Of couples clueless about each other

By OYUNGA PALA

KENYA: I watched a couples’ show on one of the local TV stations and wouldn’t help but sympathise with three guys racking their brains to answer simple questions about their spouses even with Sh100,000 at stake.

What’s your wife’s favourite TV programme? What direction does she button up her blouse? What’s your wife’s favourite colour? Really! Why would you torment men by asking such questions?

We do not store such precise details about our spouses and neither do we remember significant dates unless we are trained or threatened into compliance. We simply learn how to regurgitate stuff that elicits the treasured response, “Baby! That was so thoughtful”.

Men and women will keep up an act until they pass the test. A woman positioning for a Mrs status will cook up storm in the kitchen, impress her mother-in-law, but promptly after the honeymoon, the man will learn how to love pizza or go on an involuntary fast.

A man will comfortably maintain two separate families with the sort of discretion that would impress a Mossad agent. The average couple is often clueless about the true nature of their life partner simply because people lie. As the American stand-up comedian Chris Rock famously said, when you first meet someone, you’re not really meeting them. You are meeting their representative.