Stories told through male experiences, challenges, relationships, identity, and growth.
A Diary of Family, Property and Impossible Choices. Some families inherit wealth, others inherit questions. When Chibuzor Okeke plants a “FOR SALE” sign outside his childhood home, he believes he’s doing what every responsible son should do. Sell the ageing family compound, secure his parents’ retirement, travel abroad, build wealth, create opportunities and rescue everyone from a
I didn’t sleep, not properly. I lay on my side of the bed, staring into the darkness, listening to the sound of my wife’s breathing. She was sleeping, or at least she appeared to be. I wasn’t. Her question kept repeating itself in my head. “If you are allowed to marry four wives, why have
My friends have convinced me that I am not doing anything wrong. That is how this whole thing started. Maybe that is also how most men get themselves into trouble. They sit with their friends, everybody talks confidently, everybody has an example, everybody suddenly becomes a relationship expert, and before you know it, you are
An honest little conversation about masculinity, image, pressure, and the exhausting business of proving you are a man. I have a question. Actually, I have several, and I promise I am asking them because I genuinely want to understand. Nigerian men, who are you performing for?Who is sitting in the audience?Who is keeping score? Because
I didn’t sleep. Well…my body slept but my mind didn’t. There’s a difference. I’m sitting alone in the sitting room, staring at the blank television. It’s off, has been off for hours, but I keep looking at my reflection in the black screen like somehow it has answers. My roommate, Femi, finally convinced me not to
People think the worst thing that can happen to a man is poverty.It’s not. The worst thing is watching poverty slowly remove your choices until you start doing things you once swore you would never do. If you had met me six years ago when I graduated, I was full of plans. I was going
I have been rehearsing this evening in my head for weeks, not because I’m shy, well…maybe a little. But mostly because I genuinely wanted this to mean something. I’ve been in America for a few months now. Long enough to know which supermarket has the cheapest eggs, long enough to stop converting every dollar to
I don’t think anybody has ever overthought a train journey the way I am currently overthinking this one. I’m sitting by the window pretending to enjoy the scenery, I am not enjoying anything. In fact, if anxiety had a physical form, it would be sitting right beside me, asking if I packed my passport.I check
I’ve taken three showers already and I still don’t know what else to do with myself. The apartment is quiet, the television is on but I couldn’t tell anybody what’s playing, my food is cold, my phone is on the table, and my mind is still in that photocopy room. Still with her. I remember
There is a particular kind of lie adults tell themselves, the small and comfortable lies. The ones that help you get out of bed every morning. Mine went something like this:You died.You came back.It was weird.Now everything is fine. For three months, I repeated that lie so often that I almost believed it.Almost. Three months