AREWA GIRLS NOW AND BEFORE, THE BITTER TRUTH At 24 I have been in a real relationship thrice. One was serious and the others were a waste of time. My cry is not about the relationship I had, it’s about the ones I didn’t have simply because my Arewa girls would not give it a chance. While growing up our parents (Fathers) used to tell us interesting stories of how they married our mothers. Ever since I was a kid, my dream was to get a good girl who is educated enough to take care of me and my kids. Alas, my dream is yet to materialize. Today’s girls are completely different from yesterdays. Are our parents (Mothers) to blame or the society? That’s a question I’ve been burning to get an answer. No generation has witness the birth of beautiful young women like ours. Even with all the heavy make-ups in the market. One cannot deny that the beautiful ones have already been born. Unfortunately, beauty without a good heart is a waste of cosmetics. Our parents (Mothers) were not too pretty, but they got husbands and married at the right time. They didn’t give our Daddies hard time, they simply gave them their hearts and today we are witnessing the last age of real love. I say this because after their generation, there will be nothing like love. Lust will take over. My Arewa girls have made love so expensive, it’s now sold to the highest bidder. Pride; Show me one Arewa girl who is not prideful and I will run a marathon from Kano to Lagos. If a mountain will increase each time a girl’s pride rises, I guess Mars will now be our home. The other day I was at Shoprite with a friend. While we were walking by some girls who were taking pictures and selfies. My friend volunteered to take them a shot or two so they could have a different angular view. Just when he declared his intention to them, my Arewa girls pretended as if their ears where not functional. He withdrew to me and we left. My friend who has a good heart felt the girls needed help and will be better if they had their pictures taken from a different direction. However, his intention was perceived and translated otherwise. Instead of them to politely decline, their pride made them behave like those creatures in the Zoo. Love is a barter of deep sense of feeling and an ocean of emotions not a battle ground for pride. In the olden days, women see fashion as priority only after the issues at home have been sorted out. Well, today it’s a different story entirely. Last week a woman sold the foodstuffs in her house to buy clothes for her friend’s wedding. It doesn’t matter how or where the finances come from, what matters is they must put on the latest designers and accessories. If their boyfriends or husbands cannot afford it, they solicit other means to fill their obsession. This alone is a criteria for giving you their time or affection. If you can’t provide for them, then start learning how to continue living a bachelor’s life. As for the woman who sold her foodstuffs, she slept in a police cell. I can’t blame the husband. I once told a friend that I will marry a girl who had just completed her secondary school. After we’ve gotten a kid or two, I will allow her to further her education. A lot of people view my opinion as bizarre while to many others is a welcome idea. They say educate a man and you educate an individual, but educate a woman and you educate a community. I believe this saying works in the past. If education will become the reason why a girl will disregard totally what the society holds in high regards, I think then that she shouldn’t get that education. Our so called educated girls no longer have respect for values that are of importance to the growth and stability of the society. The education they seek have given them so much exposure and enlightenment far beyond what they need. They no longer care about morals of dressing and respect and values of womanhood and chastity. They have lost what it means to be a woman of dignity, a symbol of peace and tranquility. Nothing breaks my heart than the way contemporary Arewa girls behave in relationships. You can hardly find a guy who is happy with his courtship with Arewa girls. The kind of pain and agony we suffer from them are rarely been experienced by my comrades on the other side of the map. Where have we (Guys) gone wrong? I don’t seem to know. When you date an Arewa girl, you must be mete with any of the following treatment, neglect, disdain, disregard, disrespect and many irrational reactions. To them it is a test of love and loyalty. Even the Nigerian Army doesn’t treat new recruits the way Arewa girls treat guys. This may probably be the reason why some of us misbehave. We are been subjected to harsh emotional conditions so we find solace elsewhere. Sometimes in many places at the same time. I personally believe that if love is what it is, it cannot be shared amongst persons, but only to one who truly deserves it. I like my Arewa girls, but it’s the traits they exhibit that discourage me. I know all of you cannot change at once. However, I am sincerely calling on any of you who read this article to start by assessing yourself and proceed to restructuring how you deal with my kind. We are pillars on which you must stand, why break us when you can make us stand stronger. To love a thing and find it wanting in loyalty and respect is misappropriation of faith. Don’t you think?