A Tale Of Two Leaders

Many Nigerians like to jokingly, or otherwise, compare the challenges of being a Nigerian to that of being an Arsenal fan in the past decade. I could never see any relationship between the two entities, not until early this morning anyway. And maybe not in the way most people see it either.

Last year Nigerians voted out a leader who was accused of been incompetent, clueless and weak. President Jonathan was also accused of not caring about the masses and lining his pockets at the expense of Nigeria. These accusations are more or less exactly the same ones thrown at Arsene Wenger these days.

When Arsene Wenger was appointed The Arsenal manager he was an outsider for the job. So much so that most in the English press didn’t know a lot about him. This was highlighted by the infamous “Arsene Who?” headline. He became Arsenal’s 1^st ever foreign manager but it didn’t stop him from changing Arsenal and English football forever, for good. President Jonathan only became president because his boss died in office and the constitution automatically made him president. I’m certain if an election was held to replace his boss, the late Yar’adua, Jonathan wouldn’t even have won his party’s nomination. He did enough work in the remaining 2 years of his boss’ tenure to not only win his party’s nomination but also the general elections in 2011. First time we had a president who was of southern minority origin.

In the four years that followed he made a lot of good and bad decisions, mostly good in my opinion. Unfortunately, most Nigerians didn’t think so and last year he was voted out after the most propaganda filled elections I have ever witnessed. Arsene, just like every human being, has made a lot of decisions in his time at Arsenal. They have been mostly good in my opinion.

Just a little over a year after President Jonathan was voted out a dollar now exchanges at around 350Naira as opposed to around 180N under Jonathan, the cost of living in Nigeria has pretty much doubled. We have reports of people dying of hunger on a daily basis, the worst rates since the civil war. Polio, eradicated under Jonathan, has made a comeback. Journalists are getting arrested or declared wanted for reporting the news as opposed to celebrating the freedom of information bill under Jonathan. I could go on and on.

The way I feel about Arsene Wenger’s tenure at the moment is exactly the same way I felt about Jonathan’s presidency just before he was voted out. I believe(d) we can do better than him, I believe(d) we could/can have a better president/manager but having seen the options in front of us I believe(d) he is/was our best bet at this/that moment. I really hope President Buhari has a secret grand plan and it works out well for us all in the end just like I hope whoever succeed’s Wenger, whenever he goes, surpasses his achievements. I wouldn’t bet a dollar on it happening though and that’s not just because a dollar is too much money these days.

looking In The Mirror; Why am I always single?

I’m a serial single man. I pretty much have long stretches of singleness interrupted by short bouts of relationships and pseudo-relationships. My longest ever relationship only lasted like 8 months. I’ve had my fair share of relationships and things that looked like relationships but can’t exactly be qualified as one in the real sense of the word. After another recently failed attempt at making a relationship work and hearing “but why are you always single” for the umpteenth time I decided to look in the mirror and ask the man in the mirror why I can’t seem to make it work. Here are some of the stupid and not so stupid reasons I came up with and some I have, over the years, gotten from people I didn’t work out with.

First of all, I enjoy been single. I like it a lot, maybe I even love it. The freedom that comes with been single is so addictive that once you get into it, once you realize you can actually be happy without the help of someone else, it’s hard to get out of it. It becomes very difficult to allow another human to come into your life and take center stage. You don’t want to go through having to pay special attention to the welfare and happiness of another human being while making every single, hitherto, personal decision. You get to enjoy your food without having to fend off another person who told you just seconds ago that they don’t want food. You get to travel without thinking twice, stay out as late as you want and pretty much do whatever the fuck you want. It’s really hard to give all that freedom up just to please another human being.

If the above sounds too serious to you, that’s probably because I take relationships serious these days. Ironic, right? A guy who can’t make relationships work saying he takes relationships serious. I was actually told words to that effect by someone I was trying to work something out with not too long ago so you can chalk it up as reason number two why I’m serially single. I have also been told I’m “too good/nice to be real” and we all know the nice guy never gets the girl, right? Anyway I don’t think I don’t think I’m too nice(you don’t wanna meet pre-2010 me) and neither do I think I’m too old to not be taking relationships seriously. I know I’m relatively young but I’m not exactly a spring chicken and I have been dating for more than a decade now, I can’t help but take it serious before marriage comes around and the only dating experience I have are just one night stands and flings.

 I’m not ready to make a fool of myself. It seems these days you have do something really dramatic to get people’s attention, like you have got to pull a stunt that could easily go wrong and leave you looking like a complete idiot before people know you are serious and there is a chance you like them. I’m too old school so excuse me if I’m not leaving you 5 missed calls after you get angry over nothing and drop the call, leaving poems under your Instagram pictures,  agreeing with you when you’re as wrong as option “Z” on a multiple choice question, telling you your make-up is on fleek when its actually hideous or just plainly going out of my way to look stupid in public to make you blush for a few seconds. I can handle been your comedian in private but sweetheart I absolutely hate embarrassment. Thank you.

The friend-zone. I’m a professional at intentionally getting myself friendzoned and friendzoning people. The reason is simple, when I don’t like someone enough to want to date them, I can’t pretend for one second that I do. I hate leading people on or been led on so pretty much from our first contact I’m already positioning to friend-zone you or be friend-zoned.

The Arsenal. Let me just say that this isn’t Arsenal’s fault. It’s the fault of the people who are stupid enough to try to come between a lifetime love affair with something that is still in the incubating stages. I have followed, loved and been loved by Arsenal for longer than anybody that is not my family by blood so trying to make me choose between you and Arsenal will only ever end in tears and we all know football clubs don’t shed tears.

I rarely confide in people who are not too close to me. I feel too vulnerable talking to people who are not too close to me about my serious problems, I would rather talk to complete strangers. Even writing this post feels, to a certain extent, like been naked in a market to me. I have been told that people find it easier to date people they have deep bonds with and to create these bonds you have to share your trials and tribulations. Well, between the getting to know me stage (“me” because at this stage I already know the few things about the other person that are important to me) and the 5 or 6 months my average relationship lasts people are either still just outside my inner circle or complete strangers to me.

I am ambitious, very, very ambitious. Some people might mistake my ambitions for grandiose delusions, it might even be the reason some people think I’m too serious. I can’t change or reduce my ambitions and I’m not sorry. Working towards my ambitions also means I don’t have time on my hands to play games. I’m blunt, I like to go straight to the point but people like games. Too bad.

I’m carefree. By this I mean I don’t care who you’re texting or calling so long as you have time for us. I’m never going to snoop through your phone to read your messages or ask you not to go out without me. Long story short, I don’t get jealous easily. Apparently this is a problem because it shows I don’t care enough. I don’t understand the logic either.

Finally, I’m never searching. I don’t go out in search of relationships even when I’m not doing the whole “talking to” thing for months. In fact, my singleness always depends on who is asking. I’m generally a very confident person (this could be easily mistaken for arrogance or cockiness but hey, who cares? Not me) but when I start liking someone I become quite a bit shy and shyness never helped anybody, did it?

I’m sure there are a thousand other reasons including ones I may not even know about and ones I have never seen as a problem but these are the ones I can think of at the moment. If you know me well enough (or not) and think there are reasons I have missed out you can drop a comment anonymously or otherwise. I may have broken the record for the number of times the word “I” was used in a blogpost, maybe I’m too selfish? Make that reason number  1743.