Memories of Africa: two men, one sitting on a crate, the other sitting on his lap, both waiting for a broken-down bus. The man sitting on the crate has his arms around the man on his lap, hands clasped, resting on his stomach. They are quiet, not joking or laughing, just practicing the art of waiting perfected in Africa when one travels on public transportation. I am so surprised by two men sitting like this I try to be inconspicuous and take a photograph.
A market woman, unloading from a basket groundnuts and bananas for selling that day. A small child is strapped to her chest by a swath of cloth. The child's eyes are open and he is resting, moving up and down with the movements of his mother. I think to myself how much this reminds me of rocking, except against another's body, not alone in a crib.
In a two-room accommodation in a small village, everyone is going to sleep. In one room, a mother, father and a small baby sleep, all touching; in another room, two sisters and I sleep, side by side, on a mat on the ground. I am aware how uncomfortable I feel so close, how unfamiliar it feels to me.
Sitting on a bus for hours heading north to Kumasi, everyone is so tightly crammed into the small vehicle that it is hard to tell where my skin ends and another's begins. I'm holding two small children, and have one between my feet. The smell is thick, salty, rich -- I think how little I ever smell people's real smell when I am at home.
About a year after I returned from West Africa, I was on a CATA bus from Southgate apartments to campus at 8:30 am. It was packed; I was standing in the aisle. The bus lurched and the man behind me bumped into me, apologizing profusely and backing up. I remember being struck by the difference between here and Africa. The definition of crowded is certainly different, but it was more than that; it was the taboo of touching others that exists in the United States.
The physical contact so prevalent in the society is one of the things I miss most about Africa. It was the kind of touch that meant no more than the touch itself, and there was a unique sincerity and easiness about it. Men holding hands with other men walking down the street. Everyone shaking hands before they talk, not as a formality but as a greeting of friendship. Children bound to their mothers for the first year of life. The joking, back slapping and playful pinching. Sitting on a stranger's lap if a taxi was too crowded. Holding someone else's children when they looked tired at a bus stop. Women in the market place, braiding each other's hair.
Some of this was hard to get used to, and some of it I never managed to. After all, I grew up here, and have been socialized accordingly. In our society, touching is highly sexualized. Because sex and touching are so intertwined, both suffer the same schizophrenia: repression and exploitation simultaneously. In the United States, we don't hug each other unless we are in a support group, don't kiss each other unless we are greeting European relatives, don't hold hands or hold each other unless it is with our significant other.
In the United States, touch often signifies a power imbalance. The most obvious form this imbalance takes is non-consensual touch, which takes place without the permission of one of the people involved. There are also more subtle forms of this, as in the touch of neediness, which leaves others feeling robbed of their energy. And, of course, the most dishonest: feigned affection, the insincere touch, which reduces a person to an object.
The inextricable link between touch and sexuality has caused an enormous amount of misunderstanding in our culture. What is innappropriate touch and what is not? What exactly constitutes sexual harassment and what does not? What is "consent?" Is it saying "yes," or not saying "no?" All of those questions are pertinent in our society currently; they also apply to touch that is somehow sexual. What I miss is the easy, safe, non-sexualized touching we so need as human beings.
The touching I experienced in Africa was not a touch of neediness, of insincerity or of manipulation. It was not sexualized. It was like the touching of little kids before we learned not to do it; like holding hands with my best friend until someone told me I would become a lesbian; like kissing boys before boys became the "other;" and like wrestling with friends and tickling each other until we were told it was time to grow up.
It was like sleeping three to a bed at slumber parties, until slumber parties were no longer allowed; like kissing my dad at night before it was deemed inappropriate; like sitting on my parents' friends' laps until I became too big; and like playing with each other's hair until it became too "girlish."
Once this time in our life has passed, men begin contact sports. They begin wrestling; they punch each other in the shoulder to show affection. Girls begin to focus on boys; they begin to cultivate their appearance to be able to win affection. Same-sex touching disappears in cloud of fear; touching of the opposite sex is relegated solely to sexual/romantic encounters.
I remember trying on a dress shortly before leaving Africa. I turned to my African friend and asked, "Do you think the top is too big?" She reached over, put her hand on my breast and said, "No, no, I think it fits fine."
That was when my understanding crystallized; no one had ever touched my breast in a non-sexual way. My African friend, of course, had thought nothing of it -- she was only seeing if the dress fit. This separation of touching from sexuality allows Africans to touch freely and abundantly; I wish the same could be said for us here in the United States.
