By E.C. Osondu
Avoid
parties organized by our people. Arguments and fights break out over politics,
over politicians, over girls, over anything, over nothing. Drunken arguments.
Especially after imbibing a cocktail of Hennessey and Irish Cream.
Do not buy a car. Do not drive. Ignore
advice to obtain an international driver’s license before your arrival.
American cops do not know what an international driving license is. Or they
pretend not to know and what they don’t know makes them angry. You do not want
to face an angry American cop. Driving is a slippery slope. Driving is trouble.
Driving is tickets. Driving is a cop asking you for your license and
registration. Before you know it, you are standing before an elderly grim
immigration judge.
Avoid parties organized by our people.
Arguments and fights break out over politics, over politicians, over girls,
over anything, over nothing. Drunken arguments. Especially after imbibing a
cocktail of Hennessey and Irish Cream. Neighbors call the cops. Cops ask for
identification. Remember you do not have one. I know we are a party-loving
people so if you think you can’t live without it, go to YouTube, there’s more
entertainment on YouTube than you’ll find at any Nigerian party. Nobody was
ever arrested for watching YouTube videos.
Avoid Rashonda and Shenika and her
sisters. They once married and had kids or dated and had their hearts broken by
our men. They are on a revenge mission. They’ll take out their hurt on you. They’ll
promise they’ll marry you to help you get a Green Card. They will not. Ignore
their avowed love for our local food. They’ll tell you they love eating spicy
food. They’ll eat you dry, eat you out of the house, and dump you. Besides,
they smoke weed. They’ll expect you to pay for their habit. Weed is expensive
in America, unlike back home where you can get it for next to nothing.
Avoid Chucks. Is that even a one
of our names? Anyway, that is what he calls himself. Sounds like a made-up
name, neither Chuck, which is American, nor Chuks, which is ours.
His name is not the only dubious thing about him. He’ll tell you he is in the
auto insurance business. This is a ruse. Actually, this is what he does: he
buys cars, insures them heavily, looks for a lonely road, and drives them into
a tree. After which, he claims the insurance money and throws a big party.
Remember what I told you earlier about Nigerian parties. He recruits new
drivers at these parties. He will tell you that there is no risk involved.
He’ll assure you that all you have to
do is wear your seat-belt and run into a tree. One of his drivers ran into a
tree and broke a neck bone. He is still wearing a neck brace. Before Chucks
became a car crasher, he drove around town in his beat-up Nissan looking for
unsuspecting inexperienced drivers who’d run into him so he could collect.
Avoid him. He has no honest bone in his body. People will urge you to go to
school. They’ll tell you an American education is useful. That is not true.
That is 80’s. You are here to hustle.
If you must travel, travel by Amtrak.
Trains are safe, buses are not. I mean safe from raids by the INS. Here’s
something that happened to someone I know. He boarded a Greyhound bus that was
traveling from Chicago to upstate New York. At the Greyhound bus station in
Chicago, there were boisterous kids. The boys were in jeans and t-shirts, but
the girls were dressed the traditional Somali way. Colorful scarves and cotton
patterned wraps.
It was a night trip. A few hours after
the bus pulled out of the station, the bus was pulled over into a gas station
by a detachment from the INS. They went from seat to seat asking people, Where
are you from? Do you have an ID? Identify yourself. Soon they got to the
row of the Somali kids. Where are you from? From Chicago. I mean what
country? America. Do you have ID? And the kids pulled out shiny U.S.
passports. Avoid the bus. It is overcrowded, overheated, over-scrutinized, and
accident prone. If you must travel, take the train.
If you must go to church—I suspect you
will want to go to church, because you are a man with problems, and a man with
problems needs prayer. Avoid the American churches, though: they do not shout
in American churches and a person with problems needs to shout loud enough to
reach the heavens.
American churches do not announce jobs.
The pastors do not know the places that hire those without papers. The pastors
do not order people to go on “seven days dry” nor “white fasting.” They do not
play loud music; they do not dance energetically and frenetically. I hear the
African-American churches in the South do. But those are in the Deep South.
And while on the subject of churches:
the church is not an opportunity to meet girls. The girls in the churches, the
immigrant girls, are in the same leaky boat as you. They do not have papers,
they are illegal, they are searching for someone to marry them for a Green
Card. They’ll not tell you this fact until you happen to mention it one day
when you are both in bed and then they’ll hiss like an angry snake, Why did
you not tell me all this? I wasted my time cooking for you. They will leave
you on the bed half-naked as they march out with righteous indignation, giving
your door such a loud bang on their way out that the door is left wondering
what it did wrong.
People will urge you to go to school.
They’ll tell you an American education is useful. That is not true. That is
80’s. You are here to hustle. If you must get any kind of qualification get a
nursing certification or qualification in some medical field. A sick man does
not care about your accent. A helpless old lady needs strong arms not great
enunciation. There are many of those schools. Get into one and you’ll qualify
in eighteen months. I’ll recommend the ones run by our people. They don’t ask
too many questions and you can pay on the installment plan.
By now you must have realized that
there are tribes in America. Remember when at the port of entry you went to the
black man in the booth and he called you brother—a good white lawyer
will argue your case before his white brothers.
If you need an immigration lawyer,
never hire a Nigerian or Ghanaian lawyer. Get a white lawyer, preferably a
Jewish one. He will ask you no questions so you will not tell him any lies.
Masquerades do not fear each other—I need not say more. By now you must have
realized that there are tribes in America. Remember when at the port of entry
you went to the black man in the booth and he called you brother—a good
white lawyer will argue your case before his white brothers. Be prepared to pay
a bit more. Unlike the Ghanaian and Nigerian lawyers, they do not bifurcate
their payments. The only payment plan they adhere to is immediate payment. You
must give them a check before every meeting and before every court appearance and
before the signing of any document. I can assure you they’ll deliver. They get
the job done.
If you want to understand your new
society better, you should go to a baseball game. Ignore invitations to play
five-a-side soccer with fellow immigrants in that obscure park in the outskirts
of town. If you really hope to become a part of society, on a Friday evening go
to a nearby stadium and watch a baseball game. Sing Take Me Out to the
Ballgame along with the crowd. Buy a beer and a hotdog, eat some cotton candy,
try to catch the ball but do not try too hard, especially if there is a kid
around you trying to catch the same ball. Do not try to understand the game. It
is neither cricket nor soccer. Just sit, relax, watch the people, sip your
beer, and pay a little attention to the game.
The good thing is that you are not
obligated to stay until the end. Leave when you become bored or tired, but you
bet that you’ll learn a lot more about this society from sitting at that
stadium with the smell of beer and nachos and screaming kids than you’ll learn
in any other place. Go on the Internet. Read up what you can find on Shoeless
Joe and Yogi Berra. Learn some Yogisms. I have never met an American who hated
baseball. As tea is to the Englishman, so is baseball to the American. I’ll go
as far as to recommend listening to baseball commentary on the radio. Play it
loud and let your neighbors hear what you are listening to; it will calm them
and put them at ease about you.
Avoid buying your groceries from the
African store. Their stuff is overpriced and they’ll rip you off. Train your
palate to adjust to American food. There are affordable alternatives in the
grocery store if you know what to look for. Eat lots of kale and spinach and
collards. Winters are long. Your body will miss all those tropical vitamins but
the vegetables will help compensate. Do your own cooking, not only is it
cheaper, it is healthier. As you’ll soon find out, burgers and fries will not
do you much good. Your cholesterol level will rise, your blood pressure will
hit the roof from all that salt and fat, you’ll sicken. You are not likely to
have any health insurance, so eat healthy. Exercise moderately, but stock up on
Theraflu and Vicks VapoRub in case you fall sick. The mosquitoes here do not
carry malaria so you do not have much to worry about.
Dress well. Dress properly. Dress the
way you wish to be addressed. Ignore that entire pants on the nape of the butt
thing. Leave that to Lil Wayne and all those guys on rap videos and the guys in
prison. I am not saying you should spend all your money on clothes. What I am
saying is that you should spend a little money on the right kind of clothes. Dress
preppy. These are not my words but sage advice someone gave me many years
back. Chinos pants and button down shirts. It is in your own interest to dress
this way. It is reassuring. It makes you less suspicious. If you don’t believe
me, walk into your local Walgreens in sagging black jeans, a black hoodie, and
sneakers and watch the security guy follow you all over the store. Go back the
next time dressed preppy and watch him smile and greet you with a Hello
buddy.
Since you’ll not be driving, I suggest
you invest in a good winter coat. Do not stint on this. You can buy one on a
layaway plan. London Fog is a good brand. You do not want to suffer from any
cold-borne illness. They do to the black man what tropical illnesses do to the
white man.
Your first thought will be that the
buses are great. You’ll think the buses are clean. You’ll think the buses are
not that bad. This is because you are still making the transition from the
public buses back home.
Riding the bus is a big hassle in
winter. The schedules are crazy because the auto companies want every American
to drive a car. What makes the buses worse are bus people. Your first
thought will be that the buses are great. You’ll think the buses are clean.
You’ll think the buses are not that bad. This is because you are still making
the transition from the public buses back home. I remember them with their
mobile pastors who pray for everyone in the bus and then pass little envelopes
around for donations. With their medicine hawkers whose little pills cure TB
and gonorrhea and chickenpox. And if you aren’t lucky, you can get your pocket
picked while rushing to board or struggling to alight.
American buses do not have those.
American buses are filled with crazies who may not bother to wash themselves or
brush their teeth. They feel compunction to lean into your face and start a
conversation with you. I am user, you know. Not proud of it but not for
nothing, you know, it is what it is. Buy an ipod and blast your music. Do
not engage in conversation. Do not smile.
To join or not to join? Village
associations, town associations, state associations, country associations,
continent associations. They have them all here. They meet once a month or once
every three months. They have different names but the same parole. You pay a
membership fee. You pay a monthly contribution. Someone hosts the meetings. The
host provides food and drinks. There is usually a Christmas party. In the event
of a birth you get a cash gift. In the event of the death of a parent you get a
cash gift. In the event of your own death they are responsible for flying your
body back home for burial. Quite frankly, you’ll be better off with life
insurance.
Take accent reduction classes. Many
people will tell you they don’t know what this is, but I do. I took one and
that did help me a lot here. When I speak, people can hardly differentiate
between me and a native-born speaker. Not speaking the way Americans speak is
like a dead man refusing to speak in the language of the dead. Don’t be
deceived by all that false cooing by old ladies, Oh that’s a lovely accent,
where are you from? Some lady once told me that when you speak with an
accent people pay more attention to what you are saying. What she failed to add
was that they also speak to you very slowly having concluded that you are an
idiot.
Buy a $1 lottery ticket every Friday.
You are not likely to win but hey as they say here, You never know and You
have to be in it to win it. Avoid the casinos. They have the saddest people
in this country. Do not be deceived by their inviting names. I know a guy who
started going to a casino out of loneliness. He couldn’t wait to get out of
work and head up to play the slot machines and blackjack. He had not yet heard
the expression, The house always wins. He would win a few dollars and
put it back in. He was soon taking payday loans to gamble. He promised himself
he was going to stop.
One evening he drove straight home from
work. The first time in many months. He made dinner, poured himself a drink,
watched a little television and went to bed. He said at first he thought he was
dreaming. He saw flashing lights, then dings, tings, and bings.
He jumped out of bed, picked up his car keys and drove straight to the casino.
He got money from the ATM and began to play. He lost everything. He lit a
cigarette—back then the casinos still permitted smoking—he smoked the cigarette
halfway and dropped it on the thick rug. He drove home. The next morning he
turned on the TV hoping to see the news that the casino had burned down. No
such luck. Once again the house had won.
I wish I could guide you through this
maze of a country but as you well know, I’ll soon be gone. Voluntary
deportation that is what I took instead of prison. Voluntary indeed, an
oxymoron. But as they say here, It is what it is.
E.C. Osondu
was born in Nigeria. He is a winner of the 2009 Caine Prize for African Writing
for his story “Waiting”
first published in Guernica in October, 2008. He is also a Pushcart Prize
winner and the author of Voice of America (2010). He is an Assistant Professor
of English at Providence College in Rhode Island.
No comments:
Post a Comment