The First Wife

by Paulina Chiziane

“The first principle is this: Treat your wife as you do your own mother. The moment you close your eyes and plunge into her flight, she becomes your creator, the true mother of the whole universe. Every woman is the personification of motherhood, whether she’s your wife, your concubine, or even a prostitute. Man should thank God for all the color and light woman gives, for without her, life wouldn’t exist. A true man doesn’t raise his hand to his mother, his goddess, his creator.”

  “But that’s in the north,” I remind her. “I’m from here, from the south.”

  Of all the things I’ve learned today, I like this lesson the best. Because marriage should be a relationship without any wars. Because I’ve received many a slap in my life. Because a peaceful home is made without violence. Because a man who beats his wife destroys his own love. I place my hand upon my conscience and am shaken by a thread of remorse: Why did I attack Julieta?

  We talk now about colors. She tells me all men are creatures. Butterflies. Insects. They are seduced by the breeze, by a rainbow, by anything from which color and light emanate.

  “Red attracts buffaloes, bulls. Ripe fruit attracts the hunger and greed of all birds. Flowers attract the eyes of all human beings. The secret of seduction lies in color. Imitate nature and dress like a flower in order to attract the gaze of all and stimulate hidden desires.

  “Man is a creature susceptible to sounds. In the murmur of the pine trees, he sleeps and dreams. In the rustling of the palms, he finds ecstasy. He finds enchantment in birdsong. In the wafting of a flute, he feels elated. In the hissing of a snake, he is alarmed. Set your sonorous trap. Make your flute play a voice that lulls, softly, whisperingly, slow and melodious. From those pines, take the divine murmur that will help him rest from his fatigue. If you hiss loudly like a snake, you’ll scare your prey away.

  “Man is an elephant. Majestic. But an elephant is attracted to an ant. A large eye is always charmed by something small. Don’t try to be big, be small. Very small, almost microscopic, but astute and aware so as to attack the vital points. Be the bacterium that causes man to sway in the dance of an itchy skin. Be the virus that causes a great man to shiver to the rhythm of a fever. Be yourself. Natural. An adult surrenders enchanted before a child’s smile.

  “Man is a javelin. The tip of a spear. Man is a line without end, as straight as a die. Man is a bullet that wounds space on its way to conquer the world. Straight lines join the heavens to the ground, extending to the very end of the horizon. Let man be the end, for you are the beginning.

  “Woman is a curved line. Curved are the movements of the sun and the moon. Curved is the movement of the wooden spoon in the clay pot. Curved is the position adopted in repose. Have you noticed how all animals curl up when they sleep? We women are a river of deep and shallow curves over each part of our body. Curves move things round in a circle. Man and woman are united in one sole curve in the meanderings of our paths. Curved are our lips and our kisses. The uterus is curved. The egg. The celestial dome. Curves enclose all the secrets of the world.

  “Not to have love isn’t a question of fate, but a disaster. Learn from this lesson of mine. Love is an investment. It is born, dies, and is reborn just like the sun’s cycle. Look here, never say I didn’t teach you. Love is a taper that has been lit, and it’s up to you to keep the flame going. The rest is all trickery, my pretty one. Techniques. Knacks. Everything in life is mortal, everything comes to an end. If your flame is extinguished, the fault lies in you. Do what I say, and no amount of magic will ever defeat you in life. You are the epitome of bewitchment and you shouldn’t seek any other magic. A woman’s body is magic. Strength. Weakness. Salvation. Perdition. The entire universe can be contained in a woman’s curves.”

  My fear of losing Tony is temporarily thwarted. These classes are attuned to my hopes like a velvet blanket. I feel as if a huge veil is falling away from in front of my eyes, while tiny secrets fill my soul like dewdrops. This woman is like the morning star as far as I am concerned. I’m being reborn, I’m growing, rejuvenating. Her voice penetrates me like the gurgling of spring water. She is a refreshing breeze.

  “Nature favors us, she’s our sister, our confidante. Dress in the colors of the flowers, of the sky, the wind, and the entire firmament. Seek out the soul of precious stones and make a pact with them. Gold, silver, pearls, diamonds, rubies, emeralds, topaz. Learn the secret of their contrasts. A really dark black with very white teeth is a fatal attraction. You are a nice dark black woman. Wear plenty of gold to make your black hue shine. Wear ivory.”

  I’m completely won over. No one dominates a man better than a seductress in vampish colors. A wild bull is hunted using red. In love, there are neither big issues nor small. The polish on a fingernail can capture a man’s heart. An eyelash. A contrasting shadow in the corner of an eye. Smooth skin. A soft voice. One’s toes.

  We talk of gentle hands in a relaxing caress. Of techniques to soften the skin with the white mask made of musiro paste. We pause for a moment to discuss contradictions. In southern culture, it’s said that smooth skin is as slippery as a catfish, and men don’t like it. It’s no coincidence that women of an older generation have thick tattoos on their hips, their belly, their breasts, and their face, to make their skin wrinkled and palatable. We agree: sensuality is a cultural matter.

  I was introduced to how eyes express love. The eyes of a cat. A snake. Eyes that draw you in. Sensual eyes. There are no ugly women in the world, according to the counselor. Love is blind. There are only different women.

  She insists on the principle of pleasing your man.

  “If you want a man, captivate him through the kitchen and in bed,” she says. “There are male foods and there are female foods. When it comes to chicken, women eat the feet, the wings, and the neck. Men are served the thighs. And the gizzard.”

  “Chicken gizzard? In the north as well?” I ask, full of curiosity.

  “Yes, in the north too.”

  “How funny. I would never have imagined it.”

  “In the north, the business of the gizzard sometimes produces conflict between couples that may end in violence and even divorce.”

  “Wow! It’s like that in the south as well. This tradition must be resisted.”

  “Challenged? Changed? What for? As far as I’m concerned, I think it should be maintained, because it’s a good bit of bait. A man is vanquished through his gluttony. If you want to make some love magic, make it with what they like most. The gizzard.”

  An ironic smile comes to my lips. In matters of food, there’s no north and south. All men are greedy and they only invent myths relating to meat, fish, and eggs. There are no myths about cabbages and lettuces. Occasionally, you get myths involving beans and rice, money-producing crops. Men are all the same. We laugh heartily together.

  “When you think about it,” the teacher says, “what’s in a gizzard? Women can well do without it, even if they can die from it as well.”

  “Could it be that a gizzard has some aphrodisiac power?”

  “Not at all. It’s merely a chosen piece. And it’s not even tasty. At least, I don’t like it.”

  I attended many classes, fifteen in all. I even went to the most secret classes that focused on themes one can’t talk about. While in other parts of Africa they carry out the famous so-called female excision, here genitalia are left to drop. Elsewhere, pleasure is repressed, here it’s stimulated. My teacher tells me that preparation for love has no age and I believe her.

  These classes are my initiation rites. The church and other systems regarded these practices as heresy, and set out to destroy a field of knowledge that they didn’t even possess. I review my life. I was thrown into marriage without any preparation at all. I am bitter. I was made to learn things that are of no use whatsoever. I even went to ballet school – just imagine! I learned all these things from European ladies, things such as how to bake fairy cakes, embroider, be well mannered, all things associated with the drawing room. Anything to do with the bedroom
? Nothing! The famous sexual education was limited to the study of the reproductive apparatus, and the various cycles. About living together as a couple? Nothing! The books, which were written by priests, invoked gods in every possible position. On a married couple’s positions? Nothing! While in the streets, there were pornographic magazines. Between pornography and saintliness, there was nothing! No one ever explained to me why it is that a man exchanges one woman for another. No one ever told me about the origin of polygamy. Why is it that the church prohibited practices that were so important for harmony within the home? Why is it that the generation that brought us freedom raised their fists and shouted, “Down with initiation rites”? Is it a crime to have a school about love? They said these schools encouraged backwardness. And they do. They say they’re conservative. And they are. So is the church. So are the universities and formal schools. Instead of destroying the love schools, why not reform them? The colonized man is blind. He destroys what’s his and assimilates what’s from outside, without seeing his own navel. So what now? There’s much pain and disappointment in our country, women lose their husbands because they lack skill in love. People talk about love and they point straightaway at the heart, and that’s all. But love involves the heart, the body, the soul, dreams, and hope. Love is the whole universe and that’s why neither anatomy nor cardiology has ever managed to indicate on which side of the heart love lies.

  During these last few days I have learned some interesting things. Very interesting. Things that can’t be talked about woman to woman, but only among students of the academy of love. I learned that initiation rites are a far more important institution than all the other formal and informal institutions put together, and that their secrets are never divulged. I learned the most intimate secrets. Secrets about love and life. Secrets about love and death. Women evince an air of weakness, but they can sting like bees. They can make a man weep with love like a child, until his soul is drained. They can hold a man’s life in the palm of their hand, humiliate him until he surrenders breathless, until he gives himself up body and soul, and becomes their slave. Now I understand that swaying but secure gait that northern women have. Now I understand that singing tone of voice, that dormant, reptilian gaze. More than ever before, I now understand why men from all quarters of the world who migrate to the north of this country never again return to their native land. I don’t know how or when I shall be able to apply all this knowledge. I’m going to confess a secret to you: I feel like going out and seeking someone upon whom to try out all the lessons I’ve learned. In my old exhausted marriage, Tony has known me for long enough and is sick of me. He’s going to notice a change in my behavior. Even so, I’m going to give it a try. But what a pity I’ve only learned all this now!

  I think I now have a better understanding of why some husbands in the north are submissive, why they transform their wives into queens, and have them go around in rickshaws so that they don’t have to tread on the ground and pick up dust. When they go out for their Sunday stroll, some husbands carry their baby and a bag of diapers, so that their wives won’t crease their dress. At the end of the month, husbands spend almost all their earnings to buy cloth and gold just to adorn their queens. These women know a lot. They know all about the body’s geography. Where the sun resides. They know how to ignite flames and guide men through unknown caverns. They know how to lull a man, make him small, until he seems to be floating once more in his mother’s womb.

  In the north, without the rites of initiation, you aren’t a person, you’re lighter than the wind. You can’t get married, no one will accept you, and if they do accept you, they’ll abandon you straightaway. You can’t attend the funeral of your parents or your own children. You can’t approach any dead body because you haven’t gained maturity, you are still a child. Any child who is accidentally born before the parents have fulfilled the rituals is considered trash, impure, nonexistent. Initiation rites are like baptism for Christians. Without baptism, a human being is a pagan. He has no right to heaven. In the south, a man who doesn’t pay the bride price loses his right to paternity and cannot carry out the funeral of his spouse or children. Because he’s an inferior being. Because he’s less of a man. Children born in a marriage where the bride price hasn’t been paid have no homeland. They can’t inherit their father’s land, much less that of their mother. The children keep the mother’s family name. There are men who pay their wives’ bride price after these have died, just so that they can give them a dignified funeral. There are men who have paid the bride price for their children and grandchildren, even when these are grown up, just so that they can leave them their inheritance. A woman who hasn’t had her bride price paid has no homeland. She is rejected to such an extent that she isn’t allowed to step onto her father’s land even after death.

  The bride price in the south and initiation rites in the north. Strong, indestructible institutions. They resisted colonialism. Christianity and Islam. They resisted revolutionary tyranny. They will always survive. Because they are the essence, the soul, of the people. Through them, a people affirms itself before the world and demonstrates its will to live according to its own ways.

  I got some really brightly colored clothes made in yellow, red, and orange. I put them on and went over to the mirror. I was magnificent. Everything about me spoke of ripened fruit. Cherries, cashews, apples. I was quite simply a temptress. Along came Tony, and his eyes latched on to me. My heart was pumping, dear God, how right the counselor was! The lessons were paying off. Soon he came over to me. He was going to kiss me. Caress my silky skin, softened by the musiro. He was going to lead me to the bedroom, where I would put into practice part two of my special classes. He placed his hand on my shoulder, dear God, how right the counselor was! All of a sudden he let me go, took two steps back, and gave me a mocking smile.

  “You’re so full of color, you look like a butterfly. You look like saffron. Ripe chili pepper. What inspired you to such gaudy tastes?”

  I was crestfallen. Everything was going well. I think I overdid the perfume, it was too much, I reckon. Too much perfume is nauseating, even if it’s good perfume. But no, it wasn’t the perfume, no. It must have been the image of the other woman – the third one, not the second – who broke the spell. I’m left angry about everything. I want to meet this third woman who has driven my husband out of his wits.

  I rush to the mirror and spill it all out.

  “I dreamed about this moment so much, everything’s gone to pieces, what shall I do now, my dear mirror?”

  “Where’s your fighting spirit, my friend? You’ve failed today, but you can try again!”

  Thank you, dear mirror. Losing a battle isn’t losing the war. Tomorrow’s another day.

  5

  I woke up thinking about the third woman, who is driving my husband crazy. Who has turned me into a married woman with an empty bed. Has made the second woman, Julieta, a rejected spinster with a child in her belly. I would so like to meet this third woman, who has so much honey inside her, not in order to wage war, but to learn from her. I’d like to know what color clothes she wears. The smell of her perfume. The color of her skin. I’d like to know who her tremendous love counselor is. Julieta thought she was so much better than me that she usurped my position, dethroned me, but along came this one, and game over! This third woman was incredible, and avenged my jealousy.

  I left home first thing in the morning, spurred on by curiosity to meet this woman, this exceptional artiste. I didn’t go seeking her out of malice, as I’ve already said, but the moment I entered her home, she felt as if she’d been invaded, threatened by my presence, and immediately set about assaulting me physically. We fought. We knocked over everything around us: glasses, dishes, vases, plants, everything was smashed to pieces. I came with good intent, I shouted, alarmed. Get out of my house, she kept saying. You don’t own anything, I replied, furious. Everything here is my property, it was bought with the money of my husband, who is mine by right, we were married in b
oth the registry office and the church, and for your information, with full community of property, I replied while suffering the worst hiding of my life. That’s where you’re wrong, you’ll see who’s right, screamed my adversary as she dug her nails into my skin, leaving my body with deep scratches. The blows I was suffering were just too much. I decided to get away, I opened the door and ran off down the road. But she chased after me and struck me so many times that I was almost left for dead. Our screaming attracted the neighbors and a lot of onlookers who commented among themselves: Two women fighting in broad daylight? It must be over a man! The men shouted: Sock it to her, punch her, stick one on her. I couldn’t understand whether all the shouting was encouragement for me or for her, but she was knocking me about with unusual ferocity.

  The police caught us red-handed and took us off to the police station, where we were arrested, charged with causing a public disturbance. We were greeted straightaway at the entrance by a nauseating stench, like some message of welcome. The police had trawled the scum of the earth and got a good catch, the cell was overflowing with outcast women of all types. It was a small cell. Hot. Packed with people. We had to brush against each other’s bodies whenever we wanted to move an arm or a leg. Some were robbers. Others had sexually assaulted other women. Others sold drugs, while others still, their consumers, drifted in fantastic dreams. Some had been involved in public disorder, like ourselves. Lying in a corner was a girl who looked about fifteen. She was groaning with pain and fever. She had thrown her newborn baby on the rubbish dump. The heat caused our bodies to stew, showing how putrid human beings are. The place smelled of blood, of childbirth. It smelled of people, of women. Of heat. Those who were menstruating could be smelled from afar like open-air latrines. The place was seething, stinking, nauseating. I prayed to the gods to give me strength to withstand such torture.

  As we went in, I took Luísa’s hand and trembled. She didn’t reject me and also held on to me. We stood there, stuck to each other, paralyzed, while the other women looked at us in surprise. Ours was a private fight and we weren’t supposed to end up there. Ah, my love, what paths are you leading me down? My dream of holding on to my husband had thrown me into the hands of the police. Me, Rami, arrested, but who would have thought it? Me, a married woman. A good housewife. Me, an exemplary wife, meek and loving, behind bars. I hadn’t even seen to the household chores that day, my children didn’t even know where I was, I didn’t tell anyone where I was going. All I could think of was how to get out of there and run back to the comfort of my home. While I wept, I shot Luísa a remorseful look.