Courtship and Marriage: The Somali Experience in America (Part 2)

This article is the second of a 10-part series of true stories of Somali women and men and their very blunt assessment of their relationships. The first six parts deal with Somali marriages in America and the last four with issues of courtship. The names and locations of these individuals have been changed to ensure their privacy.

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The Lion
There is an interesting Somali proverb that says: “Libaax nin aan aqoon baa madaxa u salaaxa” (It is he who doesn’t know a lion that pets him).

When I call my husband a lion, I mean the term in both a good and bad way. He is magnanimous, family oriented, a great provider, brave, generous, outgoing, loyal, and a true leader. I feel safe with him. My family loves him.

I have, however, one problem. My husband is not romantic.

For a man who is educated and has spent a decade and a half in the United States., he lacks the basic understanding of what a modern woman wants. Every time I show affection, he jumps on me like a lion that has captured its prey. He acts as though he is conquering that prey, with no gentleness and no consideration for his wife. 

I am by nature a passionate person. I like my husband to be affectionate. A simple touch out of affection brings me more than I bargain for or want. Why do men always misread women? I have told him on numerous occasions to relax and stay put. I can’t hold hands with him in the living room. I can’t snuggle with him without going the whole nine yards. I hear now and then that spouses train each other, but that does not apply to my husband. He is set in his predatory way. I have tried everything to help him change his habits. When we go out, I try to hold hands with him, but I am gently rebuffed. He considers showing affection in public as a “ceeb” (shameful). I explain to him that his lack of foreplay and gentleness—not to mention his selfishness—are not religiously sanctioned, but to no avail. 

I  am at a complete loss. On the one hand, my husband has many good qualities that would make many women green with envy. On the other hand, his rough edges drive me crazy. I am a 27-year-old woman deprived of love and affection. Sometimes, I ask myself if I really made the right choice to marry him. I am beginning to have serious reservations about this relationship. It is teetering on the brink of collapse.

 

Settling a Score

The wedding was great. It was well planned and well attended. Friends and family flew in from various states. The food was great, too. It was the second marriage for both of us. We both came from previous relationships that had each lasted a decade.

Three years later, I realize my marriage has been nothing but a fraud, a union built on a foundation of lies. My wife, Warda, married me simply to settle a score against her former husband, Kulmiye. I have been duped and used. All along, my wife has been obsessed with her ex-husband. I will let the facts drive my theory.

Warda told me her first marriage was made in hell. Kulmiye was manipulative, self-absorbed, emotionally-abusive, and a narcissist who lacked empathy and viewed all women as objects. Their divorce was bitter. I appeared on the scene nine months after their divorce. Warda and I started as friends, and a year later I asked her to marry me. Although I was enthusiastic and pushing for the marriage, she gave me the impression she was a reluctant partner. Nevertheless, I felt I had met my soul mate. Five months before our wedding, Warda showed increasing interest in our relationship by becoming more attentive. She started calling me daily and texting. She had never done that before; I was the one who had made all the calls. In hindsight, I realize it was that same time her ex was getting married to a Somali woman who grew up in Canada. At the time, Warda’s sudden interest in me, though endearing, was puzzling. I thought perhaps she had come to her senses, and realized the strong viability of our marriage. 

My wife has been having an “object affair”— a non-sexual affair that a spouse develops to marginalize the other spouse. The object can be work, the Internet, an automobile, shopping, etc. The spouse having such an affair becomes so pre-occupied with an object of interest that the other spouse ceases to have any meaning in the marriage. It was with a great sense of consternation that I discovered the object of my wife’s affair was the habit of electronically stalking her former husband. Every day, my wife checked up on her ex through the Internet, social media, and mutual friends. She asked her friends if they had seen Kulmiye, how he looked, whether he had lost weight or not, and—in a bizarre inquiry—what his wife wore. My wife knows a lot about Kulmiye’s wife through a complex process of information gathering that would mystify CIA operatives. Moreover, my wife has often put her pictures and mine on her Facebook page to infuriate her ex and make him jealous. Jealous, Kulmiye is not.  In fact, he has moved on and does not want to have anything to do with Warda. Interestingly, I do not have an account with Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, or Instagram, yet Warda made me conspicuous all over the social media.

When I once naively mentioned my own ex and said something positive about her, my wife was so upset that she subjected me to that familiar blend of scowl and silent treatment. “You still love her, don’t you?” she exploded. In contrast, I hear a lot about Kulmiye every day from her. In a nutshell, my wife’s default setting is her obsession with her ex. I am now convinced our relationship was one-sided from day one. All the years we have been together have not changed anything in our lopsided marriage.

I care a lot about my wife, but I have come to the conclusion she is frozen in her past, a period that remains unresolved. She refuses to seek professional help and even asserts that she does not love her ex. She has stopped chatting with me as she used to and prefers to spend time with her computer rather than with me. She goes to Starbucks for coffee alone and reluctantly allows me to accompany her when I ask. I am a rental car agent and my wife used to ask me about my daily work. Not anymore. She  constantly compares me with her ex, complimenting him on his earning power versus my dwindling income, praising him for his infectious humor versus my stoic demeanor, and lauding his skill as a handy man at home versus my standoffish attitude toward labor. She rarely acknowledges all the good things I do for her. I am getting tired of my wife. My friends tells me that I am setting myself up for a lifelong misery and regret. “Your wife will not take care of you when you get older,” they admonished me. I feel like I am single because my marriage has become only a name on paper, a union devoid of care and respect. 

Something odd has happened.

Kulmiye suddenly got divorced. My wife’s resentment toward Kulmiye’s ex got hotter. Warda started viciously badmouthing her: “Look at his picture! Kulmiye has lost considerable weight because of her.” I have heard from members of our community that Kulmiye is heading to Kenya to get married, again. I also heard that he had vowed never to marry another Somali woman who lives in the West. I guess it makes no difference to me because my marriage is crumbling and there is no hope for its rehabilitation.

 

Courtship and Marriage: The Somali Experience (Part 1)

A bit of background: In ancient times, 11 women came together in Arabia and agreed to discuss their husbands. They vowed not to withhold anything. The Umu Zarci Tradition, as it is popularly known, was a frank assessment by these wives of all the different kinds of men and their character: the generous, the kind and caring, the stingy, the selfish, the altruistic, the ravenous eater, the wife beater, the romantic, the unromantic, the gentle, and the gruff.                

This article is the first of a 10-part series of true stories of Somali women and men and their very blunt assessment of their relationships. The first six parts deal with Somali marriages in America and the last four with issues of courtship. The names and locations of these individuals have been changed to ensure their privacy.

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The Accidental Husband

 I am a 38-year-old woman and have been married more than 14 years.

I first met my husband Shire in Mogadishu. I was 24 and working as a teacher. Shire and I are related. Okay, he is my first cousin. We grew up in two different regions; he grew up in Mudug, and I in Benadir. I often heard my relatives talking about Shire’s life in the United States. He was the first in our family to emigrate to America, which he did in the mid-1980s.

Shire came back to Mogadishu in 1989 to look for a wife. On the one hand, I was proud he wanted to marry a fellow Somali. On the other hand, I was curious to see who this bride would be. I never imagined it would be me, his cousin. In my family, cousins do not marry each other. Shire’s first choice was a young lady who was attending Gahayr University. Unfortunately, she was not into Shire. Her mother was the one pushing for the marriage so she could go to America and live a better life. One woman’s misfortune, of course, is often another woman’s opportunity.

After that fiasco, Shire stopped by our house to visit. That was the first time I laid eyes on him. He was of medium height, handsome, lean, and humble. He also seemed to be religious but not in a way that would turn you off.  We all sat in the living room, drank tea, and talked a lot. He was a great conversationalist and made us laugh, especially when he talked about the experiences of Somalis and their culture shock in the United States.

Yes, I liked him a lot. The next week, I was not surprised when he came back and asked for my hand. My mother was strongly opposed to the idea of our marriage. She had a hard time envisioning her daughter married to a cousin.  However, that issue did not deter me one bit.

Shire and I married and my mother finally but reluctantly endorsed our union. He returned to the States, and several months later I joined him.

I was nervous when I came to America because I did not know English, and was not familiar with American culture. My husband helped my transition go smoothly. I would sometimes hear titters and murmurs from other Somali women about Shire not being a “typical Somali husband.” What was a typical Somali husband? Shire took care of the children, changed their diapers, fed them, cleaned the kitchen and bathroom, and occasionally cooked and bought groceries. He would also sometimes hear snide comments from his friends that I “controlled” him.

Shire never speaks badly to me. He is a patient man, listens attentively, and vocalizes his appreciation of me. He showers me with gifts and even sends money to my family back home. When I turn down my family’s requests for financial assistance because I have to focus on our own immediate needs, they go behind my back and call my husband directly for help. He rarely disappoints them.

The Aimless Man

I am married to a loser, an aimless, clueless man who lacks ambition. He is 23 but acts like a child. I go to work for the family while he stays home all day, watching television and playing games. On weekends, he hangs out with his fellow Somalis in a restaurant, talking about politics and blathering on stale, boring topics.

Did I tell you he is also selfish?

He wants me to be his maid. He does not lift a finger to help in our household. I am tired of this man. I am 22 now, a college graduate, both ambitious and family oriented. I guess my biggest mistake was falling in love with this husband of mine.

When I first met him, he seemed smart, loving, ambitious, and attentive. I guess he gave me an Oscar-quality performance. I wish I had met the real him, the person lurking beneath the surface. My father warned me about him before I got married. Call that a father’s wise intuition. My husband was attending junior college at the time, and even then was a bit flamboyant. He always seemed preoccupied with his appearance. Now I realize that the only reason he attended college was to get financial aid.

I used to hear other young Somali ladies say they would never marry a Somali man because they all lacked ambition. I have seen young men my age leaving college and becoming cab drivers or security guards. No one in our community is raising hell about this phenomenon of our youth losing their ambition. I see members of other nationalities who are striving to become successful—Nigerians, Ethiopians, and Asians.

I have held out hope—foolishly, my parents say—that this man will change. I am out of sync with my husband. I am angry at myself for committing the egregious mistake of marrying him, and I am angry at him for letting me down and disgracing himself as a sloth. However, he doesn’t believe he is disgracing himself. Soon he will be my ex-husband. Mark my words. I am out of here.

The Player

My husband has a predilection for women who are not married to him. I am his only wife, and yet I share this womanizer with other women. Some of them I know are in my community; others I may never meet. He never met a woman he didn’t like. Why am I with him? I have been married to him more than 25 years. We have five children—three adults and two teenagers. 

When I met my husband, he was charming and charismatic, a very smooth talker. He made me laugh. He seemed a good catch: he was a dashing, educated, witty, and ambitious young man with a great career. We fell in love and were married. One thing we never worried about was money. I had a good job as a junior official in a government ministry, and he was a rising manager for a publicly owned company.

After several years of marriage, my husband suddenly stopped being attentive. He would come home, eat, and then sit in the living room and read. He stopped asking about me, my work, the children, and any of the household needs. I would ask him questions, and his answers were always perfunctory: One-word grunts of “fine,” “good,” and “okay,” were typical. I became a piece of furniture in a nicely decorated house, totally unappreciated and ignored.

My husband had a dark intimate secret:  He was leading a secret life of philandering. Of course, I had heard rumors of his penchant for infidelity, but I did not believe them. I defended him vigorously and lashed out at his critics. I thought these naysayers were just jealous of our happy marriage. Or, so I believed then.

Then, one day my husband came home bruised. His face was swollen as if he had been badly beaten, and his right hand was in a cast. I panicked and ran to him, inquiring what had happened. “I had an altercation with a guy at work,” he said. “It is not a big deal.”

That same night, my family was awakened by the sound of a police car. The police came and banged on our front door. They had come for my husband, and he was arrested. A police officer told me he had seriously wounded the husband of his mistress.  That man was in critical condition, suffering from knife wounds. Fortunately, he survived.

I learned that all the rumors I had heard for so long were, in fact, true. I felt the sting of betrayal. I had been bamboozled.

My husband was released after a week of incarceration. His well-placed relatives got involved, and he was hit with a slap on the wrist. All the charges against him were dropped. He returned home and promised never to cheat on me again. I naively believed he was capable of reform. For a year, he was his old self again—very attentive, loving, and appreciative.

Then, in 1991, the civil war broke out in Mogadishu, and we fled to neighboring Kenya. After two years in a refugee camp, we settled in Iowa in the United States.

People will say, “Once a cheater, always a cheater.”  Sadly, I am afraid they speak the truth.

My husband started hanging around with Somali single mothers in Iowa. He was “helping” them, he said. He started coming home late. Then, his all-night forays increased. He started driving to Minneapolis, which has the largest concentration of Somalis in the United States, a place with a seemingly endless supply of women.

I am still married to him, but please do not ask me why. He is a good father, and my children listen to him. If we got divorced, my teenage children would go astray. They would leave school and might get involved in gangs and drugs. I have to weigh my personal options very carefully. For the moment, I have decided to put my children’s well-being above my own happiness.