by Gina Yashere
I never went back to that Yoruba class.
Someone else’s legs are no good to you when you are traveling.
The comedy scene in Nigeria is large and vibrant, with its own stars who sell out arenas all over Africa and the world. Bright “Basketmouth” Okpocha is one of them. I met him while performing in a comedy show on Long Island in New York. He was the MC of a long evening of singers, poets, dancers, speakers, and comedians. African MCs tend to do that. They cram in every available artist within two hundred miles and let them do approximately an hour each onstage, so the show could be days long, after starting at least two hours after whatever time is advertised on the flyer. Whenever I’m booked in a show with more than two African performers, I insist I go on first, so that I’m still the same age by the time I get onstage. The audience for this show was a mix of Africans, varying from young college students to their parents to the odd child screeching in the background. Some of these community events are family affairs, and Africans tend to be quite religious and conservative, so for a comedian performing at these, it can be a minefield. I kept my set very “family”—as in jokes about my mum—and my twenty-minute set went well. Basketmouth approached me afterwards. He was very complimentary about my set and had recognized me from a comedic character I had done on British TV, which I had loaded onto YouTube, and it had gone viral. The character was called Mrs. Omokorede. She was a pushy Nigerian mother who would stop at nothing to make sure her daughter became a doctor. Sound familiar? Basketmouth told me he was booking a show in Nigeria later that year and would love to have me in it. I gave him my number and the contact details of my UK agent, and then I demanded a large fee, to be delivered in cash up front, and first-class flights to and from London, with a confirmation of the ticket purchase, before I’d even consider stepping foot outside my house. The reasons for these demands were twofold. I had done several shows in the past for Nigerian promoters, and these were the only shows after which I’d had checks bounced on me or the promoters disappear without a trace. And after my less-than-successful first trip to Nigeria, I was in no hurry to go back. The plan was that my outlandish demands would put Basketmouth off, and I wouldn’t have to go back.
Around four weeks after our conversation, I received a call from my agent. “Erm, Gina, a Nigerian guy just turned up at the office with a bagful of money. He says you know what it’s for.”
Shit. I was going back to Nigeria.
On hearing of my impending journey, my mum said, “You are well known in Nigeria. Your father is going to turn up. Mark my words.”
Basketmouth booked me on Virgin Atlantic flights to and from London. The show was on a Saturday evening, so I would leave London late Friday night to land on the Saturday morning of the show, perform, then leave first thing Monday morning. In and out.
I got to Heathrow early, checked in my luggage, and was belted in my seat, ready to sleep on the plane in my first-class cocoon and wake up in Lagos. The flight was full of Nigerians returning home. Africans like to travel with a lot of luggage. A lot. I’ve seen Africans dragging suitcases bigger than they are, trying to claim them as carry-ons. A plane full of Africans meant there were going to be problems with fitting everybody’s bags in the limited overhead spaces. We were the last flight of the night at 9:30 p.m., and the captain of the flight announced several times that people needed to stow their bags quickly so we could take off. Nigerians ignored him, as if he was an annoying, chatty bus driver. The captain became exasperated: “We have to begin taxiing shortly or we will not be allowed to take off this evening. Please put your bags in the overhead lockers and fasten your seat belts.” Nigerians continued milling around like he hadn’t even spoken. I began to worry. Were we about to get stuck on this runway? After yet another impassioned plea by the captain, we eventually began to taxi down the runway. Phew, I thought.
Before we could pick up enough speed to take off, the plane began to slow down, and then halt. “I’m sorry, ladies and gentlemen. We were two minutes past the final takeoff time, and we have been informed that we can no longer fly this evening. Hotels will be arranged for the night, and we will try to accommodate everyone on other flights tomorrow.” Shit. Even getting out on the first flight in the morning, I would be landing over two hours after the show would have started. On top of that, I discovered that my luggage, with the outfit I would be wearing in the show, was not going to make it onto my new flight, so whatever I was wearing was about to become my show outfit. Usually when I traveled on a long flight I preferred sweatpants, a tee shirt, and no bra. Thankfully I had decided to dress reasonably well for this flight, in that I was wearing a decent pair of jeans and my breasts happened to be supported. I’d have to use hand soap to wash my underwear in the hotel bathroom, as I had no spares. (From that day onward, I never traveled without at least another two days of emergency clothing in my hand luggage.)
I managed to get the first flight out of London the following morning, and we landed in Lagos at 9 p.m. Basketmouth had arranged for me to be collected at the landing gate by two security guys, and they whisked me through the airport VIP style. Not a single attempted shakedown. I was put into a waiting car for the hour-long drive to Eko Hotels and Suites, where the show was taking place, and where I would be staying. The show had already begun, and I was literally going to collect my room key from the front desk, then go straight to the large conference room where the show was taking place and likely be onstage within minutes of my arrival. Fortunately Basketmouth had booked around seven thousand other comedians from all over, so I had a little time. The lobby of the hotel was teeming with Nigerians dressed in their finery, wandering in and out of the show. My two bodyguards led me towards the front desk to check in. As we neared the desk, a young man jumped in front of me and began snapping pictures. I knew my little video had gone viral in Nigeria, but paparazzi? During the check-in process, the woman behind the desk asked me, “Will you both be staying in the same room?” Both? I turned to see who she was referring to, and an old bespectacled man stood behind me, dressed in a long white robe, or agbada, with a burgundy and gold hat known as a fila on his head. I knew instantly that I was looking at my father. It was like looking into my brother Dele’s face if he was seventy years old.
“My daughter,” he said.
“Eh, hello. Hold on a sec.” I turned back around and completed my check-in. I wasn’t being rude or dismissive, but I was overwhelmed with everything that was happening. It was a mad dash from the airport to the venue, I was about to go onstage in an outfit I’d been wearing for twenty-four hours, to perform for an audience of people who were not likely to accept me, in front of a father I was seeing for the first time since I was three. The universe was really messing with me.
“My daughter! It is so wonderful to meet you. We came from very far. We have been waiting for you!”
“It is wonderful to meet you too, sir.” I did a half-kneel in respect of my elder, and we exchanged quick pleasantries as my two bodyguards looked on, impatiently waiting to escort me backstage.
“Meet your brother Uyi and your sister Sandra!”
The young man who had been snapping pictures of me as I walked in hugged me tightly, then a fresh-faced young woman stepped forward. Wow.
“We have to go, madame.” One of the bodyguards.
I asked my father and new siblings if they were coming to the show. They had been waiting in the hotel lobby and hadn’t purchased tickets. I arranged for them to be allowed into the theater, and promised I’d meet them afterwards to catch up. I was then led backstage.
The show was on, and the room was full, with around three thousand Nigerians. Backstage there were at least forty entertainers milling around. Basketmouth approached me. “You made it! Perfect! You’ll be on next.” On the stage at that moment was a young white British comedian Basketmouth had also flown in from London for the show. This guy had risen through the ranks of the Black British comedy scene rapidly. He obviously had been raised around, and now sociali
zed with, mostly Black people, and his comedy reflected that. He was absolutely destroying, doing jokes in a Nigerian accent. The audience loved him. They were practically falling off their chairs laughing. “Oya! Look at this Oyinbo boy talking like us! Ha!” He left the stage in triumph, and Basketmouth brought me on next. His intro made a big deal of the Mrs. Omokorede sketch, which was what I was known for in Nigeria, and as I walked onstage I noticed the poster for the show with all the pictures of the performing comedians. Under my name was a picture of me as the character. If that was what they were expecting, they were about to be disappointed.
I opened with the story of my journey there, and how Nigerians’ huge luggage had nearly made me miss my show. I received titters. I then announced that I’d just met my father. That got a big cheer, but then I tried to follow with a joke, kind of based on what I was feeling. “I hope he doesn’t ask me for money.” That didn’t go down so well. I decided to stick to my original script and launched into my tried-and-true set that had always worked for Black and African audiences. I told stories about my Nigerian upbringing in London, funny stories about my mum, I basically did everything to ingratiate myself with this audience. Look! I may look and sound different, but I’m Nigerian too! My set received sporadic titters. I got the feeling that half the audience were looking at me like Who is this imposter telling jokes about Nigerians? I didn’t get booed off, but I got nowhere near the reaction they had given the white comedian before me, and this made me inwardly furious. You motherfuckers! I thought. This white boy gets up here, does a vocal version of blackface, and you’re all laughing like fools, while I’m here, as an actual Nigerian, and you’re looking at me, like I just farted in your face?
I left the stage at the end of my set with a bad taste in my mouth, but I kept up a happy demeanor, because as every performer knows, you may consider a show a bad one, but it isn’t always the perception of the audience, so why point out the negativity that they themselves might not have noticed? I had often come offstage unhappy with my performance, only to have ecstatic audience members tell me how great I was, so on this occasion, I kept my mouth shut and smiled through the rest of the evening, hoping that I’d gotten away with it.
Basketmouth brought the white comedian back to Nigeria several times after that show. He never booked me again.
By the time the show ended, it was very late, and so I mingled with my father for a short amount of time. We chatted, I marveled at how much the brother I had just met, Uyi, strongly resembled both our father and my brother Dele back in London. I wouldn’t say I was excited to be meeting my father and new siblings, but I had an almost scientific interest in what was happening. I felt like someone watching this from outside my body, like an alien observer. I stared at the stranger who’s sperm I was a product of and tried to summon up feelings. Nothing. I didn’t have any. I felt emotionally detached. I harbored no bitterness towards him, although I had listened for years to my mum’s anger at him for his abandonment, and I had spent my childhood wishing he would come back for us. I just found the whole thing strange. I acted in a similar way to when I am introduced to new people after shows. I was friendly, respectful, and polite, and I enjoyed them in the moment, but emotionally I was not particularly invested. I took ample videos and pictures on my phone, to record this moment for my brothers and myself for posterity, and also because despite my father being ecstatic at the possible chance of a reunion with all his lost children, I knew I was unlikely to ever see him again after this trip. I made an arrangement for them to come back to the hotel the following day, to spend some quality time together before my flight back to London.
At the restaurant of the hotel the next day, we all ate hearty Nigerian food, and I asked the questions that had plagued me since childhood, like why he’d abandoned us. My father insisted he hadn’t, that he’d begged my mum to return to Nigeria with him. He produced a stack of browned letters he had written to us over the years that had been returned unopened. He even claimed that he had called our home several times to talk to Mum, but she had refused to engage with him, and that on one occasion her new husband (the step-bastard) had answered the phone and shouted at him to never call there again. The whole time I was thinking that I probably would have reacted the same way had my husband abandoned me in a foreign country with two toddlers and been forced to have a baby alone in a hospital with no familial support whatsoever. But I let him speak.
My father handed me several necklaces made from coral beads that he had saved for me, Sheyi, and Dele, and three small books that told the history of his family and our ancestors on his side of the family. He questioned me about my life and was proud of my engineering qualifications, as much as he was of my fame as a comedian. He wanted to know why I was not married with children, and I thought it best not to ruin this happy reunion with an admission of my ungodly gayness, especially as that would have reflected badly on Mum’s parenting. What a terrible mother! Look what happened. She refused to leave England to be with her husband, and now she has raised a devil-worshipping, carpet-munching lesbian! I made excuses about being too busy for love and changed the subject.
My father then begged me to pull out my phone and call my brothers so he could talk to his sons. I wasn’t about to do that. I had voluntarily made the trip to Nigeria by myself, knowing that I may meet him, but my brothers had had no choice in this, and I wasn’t about to subject them to a cold call from a father they’d never known. I lied, telling him that my phone was unable to make international calls, and I promised that when I returned to London I would give his number to the boys for them to contact him. He seemed satisfied with that.
I asked him why he had never returned to England to see us. He answered that he had been unable to get a visa to return. I was skeptical, as I had seen Mum’s friends and family travel freely back and forth between London and Nigeria over the years with no issues, but I said nothing. I observed his relationship with his two younger children, Sandra and Uyi. They seemed to truly love and respect their father. I thought of my two brothers, who had been deprived of a positive male role model in their lives, and how these two had benefited from the love and support of their father while we, his first children, had been left to suffer at the hands of the step-bastard, who had slid into my broken-hearted mother’s life after our father had chosen his career aspirations over his family. I wondered if these two had been allowed to have friends and go on school trips. I wondered what their school lives had been like. Must have been nice going to a school where everyone was Nigerian. I bet they’d never been called “bubu” or “booty scratcher.” I wondered but never vocalized any of it. What was the point? I was a grown-up now. Too late for petty envy.
I let my father talk, which he did, a lot, and I tried to glean as much information as possible. What I found strange was that sitting there with his twenty-seven-year-old younger son and twenty-four-year-old daughter from a woman who wasn’t my mum, he still kept referring to Mum as his wife. He even went as far as to say that the child she’d had with the step-bastard, Asi, he considered to be his daughter, as my mother had never divorced him. I said nothing. Just let him talk.
He then casually dropped a bombshell I didn’t see coming. “You must come back here and go to Benin so you can meet your older brother!”
Sorry, what?
“Oh yes, my oldest son was born in 1965. He is an accountant.”
“Did my mum know about your son?” I asked.
“Of course! I knew she had a daughter; she knew I had a son.”
I was shocked. In all the stories she’d told us about our father, him having a child before they met had never been mentioned. In fact, Mum had always told me that I was the oldest Iyashere, my father’s firstborn child, and for the very little it was worth, I’d always held on to that. Why she had lied to me my entire life, I had no idea. I’d had an older brother and never knew it—I could have so used that knowledge at school.
After several hours of eating and chatting, it was ti
me for my father to leave. I walked them to the entrance of the hotel, and as we walked, my new younger sister, Sandra, sidled up to me. She stared down at my wrist, at the Cartier watch I had bought myself in celebration of shooting my first stand-up special and selling it to a cable network in the US.
“That’s a nice watch. Maybe when you leave Nigeria, you will leave it behind.” She smiled.
I bristled inwardly. I’d met her less than twenty hours earlier and already she was eyeing me as a cash cow. I was annoyed but not surprised. I definitely wasn’t coming back.
We said our goodbyes. My father hugged me tight and begged me to tell his sons he wanted to meet them. I promised I would, knowing that the chances of them wanting to meet him were slim to none. He cried as he walked away. My eyes were dry. I was much more like my mum than my dad apparently.
* * *
When I returned to England, I questioned Mum about this older brother she’d failed to mention my entire life, and she did the equivalent of a shrug, as if it was a minor thing that had just slipped her mind, and she began questioning me. She wanted to know everything that had happened, but then she became angry that I had not berated him on her behalf. She saw it as disloyalty.
“Listen, Mum, you brought me up to respect my elders. I showed him his due respect as an elder and as my father. Would you have preferred me to be rude to him and cuss him out? No, because then it would have reflected badly on you. You wouldn’t want Nigerians to think you had raised an animal.”
