MAN TALK: Are you enabling a gigolo?

Then there are the gentlemen who make us all look bad. These are the chaps who borrow women money and never return. PHOTO| FILE |NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • If you are a man and you are living in a science fictitious world you will wait for end month but if you are battle hardened if your nose has been bloodied by life a few times, you will know that waiting for that money is like waiting for Godot.
  • Surely, it must be the banks, si you know how banks are? The waiter, now shamed, says he will go and fetch a different PDQ machine and off he goes to the bar counter.
  • You would imagine that the lady picks on this from date one and flees? Naah. There is no fun in that. She thinks she can change him so she sticks around.

Let’s talk money. There are women who borrow men money and don’t pay. Especially if it’s a man who they are sleeping with, or a man who wants to sleep with them or is thinking of sleeping with them. Why should she pay it back when she continues to grace his table with such beauty and charm and irrepressible charisma?

Why should she pay him back when you are benefiting from her perfumed smell and she continues to accord you the high privilege of seeing her as naked as a tomato? You shouldn't have such ambitions of getting your money back. But the problem isn’t even that; it’s how it was asked - a long spiel about late salary or mentions of arthritic condition of some elderly relative or a stock that has to be cleared before sundowner, an elaborate fuss that was appended with a lie at the end; I will pay you as soon as my salary checks in.

If you are a man and you are living in a science fictitious world you will wait for end month but if you are battle hardened if your nose has been bloodied by life a few times, you will know that waiting for that money is like waiting for Godot.

‘MY CARD HAS NEVER BEEN REJECTED!’
Then there are the gentlemen who make us all look bad. These are the chaps who borrow women money and never return. Or the chaps who make women pay for their way under some composite heap of excuses. It goes something like this. The guy seated across the table is with the girl with the long braids. He’s trying to impress her, you can tell. He’s taking charge. He’s being a man. He calls the waiter. He orders bottles of wine for her and her friends. They have heard a lot about him and she had suggested that he passes by tonight and meet them officially. And he did, best foot forward etc. He cracks jokes and charms them, especially the friend who has the swing vote; the undecided. (There is always that one annoying girlfriend of hers who’s always so hard to read, always giving you cynical glances).
He pours their drinks, suggests bitings from the menu, orders it and makes sure that there is cheer all around. Everybody has a good time. The bills comes and his debit card shows an error or is rejected or whatever. He looks cross at the waiter, says, their machines are outdated.

“My card has never been rejected!” he says righteously.

Surely, it must be the banks, si you know how banks are? The waiter, now shamed, says he will go and fetch a different PDQ machine and off he goes to the bar counter.

The man tells the ladies, “Excuse me ladies, let me sort this little problem. If I’m not back in five minutes I will be in the kitchen chopping onions in which case you ladies can go ahead and have a lovely evening, it was nice meeting you all.” They laugh and when he’s gone they tell their friend, “He’s so charming and my you didn’t tell us that he has such a strong jaw.” And the other one - the feisty one - says “I could make a Jaw Salad off that jaw,” and they giggle. The Undecided simply grins, and rolls her eyes.

The lady’s phone rings and it’s the jaw man. “Babe, could you please come over for a minute?” So she goes and he tells her some cock and bull about his card and the bank and his other card that he conveniently forgot at home. Because she wants his friends to think of him as a charming guy with a great jaw, she covers his nakedness and does a quick mobile money payment; 15,320 bob.

“Thanks a lot babe. I’m so sorry, tonight of all the nights, it’s so embarrassing,” Mr Jaws says all sullen and apologetic. “I will wire this money first thing tomorrow morning.''

‘STUPID BANK’

Of course he doesn’t send the money the first thing the next morning, neither does he send it the second thing the next morning. He never sends that money. Then it becomes a habit; a string of excuses about his card or ATM or the company account or his credit card or the “stupid bank” or the opposition party.

It goes on and on, month after month excuse after excuse. You would imagine that the lady picks on this from date one and flees? Naah. There is no fun in that. She thinks she can change him so she sticks around. This guy comes in various forms not just the guy who doesn’t pay bills at the bar. He comes in the form of the guy who will ask the lady to book the flights that he will refund but never does, or ask her if she has a loose “10,000” in her MPesa he will refund or moan about losing a big deal, if he could only get the small balance of Sh250K he will be back on his feet.

He never gets back on his feet because he’s lazy. And women enable men like these and then moan about how Kenyan men have become useless. If he calls you for a date and his debit card develops financial cirrhosis let him call his friends for rescue, he’s not a wolf who walks alone, we are all Liverpool fans by default, we never walk alone. Some women don’t even stop there; they pay a man’s rent month after month because he’s “struggling.”

Ladies, there is a big difference between supporting a man and enabling a man to be a gigolo. And once he is used to not paying bills for his woman, do you think he will even pay bills when we - his male friends - meet for drinks? So that problem becomes ours.