The lamentation and the examination of the Nigerian species of girls by two counterparts

DISCLAIMER: this is not an academic or a scholarly work as it is not backed with any raw scientific fact.

PRELUDE: it is worthy to note that this piece, as hereby produced, is the abridged and edited transcript of a two-way dialogue, dated 18th of Sept., 2013, between two young men who currently boast of the studentship of the Obafemi Awolowo University. This conversation is nothing but just what it claims to be – a social but highly passionate chat. It never occurred to the two young men, way back in September, last year, that there would later be a need to publish their spontaneous chat. But then, what made them decide to propagate this conversation? For one reason, it is about a subject, that has for long agitated their sense of what is elegant and sublime; and what else? – they know there exists some other few men, old or young, who share in their inconvenient passion. And, of course, the sole and major target of this tirade, complaint, or whatever else it is fit to be called, is none other than our dear ladies. It is the hope of these two young conversationalists, and their like-minded fellows, to challenge our ladies’ sense of what is high and sublime, not merely in fashion and appearance, but most importantly in mind and conduct. So, not to bore your pants off, the two young men are, herein, recognized by their aliases; one Lumbite, the other Tiasma. And that, while Lumbite, by instinct of nature, played the part of a Complainant and an Accuser, Tiasma, by an equally natural bent of temperament, assumed the role of an Interrogator and a mild Judge. Enjoy the chat!

 VERDICT: “In this chat, all ladies are guilty but many more than few”

***

L : Tiasma !

T : how far ?

L : tight bro.

T:  you already working on my request?

L:  yeah. But Tiasma, I’m having some issues with my g-mail account.

T:  okay. Will wait you out.

L:  right. You tried sometime ago to play some ‘pranks’ on Tina, how did it go?

T:  it never got beyond the first phase. The second phase of my plan was hinged upon her corresponding reaction to my first ‘launch’ which, unfortunately, never came forth from her. It would have been foolhardy and too risky on my part to proceed still.

L:  what are then your inferences?

T:  that either she knew who was behind the intellectual prank or she found my rather too critical insinuations too  much to challenge; and it could also be that , ignorant of the person behind the ‘play’, she considered it absolutely not worthy of her attention,…  etc.

L:  oh! cos lately I’ve been trying to make comparison between ladies who grow up here and those with foreign experience. For more than a month, I’ve been communicating with a lady friend of mine in Boston.

T:  that should be very interesting! What, so far, have you induced?

L:  she is very evolved and sublime. I found our ladies too mundane!

T:  hahahaha! Your conclusion (for it wasn’t framed as to be termed an inference) sounds too sentimental to the extreme. But would you have said the same thing of that Boston girl before she left the country?

L:  probably not. I find sense and a lot of western influence in and on her. Would have loved to show you our chat but that might be difficult. They (western girls) are brought up to be so inquisitive; asking questions is their thing, I mean intelligent questions in conversation, extreme courtesy and politeness.

T:  well, you may be very correct on that point of ethics and courtliness.

L:  she hardly responds with the usual ‘KK’ you get from our ladies.

T:  (laughs) oh! That’s funny but very interesting.

L:  have you observed such silly response from our girls? – ‘kk’ – and they can hardly engage you beyond ‘kk’. What to ask about and how to ask it; what to do while chatting; experience to share while chatting etc… are simply beyond our girls.

T:  (laughs) Lumbite, as funny as your observations sound, it is absolutely and disturbingly very correct.

L:  infact, I find some girls on my chat list annoying.

T:  I must confess, I too have been frustrated by many of them lately. I almost had a serious misunderstanding with one recently, thanks to the deft manner in which I quickly handled it. And what can you say about the effect of these type of girls on guys like us, generally?

L:  she shared with me more than 15 pictures on Saturday night, and following each picture was appended a footnote – you can hardly get our ladies do just that. Tiasma, they are dragging us backward. Methinks ladies have a lot of effect on the guys in the society: we are only a mirror of whom they really are. There was one idiot I agreed to visit on a particular day. On this agreed day, I asked her during our chat if we are still good to see. She went blank for more than two hours. When the fool would later respond, she said: “nah, am out”. Imagine such rude and silly way of turning me down! It is a show of the poverty of the mind, anyway. They can hardly make bold sentences. There was a day a female acquaintance and I chatted and, as usual, she went  blank at a point. The first message she sent the following morning was an apology telling me she slept off. Our ladies are so insecure, inept in critical matters, and can hardly speak out their mind.

T:  again, your sentiments are very on point. Their overall effect on us is of the most pernicious type. I think I also  get a lot of blanks, gaps, “slept off”s, and of course, innumerable “kks”. Infact, you are right!  right!…  damn right! lumbite.

L:  Tiasma, I’ve always wanted to ask for your view. This girl would request me to call her on viber (an app that affords  international call). We made a video chat on Sunday on viber. I’m yet to distinguish a single exceptional girl in our clime.

T:  were you talking about the Boston girl above?

L:  yeah. I’m tired of our kk ladies! Do you know ladies there seem to appreciate texts than calls?

T:  (laughs) really? Texts than calls?

L:  a lot, because they can lay hold on messages and show their friends: it is the main evidence of

     friendship.

T:  really! I think that’s hard to believe. It’s utterly incredible if true.

L:  I was awed when I got to know. I find discussion with her so engaging and funny. She even cooked

     sometimes and sent the pix of the meal to me. Everything, to them, is fun.

T:  “everything to them is fun”: this statement has a profound effect on me. I really can’t explain deeply. Well, I guess it’s because I’m a poor pitiable boy. But I think my roomie will benefit immensely from this conversation.

L:  she confessed to me that she used to have a crush on me back then. I find this confession so brave…despite her change in status.

T:  … and unassuming, too, on her part. Does she still?

L:  well, she claimed not to be again, but she has never hidden the fact that she likes my person. There was a day we debated this for long, and she said she is currently seeing someone in the state, but that she doesn’t  know what the future holds. She said  “let’s watch and see”.

T:  has she forgiven you for how you treated her prior to her departure?

L:  I told her I was going through some challenges that were not obvious, and, besides, I was at that time neither sure of myself nor her. She was convinced.

T:  she had to be, or at least, pretend to be.

A brief relapse in time

 L:  Tiasma, sorry. She just called me. She already told me she wanted to surprise me with a call.

T:  have you always received such occasional surprise calls from her?

L:  nope. She would always tell me on whatsapp before she called.

T:  come, what was your summary opinion of her before her translocation?

L:  I knew she is the ambitious and decent type, and I did not fail to tell her how much I also desire her

     then.

T:  okay, ambitious and decent! But would you say she was also appreciably cultured and polite back then?

L:  yeah, she was. But I’m sure she can’t relate at this level if she had not travelled – that society has

     influenced her.

T:  what was the most significant transformation you observed in her relational skill?

L:  it wasn’t that I knew much of her then. I gained admission briefly after we met, and by the time I came

     back for the holiday, she had travelled.

T:  how many months has she stayed over there?

L:  she left April 2009.

T:  ah, quite a long time ago! Such improvement, as you have been forced to notice, are inevitable

     considering the fairly long intercourse she has sustained with the westerners.

L:  yeah, you are right.

T:  but then, are our girls really to blame? Or better still, are they only to blame?

L:  that’s a tough question. But I think no matter where one is, one can polish, refine oneself. Tiasma, you have never left Naija before, but then you can’t find it difficult to cope with a westerner, even without having once left the confines of this country; because you have broadened your horizon through sound literatures and by having a curious nature. It is not really hard for anyone who craves international orientation: any mind that is open to knowledge will not find it hard. Knowledge about anything is universal. Tiasma, knowledge is power. Even our ladies who are sound do not have sound mind. What we need is to cultivate a sound mind.

T:  about me: right observation but wrong inference. Knowledge is universal, yes;  but its application? I don’t think so, especially in areas of art and culture. Lumbite, exposure is almost superior to mere literary knowledge – almost, but not.

L:  exposure to what? It is not a must you have a first-hand exposure, afterall, we all read pop literatures.

T:  you see, there is a very crucial role that cross-cultural and high societal exposure plays in precipitating the rapid maturation of one’s latent faculty and overall sensibility. Let me send you a quote from J. J. Rousseau’s  ‘confession’ which I found particularly true.

 NB: Jean Jacque Rousseau was a writer and a philosopher. ‘Confession’ was the title of his more than two centuries old autobiography.

L:  please do.

T:  “The seed of literature and philosophy, which began to ferment in my brain, and only waited for culture and  emulation to spring up… “. Lumbite, do you know what that means?

L:  think I do.

T:  Rousseau, as at the time being referred to in this acutely introspective quote, had read three to four times more volumes than myself – volumes more diverse and scholarly than my present, still very scanty, readership could boast of. Yet, he owned up many times that he still often used to act in a very awkward manner in high societies, neither could he conveniently contrive a statement of gallantry to ladies and women alike when occasions demanded it. Lumbite, to know is one thing, to be cultured is another thing entirely. If mere theory equitably corresponds to practice in all sense of proportion and consideration then, Nigerian students wouldn’t feel much lagged behind in the global race to the pinnacle (wherever that is) of civilization.

L:  you know Rousseau as a psychopath, temperamentally with his behaviour to a large extent.

T:  to acquire theoretical or literary knowledge, I think, is the easiest thing; but to acquire the requisite art and skill to apply these floating knowledge is, to my thinking, a more tasking endeavour. And it is even worth stating that one can hardly achieve this end by oneself alone – the reason, I guess, for the “emulation” in Rousseau’s quote. And about him being a psychopathic, I beg to state that I hold a different view.

L:  hmmn! Hmmn! You are right. are you saying we, being conscious of a great lack in ourselves, lack the moral right  to assail them?

T:  well, that’s one and acceptable way of putting it. But, of course, they have their faults still, the problem is more fundamental and goes far beyond our girls.

L:  but remember we are trying to bemoan our ladies’ poor sense of communication and their ineptitude at engaging in sublime quotidian(recurring daily) conversation, not anything deep. They are poor in conversation and the most basic manner of relation with the opposite sex. It is all because they have nothing to say – their mind is empty.

T:  listen to what you said: “… sense of communication and … sublime quotidian conversation… “, and then you said “… not anything deep”. Well, if such expectation as yours is not deep, I don’t know what is. Those are high-powered lofty words that would require a great art on anybody’s part to master. But if you talked strictly about the “… most basic manner of relation”, you are very right, and we are perhaps both justified in judging them from this perspective.

L:  they can hardly share their thought on anything, not even the useless music they hear or the fashion they shallowly pretend to appreciate.

T:  Lumbite, you should know that one’s location also automatically puts one at an advantage in quickly imbibing and cultivating all these things. While that (the location) of the Boston girl is more advantageous than yours (Lagos), yours is more so than mine (Oyo) – at least where cultivation of good and acceptable forms, updated societal norms, interpersonal etiquette, and proper inter-relational conducts are concerned. Do you agree?

L:  nope. I have met too many morons in this city called Lagos, even on unilag campus. Our ladies are stupid!

T:  are you then implying there are no morons abroad, where your lady friend is situated?

L:  there could be, but they will constitute a microscopic minority. That is not really possible where people are nurtured to air their view, no matter how awkward. They speak their mind; they are in possession of enough vocabularies to express how they feel. Here, our girls find it difficult to tell you how they feel about something, they would rather imply by some funny sign or icon.

T:  are you so confident of the minority of the percentage of morons that constitute their population over there? But should we even excuse this as a possible truth, it is only normal given the settlement in question (a metropolitan modern city). So, if you have such to say about those in Lagos, you can imagine the kind I deal with on a daily basis here.

L:  my Boston friend had never replied me with “kk”.

T:  you know, that was quite funny – about our dear girls rather implying how they feel with some funny icon or sign. The ‘kk’, and sometimes ‘lol’, from most girls, usually marks the end of all discussion. These exclamations, ‘kk’ and ‘lol’, represent so many cheap and escapist meaning in most girls’ mind. I think it is their saving remark when they are suddenly caught in-between two extremes of communicative exchange; during a very humorous chatter, and during rare moments of critical conversation – these two virulent text-speak inventions have never failed to come to the quick rescue of their dull mind.

L:  wow! Tiasma, you are absolutely right there. You know, it is hard for our girls to invite a guy over and explain to him why things can’t work out  between them. They have no explanation to make; all they do is throw tantrums. To be mundane to that level is a vice!

T:  (thumbs up). As much as there is much truth embedded in our castigation of the Nigerian species of female, it can still be said, in the final analysis, that they are mostly victims of a downtrodden and backward civilization prevalent in our clime. Because this same class of girls we berate, if set up in another clime that boasts of a more grand culture and values, are not entirely incapable of evolving a better sense of culture, refinement, and sensibility. For me, I think this is where they can be said to be unpardonably culpable, that is, if we are to be any just in our assessment of them: that they have failed to prefer a sound, working mind above that which is parochial and mundane. And I think this to be a just verdict which can neither be faulted nor excused against them.

All enquiries, questions, suggestions, opinions, etc, should be forwarded to either the lines or the email address hereby provided.

awoyemiolumidebabatunde@gmail.com.

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T&L@2014

To be continued…