So I was in this public place (no free advertising here!), waiting for a few friends to join me, when I heard a man coughing discreetly above me.
I looked up from the book and raised my eyebrows questioningly.
“Hello”, a tall brown man said.
“Hello”, I replied.
“How are you?”, he asked.
“I’m fine”, I replied.
He shifted his foot a bit and I reciprocated his movement. What did he want? Reading a book always makes me feel very busy and important.
“Are you busy?”, he asked softly.
“I’m reading my book”, there was a hint of apology in my voice. I pointedly looked down at my book. Little did I know this was just beginning. That this was not a man swayed by pointed hints.
“Because if you’re free, I’d like you to join me so that we can talk and get to know one another better”.
Wow. Not what I wanted to hear. I decided to be more blunt.
“No, I’m waiting for a friend”, with a pause long enough to suggest that friend may be a man.
“Oh?”, he said. And smiled. I smiled back. Perhaps this would be over now. I proceeded to read my book, and was shocked to the core when he did not walk away. Instead, he started a conversation.
“Are you from Rwanda?”, he asked. I gritted my teeth.
“No”, I said through them. Great. Another question for him to ask. Where, he wanted to know, did I come from? I said from the west. Again through gritted teeth. He started warming up good and proper. He always traveled to western Uganda, he said. Where exactly was I from?
For the love of God. I took a deep breath and told him I really wanted to finish reading my book. He stared at me. I stared back. We looked at each other for a while. As I realized this man had no problem staring at me forever, my mouth begun opening and closing like a fish. When would he look away?
I had no intention of being the first to break eye contact. I gat this.
“Why are you staring at me like that?”
No. It was not me who asked this. It was him. I stared at him more, and my mouth opened and shut a few more times.
“Am I a stranger?”, he queried, smiling gently, like one who knows a secret.
Shit. Was this a relative? You know how Africans have many. Was he a former colleague? (I’ve had quite a number of jobs, I can’t remember everyone).
“I’m a human being like you”, he explained. How, he asked me, could he be a stranger?
This I could handle. I told him I did not know him. Then I begged him to go away, as I really needed to finish my book.
I kid you not that we looked at each other again in a final eye contest for over two minutes. I could feel the sweat on the back of my neck. I was not used to this sort of stress.
He smiled one last time, and walked away.
That was awkward.
He just went about it strangely, but there is no problem with trying to pick up a girl in a public place. PS Do you want them to try picking you up in the privacy of a bathroom stall?
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