The guy was out of the country for almost a decade and half. He was in an European country and all these years he never got a valid residence permit. Still, he marries a ferengi though in real terms it wasn’t much of a marriage. He being a hopeless guy who expected roads paved with gold and finally ended up learning to live with his always starving self. As he was inclined towards criminal activities the ferengi woman in whose he resided throws him out. Now, the story while still in Ethiopia he had this girlfriend and they were planning to marry when he suddenly disappeared just like that! No one had any idea whatever happened to him. Or as a common Amharic pun has it ‘which hyena devoured him!’ A few months later he phones and tells in which country he was promising to take her out once he put things in order.
A couple of years tuned into many years and the girlfriend who decided it was time to forget about him and get on with her life did exactly that. A hard worker she makes it through life achieving one success after another. She had a very well-paying job and she manages to build her own wonderful G+1 house. For some reason having dumped a one new boyfriend she was going it alone in life.
Suddenly one Sunday while she was home after prayers in her neighborhood church fixing breakfast for herself and a couple of friends who promised to drop by there was a knock on the door. Her friends have arrived; so she thought. When she opens the door indeed her friends have arrived but there was a third person with them, the very person who left her out in the cold a decade and half ago and who just forgot about her. Here, knocking on her door on a bright Sunday with all the promise of being a wonderful day was the guy who was supposed to be somewhere in Europe married to a ferengi and leading a comfortable life! Well that was what she heard about him the last time she inquired many years back. And now here he was on her doorsteps disheveled, thin and looking like the last time he ate anything was when Saddam was still wielding rifles at rallies. She was so shaken she said not much and their greetings were the strange and queer. The two friends left once they hastily did away with the breakfast.
His story was that after repeated warnings from the authorities in the foreign country he was once again caught in illegal activities and deported. In fact the unconfirmed talk is that a police officer from that country accompanied him all the way to Addis. No one is sure if he ever saw the inside of any prison cell once back home and what his crime really was back in Europe. I mean it must have been quite serious if all the gossip about his being accompanied by a police officer holds any water. Somehow no one is sure how he managed to soften her heart and they got into a not-so-passionate and very short-lived romantic relationships; she was the one who called it quits telling him in as many words.
However the nice God-fearing lady she was she still kept him in the house until he gets somewhere else to go. Still being the one who brings home all the money she covered his every expense. Let alone earning a single cent he never went out looking for any job! The cracks appeared when he, to her total surprise, asks her for them to have a joint account! This is the very guy who was served the red card of any personal relationship with her! And he asks for a joint account! (No wonder the football team of the country he was in was sent home from the Qatar World Cup quite early!) I mean some people are real weird creations! He earns not a single cent and he has the guts to demand for a joint account! A joint account! Really!
She says there was no way this would happen and it is at this time he started acting like some Napoleon trying to boss his way around her house and she had had enough! She asks him to leave and the guy had practically nowhere to go. Her friends tried to cool her down and give him some more time. But the way he was acting she was also afraid he might try to do something bad and it became a life-threatening situation. With her verbal warnings for him to leave having fallen on his deaf ears one day she threatened to report him to the authorities and that did the job. He left promptly leading her to believe the guy must be involved in some real bad stuff for him to be so sacred at the threat of being reported to the authorities. He approached her friends begging them to do something and that’s when we heard of this story.
I mean given that his betrayal the guy didn’t deserve anything. But the philanthropic-hearted lady went out of her way and did only a few, if any, would have done and took him in; and see how she’s paid back! The fact is that if things had gone well back in that European country he would have forgotten even she existed.
By the way, about this joint account thing we hear many stories of hubbies with hidden accounts of their own where they put in much of whatever extra money they get throwing the crumbs into the joint accounts. Here is a humorous piece I read somewhere;
“My wife and I have a joint checking account.”
‘Isn’t that hard to keep straight?”
‘No. I put the money in and she takes it out.” There you have on chauvinist macho!
Now, about this really good lady it’s absolutely maddening to hear some of her closest friends are trying to paint her as a heartless person who threw a defenseless guy out to the wolves! What is wrong with people, especially so-called best friends, these days! These people who in their live times haven’t never been involved in any humanitarian work or even came anywhere close to it and they try to take apart this humble lady’s name!
Here is a wonderful line I read somewhere; “Give the world the best you have and it may never be enough. Give the world the best you have anyway.” Isn’t that a beauty! We need more people like this lady who give the best they have despite the ungrateful times we’re in!
The Ethiopian Herald January 15/2023