Over the holidays, myself and a few friends
decided to treat the wives to home made
pounded yam for fun. One of the jokes
cracked was that if the pounded yam had yam
lumps, they'd "send us back to our fathers
houses". That particular statement is an inside
joke especially to the Nigerians who
understand its real usage.
As we got pounding, what started as a joke
began to dawn on us as a threat. Of course
they weren't sending us anywhere but we
were unwilling to live the rest of our lives
taunted so we pounded hard, for that brief
moment pounding, it dawned on me what
women go through on the daily. The fear of
what would happen if the soup got too salty
or if something random went wrong. Only
this time, the threat would be real.
Women don't exactly have it easy to be honest
but that's how society sees it. To not meet up
here is to be a failure in the home.
No excuses, it is unacceptable. Yet, majority of
men cannot successfully heat up water.
We need to wear their shoes sometimes to
fully grasp where it hurts.
It's been almost a week and these shoulders
still hurt, next time I hear poundo yam, I am
never thinking the person is lazy.
