Originally Posted by akuluouno Dear Phil,
Many thanks for your article which if only written words would change attitudes in Nigeria would have done so but infortunately we also need crude force to change us. I was not surprised that it is only our women who protested your article because they are the guilty ones by far in this infamy. Even among the highest elites in Nigeria the same attitude obtains. When Minister Fani-Kayode said that he would protest the uncivli treamtent of Nigerian travellers by foreign airlines, I laughed all the way and wished him well in his neonationalist tendencies, afterall he is a chip off Fanipower.
Let us, especially the elites and the women in particular learn to be a bit serious and learn to display the victorian sentiment of noblesse oblige and decorum at internationally recognised spaces such as airports etc.
I know that you were very conservative in your write up, if not I would have liked to bore you with the story of the Nigerian who overfed with amala and guiness b4 boarding an international flight as well as the reasons why we shall never have a Nigeria Airways.
Akuluouno,
with your words that I have highlighted above you have displayed the precise problem with Nigeria/Nigerians: There is this belief that sentiments of noblesse oblige and decorum belong to someone else. The Victorians, The British, The West et. al.
Are you telling me or suggesting that such sentiments are/were absent from your forefathers/mothers? Or have you so internalized the concepts put out by so many of the books/media we consume that as Nigerians/Africans we neither now nor previously had any positive attributes/behaviors to display?
I enjoyed the article very much and see it as a humorous take on travel centered around the behavior of a very small minority of Nigerians. Why? Phil spoke about the behavior of perhaps between 6-10 different people at the counter. Since we know that a typical long distance flight like that contains easily in excess of 180-240 persons, it is safe to say that the
MAJORITY of Nigerians on that flight acted with
NIGERIAN decorum.
One should enjoy the article for it's humor, take lessons away from it, adjust one's own behavior accordingly if required and refrain from painting people with wide brush strokes.
Peace!