Piece by Paula Nzissi
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
We teach girls to shrink themselves
To make themselves smaller
We say to girls,
“You can have ambition
But not too much
You should aim to be successful
But not too successful
Otherwise you will threaten the man.”
Because I am female
I am expected to aspire to marriage
I am expected to make my life choices
Always keeping in mind that
Marriage is the most important
Now marriage can be a source of
Joy and love and mutual support
But why do we teach girls to aspire to marriage
And we don’t teach boys the same?
We raise girls to see each other as competitors
Not for jobs or for accomplishments
Which I think can be a good thing
But for the attention of men
We teach girls that they cannot be sexual beings
In the way that boys are
Feminist: the person who believes in the social
Political, and economic equality of the sexes
Tries to open my last Batook Bubble gum as I lazily lay on my bed. Outside the other students lazy around the Institution.
But I haven’t written this blog post so that you can see how I lazy around on Sundays.
The top phrased words are from Beyoncé’s song flawless and the words are from a very renowned critic, a Male Critic.
The words are deep, in written form they may seem like a waste of blog space perhaps you should listen to the song.
I am a Female Child.
And this is the twenty first century, where modernization has almost reached its peak.
I live in the era of
‘ The Woman Uprising’
Wait….
No,
No I’m still far from that era.
The era where,
I as a Female Child, can do anything my little heart claps for joy for.
I wake up and I want to be an Engineer
Scratch that
I want to be an Electrical Engineer and I can comfortably go to class.
A class that does not have just one or seven Ladies doing the course in the midst of a hundred men.
Where If I fail to connect my instruments well, it shall not be taken that…
She is just a girl, thats why.
Where if I become number one hundred in the class, I won’t be the case of gender.
Gender to me is nothing more than a complete Idiotic classifier.
Oh hail…
The girl who can cook
No… Not at this era, boys cook too.
Oh hail…
He who brings the bread home
She too can bring Elliot’s Bread home
Oh hail
He proposed.
Please we can do that while standing.
What I’m trying to drive across to Atlantic Ocean is
What a man can do a woman can do
And what a woman thinks she only can do, you’ll be shocked.
I should not aspire to be a wife,
I should aspire to be a golden trophy.
Where I can first sustain a relationship.
Financially and Emotionally.
Wacha kukula 2!
I should be in the position where if things do not go well with the man, I will not take home my cooking skills. I will reap havoc on that house by ripping away the twenty flat screens, the home appliances and a settlement that does not hold up you getting 2%
For we live in an era not yet sure if we should evolved a little further or to be content with the ‘GREAT MILESTONE’
of educating the girl child.
It’s high time that Feminists crop up like stubborn weeds.
If not, I’ll stand 5 inch heel dug on the strong principles that I walk, been walking and will walk on till I catch up with that era.
