Most Men Don't Cook or Clean
Most men don't cook or clean, unless they live alone. Women cooked for love, once. Mothers taught daughters how to put pots on the fire, because it was an investment for the future: marriage.
Times changed, living conditions changed and women work, so cooking for husbands is like lava in a dormant volcano. It might erupt anytime. Although times have changed, expectations are cast in stone. The husband drives the family car, the wife cooks. The husband and kids only bring her breakfast in bed on Mother's Day. Call it a mummy holiday.
Women cooked for not only husbands, but in-laws as well because they all lived in the same compound. There were no flats or condominiums. Let's put this in context. A man returned to South Africa with a wife born in North America. Her father-in-law asked her for food. She pointed at the fridge and told him to get it from there.
Language was the main culprit. The father-in-law asked in English because she didn't speak Zulu obviously. The request would have landed gently if it had been in Zulu. He would have given a preamble about his hunger, praised his daughter-in-law using her surname and related sub-names (izithakazelo) then lodge the request. She would have smiled and prepared the food lovingly.
He asked her because he thought she loved not only the husband, but his family as well. Before the dismantling of traditional homes to make way for railways and police barracks, families lived in one compound.
That was then. The modern reality is that some societies use tradition to oppress women. In Nigeria men look for 'wife material' meaning, women who can cook and clean despite working full-time.
In Tyler Perry's movie, Why Did I Get Married, Richard T. Jones' character complains that his new, young, slim and beautiful wife doesn't cook and clean. Women loved cooking once, because they lived in spaces that did not belittle their efforts.
By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.
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