Thank You For Coming

Vasilis Onwuaduegbo

First of all, if you met me now, you would be confused. I am behind on rent and overdrawn on several bank accounts, and I am writing to you. Life has not turned out to be what we expected it to be. It is upsetting, but we can only continue to choose life. We can only continue to put a step in front of the other, bracing for thunder and lightning and wind and ice.

I feel foolish for not seeing you earlier. I think I always knew I was speaking to you, but I didn’t allow myself to be sure. You know what it is, I could not let myself be seen by you until I felt ready to be revealed, to bare myself naked to your scrutiny while I recount how my life unfolded the way it did. It is a whirlwind story, but I am proud of every drop. I have been drawn to death on numerous occasions, and the past attempts to talk to you have unlocked experiences that I could never have dreamt of, and I hope this final letter to you will do the same.

The last memory we shared was the side glance at the Murtala Mohammed Airport departures section. If I recall correctly, non-travelers couldn’t cross beyond a certain point that could be seen through the glass walls, and I remember we waved. And the next thing I remember, we were in America.

Actually, I do remember stopping in Dubai and feeling cool, then stopping in Milan and feeling even cooler, and finally landing in New York and feeling sore. The move to America was so urgent that comfortability ranked low. Don’t overreact, though; when it was introduced to us, it was introduced as an adventure. And it was an adventure indeed.

We got to go to the Middle East. Then we got to reenter Europe as a more conscious human, amazing! And the landing in New York, though hundreds of miles from Indianapolis, will always have a mystical status in my life. We landed, and things sped up; the risk heightened. Dreaming about America is not the same as existing in it, and I think this might be why our perspectives differ so strongly.

When I look at my life in the present, and I feel it does not compare to the life I should have, I am comparing it to you. We made a pact that we would part only because I would find peace elsewhere, and here, I am, in the elsewhere, and peace has not come. I am here to tell you that we made that pact when we did not know better. The split that has become my foundation did not result in heaven—my god, what a horror.

What we had known during those last days in Lagos was that Nigeria would not offer us more than it had already, so it was in our best interest to pour ourselves into ‘the abroad.’ It might bear unexpected fruit, and unexpected fruit, it did.

Grâce à papa, when we got to New York, we were immediately sent for processing at immigration. Our fingerprints were taken, and we filled out forms. I remember just confirming and confirming the spelling of my name. My date of birth. The Indiana address I had never visited. I was so jittery, and to this day, I still get nervous around customs officials. Each flight is a breath held upon entry into the airport at origin and released only upon exit at the final airport. I know more positive travel experiences in the future will rectify this.

Indeed, by the miracle of determination and a million questions posed to every passing soul, we found our way to the exit. A man from our father’s girlfriend’s family came to pick us up and take us to his apartment for dinner. It was one of the most satisfying drives in my post-Naija life. On the way, he pointed out Riker’s Island, and I thought it was weird to acknowledge a prison the way one would acknowledge the Eiffel Tower.

We were served white rice with stew and plantain. I have come to deeply appreciate welcoming rituals and the attempts to make a new space seem familiar. I like it because it doesn’t last; eventually, no one has the time.

We were expected to take a bus from New York to Indianapolis. As the oldest boy, I ensured that everybody (Chinye, Kachi, and myself) made it to Indy unscathed. I remember the whispers in my ear with threats.

“If X happens, you will pay for it.”

“You better not mess up.”

“Pay attention, be serious, be a man. You are the first child and the big brother. Your siblings depend on you.”

And this was true. About halfway between New York and Indy, maybe in Pennsylvania, Chinye started to feel ill. Her bones and muscles hurt, and it seemed like she had a cold. It was hard to witness because the heaven I had thought we could discover was nowhere to be found, and even my optimism could do nothing to change the fact that we had been in transit for more than 48 hours, and right of the bat, it didn’t look like it was worth it.

Moving through America on a Greyhound really punctures the glossy image that Hollywood creates of the state. But even more than showing some of America’s oldest and most run-down transit hubs, taking the Greyhound halfway across the country pushes against the myth that folks in ‘the abroad’ behave in rational well-mannered ways all the time.

After spending years listening to folks justify the chaos of Naija living by insisting that we would enter perpetual enjoyment when we moved outside the country again, it was confusing to my seventeen-year-old mind to see Americans (presumably born and raised) having such harrowing experiences. The people that leaned against the walls with paper cups placed in front of them. The ones that seemed to be half asleep and always angry. The ones that looked like they had a personal vendetta against showers and toothpaste.

Unlike Nigeria, where it seemed that dysfunction could always be pointed to state neglect, here I realized that the world was truly a difficult place to navigate (with or without a strong government structure).

We finally arrived at the Indianapolis central station, and I was just terrified. What would it mean for our dad to be the primary parent?

As I write, I imagine that he would one day pick up this piece of work and read my words as if they were written for him, so I have to clarify.

Years of work have revealed things about my past that I did not know while experiencing those past events.

Sometimes, entering a situation terrified is seen as the invitation of trauma; but as a seventeen-year-old, I didn’t believe I was going into legitimate violence. I just thought I would need to work a lot harder to keep the peace, but at least I would be in America. That would be the reward.

I think a difference between our family, a family of migrants separated by borders and varying legal status, and other families with neater links to their states of residence is that parenting decisions are made partially in favor of the child’s wants.

“Chidubem has a cool group of friends in Nigeria, maybe he should move to the States right after the graduation ceremony, and then he can visit Naija next summer if he saves up.”

After spending a considerable chunk of our life, from six to seventeen, almost exclusively with our mother and other relatives, it was new to be placed in the permanent custody of our father. He had never revealed himself as the nurturing type, and his criticism was fierce. Even in the moments when we connected when we were apart (over the phone, during the summer visits), I always felt tenser around him. He expected this. You stand up straight when you near me.

Bitch, the way gayness factors into this will blow your mind. See how we were trying to tell ourselves that we could actually make do on the promise not to be ’a gay’. But, unfortunately, the gay in us slipped through even when we didn’t permit it.

Before we left, we had formed a way of being in Nigeria that allowed us a certain level of femininity. We didn’t mind that we were the bookish go-getter trying to be a doctor, lawyer, and engineer. It allowed us to avoid questions of why we weren’t dating. People often questioned why we didn’t have a masculine stiffness, but we quickly changed the subject and moved on.

The problem with our move to America is that we moved to a more open society but into a more restrictive house. It wasn’t enough that we had mastered a satisfactory performance of manliness; he wanted more. He would never say (or maybe he has, I forget) that he wants a change of spirit, “you shouldn’t be who you are.” But the problem is that the person I am ends up cosplaying as the person he wants me to be—a terrible performance for both audience and actor.

I’m never sure what will incite the anger. Is it when I slip and pronounce okro as okra (playing with newly learned American alternatives) or when I ask to be taken to my voting center job at six in the morning? I must admit, even I would snap if I was woken up at six so my child could volunteer as a poll worker like six miles away in the winter, but then on the reverse side, you peep how much of a burden you are.

As I started driving throughout Indy and the suburbs, I realized that it was in one’s best interest to only leave the house when necessary. But unfortunately, I didn’t have that awareness when I signed up for that gig, and one could say that miscommunication existed.

But even outside my silly cultural faux pas, I had thought that our dearest papa would say, “Volunteering, what a good boy.”

It is so weird to admit that I wanted my father’s positive reinforcement because it always leads to questions about the orientation of my spirit. I sincerely believe that every child, regardless of gender or perceived sexuality, deserves love from their guardians. It won’t kill anyone if one thing a child does is seen as right.

I am not altruistic because I want to receive undue favors. But often, it feels like philanthropic work allows me to be both authentic to my desires in life and be in a line of work that can be objectively classified as good. It had been a shocker to learn that I wouldn’t win his heart by giving to the world, and I guess I realized that the work cut out for me might not be surmountable after all.

When we were preparing to move, we didn’t see that our lives started when our father had been in the world for thirty years already. When he would say, “No matter all the school you go to, you no fi senior me.” I used to think it referred to mental capacity, but I learned it also related to one’s experience of capitalism. If we are counting from my birth the time spent acquiring individual wealth, my father has a thirty-year head start. And even while you were growing to learn about your body and the world, he was learning from his failures and finding ways to reap the most benefits from the system. This was also a head start.

In the stories of families that love themselves unconditionally, the things I refer to as a head start would be seen as a shared blessing.

I was watching a documentary on Mormon fundamentalist sects, and I learnt the priesthood holder concept. I am not an expert in Mormon tradition, but I believe the priesthood holder represents the authority of the Church of Latter-Day Saints in the home. I learnt that wives and children were not automatically tied to their husbands and fathers because of marriage and blood. If a father was deemed unworthy by the church, he could be relieved of his role as the priesthood holder and be barred from maintaining a relationship with them.

I thought it was a fascinating concept because it allowed the church to intervene if it was believed that the father was leading the family astray. There are numerous monitoring and policing structures for women and children, for single men and women, for queer and gender non-conforming folks, but who has the power to correct the actions of a married man, a father, especially in his home?

I remember numerous occasions when my aunties would give my mother a tongue lashing because she acted in a way that seemed detrimental to her husband, their brother, but no one could caution him if his actions were wrong.

Dear lover boy, a day or two before I started writing this, I called an uncle, and I told him a bit of what happened towards the end of 2014, and he said, in a way that caught me off guard, “Why would Ike do that?”

Why would Ike do that? I, too, would like to know.

That has been the limit of the criticism. There was no intervention, whether at church or with some of his friends. We don’t typically use the phrase, priesthood holder. Still, when we talk about father, we mean either Father as the provider, the protector, and the resident wise man or father, the man blessed with this label by genetics or legal declaration. Often, the father is expected to be a Father; but it isn’t always the case. If you have a father that doesn’t (quote unquote) simp, you will likely not find a good Father in them.

I have a question for you, my dear friend: “Is the decision to bring children into the world ethical?” Is the protection of the body enough? If your conceptualization of parenting does not include vulnerability and warmth amid your children, then what are they to you but a part of your herd. It doesn’t matter if they are writhing in pain as you drag them from place to place. On the contrary, they should be grateful they glean any attention from you.

In a family where the father shows love in almost stereotypical ways (like showing excitement for small and big wins, giving hugs, and commending a job well done as well as he would condemn a job poorly done), it is also easier to find that their presence in your life will always be additive. They refer you to their friends for jobs; they invite you to work on things together, their wealth of experience and life is yours to benefit from.

When the reverse is the case, lines are constantly drawn, “this is mine, and that is yours. If you want what I have not sanctioned, go and find it yourself.” And the system is rigged against you because you can’t influence the sanctioning process.

When you present an alternative perspective, you are reminded of your poverty. You are reminded of how you need them to survive, and you are faulted for it. If you were not an MD/Ph.D. serving a simultaneous mandate of President of the United States and Chief Astronaut at the International Space Station, then you had no right to complain or confront the status quo. In fact, your quest for fair treatment is seen as a cowardly path. So, buckle up and take the shit. You don’t have other options.

I think there is value in seeing parenthood as something that needs to be earned daily. You can’t hold such power over an individual and not know how to differentiate between complicated love and violence. It is even worse when no one can counsel you. If a parent can’t recognize that they are not all-knowing, things might be destined to fail.

We moved to the US, hoping things would work out. Hoping that by some supernatural force, hearts would be changed, and the quality of our lives would improve drastically. We had even believed that we could make it to the ‘doctor point’ before falling apart. However, when the facade fell apart eight months later, I learnt that this life really does not balance.

A former lover once said, “if you and your father worked together, we would know where you would be,” and I was upset to realize that it was the first time I envisioned my father supporting my goals. Before that, I had seen the role of parent as one that does not demand more than the basics. If I had homework, I wasn’t going to my parents for answers. Because discussions of career always ended with non-healthcare field or non-business field shaming, it wasn’t worth the try.

In the earlier days of Instagram, a whole suite of comedians would share hilarious skits showcasing the drama of living in an African home. I love the transformation of pain into magic; I love how distance and time give us the grace to reimagine tense moments in the past as comedic gems. But the African parent trope leans so heavily on the expectation that the parent is their child’s most consistent aggressor.

In these African parent scenarios, it would be strange to see the parent respond to the words, “I am an artist,” with a smile on their face and a declaration of support. Oftentimes, these comedians overtly say that they performed in defiance of their parent’s wishes, hoping to push through the muck so they can eventually tell their parents, “See, I did it without you.”

In this parent-child relationship, the parent is not seen as a co-facilitator but rather someone to report success to. I am writing this because I have also realized that success can not come to fruition simply as a ‘fuck you’ to a naysayer. Success comes through individual effort and support. We don’t have all it takes to navigate life entirely alone. Even successful family men who boast of their wealth and picturesque homes cannot occupy such roles without individuals in charge of their domestic affairs. They can’t deny that the time saved, not cooking, cleaning, or nurturing the offspring that is their legacy, allows them to dedicate more productive hours to their economic pursuits.

I can already hear the chorus, “but a provider needs to be outside working for his family; he has no time to lounge about.”

I have witnessed fierce debates where men would complain about the economic landscape and admit to not having any energy to be soft or forgiving. These men would say, “I just want to provide in peace,” as if we live in a world where coming home with a slab of meat is enough. But unfortunately, money does not translate to a home without work, and the decision to parent means deciding to take it on in its completeness.

Sometimes it feels like parents ask, “why do I have to work so hard to raise children?” and I am responding now, with as much grace as possible, “because you chose it.”

When we were in Nigeria, we knew this feeling, but we couldn’t describe it, and now, we have a bit more confidence and more vocabulary. It often feels like people are more interested in being seen as a parent and spouse than fulfilling the roles.

When we moved to the US, we were 17. After being away for most of our childhood and early teenagerhood, our father would regularly say that his support of us would be optional when we turned eighteen. Parenting was a tick on the list that lapsed its permanence at 18. It didn’t matter if their child was educated, it didn’t matter if they had enough experience to enter the job market, it didn’t even matter if they had a place to live. The child was responsible for the totality of their actions and outcomes in the world. But they (the children) could still not choose their future.

In this manifestation of parenthood, parents can free themselves of the obligation of protecting and providing for their children, but if a child does what the parent doesn’t approve of, they (the parents) will be quick to say that the child would always be their child, even if the child were 100 years old.

Because of the wildness of the Nigerian system, a child must really be a nuisance to warrant being kicked out; and kicking out (the way it might be visualized on American TV) wasn’t really the case. Folks would go to a neighbor’s house or stay with other relatives. When my father kicked me out, I also had to wait for him to pick me up and take me to the motel he had reserved. That had been his apology, but my world had already shattered, and nothing was done to correct that.

Let’s back it up a bit. We had moved to the US for the good life. What changed between early April and mid-November? First things first, I graduated high school. As you can possibly remember, I was prevented from graduating with my classmates in Nigeria because, apparently, transferring to an American high school two months before the end of senior year was better than moving to the US fully graduated, ready to enroll in a university. After speeding through a whole year of coursework in two months, I felt the logical next step was college.

Nigerians have come to highly value their educational prowess, often quoting a flawed statistic that claims that Nigerians are the most educated nationality-based group in America. As a science student with medicine ambitions, college was a done deal. We would attend a dope university, get excellent marks, and move on to a great career.

In my foreshadowing of this experience, I had felt that I would go through the WAEC and graduation experience in Nigeria and then get to the US in August, just before I had to start school. I had written the SATs in SS2 (concurrently with GCE), and I had fully expected to be admitted to one of my top choice schools, with or without funding.

I had assumed that because education was such an essential part of my parents’ demand of us, they would be able to pay for it; or at least contribute past the silly room-and-board coincidence of a commuter student.

When I asked our father about college, I was called impatient. This was a significant indicator of pending wahala. This meeting point of our values, education, was being treated as a luxury I was nagging for.

Should I have told my former lover that I got educated despite my father? That I forced myself to finish in three years because my father was becoming even more restrictive on the support he offered me.

In the beginning, he would at least engage me when I asked for the necessary information to complete the free application for student aid, but by year three, he told my sister not to share the information with me.

It was always a fight, and I constantly patched up the work. The first time, it was related to my application fee. While I assumed that my school orientation would be a shared joy in the family, I felt stupid for needing a ride to campus. So, I said I would study Radiation Therapy and premedical studies. Now those words just make me want to gag.

After spending so much of secondary school entirely focused on academic achievement, it was refreshing to be in an environment where non-classroom educational experiences were appreciated and encouraged. I realized quickly that the extracurriculars could lead to more student funding and resume entries, so I filled my calendar up. I sent out applications whenever I saw something that fit my profile and made it, so I spent hours at school. I would not waste this opportunity. I would not let my village people win.

The semester was going well, and I was following through on set ambitions when I received a call from the US-Mexican border near San Diego, and I was told that my mother might be there.

Loved one, you know, when we were about to leave Nigeria, and you asked what would happen to mummy, and they said they would figure it out; that figuring it out had meant nothing. There had been no plan to bring mom to America.

Someone said mom went mad after our departure. All of her children, carried in her womb, raised to the ages they were by her overwhelming labor, were in America with their father and his girlfriend, and she was left in Nigeria with no allowance, no property, and no higher education (deferred because of child rearing). The calls to Naija became too painful because of their repetitive nature, and I started to avoid them. There are only so many ways we can say we have eaten before deciding not to speak anymore. Our mother felt abandoned. And I am upset that it had to happen like that.

The problem is that immigration systems prioritize blood relationships over contractual relationships. It didn’t matter that my mother was my father’s wife in the eyes of his family or that she had no one but us. My father would have had a complicated time filing for her to come, so it was never a proposed option. If fact, it was assumed that one of us, the kids, would come of age, get a place and a good job and then file for the reunification of mother and child. My mother wasn’t going to wait years.

She texted me and told me she was in Sao Paulo. Then she was in Mexico City, and finally Tijuana. From there, she took a taxi to the border.

You know what, I won’t lie; that is still one of the strongest examples of determination in my life. When I feel humbled by the demands of life, I remind myself that this life I take for granted at times was fought for. That we have all fought, fought the world, and fought ourselves; and it would be a disservice to the past examples of outstanding achievement if I decline to fight today.

Our father was angry. How could I be aware of such a secret plan? How could I try and ruin his life? That I never liked his relationship with his girlfriend. That I had a nasty attitude and that I should get out of his house.

Yes, I will rewind. He said I should get out of his house.

I know the alpha males are beating their chest, playing a Future song featuring Drake, saluting an unapologetic king. But I don’t think many people understand what it means to be told that one isn’t at home, even in their parent’s house.

A home, by colloquial understanding, is irrefutable. It can’t be ripped from beneath your feet. But the fact that it was permissible to throw me into the cold meant that I actually needed to leave and find my own home as soon as I could.

I was ordered to pick up my mother from the same Greyhound station as before, and as I walked in the rain, I remembered the conversation I had with her days before while she was stranded at the bus station in San Diego. She was disgusted that my barely eighteen-year-old, recently migrated ass did not have money to buy her a bus ticket to Indianapolis and that I did not know where she would stay.

Eventually, my dad picked us up and took us to a motel, later rationalizing that he did what he did because he didn’t want our mother to be lonely—acting as if it was necessary to accuse me of sabotage so that I would be ready to help my mother acclimatize to American society. Me that had not gotten a job yet. Me that still needed to get my driver’s license. Me that was trying to train as a professional healthcare worker while prepping for graduate school. It was utterly bizarre.

The strength of expectation from my mother that I brought solutions was fierce. I called everyone I knew. People I had just met at church and school. Loba got groceries, and Darrel gave me my early driving lessons. Chris brought laughter and good vibes. Most times, I did not even know what to say.

I had been harmed but also, he was the one paying for the motel. And he was the one that secured the apartment we would move into. It was hard for everyone involved, but my punishment was unwarranted. It was said that I needed to find a job to pay the bills in the apartment, and I just remembered thinking, “but I never asked for it in the first place.”

Along the line, my frustration with the setup was framed as a reluctance to pay my dues, when the fact was, I was paying another person’s debt. I was primed for the commuter college experience that would probably lead to an out-of-state medical school education, but in the blink of an eye, I am placed across the bridge from campus and told to pay for my off-campus experience as if we were off-campus at my request.

Do you remember what happened when our grandfather died, and it was time for him to be buried? The period had been painstakingly difficult because our father had returned from the US with his Beninese girlfriend. Of course, my mom would hate to hear this, but I liked her. She was lovely and had underestimated what it would mean to be with my father.

When my father returned for the burial, he was adamant that no one could question his decision, not even us, his flesh and bone. So, we found ourselves in a situation where the mother of his four children was sitting across the table from the American live-in girlfriend. If Instablog Naija had existed then, it might have picked up the story.

I absolve myself from responsibility in that situation because I wasn’t there when my parents met. I wasn’t there when they decided to commit to each other. I wasn’t there when they chose to have children. So, I wasn’t going to pretend to play a role in the unraveling of their relationship.

My mother risked it all to come to the US because she had spent most of her adult life under the impression that she would one day be the matriarch of my father’s ‘highly favored and divinely blessed’ house. She had been heartbroken when my father decided to disrespect her by bringing his intimate foreign partner to an inner circle event. Everyone, even my father’s siblings, commended my mother on her demeanor because they knew it could have gone sideways. Please note that my mother would always say she kept calm so my father wouldn’t abandon his plan to bring his children to America. Something that he would one day use as the ultimate ‘got ya’ is the same thing he used to guarantee our compliance.

The kicking-out happened because my father made promises he did not keep, and the kasala burst. I imagine that this essay is also part of the process.

College was a trip. Before arriving in Indianapolis, I hadn’t known the school I would go to existed. Instead, I had had my eyes set on Stanford.

IUPUI, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, was set up as a cost-saving measure. IU (Bloomington) and Purdue (West Lafayette) are the most prominent universities in Indiana. They both had faculties in Indianapolis that catered to the non-traditional students that resided in the area. Also, it was a way to expose the student population to the resources present in the capital city that could not be found around the flagship campuses—amenities like huge hospitals and state government opportunities.

I changed my course of study three times, and due to the high number of classes I took for the different majors and minors, I was eligible to graduate in three years instead of four.

The first major-minor pairing was radiation therapy and pre-medicine. My advisor had cautioned against it because it would mean that I would have to take two different sets of biology classes and that because of the professional nature of radiation therapy, there would be several practical courses that took a lot of time. Nevertheless, I affirmed I could do it and spent a year and a summer on that track.

I decided I would not be continuing when I went to shadow at a radiation facility and saw a man with a tumor sticking out of his ear. Then I said I didn’t want to be around so much radiation (and risk developing cancer), but now I realize I didn’t want to be trapped indoors assessing and treating sickness all day.

I knew that as a radiation therapist, I would be expected to work within tiny margins without guaranteeing that the person’s life would improve. However, I am a person that likes to know my work has an impact almost immediately.

Truth be told, when I saw the man with the tumor that looked like a vast, calcified chunk of black ear wax, I was more interested in why our understanding of cancer had not improved our remedies from sophisticated guesswork. I remember thinking, how do we prevent this so that radiation or chemotherapy is not even necessary.

Soon after that, I couldn’t imagine myself using more life force to pretend I had an interest in cancer treatment from the perspective of a scientist or medical professional.

Trying to maintain scientific rigor, I switched to Neuroscience (and the premed stuff). At IUPUI, neuroscience was half of a biology degree (the perfect premed course) and psychology (the ideal subject for minds curious about the human experience). So that year, I got a job at the Psychology Advising Center and assisted other students in satisfying their major’s requirements.

I even spent time in the lab of a psychologist interested in the way race and racial prejudice correlate with drug use. It was a crazy time. I was running from late meetings to late job shifts. I eventually realized that I didn’t give any fucks about medicine or the medical establishment. I had thought it would be a backup as I made it as a writer and development professional, but you have to imagine yourself in your backup job. I could never see myself wearing a lab coat and caring enough to be professional with a patient as I tried to diagnose their problems and propose solutions. I am a problem solver, but I don’t need to help people when I am near them. I also don’t concern myself with problems that stem from the dismantling of the body because I know it is inevitable. I cannot change it with all the training in the world and not with all the world-class experiences.

I realized that the ‘humanities’ gave me a way to impact several people’s lives without promising that I have the knowledge or ability to keep them alive. I realized that even though we frame professions as completely logical choices, I couldn’t use logic to be a doctor. I needed to want to be a doctor, and if that wasn’t the case, I needed to let go of the dream before I had completely wasted my undergrad.

I switched to International Studies. Finally, after all my ambitions, after annoying my secondary school classmates with persistent high marks and first positions, I was studying Global and International Studies (GIS), and I was even struggling to get A’s.

I chose international studies because it wasn’t straight political science, so I wasn’t trapped in the entire theory. It required extensive language study so that I could improve my employability that way. And it matched my love of different cultures, traveling, and making an impact worldwide.

At IUPUI, GIS students were expected to study abroad mandatorily. That, too, was appealing because I wanted to have a formal study abroad experience to match my informal experience as a green card holder studying in America.

Naively, I had thought that a mandatory program would come with support, but the department of international studies expected students to organize the study abroad program entirely on their own and only loop in the heads of the department when it was time to validate the experience. One professor suggested that I leave school, get a job anywhere I can, and then return when I can afford to study abroad. I was in my third year, I had accumulated four years’ worth of class credits, and I was being told to either change my major, do magic and go abroad, or leave school and return when my bank account looked heftier.

I knew that leaving to come back might put me at risk of never actually getting the degree, and I could not change my major again because it might push my course of study into a fourth and fifth year that I could not afford. So, it was time to finesse myself abroad. I spent hours scrolling the internet. First, I thought I would go for a Spanish language program since I had started spending more time on Spanish courses. But when I brought it up with my parents, they made it clear that I couldn’t leave North America.

So, I started to filter for North American programs, and I found one in Toronto administered by International Educational Services through George Mason University. I would study abroad and complete an internship (while taking a remote class on cross-cultural working environments). It was a dreamy program.

Then it came time to fight for funding. I remembered that I had entered the honor’s college after my first year of perfect grades, so I took advantage of their $2500 stipend for study abroad. The rest was a patchwork of student loans, money saved from work on and off campus, and money I imagined I’d get from my parents, which I imagined would hold me over.

Leading up to my departure, I ran into a rock and had to get a new car, so I drove from Indianapolis to Toronto. My love, that was an experience.

We (the whole family, by then my father’s girlfriend had left, and my mother and I had moved into the family home) drove to the US-Canadian border near Troy, Michigan. Everyone crossed over, except my mom, and I continued to Toronto while the rest returned to Indianapolis. This was the summer after I celebrated my graduation. In fact, I left maybe a week after the ceremony.

Toronto was so beautiful, and I can’t wait to go back. I stayed on the University of Toronto campus with many other American college students, which was a blast. It was my first time having an on-campus college experience, my first time being able to go out for drinks legally and my first time existing in the world as an out gay man. It was an experience.

Even without the chaos of getting to Canada, the country turned out to be more demanding than I had anticipated. I thought my internship would be flexible so that I could spend time enjoying the trip, but it ended up being quite rigorous. It was my first full-time office experience, and I think I could have done better.

The stress of being in a new city, being independent, and being completely broke made the work feel bothersome, primarily because it was unpaid. I can go on and on about unpaid internships, but it can all be summarized as, “it usually ain’t shit.”

In the capitalist arrangement we find ourselves in, labor doesn’t even have the audacity to be free or cheaply available; it always has cost. But the person paying the cost isn’t always the employer.

Dealing with rigid rules that other employees were not subjected to made me feel unappreciated and held to a higher standard. I understand seniority because, in Nigeria, seniority exists on steroids; but it made no sense to me that the intern would be expected to come in on a day when the full-time staff worked from home.

I understood that full-time staff negotiate better employment contracts, but, as Nigerians might say, “fear no go allow me treat unpaid intern like normal full-time staff.” It wasn’t unreasonable to expect similar treatment as my colleagues, mainly since the work was straightforward and could be done at home or from the office.

While struggling with my first full-time nonprofit gig, I was introduced to dating as a state-recognized adult (according to drinking laws which set the age to 19 as opposed to the American 21).

On one date, I realized we were going Dutch just as the check was brought to the table, and I nearly fainted. I had to beg my sister to cash app me $20. This dude, a Nigerian man, ended up giving his life to Christ and opening a Christian YouTube channel. I checked recently, and he was gay again.

I met up with a gorgeous man from Trinidad and Tobago, and he took care of me so well that I often return to that experience as one of my best examples of good sex.

I had a coffee date with a French Canadian, which led to ‘meh’ sex and a text from me that barred him from ever reaching out to me again. He had responded, “but you owe me a coffee.” Talk about delusional.

I drove to see an uncle in Hamilton, Ontario, and I drove myself and a couple friends to see Niagara Falls.

By the end of the program, I was ready to leave but also distraught at the thought of going back into a repressive environment where I would have to walk on eggshells. Before leaving, I received a notification from AmeriCorps that I had been approved for a service year in Colorado, so I had thought I would be in Indy a couple weeks before I left for Denver.

I got home, after driving at least seven hours with Lemonade on repeat, and I was told I wouldn’t be able to go to Colorado, that I needed to find a job in Indianapolis and move on from my lofty dreams.

Because I like third and fourth options, I had applied to graduate school before I left for Canada, and I had been accepted at IU Bloomington and the University of Indianapolis (my father’s graduate school alma mater). None of the programs had really interested me, so I had not even paid attention to the emails asking me to register. That was until I was informed that I had received a partial tuition scholarship at UIndy and that I would not be able to obtain it if I did not accept the offer.

Seeing as AmeriCorps was a bust and I wasn’t en route to find a replacement job before all my financial commitments actualized, I decided to try UIndy.

That lasted three months.

The problem was that I wasn’t a fan of doing my undergraduate and graduate degrees in Indianapolis, and I wasn’t a fan of how similar it was to my undergraduate.

I also wasn’t settled in my parent’s house or in Indy. I was scrutinized for everything I did. By that time, I had come out at home, and in addition to my lack of significant success professionally, my mom constantly asked me if I had been healed.

To my newly 21-year-old ass, Indy was too close-knit. The Nigerian community was not as progressive as I had expected, and I was not ready to pretend that I was prepared for a full-time job in some safe role in a city I could see myself living without.

I couldn’t return to Toronto because I wasn’t Canadian, and I couldn’t be bothered trying to complicate my American situation under the premise that I would be able to recreate a once-in-a-lifetime summer. Chicago was too cold and old school for me. DC was too politically oriented. New York was just the perfect mix of politically important, artistic, and socially liberal. So, I decided during a church service at our family RCCG that I would move to New York.

New York changed our life. I once thought I would expand on my New York experience in a full-length manuscript, but now I am content with simply acknowledging it as part of my past. My parents believed my affinity for huge international cities meant I was obsessed with their mythical grandeur. But the truth is, due to the finite nature of life, the things we interact with every day become our life, and I wanted to create life with people that valued my creativity.

Whenever I’ve been forced to make a life-changing decision, I’ve been pushed to a point where I need to acknowledge that I can continue to have a lackluster experience or walk with faith and completely change up the game. If Toronto involved a teaspoon of faith, New York involved a whole bottle.

A week into being in New York, I sent out a MeetUp invite for African Artivists. A name inspired by a Kelani bio. We would meet in libraries all over Brooklyn, taking full advantage of the free meeting space in beautiful buildings. We would talk about dream out loud about a world with a dignified Africa. What I remember now is hope. Where is the hope?

There was Liam, a Canadian photographer that had done quite a bit of work in Africa before. I loved his work. The dark colors, the “finna beat you and yo mama” energy.

There was Emmanuel, Danny, Zola, Chidi, and a couple of other people I might have forgotten. It was a sweet gathering when it was adorable. But, because we are human, energies also misaligned.

Let’s see, babe, I had started to work more hours around the city to pay rent and other things, and I couldn’t organize AA meetings anymore. I would get messages that expressed great displeasure with the unplanned pause, but they couldn’t pick up the mantle. It was my creation, and I could not sustain it, so I moved on.

African Artivists gave way to Jacob Javitz Convention Center, Juice Press LLC, and a Jewish kindergarten. A good part of a traveler’s arsenal is temporary employment in a city like New York. I went to agency after agency in search of gigs. And one of the temp agents said, “they need young folk and it starts immediately.” It was a porter job at the Javitz Center.

I think their claim to fame was that they were the “biggest convention center in a major North American city.” That tagline annoyed me because I had to walk up and down that big ass building, doing the silliest things. Huge vehicles, really nice coworkers. The work was hard, it would be unbearable if people weren’t at least surface-level nice.

I loved being around them, but I hated the job. My favorite moments were the days we would meet upstairs in the center and folks would just insult themselves and crack jokes. I kept quiet, but I laughed at the right times.

The decision to leave came about because of sickness. I just couldn’t bear the mind-numbing nature of the job. The work itself was not particularly hard, but at times it felt like we were expected to just expend ourselves throughout the building even though the work had been completed already. It is what I can only describe as busybody. If you can lean, you can clean.

It was a car expo event and as soon as I got to the exhibition hall, I left my broom and bin at a pillar and walked back out of the building. I did not even respond to the email that said it would be hard to get rehired at the Center. I had no intention of going back. At that time, I had already started going into stores and restaurants that I like asking if they were hiring. I nearly got hired at the IHOP on 14th and 1st and that is still a sour loss. I have always loved the idea of working in a diner since I saw Lafayette on True Blood. I ended up getting hired at a Juice Press in Willamsburg and for a moment, I lived among Williamburg folk. A truly peculiar experience. There was this lady that would come in and buy all this product and I would just think, “I love that power.” To be able to decide on a taste or specialty and go ham on it.

Capitalistic pursuits requires that producers sell as many things as they can, preferably at the same time. A business like Juice Press, aware of the complexity of a plant-based diet, would do well to sell B12 tablets and ginger shots along with Blue Magic Smoothies. When I was at Juice Press, I was told Goji berries were some type of super food that could cure cancer. But I later read that they probably had no nutritional value and that they may be covered in pesticides.

It was, what Nigerians call, cruise. There was a lady with a masters there. She had the most Victorian approach to life. Tone, head held high, disapproving shake of the head. She was the “don’t fuck with me” manager, but she also wasn’t as insistent on backbreaking work. One could breathe a bit easier during her shift.

Smoothies are dope ass concoctions, but they definitely don’t escape unhealthy status. I would always mix recipes for myself. The stuff was delicious. The joy of being surrounded by all the most exotic smoothie ingredients.

While I worked at Juice Press, I started reading books and writing reviews of them. I would borrow the book from one the libraries in the city (there are three independent systems in New York; New York Public Library covering Manhattan, the Bronx and Staten Island, Brooklyn Public Library and Queens Public Library) and then I would stage them in cute places, edit the hell out of the photos and then post the review online.

I read Speak No Evil and I loved it. Do you know how it feels to see a gay Nigerian boy with a strong storyline in fiction. I do have to thank Uzo because it felt godsent. And that is the strangeness of the universe. I had never met Uzo and I had only come to see gayness in African/Nigerian spaces as valid, but here was a book, probably written two years before, speaking to issues I had believed was novel.

I wrote a review, that I have lost because of shame, and I sent it into the universe. By some strange stroke of luck, Uzo saw it and that started a history that you would have never imagined.

When we were in Naija together, unsplit, still sure that we would conquer the world without succumbing to it, we dreamt without clear edges. When we moved to the US and we had more time to learn of our mind and body, we realized that literature, storytelling, was a must in our life. We pointed to Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, we pointed to Wole Soyinka and Chinua Achebe, we pointed to JK Rowling and the richest person in the UK tagline. One day, during my Wikipedia research spirals, I found out that Madame Ngozi Okonjo Iweala had four children that had done medical degree studies and a second degree. Uzo popped up as the writer of Beast of No Nation, that had been converted to the Netflix film with Idris Elba. An MD and a writer, I told my mom, “See someone has done it already, I can do it too.”

That memory would fade completely from mind and then I would find myself at The Africa Center on the day of my job interview. The day before I had cut my hair low to remove the blond dye I tried on at the urging of my barber. You know what I learnt from Uzo, that work is real.

It is easy to see ease on television or on the pages of a book and think that ease comes easily. If one is filming and ad, one is advised to develop a clear engaging script beforehand so that the unscripted moments feel more coherent.

In many of the jobs I had before, work was just work. It could be given as defined by contract and then it can never be thought of again. And then there is work that is a mission, a righteous goal, and here achievement feels like the creation of history, the breaking of chains, the releasing of power.

It is really cool to be so intricately involved in the management of a small but powerful nonprofit organization in Harlem, an historic gathering of the Black diaspora in America. The Africa Center was a “put on LinkedIn” type of job. I gave a lot of life energy to the job. I loved it. Advocating for Africans, anywhere in the world, excites me. I always want Africans, Black folk to have more. More peace, more capital, more political sovereignty, more positive history.

I went all over New York. Went to the Bronx to look at fabric for one of our public spaces, went to Brooklyn to talk about a newly translated French book written by a Malagasy author. The world was wide. The realist insistence on inter-state or inter-ethnic rivalry failed to hold water. People were deeply pleased about the variedness of our spaces.

My time at The Africa Center really pushed me to access with honesty, what I was capable of. When I realized writing a book just involved sitting down to write what one has been called to write, I could no longer avoid it claiming ignorance.

I realized that oftentimes; it isn’t lack of knowledge, it is lack of support. So much is possible when capable folks congregate and that was eye opening.

We often look at political occurrences and imagine that they were actualized by the most brilliant and beautiful people, but the real winners are the most desperate ones. The ones that need it to be a win no matter what. It can be a dangerous frame of mind, but can bring into fruition, terrific results.

When we hosted the Future Africa Forum and the building was gorgeously clad, packed to the brim with people that do important work in African spaces, it was a thrilling day. I know it is seen as rude to list off people one might have met at social gatherings, but one I must mention is Boris Kodjoe. He was so tall and so foine, I started to believe in juju. It reminded me that not everything is photoshop.

I had thought that my departure from The Africa Center would be glorious. You know, planned to the T, where we would convene around warm food and I would bawl my eyes out, but I would be happy.

COVID is a reckoning you will never understand. When we were in Naija together, we knew of the concept of viral diseases, but the idea that the whole world could be impacted by a single virus at the same time was not on our mind.

The reports of COVID were soft at first, exactly like in the movies. I remember one day I was returning home from work, and I saw a news article on a sickness in China. Because of the distance between the US and China, I did not even think too long about it.

Then I think I joined the group of people that compared it to other viral outbreaks because no one believed that it was a real risk. Loved one, fear gradually rose. Hand sanitizer bonanza. Masks of any kind. Reduced in-person gatherings and then finally on March 13th, a full declaration of pandemic status. An invitation to take emergency action.

You have not known madness if you have not brushed against an apocalypse. People said, “stock up on everything, get some cash,” and I was waiting for my paycheck. I could not stock up in any capacity, so I just took things as they came. If we die because there is no toilet paper, then so be it.

It was a strange time and Harlem was having an open conversation with the lockdown reality. There were the folks that spent time on the stoops of their buildings, in front of bodegas and corner shops. I would we walking around the city, and I would run into friends. It, at times, felt like a village. Folks were just bothered with what they needed. “Oh, are you going to buy groceries? I’ll come with.” My roommates and I bonded, a little. Three Black gay men with strong personalities, there was definitely cattiness at certain moments. But we ended up creating really beautiful memories together during game nights and wine downs.

I could not be preoccupied with my self-preservation and simultaneously spending a huge chunk of my time performing tasks of questionable value. Tips were flying around on how to be a perfect employee during an emergency work from home situation, and they would say stuff like, “prepare tomorrow’s lunch the day before so that one doesn’t spend the allocated lunch break cooking.” I just could not understand how we could continue to insist that perfect work behavior was achievable when we were dealing with a virus we were still struggling to understand. I am not sure I will die tomorrow, but at least I have made lunch to prevent time theft.

The pandemic reminded me that life is the greatest success. That contrary to the common narrative in capitalism that equates a person’s value to their productivity within the system; if we die in service of capital, it doesn’t reduce the impact of our death.

First and foremost, death is permanent, so we do not reap the rewards of the actions that led us to the grave.

Secondly, those around death often declare that they would do anything to have their loved one back. You would hear in the case where a man commits suicide because of financial issues, “it’s a shame he had to go because of money.”

I realized that because of my precarious housing situation, because of my low wages, and because of how rapidly things were changing to match newly acquired knowledge, I could not focus on my day to day needs while being expected to dedicate my most productive hours to tasks that can wait or be dropped.

The reason I gravitate towards roles that deal with providing aid to others is that people will always need help. We know how to invoke the we are social creatures line when it is time to enforce laws. But the idea that we are social creatures doesn’t also imply we lean on each other?

Benevolent systems are necessary because if we were to pay for all of the things we utilize to sustain our lives, we might never pay the bill.

I sent in my resignation letter on the 10th and on the 17th, my sister passed away. Talk about bursting kasalas.

Chinye was my Irish twin, meaning she was just a year younger than me, and we grew up together. Now, it’s weird to say, but I never thought she would die. I just assumed, we would be old and rickety before we even started to think about saying goodbye.

We would butt heads and we would hold firm because part of our love language was guidance and correction, almost to a fault.

How so much of our squabbles related to different takes on dogma. We were bickering over the best way to live life when we were already living life and wasting it.

Chinye’s death gave me the fear of death. Not the fear of death that makes me close my curtains and sleep with a knife under my pillow. The fear of death that reminds me to live intentionally in my purpose.

People go through great lengths to theorize what happens after death, and I just don’t get it because what we do know about death is enough horror. The fact that a person will seize to exist is horrible. The actual funeral arrangement process is horrible and expensive. It’s heart wrenching because you don’t want to believe that you are really experiencing what you are experiencing but you also have to proceed with traditional rites. I didn’t know land and plaque were priced differently. Didn’t know I would encounter salesmen trying to suggest we purchase family lots.

My ass that had been quite suicidal for a while realized that I wasn’t actually ready for death. There is still so much that I need to do. But also, now that I know the sorrow of the loss of a loved one, I cannot imagine being the quake that shook another person’s world like that.

After her passing, we returned home to Indianapolis. Did the burial and stuff, then returned to New York. We packed up our stuff, dumped them at a Greyhound station. Flew back to Indy, went crazy. Left in a frenzy to New York. Had the most tropical summer in the North Atlantic. Fought again to go abroad.

One day, I was walking down the public park section of the West Side highway and a man approached me. He wanted to know what I was about. I told him I was going to France, to try and get him off my back. But then he said, “Wow, that’s cool,” or something like that. And I was mad that he didn’t persist and say something like, “Stay with me.” So, I said, “I wasn’t sure, that there was a lot to sort through.” And guess what he did?

He said, “nah, you going.”

A lot of modern calendars use the Before Christ /After Death logic to organize their years. The BC/AD line is a line of reset. It restarts with one. In my life, Chinye’s death is the reset. If I wasn’t living life before, I am living life now.

So Nonso, did you ever know we would end up in France? You do remember JSS3 where we spent hours studying Ike’s JSS1 French notes, to make up the year we had missed (or skipped, depending on the reader’s personal philosophy).

We had always thought French was a nice language to learn, but to live in France; far from far fetched, unthinkable. What was I doing there, when I could go to America, or Canada, or the United Kingdom.

During my interview at The Africa Center, Uzo and I agreed to a two-year contract. So, about a year into the job, I started to scout out my next plan.

Of course, going from one job to another is a great way to increase one’s salary, but it doesn’t give one time to decide if the work still fits one’s desires. I didn’t want to do a frying pan to fire situation, so I decided it might be time to finally complete a master’s program while I determine my interests.

One thing people don’t mention about an international upbringing is that it isn’t enough to just have citizenship or a heritage connection with a place, success requires a certain level of assimilation.

The assimilation discourse typically frames it as a form of erasure. A positioning of a set of norms over another set of norms. But even in Lagos, after a while, you will ask the lady always complaining about mosquitoes if she forget say she dey Nigeria.

The values, the behaviors that make a good student or worker in Nigeria are not the same as those that will do the same in the US. It is only natural that this is the case, but we make it seem that someone can just land, anywhere that they have never been before, and succeed on their sheer will, succeed without learning to speak the language of the land, without learning about the gaps in their community and equipping themselves to address it.

By the end of my first year at The Africa Center, I felt confident about my ability to work in American professional establishments. I also knew I was loved as I was and that I didn’t need to change to be deserving of safety and progress. But I also knew that living in New York would soon become my sole priority, if I did not do something about it. So I decided to only apply to foreign schools.

When we were in Naija, America was gigantic, but in reality, a lot of that space isn’t occupied or appealing for city-raised youth.

Queer Black boys can really only live their best life in New York, LA, San Francisco, Atlanta and then other big progressive cities, but those cities cost a leg and an arm. Then you have to factor in community, the quality of our lives depends on our environment; but if we are in a dope environment with no friends, are we primed for growth or joy? The thought of going through another breaking in process in another American city was not shaqing me, unless I was trying to be there for a long time.

A foreign experience would also give me more time to decide where I might want to lay deeper roots.

On many UN job descriptions, they say “the working languages of the UN are English, French and xyz. This job requires complete English fluency and a knowledge of a second UN language is strongly advised.

In a world where English is almost an unofficial lingua franca, the opportunities for English speakers to become fluent in another language without becoming a specialist or growing up in a community of target language speakers are far and few between.

Rumor has it that I used to speak Greek. I don’t remember. I was born in Greece, I do have family there, there was a time my parents would use Greek to talk about us while we were there.

I didn’t really start speaking English until elementary school and we spoke English because it was Ireland. I didn’t start paying attention to English grammar until a summer in Lagos when I said, with too much pride, “a elephant,” and I got the yabbing of my life. “With all of your oyinbo accent, you cannot even speak English.” English was now my first language, but the UN required two. There isn’t room for the fact that I’ve been raised around several Englishes and my ability to navigate all of them is a plus. Or the pidgins, and the local languages, those too weren’t enough.

So even while I applied to schools in the UK, I had my eye set on France. We are still young enough to try and learn a new language.

You know when motivational speakers say, rejection is redirection, I would have bitten off the head of the person that would have tried to frame my potential rejection from Sciences Po as a blessing in disguise. I had no other plan that seemed anywhere viable, so any answer but yes would have been earthshaking. I did not want to be redirected; I knew I was on my path.

And the universe conspired to make it happen.

October of this year will be two years since I moved to Paris, and I am so glad we made the move.

I am writing to you because when we left for the US, we thought we were escaping the legacy of Nigeria in our life and I think it is time I acknowledge, for the both of us, that this is not the case. We don’t move and mutate upon arrival at destination. If we travel with a wicked spouse, we will land with a wicked spouse. All the things we thought we could avoid in Naija, it caught us eventually.

Life is hard, and it is made harder when people believe they can dictate your behavior. It is harder when you constantly have to look over your shoulder, watch for who might be watching. Life is hard when people can deny you jobs, healthcare, housing, sympathy, just because they perceive that you might be queer.

I had told you that our departure would be worth it eventually, but I am done living by your metrics. We left Nigeria, not the world, and hence our loads to carry, the obstacles on our track path, stayed consistent.

When we left, we thought we would be able to cover up family issues with better concealer. We would no longer have to go to school and risk being kicked out because of late school fees. We wouldn’t have to mix rice with palm oil to stretch out an allowance. We wouldn’t be living in front of an open gutter that spills right on to the side road leading to our block of flats.

My second summer at IUPUI, I took an African literature course, and someone criticized the osu practice in Igbo culture. He said it was like inheriting the sins of the father and before I could craft a rebuttal, I realized that he might have been right. The idea that generations upon generations can be given an outcast status, simply because one ancestor made a particular decision, did not sit right with me.

Each person deserves to suffer for their own actions and the actions they co-opt as theirs. The idea that because of parentage, one is deserving of special punishment is deeply flawed. We do not choose our parents and we do not choose to be born.

A question I was left with as I left Sciences Po was, “how do we differentiate between a different cultural practice and a potential human rights violation?” For example, a young mother might believe she is the best guardian for her child, and she is doing her best, but she is always annoyed with the child. She often insists that the child wants too much when they ask for anything outside of what has already been approved. When does a different type of parenting become a harmful type of parenting.

Referring to that same uncle I spoke about before, just as I was about to hang up, he cleared his throat and said, “so when will you be getting married,” and I felt a shock go through my body.

I wanted to scream, but you know gay marriage is illegal in Nigeria, why are you asking me this.

I am writing this because I want it to be clear that I don’t have a stone to pick with marriage; I am barred from marriage by very explicit laws that many Nigerians claim to support.

I am writing this because people believe that it is in my best interest to lie to them about true things. To play the “my girlfriend is coming” game. To appease their sensitivities by not confirming what they might suspect.

When I was in Abuja last year (a quick trip to Nigeria that did not really feel like a homecoming), a taxi driver asked me the same question and I had to feign hearing loss. This man had spent the majority of our ride complaining about the children he needed to take care of, but it was me that needed to start thinking about marriage and children when I could not feed myself. If I say misery loves company, someone will call me bad belle.

I think Nigerians misunderstand what queer Nigerians need. Same sex marriage, as much as it is a cool concept, it isn’t the most pressing matter. What we need first is freedom from persecution due to perceived or declared queerness. I have no qualms responding to a question like when will you marry with the straight forward, “same-sex relationships are heavily scrutinized, so marriage might never be an option, but I’m not stressed about it.”

But in the current set up of the Nigerian system, declaring queerness can be used as a justification for received violence. I find myself asking the question, is this a reasonable person or is this a mad man.

My mother was once chastising me and she asked, “Is it only you that is gay? Why do you carry it on your head?” Loved one, I am here to say, we carry nothing. In homophobic spaces, one doesn’t even need to speak to commit an offense. Your walk ain’t right. Your hair too long. Your lips too glossy. You silhouette too curvy; and so on, so forth. We don’t carry gayness on our head, people just hate that gayness exists in their communities and they think they have the right to try and stomp it out.

People know that conversion therapy is bullshit, so they try and use fear. “I will insult you, slap you, beat you, even kill you, if you do not convince me, you aren’t gay.” They treat queer folks like children, saying things like, “if you don’t shut up.”

My mom lamented that if something were to happen and it was time to bury her, what would I do if I was prevented from participating in the ceremony. I could only ask, but why would I be prevented from participating, did I kill my mother?

I hate when people use culture as an excuse as if I am not also an inheritor of the culture. Okay, we don’t have many modern examples of openly gay Igbo men, then I can define the culture, so it fits my experience. People believe that one needs to change one’s personality or one’s desires to fit ‘culture’ but all we are really doing, in those moments, is fitting another person’s definition of culture.

We can go to the stream and come back with fish and water. We don’t need to see culture the same way all the time. We don’t need to pretend that people aren’t different, even in the same ethnic group, or nation, or religion.

“Na gay I gay, I no kee persin,” comes to mind at this point. When it was time to leave Sciences Po, people started to ask me questions, “Where will you go to, Nigeria?”

- No, I would need to work quite a bit harder to ensure my comfort and I don’t have the ability to do that now.

“The US?”

- Not yet sure, previous experiences have made me realize that I don’t feel at ease in my expected family home and I would rather visit when I feel I have more control.

“So what’s next?”

- Life.

I have spent the first 25 years of my life collecting beautiful, majestic experiences but I am no longer pretending that my Nigerianness is just a cute pendant that represents my heritage. People will comment on how well I would succeed if I *insert profession here.* But instead of growing my career and impact, I feel like I’m always making a case for why I should be respected, why I should be valued for what I bring to the table and not how I present.

I can do many things and I do influence my environment, but my ability to work is stifled when I am with people that believe their worldview trumps my reality, simply because their worldview is ordained by their religion or supported by their flawed laws. Productivity is far from my mind when I am not sure which unintentional action will break open the floodgates of condemnation.

I think it was Virgil that said he created for the 17 year old him and in a way, he gave me permission to talk to you. Like I said, if you saw me now, you might be shocked because life is not picturesque at all. Listing out the details feels unnecessary, but it is not our fault. This is a lesson I have had to learn. If you started a race ten minutes after your competitors, it isn’t strange that you might trail behind.

The Bible might have said the truth will set you free and I have found that to be true. We no longer need to carry the guilt of inherited dysfunction. This situation, this nation, this layering of culture was given to me. I have tried to bend within it. I have tried to play the game of coyness, of academic excellence, of working smarter, harder, longer than my peers. I have written letters. Screamed with tears in my eyes. Prayed to all the deities I know and now all I have is the truth; and the release; and the peace of soul that comes with it.

I will close here, I was recently in a Clubhouse room and a man asked those on stage, “have you ever lived in an abusive home?” and no one indicated that they have. We live in a culture that values respect, even me on stage did not flash my mic because my trauma isn’t meant to prove a point.

He proceeded to say that since only one person flashed their mic, the claims of tense family situations in Nigeria is false. He then said, “I have never heard my mother complaining, or my aunties,” and I just wanted to explode. One doesn’t have to be a genius to know that the abused often don’t know they can classify their experiences as such. But also, we tend to isolate the perpetrators of abuse as the creators of their abusive beliefs.

Because I did not see it and I did not hear it and I did not do it, so it could not be a feature of a community I am a part of. My experience of Nigeria and Nigerian spaces is that the option to not be queerphobic is not widespread. But it isn’t enough that I am left to the whims of luck. The difference between going to a church and having a blast; and going to a church to be exorcized should not be based on the luck of who I go to church with. Gay, queer folk deserve a certain degree of bodily autonomy, even in places where it is against the law or social expectation. Even if it is a sin, let them carry their sin on their head. God called us to control our own lives and secure our own paths to paradise, if one isn’t invited to consult on another person’s journey, one shouldn’t be allowed to interfere.

I managed to go through all this without an emoji or lol, I think I did a good job. I won’t write to you again, I’m moving on. I am no longer apologizing because of my smile, or my love of talented female artists, or my lack of interest in playing mind games; I am just moving on.

There will be no grand return, the abroad isn’t a panacea to the chaos Nigeria can be. The life we had dreamt of in Nigeria, needs to come from Nigeria. There is no education, no bank account balance that can protect us if the state and the community don’t commit to common human decency.

As we approach our 26th year, almost a decade since we left, I look to the future. Anti-queer violence shows us so many young deaths that sometimes it feels like 30 is a millennium away. We will see 30, and 40, and 50, and more as the universe wills and we will thrive. Nigeria is not a limiting factor, queerness is not a limiting factor, poverty is not a limiting factor; we are destined for more and we will achieve it.

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Currently in search of jobs, funding, and good energy. We rise by lifting others and I would love to be lifted. Best, V.