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Courtship and Marriage: The Somali Experience in America Part VI

By Hassan M. Abukar

This article is the sixth in a 10-part series of true stories about Somali women and men and their blunt assessments 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 the individuals have been changed to ensure their privacy.

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The Spy

My wife spies on me constantly. She checks my cell phone, my emails, my mail, and even my pockets. I am, by nature, an open book. She knows my email password because I willingly told her. My mantra has always been: “Go ahead, because I have nothing to hide.” She checks my text messages when I go to the bathroom or to bed. Sometimes, when I wake up in the morning and check my cell phone, it does not indicate any missed calls. However, when I check my call history, I notice several missed calls. I’ve talked to my wife on numerous occasions about her lack of trust in me. She is never satisfied with my constant assurances that I do not cheat on her.

Wedding_marriege and courtshipI know why she is suspicious of me. She is afraid that the past will come roaring back. Once upon a time, I was an indomitable flirt. Moreover, I met my wife while I was engaged to another woman. I left that woman in a heartbeat and fully committed myself to my wife.

It bothers me that after eight years of marriage and not even a single act of indiscretion, I am being subjected to an elaborate system of spousal surveillance and spying. My wife is computer savvy and has a habit of checking my activities online.

Today, I have to be cryptic when I talk with friends. I watch carefully what I say when I am home. I have asked all my female friends and female co-workers not to call me. I deleted all their contacts from my cell phone. I am scared my wife will misinterpret things if I talk to women.

The Isolator

I was once the most outgoing man on earth. I was sociable, gregarious, and funny. Most of all, I was very close to my large family. These days, I rarely leave my home. I have become, suddenly, homebound. My wife is a homemaker, and my adult children run our family business. I do not even remember the last time I went to the store my family owns. My relationship with my parents and siblings has become progressively worse.

My wife is the cause of my isolation from family and friends. Since I married her, she has done a marvelous job of alienating everyone in my big family. My wife is a sociable woman. When she addresses people you would think she is the nicest person in the world. She has a sweet tongue and is a natural charmer. After you leave her, she will call you bad names and say terrible things about you behind your back. Interestingly, she has a nickname for everybody in my family, including myself.

Do you know what she calls me behind my back?

Xaarle,” (dung beetle).

BugI have no idea why. All I know is that she views my family as dirt. I used to get upset about the way she treated my relatives and pulled me away from them.  Not anymore. A series of poor judgments by members of my family toward me gave my wife the ammunition to hate them. I was fired from my job several years ago and no one in my big family came to my assistance. It was a bitter disappointment. To this day, I have no idea why my family was indifferent to my plight. “Who needs a family like this?” my wife said.

Honestly, I miss talking to and visiting my parents, my siblings, and my cousins. Every time I saw my parents, they badmouthed my wife and raised the issue of my “indifference” to the rest of the family. I got tired of their constant complaints. Then, they asked me never to set foot in their house again. My own parents in essence disowned me because of my wife. That was—and still is—painful.

In the beginning, I was very defensive of my wife and blamed my family for their unbridled enmity toward her. Now, I am having second thoughts about my wife’s innocence. Something is amiss. It does not make sense that all my family members are wrong and only my wife is right. I am a middle-aged man, and life is short. I miss my family, the family weddings of my nephews and nieces and their high school and college graduation ceremonies. No one invites me to these important occasions because of my estrangement from the family. I am treated like I have the plague. This estrangement is taking a toll on my marriage.

I think my wife has performed black magic on me. Perhaps I am possessed. I know my wife believes in sorcery. She definitely has put a spell on me. I am developing resentment toward her. Am I paranoid? Surely I am. I have to seek some help.

On the Brink of the Precipice

I am a 25-year-old woman who was once married to an American Muslim. He was a white, handsome character of medium height, confident and always fun to be around. Our courtship was truly memorable. We met at college, hit it off, fell in love and cared about each other a lot. Why I decided to marry a man from a different race and culture is a question I still cannot answer. It was likely a combination of youthful exuberance, deep love, and exoticness. I was only 19 when I met Adam and the thought of marrying before the age of 25 had never entered my mind. There was something adventurous in forging such a relationship—an attempt, on my part, to break with Somali tradition, which I found restrictive and uncreative. I longed for a different life than the one in which I was raised.

heartInevitably, Adam and I got married and our happiness was complete. However, married life turned out to be very different to our courtship. He ran into a gauntlet of obstacles. My family was cool to him, even though he went out of his way to be good to them. Adam started learning Somali; he wore traditional Somali dress for men such as the Macawis, and he called my parents “aabbo” (father) and “hooyo” (mother) respectively. Sadly, they were anything but cordial. The Somali community wasn’t kind either. People would stare at us as if we came from a different planet. Somali men looked at me contemptuously; they viewed me as a traitor marrying out of my race and people. One man was so rude to me he called me a whore and then swore to his friends that I was not even Somali. “She must be an Ethiopian,” he muttered derisively. Adam and I would go to a Somali restaurant, and the waiter would talk only to me, ignoring my husband as if he were non-existent. This treatment hurt Adam and disgusted me so much I considered it immoral.

At home, Adam was very helpful—cooking, cleaning, and taking care of our child. The first three years of our married life were wonderful. Then, our ‘honeymoon’ ended abruptly. Some relationships snap for no good reason; others falter because of complicated outside influences. Ours was a perfect example of the latter. Adam suddenly became distant and aloof, and openly hostile to my family. He freely spewed contempt on my people. Then his outbursts became violent. He slapped me a few times, punched my back, shook me, screamed at me on any pretext, and once squeezed my wrist so hard it was sore for weeks. Within a span of nine months, he was arrested twice for domestic violence, but that didn’t stop his abuse. He threatened to kill me if I ever left him.

Once, I overheard him tell an American Muslim man never to marry a Somali woman.  Then, one day, Adam’s deepest feelings finally exploded when he made a terrible confession: “I can’t stand Somalis because they are damn racists.” I was stunned. This was not the man I knew. He was angry, difficult, and constantly disagreed with my suggestions for improving our relationship. Such disagreements became reflex actions for him. He saw in me the embodiment of everything he believed was wrong with Somalis, and he did little to disguise the loathing he felt for them. They, in turn, also harbored strong resentment against him. Frankly, apart from the domestic violence, I was sympathetic toward him until he started regarding me as his personal enemy.  True, he was a victim of reverse discrimination, but I was at the end of my own emotional tether. I was paralyzed by fear and became concerned for the safety of our baby. I was too embarrassed to discuss my dilemma with my parents, three brothers and three sisters. However, when the news of Adam’s arrests became known, a chorus of voices in my family demanded that I leave him.

Finally, I filed for divorce. I thought my nightmare was over and that I had removed an irritating thorn deeply embedded in my flesh. I was wrong. A new battle with Adam had only just begun — the battle for the custody of our child. The fight for custody of my baby highlighted a significant difference between Somali men and foreigners: a Somali man will never contest a mother’s claim to custody of her child, no matter how bad he has been as a husband. Somalis believe children should always be raised by their mothers.

Today, I am engaged to a nice, compassionate Somali man. We are planning to marry soon. However, my biggest concern is my ex-husband remains part of my life because he has partial custody of our child. Adam is very capable of manipulation and revenge and I am afraid he will use my son to ruin my new relationship. He is single and I am sure has free time to concoct plots against me. For the record, just to spite me, he has told me that he will marry someone of his own race and go back to his roots.

My parents are excited about my new man because he is Somali. My community is elated, too. This is indeed a welcome but very bizarre change.  A few years ago, I was scorned by my community for choosing to marry outside my race; now I am bathed in adoration and approval. Just yesterday, some of the ignorant members in our community were calling Adam “Gaal” (Infidel), even though he was a Muslim and me “Gaalo-Jecel” (Infidel Lover). Suddenly, I am no longer a traitor. I am happy with my fiancé but I have become cynical. I am disgusted at the way my family and community treated Adam, a man who did nothing to them except be different. If he had been treated well, I wonder whether he would have imploded as he did and whether we would still be together. He is not a man who forgets and forgives. My community pushed him to the brink. It may sound as if I am sympathizing with my abuser—a typical response from a victim of a domestic violence—but that is not the issue. I am simply against injustice because injustice not only leads to social and community tragedy but also to personal tragedy and devastation. .

Hassan M. Abukar

Email: [email protected]

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Hassan is a freelance writer and political analyst.


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