The Story of My Latest Not-So-Real Marriage Proposal

The proof is in the pudding (or, rather oatmeal): I do indeed eat breakfast!

          Characterized by comic misunderstandings and a whole lot of playing charades, my Friday mornings of computer literacy lessons are always filled with laughter.  This Friday, however, was particularly entertaining.  I started off the day working with a French-speaking, African man with whom I get along especially well— in fact, I would even wager to say that we’ve lately become pals!  He seems to understand my French (not to mention my oftentimes quirky humor) better than most, and so, even though two weeks ago was his very first time to ever sit down sit down at a computer, our lessons have been flying by pretty seamlessly.  This past Friday, he opened the laptop we were using to find a desktop photo of one of the Lutheran Services cultural orientation specialists and her husband.  When I explained to him who the people in the picture were, he nonchalantly asked where my husband was.  “Not in the picture,” I said casually back, “this or any picture at all, actually.”  “I see,” said he.   “Well, I could be him,” he added, totally joking.  Establishing that I wasn’t much in the marrying mood that morning, we moved on to matters of Microsoft Word, and I thought the joke was behind us.

            However, a little bit later when I got up for more coffee, he commented that it made sense that I would need a lot of coffee, given that he was pretty sure I didn’t eat breakfast.  When asked how exactly he arrived at that conclusion, he explained, “It’s simple.  You don’t have a husband, so you don’t eat breakfast.”  “Ah, now, I see,” I responded, “So are you saying you would make me breakfast if we got married?”   “Oh no, no, no,” he exclaimed, “But if you married me you would have a husband to give you money to buy breakfast every single day!”  He then proceeded to create a pretty compelling (albeit totally make-believe) case for why we really ought to get married, crowning it off with the very pragmatic point that it’d probably be good for his English.  Feigning indignation, I questioned him as to whether this meant he was just using me for my knowledge of the English language.  His response: “No, no, of course not!  I am marrying you mostly for a love!!  And a little bit for English!  But mostly for love!”  That being settled, we went ahead and invited the others in the class to our impending wedding, provided, of course, that I felt like getting married at all the next day or the next. 

            Things took a dramatic turn, however, when the apartment we have class in lost power and, with it, Internet connectivity.  Unable to continue with what we were doing on online, the other volunteers and I took turns giving an impromptu English lesson, reviewing vocabulary of all the rooms/ objects in the house and inviting the men to share full sentences with the new words they were learning.  When we started going over vocabulary pertaining to the bathroom, my friend turns to me, and, in perhaps the only English sentence I heard from him all morning, told me with a giant laugh, "Love, you neeeeeeeed a shower!”  And that, as you can well imagine, was the end of that.  Doing my best to act as pretend-outraged as possible, I threw my hands up in the air, “No more wedding!  No more getting married!  Nope, nope, nope!”  And so it was that my imaginary-engagement came to a swift, uproarious end!

As absolutely absurd as this whole morning might sound (and yes, to be sure, it was), I am also seriously quite thankful for it.  Given that the refugees that show up to computer classes have, at least up to this point, been exclusively male, and come for the most part from societies where gender roles are even more deeply entrenched than our own, I have sometimes felt at a disadvantage in terms of being able to make them feel comfortable around me/ easily establish rapport.  However, our super silly, not-real-at-all almost-marriage seemed to span that particular bridge, in some ways freeing everyone up from the constraints of formality through the simple act of sharing in a few ridiculous, mischievous moments together! 

** Final note, for any friends/ family who might yet be harboring feelings of concern, please rest assured that both my refugee friend and I were being 100% silly.  I would never marry someone for breakfast.  Dinner, possibly, but never, ever for breakfast.  So no worries there!