I thought I was just taking a picture. I asked permission, got the permission and
snapped a picture of a man selling cloth to women. Some
of the women held up the cloth for me to snap it. It was a quick shot of normal everyday
life. End of story?
Then a Nigerian colleague who is spending a year with these
people took another picture using the seller’s own phone. When I saw the picture on his phone I thought
it was quite strange. He had cut out the
people buying and selling and even the cloth completely. All you could see was me with the man. Was it a mistake? When I expressed my surprise at how close the
picture was, he explained. “In this
culture, men and women have a gap.”
I realized it was true.
I only saw men sitting with men, and women at the borehole with
women. In another interview someone told
me that a man and his wife don’t even share finances with each other. Traditionally, they hardly even spend time
with each other.
No comments:
Post a Comment