There was a day, during our undergrad days, a female coursemate confided in me the quarrel she had with her husband. She's not Hausa by birth and, to an extent, by upbringing. She's only Hausa by naturalisation. Being that hybridised, if you like, made her thinks rather differently from a typical Hausa woman. The dispute was about cooking. She asked him if there was any "written" law that mandated her to cook every day for him. He couldn't bring out any. It took me some effor ... t to convince her to think otherwise, and I succeeded.

In an ideal Hausa household, the wife cooks for everyone in the house. This is her PRIMARY duty; everything else comes second. Perhaps that was why my coursemate's husband found her challenge so weird, a kind of unheard of and disrespecting. Thank God he did not divorce her as would have been the case with some rash husbands. Most of us do not take the women's constant effort to cook our food worthy of any appreciation. We just believe, without saying though, that she's discharging her duty the same way we do ours - bringing the raw food home. Some will not bring anything, not a single grain, home but they expect the women to do "dabarar mata", women's trick, to cook something. romantic boho wedding garments hippie style

Reflecting on some of these ugly truths about our setting makes me recall the words of our controversial emir, Muhammadu Sanusi II, that we are not romantic. I have since concluded that it's not in our pristine culture to take out our family to eat outside at a restaurant or something like this. Sai 'yan boko, right? We equally barely excuse any delay, even during Ramadan, by them. They fast the same way we do. Etc.

I am not exonerating myself, hence the use of "we", "we" in the above paragraphs. I may or may not be like one or other kinds of husband described. Whatever and however I am, my present living circumstance is every day teaching me a lesson. Besides many other things I miss of my dear wife, her cooking is among the top on the list. I have now (re)discovered the much our women do, day in day out, in our kitchens. Wallahi, yes I swear, it's not easy cooking. You have to weigh and gauge and wash and peel and grind and this and that and then cook. Haba! Our women are expert chemists. # Salute .