Just the other weekend I was with the boys (and girls) shedding off the stress of the past week while sipping some cold beers. I don’t know how the conversation steered to how ungrateful and selfish our women are. “Girls are takers not givers. A lady can ask you for money to go to the hair saloon to plait or do whatever they do with their hair, being the gentleman you are, if you don’t have money you borrow, but she doesn’t stop her terrorism on you she calls David and makes him foot the same bill!” “I have this neighbour girl,” Mark bugged in, “she calls like seven guys asking them all for airtime. One day I asked her what she does with all of it, her little brother joked that she probably sells ‘me 2 you.’ We all laughed. But the ladies weren’t amused; it’s at this point that Tina who was listening soberly and attentively interjected, “Look at all of you? Aren’t you even ashamed of yourselves?” “Check out all the drinking joints around the city, the patrons are predominantly men. You drink beer and eat roasted goat, chicken, and pork like the world is ending. The question is can’t you have it roasted at home?” she challenged. ”You men are so mighty greedy! That’s why you used to stop women from eating some delicious dishes like goat meat saying it would cause women to grow beards. No woman could eat eggs due to the fear that it could cause infertility.” This hit me below the belt! I felt guilty for the sins of our grandees. “Now that we are school-ed and liberated, in your selfishness you have decided to have your meat away from home,” Tina continued. Her momentum kept growing. “You hide in these joints and gobble juicy chicken thighs, whole deep fried tilapias, plates of barbecued or deep-fried pork, goat meat etc and you wash them down with bottles of beer or other drinks as your wives and kids at home make do with plain Ibilayi with indagala! While our grand fathers used to buy hooves for the dogs, today no dog can taste the so called hooves. You guys have taken them over too!” At this point she was raining in more concrete evidence of our selfishness. I took another swallow and recalled the words of my old man. He once told me, “Son, when you’re in the mist of a battle and you see that you’re losing it, it ain’t no shame running and saving your skin!” Guys it’s at this point that I made use of the back door and took off! Not that I am a coward, just a tactical retreat. Ends
