Jack Kerouac Was Right Reflections on a Mixed Marriage

Oh my God, Megan! I cant imagine how you must be feeling! were the words which one of my aunts greeted my mothers news that I was marrying an African woman.

 

To be fair, the aunt in question is on my fathers side of the family; they had never really forgiven him for marrying a woman who came from a village twelve miles away on the grounds that she was not one of us. Obvious, really, when you think about it in the right frame of mind. 

 

That I had even wanted to go and live in Kenya in the first place was a bit of a shock to my family (actually it came as a bit of a shock to me, as I was also applying for a job in Norway at the time). Still and all, they decided it was just a phase I was going through, and something I needed to get out of my system before I finally settled down. As I was thirty-seven at the time, I am rather more in favour of the idea that it was an early mid-life crisis, disguised as a need for new professional challenges. 

 

Well, whatever the reason, I had gone to Kenya. A colleague who had worked there a decade or so earlier had told me that by the end of the first week I would either love it or hate it and that whatever happened afterwards, nothing would change that feeling. I was deeply in love by the end of the first twenty-four hours. With the country that is, however, meeting my future wife had to take a little longer.

 

I suppose that, like most neophyte expatriates, I had thought that a new life in a new country would be just that And because of this entirely new life, that somehow I would be transformed from the quiet, reasonably domesticated, middle-aged man into something a little more more or, lets say, less dull. Over the years to follow I found it endearing (or frightening, depending on my mood) just how many people thought that they would somehow gain six inches in height, lose thirty pounds, and develop a thousand yard stare in a pair of startlingly blue eyes, set in a tanned and weather-beaten face, just to be getting off the plane in Nairobi.

 

After nearly nine years, I have got the blue eyes (but I took those with me anyway) and everything gets watery after about ten yards. Oh, and I have gained thirty pounds. 

 

Once I had settled in Kenya I did just that settled. I got on with my job, and found a selection of pubs to visit where I would not be bothered by anyone. I certainly had no thought of getting married. 

When I first went there, Kenya was still after nearly thirty years seemed to be trying to come to terms with the fact of its independence (which has changed a great deal in the last eight years, I am glad to say), and Wazungu were still, in the national subconscious, the colonial rulers in many ways: the old deference (and its justifiable negative aspects) were still there. 

 

The first thing to say is that, at the time, and still, it is a common assumption to make, from both Africans and Europeans, that a mixed relationship, especially where the man is white and the woman black, must have a financial basis. It is a sad truth that there are a lot of women in developing countries who will see a white man as a meal ticket, an new passport, a way out. A result of the conspicuous wealth of people who work for the UN, the assorted NGOs, and on expat contracts (much better than a teacher will ever get), and when coupled with the extraordinarily lax morals that come over people when away from home for long periods of time, many westerners do tend to hang around with women of negotiable virtue. To many people, the financial aspect to any such relationship is seen as the norm; men who might be quite civilised in many ways will treat African women with the most amazing contempt, whether they are prostitutes or just decent women looking for a relationship.

 

Which is why the beautiful sister of one of my colleagues was more than a little hesitant to go out with me. Actually, hesitant is not really the correct word adamant refusal would be closer to the mark. She had never really mixed with white people before, and had the same reservations as many Kenyans. Obviously, I overcame that problem (although I rather gave that away earlier, didnt I?) and we started, each hesitant in our own way, to see each other.  

 

We both got used (no, resigned to) what she referred to as bad eyes: hotel receptionists would be surprised, even shocked, when we turned up for a weekend away with luggage, waiters would make whispered comments, as would other guests.

 

Out of the resignation, as the relationship developed and matured, grew the feeling that we really did not give a damn about what people thought. Sidelining people for whom it remained a problem became something we did unconsciously. It says much about my wifes strength of character that she dealt with all this so calmly since it was clearly much worse for her than for me. 

 

Gradually, over time, people we saw regularly got to recognise the reality of the relationship; and, curiously, we found ourselves inside an informal circle of mixed couples where the one topic of conversation we never had was the fact that we were mixed couples. This even happened when we spent a year in Oman. Now almost every couple we regard as friends or mixed couples.

 

The minister who married us (not the one who was supposed to be doing it but thats a different story) gave an excellent impromptu sermon, full of very good advice to the sundry friends and relatives gathered at Nairobi Cathedral: Leave them alone! He told us to ignore anyone for whom it remained a problem that we came from different backgrounds. To be fair to everyone, we have all stuck to his advice. More or less. 

 

We are often asked (usually four or five questions after the opening so, how did you two meet?) what problems we have had to deal with in merging our two cultures together in one house. They often get upset when we tell them that we have not really noticed any.

 

Which is true we have had far more difficulty integrating our two very different personalities, our preferences and tastes (seriously, how can anyone actually like Celine Dion?) than we have had with cultural or racial issues. Sure, we do some things in different ways, have different world views, as a result of our upbringing; but the same would have been just as true if I had married a Scot, and she had married a Swahili from the coast. If anything, the real differences are more to do with the age gap of fourteen years. 

 

Does that sound smug and complacent? Well, tough, because it is true. Maybe it is because, as a couple, we have always been happily self-contained. On the other hand, if living abroad has taught me anything, it is that people really are pretty much the same wherever you go. To paraphrase, Jack Kerouac: Somes bastards, some aint.

 

After four and a half years I am still finding it a bit strange to be married to anyone, and still feeling lucky to have found someone so good for me and the question of her ethnic origin, or of mine, only enters the house when brought in by other people. Usually the same ones who ask dumb questions like, so, how did you two meet?, or how do you manage to talk to each other? 

 

Other people who have brought it firmly to the forefront include the tourist in Mombasa who asked me if he could have her after you have finished with her; and the man who wrote to the daily Nation declaring that mixed marriages are Against Gods Law (this is not an unusual claim for certain sectors of the Christian community usually they quote Samsons mum and dad, and the people who objected to Moses marrying a Cushite); and then there was the colleague who asked me, aghast when she saw us at the theatre together, early in our relationship, you do know shes black, dont you?.  

 

The question came up again recently, when our three year old daughter, a beautiful amalgam of sleek Luo and fat Celt, had it brought to her attention that her mama is black. With the straightforwardness of a child, she had thought nothing of the difference in pigmentation between her parents, until a new little chum, the five year old daughter of a British couple, new to Africa, who had come to teach in the same school as me, made her aware of something she had had no reason to notice before. 

 

The last few months have been interesting in a way we had hoped to defer for a while. As intelligent and sophisticated adults, we have dealt with each aspect of our differences, and the problems the cause for other people, in an intelligent and sophisticated way making, with other people, full use of the whatever defences we have developed since we met seven or so years ago. Of course, a child has none of these defences, nor could even understand the need for them.  

 

We know, confidently rather than complacently, that everything will be all right we know too many couples who have raised stable and balanced children for us to be too worried. Her own, very effective, answer to comments about her colour is God made me this way.

 

On the other hand, I had not really prepared myself for discussions about race and colour with a three year old. Somes bastards.

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