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It came at 5pm on the dot; a rude awakening from
someone pressing insistently on the bell at the front gate. Like Lagos,
the inhabitants of Johannesburg’s suburbs live behind high walls,
topped with electrified fencing, backed up by subscriptions to
emergency response security services and on top of that ringed by 24
hour community automobile street watch patrols. The threat of crime is
constant in these parts as always when you have people with lots of
money on one side and those with very little on the other.

But perhaps it is also the constant presence of
the forces arrayed against crime that makes you so mindful of it. Maybe
that is a good thing. I know when I am faced with complaining South
Africans I say to myself at least you guys have someone to call.

The ringing at the gate though was of a different
nature. I hesitate to say it was criminal per se but my thoughts did go
there. The voice that came over the intercom wasted little time after
the loud and effusive greeting to make its intentions clear. It was my
friendly neighbourhood garbage man coming to demand his Christmas gift.

December had barely begun; I think we were just a
day into it. Schools were due to close on the 3rd and the children were
not yet home so it could not have been any later that December 1.
Besides that, it was a Wednesday, midweek. My garbage men collected on
Friday mornings. Exasperated at being disturbed from my peace I
shouted, it is too early. I am not ready and dropped the earpiece.

The next day same time, 5pm on the dot the ringing
came again and I could hear from outside the voices on the street and
surmised that this was a group of usurpers trying to steal a move on
legitimate council workers by striking early.

So this is what it has come to; the season of
goodwill and giving has become a time to demand, importune and harass,
in effect do what you can to get as much as you can.

Am I being churlish? I don’t know. I remember a
time when a greeting was just that. I remember being chided for not
rushing to greet my elders first and being slow to utter those words
that were at the root of social interaction: acknowledging a person’s
humanity is acknowledging yours. I am because you are and this is the
thread that unites and gives us value.

It is a recognition that takes on deeper meaning
in certain contexts. Away from home the nod of acknowledgement signals
shared roots to a mother continent. In another kind of gathering the
uniting bond can be the agreement over shared values.

But the debasement of the generous acknowledgement that we define as greeting has been going on for a long time too.

‘Good evening, sah’ is an invitation, with a
price, or should I say many prices. God Bless you Aunty is not an
endearment brought on by the effect, as you may imagine, of the pure
and utter goodness shining from your face. It can just be request for
money.

You may think that this perfect stranger is simply
expressing the traditional fraternal goodwill members of a community
are supposed to have for each other. You are at a wedding or a funeral
and some lady who looks like your favourite aunty rushes up to you and
pins a rosette on your bodice, and you think what a pleasant touch
until you get a shock at the look that greets you when your hand does
not do the expected and reach instinctively for your purse, or inner
pocket of your agbada as the case may be.

And then those praise singers and drummers who
have done some natural googling of you. If you have to pay for praise
can it be genuine?

These are the times when you hear about a
politician’s skill at counting and talking at the same time one hand in
his pocket flicking silently through notes, his eyes fixed on the
person he is addressing as if there is nothing else on his mind. Then
there is the deft move as the roll of notes is delivered to the
expectant hand and he moves on, campaign complete.

So now a stranger greets you and you are
immediately wary. Even, “I am believing in God,” often just leaves out
the additional, “to work through you to help me.” You meet fellow
Nigerians abroad or even at home and you close up, taking careful
scrutiny before you begin to divulge any information that could end up
in a 419 scam.

The world is just is not the same anymore.