Igbo Proverbs

An Igbo proverb goes, “When a dog bites a man, nothing much is said; but when the man bites back, everybody’s tongue begins to wag.” In nowadays parlance, the latter statement might read, “When he bites back, its YouTube video will have like 200K views, a Facebook fan page The Dog Biter will garner thousands of ‘likes’ and an MTV 30 minutes program called Dent Your Dog, Mutt Muncher or Bite That Bowwow will be developed based on that story ”. Imagine this, a black suited goon rushes at a K-9, diving at its hind quarters and chomping at the it’s rump. It yelps and scampers away, peering over its shoulder in hurt surprise at its attacker. The dude gets up, dusts off his shirt and saunter away to the soundtrack of Danger Mouse’s March Popakov Remix as ‘Mission Complete’ appears on the screen behind him.

Igbo sayings range from the pithy (a cockerel stands on a foot in unfamiliar territory) to the outright hilarious (an old lady handed a baby complained she has no teeth. Mrs. Ancient, were you asked to bite him?) A lot of them are of the hilarious variety. It appears they were composed by a Groucho Marx character and his Woody Allen friend trading jokes and after a session they recorded them and labeled them proverbs as a gag. My Mom is a repository of these proverbs and always seems to have one handy for any conceivable situation. It sort of defeats the aim when she tries to use these sayings to drive home a serious point she’s trying to make and has everyone cackling with laughter instead.

To make already bad matters worse, there is an adage that discourages asking for proverb clarifications: one who asks the meaning of a proverb suggests that his mother was given away free without dowry. As nobody would like to imply that his mom isn’t worth much, no one usually asks. This creates room for misinterpretation and the opportunity to abuse these proverbs rarely gets passed up. I am an enthusiastic culprit of the aforementioned offense.

It can’t get much worse, right? Wrong. A lot of these adages star so much animals you’d think a compilation of them was The Zoo Chronicles. Tortoise said this, vulture said that, lizard boasted thus. I mean what’s this? The Minutes of the Animal Gang Meeting? All these add up to give the proverbs their unique flavor. It is little wonder that Igbo proverbs don’t get caught on easily.

Here are some choice ones:

· When people piss together, it foams (so what do I do? Wash in it?)

· The snake said, “Were it not for my terrifying eyes, women would use me to tie firewood together.” (Fangs, too. Don’t forget the fangs.)

· The vulture asks his kin after taking a bath, “Do I look pretty now?” They reply, “No. Your bath, if anything, exposed your ugliness even more. ”

· He who sells his dog for a baboon still has in his house an animal that sits.

· The madman says, “Hurry up. I have a lot of places to go to. Not mentioning the dances I have to do along the way.”

· The lizard says the warrior who refuses to acknowledge his fellow warrior (obviously referring to self) death awaits him (what a joke? I was about to ‘acknowledge’ him the other day and he fled. I wonder why.)

· If you bite me on the head not finding my hair repulsive, then I’ll bite your ass not finding your shit repulsive.

My favorite— for now— is one which my 12-year old relative remixed. It goes: Ike nyuo aru, isi eburu okpo (when the ass farts, the head gets conked). His remix: Nkita nyuo aru, oke eburu isi (when the dog farts, the rat fetches the smell). What the hell what the rat doing peering up the dog’s asshole?

This young guy comes back to his village from the States. You all know his type: the kind of dude who thinks he ought to Americanize our culture by all means probably in a misguided attempt to hurry us on along the road to globalization. The kind of guy who would not answer “Yah!” to “Igbo kwenu!” he would rather yell, “Yippee-ka-yay, motherfucker!” Yeah, we all know him (or a variation of him).

So he decides to attend the clan powwow where elders were to discuss crucial community issues. He dresses in the traditional Isi-agu tailored in a trendy Nehru-suit style, black jeans and white Air Jordan hi-tops. On his head rests a red New York Yankees baseball cap reversed on his head. Unaware of or disregarding the age-over-beauty recognition basis, he plops his ass into the most conspicuous seat. His grandparents turn in their graves. The elders eye him curiously.

Kola nut arrives and the guy, eager to impress, rushes forward to do the kola breaking service. The elders look on in surprise. His ancestors join his grandparents; spinning like tops six feet below. He begins in the most irritating American-accented Igbo.

“Our people say, ‘he who brings kola brings life.’”

The elders respond, “Iseh!”

“Our people say, ‘the frog does not hop about at noon in vain.’”

“Iseh!”

He looks around smugly, appreciating the accolade from his seniors. By now his forebears (probably back to Adam and Eve) are doing complex calisthenics in their caskets.

He goes in for the finish.

“Our people say, ‘when the okuko (cockerel) farts, the earth pursues him.’”

“Iseh!”

“Then, mehn shit, let’s get the okuko’s muthafuckin pants before we scare the poor thing to death!”

At this point, other youths barge in, clock him upside the head and hustle him out.