved by other people's feelings).

dayokanu: If we share financial responsibilities then we would share domestic responsibilities

Marry me, I'd leave my husband for you

Seriously, we both work full time, we bring in more or less the same money BUT I have a second job i'm not paid for, which is cleaning, cooking, taking care of the kids, running errands... I wouldn't leave my husband because of that, but I am way less tolerant to any other flaw because I consider that i contribute more than him to the home.

@op : That's a "rule" you have to discuss and decide with your wife. IMO, there's nothing rude about it, especially if it only concerns her conversations with her own family. Hubby and I have english in common, but we both speak our own language with our family AND friends, whether on the phone or in their presence. At the beginning we didn't understand each other language at all, with time we can now tell more or less what the topic discussed is. We are both very comfortable with it, we naturally translate from time to time for each other, or we directly ask what we are/were talking about.
For example, despite the fact he can now understand my language pretty well, hubby still asks me why i mention his name in my phone conversations with family/friends : I just tell him what we said (usually people ask of him), and topic closed. Same thing when I hear a repeated "iyao mi" in his conversation with others... or on the contrary when I don't hear it (how come he's not mentioning ME )... no big deal, really. English, to us is just a tool but none of us is comfortable enough to enforce it as a law in our home.

50/50 is very common in the west, and it is not a miracle solution. Some traditional couples work perfectly, some 50/50 couples too, I even know of some families where the husband stayed home to watch the babies while the wife was going to work. What I mean is that each couple should try to think of what is best for them, there is no point trying to follow a rule just to save the face. Where I stay, many people frown at a woman staying at home once the kids are in school, some frown at couples not sharing house chores, while in nigeria it could be the opposite. It doesn't matter if your neighbors think your couple is following the right path, what matters is for both partners to be happy and comfortable in their marriage, no matter what it means.

Another thing is that, marriage is for life, and through life, a couple might need to adjust the way they share responsibilities depending on the phase they are going through. We can't expect to share things the exact same way when newly married without children, when with toddlers/pregnant or with older kids. There might need to be sacrifices at some point, whether one chooses to slow down on the career side to be more at home for the kids or on the contrary if one takes up a new challenge at work to bring in more money... If two people understand and love each other, they should be able to come to term with what works for them. The one thing I agree with debrief on, is that sometimes what we believe is best or what we personally prefer is not what works best for both partners. The way we share things in my marriage is not at all the way I pictured it before being married, but it works well for both of us, and I know we are able to change/adapt when the situation requires us to do so.

jidegirl12:

Another question is ; will her then husband to be let her make that decision she's bluffing bout?

he won't, that's for sure. He'd take me with him to sign the deal, then take me on a wonderful honeymoon straight away, forgetting we even missed the wedding...

Adufaye: u mis road

maybe you do. I'd rather miss all the 300 million dollar deals in the world and marry my husband over and over again. I know where my priorities are. If the deal can't wait til after the wedding, better forget it. There will be other ones. But there will never be another husband like mine.

A 300 million dollar deal that would disappear in thin air in just a day or two ? I wouldn't even consider it.

shortcuts have become a habit to me : plaiting once a week (don't try to know what the style is supposed to be on a friday), shower in the evening, and when very tired it's one day on/one day off (I say it's to preserve her skin in winter... ), quick fixed dinners and breakfast, I only spend long time cooking on week ends and holidays. I buy clothes that don't need to be ironed, so I make sure they dry very flat and fold them once dry...

When my daughter reached between 12/18 months I started putting her to sleep early at night, she now is in bed before 8pm and is usually sleeping by 8.15pm. This is survival, I need a couple of hours to do what I have to do in the evening.

Got your mail, will reply very soon ! tks !

Good, I removed it already, waiting for your email

Have a great sunday

oh... I just saw ur msg, I actually left the computer on while I was doing something else. It doesn't matter, let me drop this email : *******

I'll remove it later.

No problem. Do you have another email ? Or I can put my email here for a short time if you are online ?

I replied your pm

@minudus : thank you again. I will pm you, don't want to give my email online. I'm looking for the 1-6 curriculum.

minudus: @ ife,
There is one that just bn published by NERD and ministry of education recently.. I guess, it came out last year.. Coz each year, FG and the ministry of education in conjunction with stakeholder in the education sector do come together to review both d syllabus and curriculum..

What else do you want to know??

A lot
Is there any online copy of the current and past curriculum ? I went through the official website of the ministry of education but couldn't find it. Is there another place I should look for it ? Or should I ask someone to send a paper copy ?

many thanks again, are you a teacher ?

@minudus : thank you very much for your reply. I am actually abroad and was hoping to get an online copy. You say yours is from 3 yrs back, how often do they change ?

Hello all,

I have been looking online but couldn't find it Does anybody know where I can find the curriculum for primary schools in nigeria ?

many thanks

jidegirl12 : are you based in nigeria or abroad ?

Ujujoan:

Excatly!

She doesn't really feel responsible. She's feels like she's obliged to offer . . . I bet her granny sensed this hence her refusal!

Actions speak louder thatn words.

In a way, you are not wrong. I would take responsibility for her in my home if I had her agreement, and possibly her children's support. I am not even sure some of my uncles or aunties would agree with her staying with me. I offered, because I wanted to know if she was refusing to stay with my mom only or if she was refusing to stay with any family member. She has a complicated relationship with my mom, though she's the only one who offered to take her home.

Til today, I never even thought she could stay with me because my situation wouldn't allow such. It is the first time I actually consider it myself, and that's quite a new idea to me. I know I will be responsible for my parents when they grow old, and we've started talking about it, but as for my grandma I've always thought her children would do it and I've just started to realize that I might have a say in the matter.

As for the fact that I emphasized how "nice" is the home, it was to emphasize the dilemma : nice home but far away from family vs. staying with family probably in a less comfortable environment.

I honestly don't mind people having an opinion about my own situation, but I don't see how that could keep those who want to talk about their own to do so. IMO talking about your personal situation/experience helps understand where your opinions are coming from.

tpia1:

Yes.

Asking a question- how do you take care of the elderly in your family, is different from i need nlers to come and validate me for whatever.

I actually asked that question. I talked about my own situation just to let people understand why I was asking. I would appreciate it if you'd talk about your own situation, how you actually take care of the elderly in your family. You don't have to comment what i wrote about my own.

The good thing about it all is that I had the opportunity to discuss this with my mom, and since I know her opinion on retirement home and what she wants when she gets old, I can keep this in mind for the future.

As for my grandmother, I also can't believe that is what she really wants, I tried to tell her that helping people and taking care of family members is not only a duty but something we can enjoy, but she wouldn't change her mind. I wonder... will try to talk to some other uncles/aunties to get their opinion.

Thanks all for your replies.

For those who asked how she got there, I was abroad when it happened, but I remember that she was renting a small flat nearby my mom's and couldn't take care of the daily chores (food, cleaning etc.), though the children and grandchildren were helping (grocery, cleaning, cooking for her). She wanted to get rid of those tasks. At that time my mom had an available room in her apartment cos me and one of my siblings were already living on our own, so she offered my grandma to move there and have someone deliver the meals at lunch time when everybody's at work.

I guess my grandmother already didn't want to sacrifice her independence, so she refused and found herself a retirement home. Now, the second issue is that she didn't want anybody adding up to her pension to pay for the home fees, so she chose one far away home in a remote area, since it was the nicest she could afford with her pension. One of my uncles doesn't live so far away from her and can visit once or twice a month, but for the rest of us we do our best to manage one or two trips a year. And though she doesn't complain, we know that she feels lonely sometimes. We call her everyday, so she receives at least 2 phone calls a day.

The first time I visited her there, I was nicely surprised with the home, it is nothing like a hospital room, she could take some of her furnitures and stuff there, and we pasted all her family pictures on the walls. But this time, maybe cos she got really older, I felt bad. I took care of an elderly woman when I was a teenager, and I know it's not easy, but I somehow believe it is our duty. I wouldn't want to end up in a retirement home, so it is difficult for me to understand that it is what she really wants. Of course, if she were to stay with me or my mom or any family member, she would be alone all day, which is not fun, but we could arrange for someone to watch after her when we are at work.

I don't know, as someone said, she is a very selfless woman and she spent most of her life taking care of others. Anyway, the decision is not mine, since her children are the first to decide, I think for now they have decided to respect her wish, at least as long as she is able to go in and out.

I recently visited my grandmother in a retirement home, where she's been staying for the last few years. She is getting older by the day and this is starting to affect her abilities.

I felt so bad seeing all these people being taken care of by nurses, in a home that is not theirs, far away from their family. I naturally offered her to come stay with me, my mom offered the same... And she declined.

She said she doesn't want to be a burden, that she is doing ok here, that we have enough on our hands with the young ones. I was really disappointed. I thought she would love being surrounded with children, grandchildren and great grand children.

The place she stays is neat, she has her own room and the staff is really efficient. They offer activities for senior and she is still allowed to go out as she likes. Still... even though it is the norm in the west, I feel something's wrong in letting her stay there. I want to be there for her last moments, even if that means taking care of her like a small baby. I can't stand the idea of her dying all alone.

What do you guys think about it ? Should we just respect her wish and let her stay where she is ? How do you take care of the elderly in your own family ? What plans did you make/are you making to take care of your parents when they won't be able to watch after themselves ?

I find it amusing to read such topic here. In the west, and in other western forums I go to, ladies get into e-fights over the breastfeeding topic. The points this man makes are broadly shared in the west. I often wonder, when I go to such forums, how come over half of the ladies quit breastfeeding after just a few weeks or even days, claiming that they "don't have enough milk" when this is a topic I never heard about here ? Is it a taboo in african culture to lack milk or are those western ladies just misinformed about how to breastfeed ? I seriously wonder...

As for the men, well, IMO that's what happens when you marry a boy and not a man... the "bonding" part got me laughing, like there's nothing else to do than to give bottle to a baby ? He can't sing songs if he's not feeding him ? And he probably wants a medal because his wife could sleep 6 hours straight while he was giving bottle...