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Cook: ‘No, we have no rice.'

Emmanuel: ‘Then get some then.'

Cook: ‘No. I will not go out this night.'

Emmanuel: ‘But I have a guest who desperately needs to eat.' (He kindly added that embellishment.)

Cook: ‘I will
not
go out.'

Emmanuel looked up at me: ‘Don't worry,' he said, ‘we'll get some rice.'

Cook: ‘OK.'

Emmanuel: ‘No, I'm not talking to you! I was reassuring our guest that she will get some rice.' He angrily dropped the receiver. ‘Don't worry, we will bring you your food.' His face was disappointed, and a little embarrassed. I was witnessing the battle of the two Nigerias: the cooperative side that tries to impress and provide, versus the selfish and unprofessional side, holding the other one back.

In the end, professionalism triumphed over inertia, and I went to bed on a very satisfied stomach.

 

‘Africa time,' Ophelia sighed. She and I and her friend were sitting among rows of empty chairs beneath a tarpaulin canopy, and fanning away the brutal heat. It was three o'clock in the afternoon, but their friend's wedding, scheduled for two o'clock, still hadn't started. Luckily for me, I was dressed in a cool T-shirt instead of the long, hot wrappas Ophelia and Jessica were wearing, because I was attending this wedding at short notice.

Ophelia had invited me at the last minute after finding me pottering around the hallway of her house. I hadn't intended to trespass – the house stood on the side of a busy Calabar road, and
looked completely unoccupied. Its 1920s English style, assaulted by tropical heat and poor maintenance, had taken on an appealing dilapidation. I'd walked through its gaping front door to investigate, only to find Ophelia walking down the stairs. Unperturbed by my presence in her home, she casually offered me a drink and invited me to her friend's wedding.

And so there we were, sitting in a small residential side street, waiting for all the guests to arrive. We were almost sun-blinded by the sea of white plastic chairs around us. What insanity had compelled us to be punctual?

‘Africa time,
nawa-oo
,' Ophelia repeated regretfully. ‘They should have said twelve o'clock . . . people would take their time to come at two or three. Then we would have started by now.'

‘It dey vex me that,' Ophelia's friend lamented.

In the background, the DJ played synthesiser versions of Roberta Flack's ‘Killing Me Softly' and Norah Jones's ‘Don't Know Why' over and over again on a loop. The songs' sluggish melodies seemed to slow down time itself.

‘I beg, let them start,' Ophelia's friend implored, guests or no guests. Somewhere in the vicinity, the bride and groom must have been sitting ready and waiting.

The only distraction came from across the street, where we spotted a tiny fifteen-month-old girl walking with her mother, wearing nothing but a nappy, and carrying a mini jerrycan of water like a responsible adult.

‘Just look at her!' Ophelia squealed in delight. ‘She wants to help her mother, o!' We had a good laugh at that.

Finally, the guests began to arrive. Women sauntered towards the seats, wearing wrappas of every colour and pattern, their majestic head ties soaring skywards. The men wore the traditional clothing of many south-eastern people (including my own Ogoni): thigh-length, long-sleeved white shirts with round-neck collars, teamed with beaded necklaces, a wrappa from the waist down, plus a walking stick
and bowler hat – the accoutrements of ageing Victorian gentlemen. The bowler hat was once the standard head gear, but these days anything goes: ear-flapped caps, Kangol flat caps or cowboy hats. Some people have given cowboy hats the nickname ‘Resource Control' hats since they've been adopted by some people in the Niger Delta who are campaigning for more control over the oil wealth. The person responsible for this new trend, so I was told, is Peter Odili, the Stetson-wearing former governor of Rivers State. South-easterners seem unique among Nigerians in the fluidity of our traditional wardrobe – we've been co-opting foreign and modern influences since colonial times.

Ophelia and I had moved to a smaller ‘in-law' tent next to the house of the groom's parents. We listened to the MC announcing the names of the various chiefs and their wives attending the event. The band began playing Nigerian highlife music with their electric guitars and trumpets, while women carried drinks on gold trays for the newly-weds' parents and elders, who were sitting inside the house.

In the distance the drumbeats grew louder and louder, and people chanted a song in Efik (‘We are bringing the husband!'). The groom arrived with his male entourage, enveloped by a gaggle of women dancers. He and his men shuffled down the street in time with the rhythm, laughing and singing. Dancing beneath a large parasol, they punched the air with their walking sticks and bowler hats, the whole lot bobbing to the drumbeat, a happy mass of limbs inching slowly towards the house.

The groom and his dancing coterie approached the in-law tent to loud cheers and claps from the seated guests. Just before entering the house, he turned to the crowd, raised his arms and wiggled his hips once more. Everyone cheered again, even more loudly and enthusiastically. The groom then disappeared into the house to join his waiting bride for the private part of the wedding ceremony.

While this went on, the guests got ready to eat. I could barely
contain my glee when women began distributing pots of jollof rice, goat meat and
moi moi
, a steamed pudding made from black-eyed peas and onions. The party had truly started now. People ate and chatted amongst themselves while the MC cracked jokes on the mike. A boy ferried boxes of wrapped presents into the house. Another child led a bleating goat into the building, a gift for the bride and groom.

‘What's happening inside?' I asked Ophelia.

‘The parents and elders are talking to the bride and groom,' she explained. ‘They ask the husband how he intends to take care of the wife and household. The man and woman are told they must stay together until death. They will tell the husband that he must have
patience
. And the wife must
endure
.'

Endure. That word featured heavily in Ophelia's explanation. She repeated it several times. Still, I found something very appealing about the parents and elders of newly-wed couples giving stern talks about the virtues of patience and endurance. It seemed the antithesis of the fancy-dress ‘Las Vegas' approach to marriage.

Traditionally, Calabar women were fattened before marriage. The woman spent weeks in a fattening room where her husband-to-be gave her a small bucket of
gari
(powdered, uncooked cassava mixed with water) twice a day to soften her skin before her body was massaged. Afterwards, the woman would sleep for two or three hours, then stuff her belly with other foods. This gruelling routine of force-feeding and sleeping lasted from one week to three months, depending on how quickly the woman developed the necessary flab. The government has now banned the practice for health reasons, though a defiant few still continue it.

Half an hour later, several of the traditional dancers emerged from inside the house, looking magnificent. Ornate gold combs cascaded down their hair weaves, and their smiling faces glittered with matching gold paint. Their arms and legs were covered with feathered bands and bells, while a kaleidoscope of beads criss-crossed their
torsos, colour coordination be damned. After them came the stout newly-weds, dancing out of the house and onto the street. Several guests gathered round to dance alongside them and shower them confetti-style with
500 notes or slap the money against their bodies. As the notes floated onto the ground, two designated collectors scooped them up into plastic bags.

If the government has its way, this money-throwing practice will be scrapped. For weeks, I'd seen state TV commercials ordering the nation not to abuse its newly issued banknotes. In the commercials, the police break up a joyful wedding celebration and fine the guests
50,000 for violating the notes. At the end, a stern voice says: ‘No march am, no squeeze am . . . otherwise government go charge you, o!'

This was one Nigerian law I was happy to break. The newly-weds grinned and danced to the music, shuffling their feet and making their way slowly through the crowd. There was no starchy, ritualised dancing, but a freestyle boogie from the soul, laced with humour. People stuck out their bottoms and pouted theatrically. Two men faced one another, twisting and gyrating their hips as they lowered themselves towards the ground. Even the masquerade playfully followed me around (masquerades are costumed men who wear masks representing spirits that possess the human body, making their wearers dance).

A new song started playing, a new rhythm that immediately gripped everyone, infected them, rotated their hips and turned their smiles into frowns of exquisite concentration. Ecstasy was a serious business.

This, I realised, is what Nigeria does best. The weddings, the humour, the music – often too visceral to convey in our tourism brochures – were what made Nigeria special. It was an epiphany for me. The concept of ‘Transwonderland' with all its artifice and modernity wasn't our strength right now, but it didn't matter. The alternative was so much better and richer.

The masquerade stood in front of me and wordlessly cocked itself sideways as if asking me something in jest. I waved it goodbye and returned to my hotel, feeling pleased to be a Nigerian.

 

As the motorised canoe sped through the choppy waters of the Cross River two days later, I crouched to avoid the fountain of sea spray spewing from the side of the boat. Goodbye to smooth hair. I sat with several other passengers behind a mountain of suitcases, big bags of rice, and crates of wine and soft drinks. The boat sliced through the gold-flecked, olive-green water, fringed by glorious mangroves, palm trees, and Calabar's lush hills rising around us. Nestled among this bountiful greenery were oil installations, petrol helipads and, peeping furtively above the foliage, the home of Charles Taylor. The former Liberian president and warlord was granted asylum in Calabar by President Obasanjo in 2003. Taylor was eventually extradited to face war crime charges, but his wife and children still live in Calabar, enjoying these fabulous river views.

We docked at a short jetty in Creek Town, a small settlement further down the river. WELCOME TO THE CENTRE OF BLACK CIVILIZATION, the signboard said. Its message was more aspirational than indicative: we were actually standing close to the very part of the river where hundreds of thousands of slaves were transferred from canoes to ships and taken to the Americas. Many of them were Igbo people, whose stocky, strong physiques made them valuable as slaves, a fellow passenger told me. Creek Town is the heartland of the Efik people who settled here in the fifteenth century before spreading out into Calabar. The town was also one of the first areas of Nigeria to be settled by missionaries.

One of my fellow passengers helped me onto the jetty. Ekpenyong Cobham was in his forties, a tall, quiet version of the American boxer George Foreman. Ekpenyong was the only person I'd met who sweated as much as I did. In awe, I watched as he used his fingers like windshield wipers to slake sheets of sweat off his bald pate
before dabbing the re-emergent perspiration beads with a saturated handkerchief. Ekpenyong told me he used to run a traditional dance troupe that performed around Cross River State. One year, a French visitor to Nigeria was so impressed by the troupe he invited them to a festival in Paris.

‘How did you find Paris?' I asked.

‘It was wonderful,' he replied in his quiet baritone. ‘The streets were so clean. I looked at Paris and I realised that we Nigerians like to dupe people.'

‘I know. All our politicians want to do is steal. They don't want to build a Paris.'