Atoke’s Monday Morning Banter: Bow, Kneel & Greet

Good morning guys!

Did you have a restful weekend? Did you wake up this morning thinking about Friday? I hope all is going right and dandy with you? Well…

Oh gosh! That felt absolutely tedious. My friend, Nengi, has been trying to school me in the art of greeting before jumping into conversations. She says it’s a thing ‘normal’ people do. So in the past two weeks she has been working on me. If I send her a message rattling on about something or the other she replies with “Good morning to you too. How are you this morning?” Urgh! It’s maddening, but I’m learning. This thing called greeting properly is a serious issue.

As a Yoruba girl, the art of greeting and politeness was ingrained in me even before I could walk. You see an adult coming and you drop down to your knees… or receive a slap on the back of your head. Men had to drop flat – prostrating to greet. It was culture and it was the norm that I knew. Then I became a teenager and I started visiting non-Yoruba friends at home and I saw that things operated quite differently. First, the fact that nobody was acknowledging my ‘good upbringing’ evidenced by my darkened knees was quite jarring. Small curtsy, scraping of knee, midway curtsy… they all had the same effect as a simple “Good morning Ma” said standing upright. Ah! What is going on here?

As much as Nigerians like to pull the card of “Nigerian Culture” when things don’t sit comfortably with us, realistically, there’s nothing called “Nigerian Culture” (Unless we’re talking about corruption & living without basic amenities). With over two hundred ethnic groups, the entity called Nigeria is too large to be aptly categorized into one box. Thus, leading to the conclusion that something as basic as how you greet each other will be markedly varied.

It becomes even more interesting when someone from one part of Nigeria is offended that someone from another part of Nigeria isn’t giving the appropriate and required deference he/she believes they should get. My friend, Seun, always gets a weird reaction from older people who expect her to drop down to her knees to greet them when she mentions that her name is Seun. Although she has a Yoruba name, she is Kalabari. Both her parents are Kalabari (Don’t ask why she has a Yoruba name, it’s a long story).

I asked my Bini friend how she greets her parents; I asked if they knelt down as they’re geographically close to Yoruba people. She replied that they didn’t kneel, but only genuflected in deference. I know from living in Kwara State that Ilorin men don’t prostrate. This is because some part of the culture has its roots in religion and they’re not supposed to bow to any man; any signs of deference should be reserved for God.

Last week, I received a phone call from someone who is significantly older than me. I picked the call, greeting and subsequently genuflecting to show some respect. {I don’t know who I was showing since the man couldn’t even see me over the phone}. Deep in the recesses of my mind, I have been conditioned to believe that it is the way to show respect – and you know how much we value respect around these parts {Remember I wrote about appropriate tags for anyone who has had a child} I can’t seem to help myself and sometimes it is a little embarrassing when I drop to my knees in a place where it’s totally awkward – like the time I dropped down in front of my brother’s Tiv father-in-law. I must have confused the man because he didn’t know what to do with this girl who was now on her knees in front of him. Since then I’ve learned to carefully gauge the environment before knowing the method of greeting.

Exploring the idea of the acceptable mode of greeting across cultural platforms becomes even more intriguing when one considers marriage and raising children. How do you teach your kids to greet if you’re from one part of Nigeria and your partner is from another part? How do you start learning the ways of your in-laws?  How soon do you start teaching your kids that this is an aspect of culture which you’d like to foster. In my conversation with Mo, he mentioned that his parents didn’t insist on any style of greeting. In their house it was “Good morning Mummy: Good morning Daddy”, until their late teens when some ‘nosey’ relatives started complaining that it wasn’t right for children to greet their parents in that way.  When I was younger, I used to greet my parents – knees kissing the ground. However, as an adult, it’s simply “Good morning” with a hug or a side hug. Does this, therefore, mean culture has taken a back seat? Does this mean I respect them less?

These things are just mind boggling. Can we just live? Really? Or is this one of those things which make us “Proudly Nigerian”?

I’ll leave you guys to ponder on it for a bit. Have a fantastic week ahead. Please, stay safe and stay healthy. If you live in Nigeria, please don’t bath with salt in the hopes of killing the Ebola virus. Please. Read and be informed.

I have to leave now. Don’t forget to share how you greet where you’re from. Tell us if you’ve had any awkward greeting moments. Share some of your fun stories with us… you know how much I love to learn from y’all!

Peace, love & carrots.

Toodles!

Photo Credit: Dreamstime | Katrina Brown