by B. Nyamnjoh
“How well do you know my friend, Wiseman?” Bobinga Iroko asked, as soon as they were alone.
“Not that much. He’s a friend of my supervisor’s. And he has been very helpful in ensuring that I settle in without much pain. He’s arranged for very good and terribly affordable accommodation for me with his colleague Desire, a very friendly woman herself. Desire is such an amazing personality. She’s so friendly that she can enter this place and be friends with everyone within minutes…” Lilly Loveless spoke at length on Dr Wiseman Lovemore and Desire, full of superlatives.
“I’ve known Dr Wiseman Lovemore for years, and we’ve been friends since our secondary school days. He’s very hard-working, but not terribly lucky. It took him years to get his PhD, and it is taking him for ever to change grades. He has been marking time as a lecturer for years. And his scholarly inertia seems to be affecting his social life. His wife, whose highest qualification is a Masters, heads the Department of Rhetoric. She is almost always on a plane to somewhere, to attend one conference or another, and the poor guy is forced to babysit a daughter of whom he seriously doubts he’s the father. He is particularly bitter about the fact that his wife talks openly here and there about her infidelities…”
“His wife is unfaithful?”
“It is the talk of the town. She’s said to be a favourite hunting ground for many, including our very own local champion the Reg, which isn’t surprising, given our penchant for light-skinned women.”
“I now understand why he has never taken me to see his family.”
“The Reg?”
“No, Dr Wiseman Lovemore.”
“He is not a happy man at home.”
“Has he thought of moving out?”
“He thinks it is still possible to patch things up, if only she wouldn’t go around broadcasting their private life at coffee tables and panel discussions at feminist congresses. There are certain things she just shouldn’t talk about outside the home.”
“I do empathise with the fact that he is not happy at home, but you can’t keep your wife from talking to her friends or expressing herself. That’s almost symbolic violence. We survive by discussing our troubles with women friends! And there’s no room for inhibition in scholarship.” Lilly Loveless felt pleased to reproduce her cherished rhetoric in favour of a sister and expert at rhetoric.
“They hardly talk. She at least should talk with him first. Charity begins at home, doesn’t it?”
Lilly Loveless nodded. They at least should talk to each other, try solving their problems themselves, and only after repeated failure at this level should they turn elsewhere for mediation.
“When you visit them as I do,” Bobinga Iroko continued, now drinking directly from the bottle, having inadvertently broken his glass. “You notice the huge chasm between them. He seems to live at the back of the house where there’s the kitchen and she seems to live at the front of the house. Their daughter is often made to serve like a boundary tree between two warring villages.”
“It must be really tough for both of them.”
“What would you say to this: A year ago, she left their marital bedroom, to sleep in the parlour, and sometimes in their daughter’s bedroom.”
“I think that’s completely natural. I know several married couples where he has his room and she has hers. Sometimes they visit each other at night … My mom and dad lived like that for a couple of years before their divorce.”
“No, that doesn’t exist here in Africa.”
“I admit my knowledge of Africa isn’t that great, but I’d be surprised if Africa is that different from Muzunguland,” she replied, taking care not to sound as if she wanted to pick a quarrel on the rampant attitude (often informed by assumptions of superiority, she was convinced) of ‘Africa is not like your Muzunguland’ that she encountered almost every day.
“That’s exactly what she would say, has always said. It must be something Muzungulander … how you are brought up, perhaps,” observed Bobinga Iroko.
“What do you mean? Is Dr Wiseman Lovemore’s wife a Muzungulander?”
“What did you think? He hasn’t told you that his wife is half white, half black? Only half as white as you, but Muzungu all the same?”
“No, he’s told me very little about his family situation, like I said.” Lilly Loveless was still to come to terms with what she had just heard. Dr Wiseman Lovemore, married to a Muzungu? He didn’t come across that way. How interesting… “When did they marry? How did they meet?”
“That, you’d have to ask him.”
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be discussing his private life in his absence.”
“As I was saying,” Bobinga Iroko went on, “if and when she speaks to him, her words are harsh. They burn his heart like vomit from the belly of the mountain.”
“Instead of just listening to her words, he should listen to her actions. If she didn’t care, would she still be sharing the same house with him? I bet she buys all the groceries and does all the cooking. You talked about words. What soft words does he say with her? What has he done to lure her back some nights? Why should we take those acts for granted?” Lilly Loveless was all too conscious of springing to the defence of a sister without any real knowledge of the facts of the case.
This, Bobinga Iroko picked up on. “You talk as if you’ve been there and know who does what, and who says or doesn’t say what. You may have some wise words, but you don’t really know what it’s like.”
“Maybe so,” she conceded. “All I know is that it seems God gives us this funny thing we call love, then he seems to sit back and enjoy watching what we’ll do next …”
“He also gives us investigative journalists to document what we do next, and with whom,” he laughed, and screamed for the waiter to replenish the drinks.
They drank and chatted deep into the night. Lilly Loveless learnt a lot.
Bobinga Iroko told her more about Dr Mukala-Satannie, how he came to write his column for The Talking Drum, and how he got offered part-time lectureship at the university. Dr Mukala-Satannie was unemployed back home in Muzunguland. He had completed a PhD on Karl Marx at a time when everyone was saying farewell to Marx. He used to give free public lectures to interested students and the clientele of a pub next to the university that awarded him a degree that could not be listed on the stock exchange.
It was at those lectures that he met a young, beautiful woman who had a soft spot for philosophy. She had just completed a Masters programme on Sustainable Philosophies of Environmental Management, and had been offered a very good job in Mimboland, with the Mimbo Forest Conservation Project, funded and managed entirely by Muzungulanders. The unmarried young woman feared being lonely in Africa.
When Dr Mukala-Satannie heard of her prospective fat expatriate salary, and especially of the fact that her husband could earn an unemployment allowance as well as live prosperously above the infectious misery of Africans, he said to her jokingly: “Why not marry me? If it works, fine, if it doesn’t, you could always repatriate me.”
She took him seriously. Tall, huge, imposing and instinctively aggressive, he was just what she needed to feel safe in Mimboland, where men were rumoured to have an aggressive desire for unattended women.
She was flattered when he discouraged her from wearing makeup, saying: “There’s no need seeking to enhance what is already perfect.”
They hastily married, and left for Africa.
Three things he remembered to bring along: The writings of Karl Marx which he hoped to invest in every African he met; Cuban cigars which he had accumulated over the years, stolen off his stepfather’s impressive collection of the finest Habana without him noticing; and different whiskies, brandies and wines to keep him going. He once described himself as a man who had reconciled capitalism with communism in his personal life, the only place where such reconciliation was possible, by making his “determined communist mind pregnant with material ambitions”. His mastery of Karl Marx struck an instant chord with the pro
vocative and recalcitrant head of Political Science at the University of Mimbo. With an understaffed department and plethoric student numbers, the head of Political Science had little difficulty making a case for Dr Mukala-Satannie to be recruited as a part-time lecturer… The conversation was no doubt interesting, but Lilly Loveless was dying to go to bed.
“I should be heading home,” she told Bobinga Iroko, yawning. “Could you point out where to get a taxi to where I live?”
“I’m not too drunk to drop you off,” he replied, standing up, his half finished bottle ignored. “Let’s go.”
It was difficult to say whether Bobinga Iroko’s sobriety was literal or figurative, but Lilly Loveless was trusting enough to entrust herself to him.
“Just a moment,” she said and went over to the two students of Dr Wiseman Lovemore, who were still there with the men. She introduced herself as a friend of Dr Lovemore’s, and as a researcher, although she stayed deliberately vague on what she was researching. She gave them each her complimentary card, at the same time as she complimented their beautiful hairdo and lovely outfits. Then said she would very much love to meet and discuss with them at their convenience. They exchanged phone numbers. Against the first Lilly Loveless wrote “Fancy”, and against the other “Goodness” – the names the girls gave her.
“I’ll call you,” she told Fancy and Goodness with a giggle.
“Enjoy the rest of your night,” they giggled back, sizing her up. Something about the way they exchanged looks told her what exactly they meant.
She looked at Bobinga Iroko who was watching the starry skies and smiled, broadly.
As Lilly Loveless drove home with Bobinga Iroko, her thoughts were much less of the rest of the night than of the mysterious Mrs Lovemore.
She determined to meet her by hook or by crook.
5
Lilly Loveless is sitting at the CNN New Look, having a conversation with Britney, the receptionist of Mountain View Hotel, who impressed her the very first day they met. Britney has accepted to serve as her research assistant on weekends, and to conduct interviews on her days off and especially during the strike period, as she would not have that much time once courses resume at the university where she is a student as well. Lilly Loveless has already sensed that to tap Britney and her connections is to tap a wealth of information and experience as a participant observer. They’ve agreed on an allowance that pleases them both.
Today Britney is presenting the results of her first interviews, for feedback. Lilly Loveless’ digital recorder is switched on, and Britney is keen to impress. The money is good and badly needed.
Drinks – a Mimbo-Wanda for the one, a Pamplemouse for the other – and soya are served to them in the back room where they are seated, away from the noisy customers, and the musical cacophony generated by competing bars.
Britney, playing with the tassel of her small beaded purse on the table, begins anxiously: “Here at the University of Mimbo, we use the term ‘Mboma,’ to refer to a married man who is usually older and with children and who just can’t resist what younger university, high or secondary school girls offer.”
Lilly Loveless fidgeted with her recorder to be sure it was recording. Satisfied, she sat back and listened, taking down notes from time to time, and scrutinizing Britney to determine if she had made the right choice of research assistant.
Britney started with an opinion: “First and foremost, affairs in our environment are encouraged by money. And we know money is the source of all evil. Money is the machinery behind most cases mentioned of this nature, as you’ll see from the interviews I have conducted. Nevertheless, it does not wipe out the fact that there are other aspects attached to affairs.”
Lilly Loveless didn’t interrupt, but she would have to ask Britney to keep her opinions in check in future interviews. Scholarship is not about subjectivities. Objectivity is paramount, and a good researcher is one who sterilises her personal opinions the way a zombie without a tongue does her words.
“I know a girl, Emma,” Britney continued, presenting her first interview. “She is a dark, beautiful girl of average height. She reads Life Sciences and lives not faraway from here, with her junior sister who is also in the university and reads the Bilingual Series. She is going out with a 55 year-old Mboma in town. I shall call him Innocent. Let me add right away that other Mbomas I know are much younger than this man, and given their lucrative jobs as customs inspectors and state treasurers in Sawang, they are certainly much more competitive with girls here in Puttkamerstown than Innocent could ever be on his meagre salary and lousy bribes as an ordinary civil servant. But since he can’t simply allow them to beat him hands down, he invests as much of his salary and bribes as he can into these fountains of delight, if you don’t mind the expression.”
“So it is all about competing for the attention of the girls?” asked Lilly Loveless, taking a sip of her Mimbo-Wanda.
Britney nodded and added, “He wants to prove himself to his competitors and to himself, that he is a force to reckon with, despite his modest means.”
“Interesting, very interesting,” Lilly Loveless noted in her notebook.
Britney continued: “Innocent’s wife of 35 years, a beauty in her days, complains, using the fact of their children’s education, five of them, to appeal to his conscience. But he just can’t see himself giving up on such exciting encounters with ever more beautiful girls at the university and schools around. That doesn’t mean he totally neglects his wife or kids. No, he couldn’t do that for the world! He claims all over that he gives them as much as possible the lifestyle they aspire to, which isn’t negligible, believe me. His eldest daughter is in high school, and they rent and live in what by every standard should pass for a comfortable house, which is just like the personal retirement house he built in his home village up country during his days as a top civil servant when bribes and salaries used to be hefty and distractions not as plentiful.
“Emma’s parents are not poor by any means. Her Mboma, Innocent, met her at a students’ party organised at the M&G nightclub, commonly known amongst students as ‘Mbomas and Girls.’ That was during the second semester of her first year at UM. Innocent, although at the party with his wife, still managed to make an appointment with Emma. Men can be as cunning and subtle as a serpent. Before the party he is said to have practised well-known dance steps used by young boys to attract and impress young babes.
“Even then, Innocent had to go out on several dates with Emma before she yielded to date him regularly. He promised to take good care of her. If the material possessions of Emma are used as an index for Innocent’s ability to take good care of a woman, then Emma has no need to complain.
“Innocent gives Emma a lot of money. As noted above, Emma lives with her junior sister and this used to disturb Innocent. So in the fourth semester, Innocent asked her to move to an apartment which he equipped with good sofas and a family size bed. She is from a rich family no doubt, but her parents refused to provide certain things for her on the basis that these were luxuries for a student. These things were however rapidly provided by Innocent. They included a TV set, a compact disc set, a fan, a Moulinex blender, a fridge, and a wool carpet, just to name a few. He also feeds and clothes her. He buys her expensive body lotions, perfumes, shoes, jewellery, clothes and airtime for the cute little cell phone he bought her as a birthday present.
“Health-wise, Innocent takes good care of Emma whenever she is sick. It should be noted that his ‘generosity’ extends to Emma’s junior sister. He settles their hospital bills and pays their transport back home during vacation, among other things here and there, now and again. This keeps Emma’s junior sister happy and stops her from reporting her elder sister to their parents, and perhaps from aspiring to be like her sister.
“Innocent takes Emma to social gatherings like parties and also to nightclubs, like Black & White in Sakersbeach, M&G in Puttkamerstown, Biblos in Sawang and even Libidinal in distant Nyamandem. At times he takes her fr
iends and junior sister along with them.
“Socially, Innocent does his best to satisfy Emma but she is always annoyed. She never seems to have enough since he is not usually there when she needs him. As a ‘responsible’ married man, he has to spend time with his family, but as a lover, she needs him just as much. And he loves the way she makes him feel proud, especially when she says things like: ‘You may not be the only man I have known, but you are certainly the only one who has marked me’.
“Word reached Innocent’s wife that he was having an affair with Emma. Like a puff adder she stayed cool initially and pleaded with her informant to watch them at close range. It was therefore not surprising when she surprised her husband at Emma’s apartment one weekend. Innocent had left the house saying he was going to their home village for an urgent funeral, only for his wife to meet his car parked outside Emma’s apartment. She rapped at the door continuously, shouting her husband’s name, claiming that their baby son was critically sick. But Innocent didn’t answer. She left, and I don’t have any details how they resolved matters that day.
“If you permit, I would add here that in other instances where wives have met their husbands in similar situations, they have destroyed their cars and caused quite a scene. There is the story of a university professor whose wife caught him in the act at a resting place, destroyed his car, stormed the door and pulled the girl out of bed and went into a fight with her. She then drove the car home, making her husband bear the shame of taking a taxi home to face her wrath.”
Britney watched Lilly Loveless take notes and was impressed. Even with the recorder on, Lilly Loveless wrote frantically as if she distrusted her very own recorder terribly. Britney could see that Lilly Loveless was intimate with her subject matter, reading far more in the account Britney was sharing than Britney who collected the data. It would be great to read that notebook of hers some day, Britney wished. In a beautiful and mysterious way, she imagined the words in the pages of Lilly Loveless’ notebook reaching out and touching her, saying: ‘welcome to the life of Lilly Loveless, our beloved foster mother’. Britney wondered what would happen if Lilly Loveless were to lose her notebook.