#russian woman

2 Russian women, 2 friends who said no to Russian men, and said yes to African immigrants ‍‍‍‍❤️✊

Civil wife fled to Africa and married a black man

It just so happened that most Russians (and residents of Western Europe) perceive all African countries as unfavorable and unsafe. Although, of course, few people actually went there.

However, I know a woman who married a native African and claims to be very happy now. Yes, it was my common-law wife, but relations with her have been deteriorating lately.

Ultimately, she fell in love with a black man, and he, without thinking twice, took her to his native Nigeria. The fact is that in our country, her chosen one was just a foreigner, devoid of work experience. In his homeland, with work, in general, things are not going well either.

However, it was not for nothing that he came to us in Russia just to get a good education here. After he completed his studies at our university, he became much more likely to find a well-paid position in his native country.

I decided to tell in more detail how the girl moved to a country that was still foreign to her, how their wedding took place and, most importantly, how she now lives away from her homeland, but next to her beloved black man.

Wedding according to their traditions

The Nigerian marriage process is very different from ours. Before the wedding, each of the newlyweds had to personally meet with as many relatives as possible. However, the wedding was not even one. They made two of them.

A traditional celebration with a walk, like the one we have, is arranged by the future spouse. And the duty of her chosen one is to organize a religious wedding.

I was very surprised that, according to Nigerian traditions, it is not the guests who are supposed to give festive souvenirs at a wedding to a man and a woman entering into marriage, but, on the contrary, the newlyweds themselves to the guests. As a result, none of those invited to this celebration was left without a gift from the main characters of the holiday.

Adaptation to new conditions

The wife quickly settled into a new country for her. The weather soon became familiar to her. Yes, this is not surprising, because for so long she dreamed of living somewhere in the tropics or on the equator only because there is no winter there. She really doesn’t like the cold.

She also did not have to get used to the peculiarities of Nigerian cuisine for a long time. Unfortunately, I don’t know the details of it, but I can say for sure that there are very few similarities with traditional Russian dishes.

She claims that she likes African foods and even that they are tastier and healthier. And I can’t deny that either.

And the fact that Africa is still not as developed as European countries is reminiscent of frequent power outages. We have to sit for several hours without electricity. However, in many Russian cities and especially villages, the situation is no better. So it’s not such a problem. Moreover, it is never cold there anyway. Electric heaters do not need to be turned on. And for products that should be stored in the refrigerator, you can find another fairly cool place in a country house.

Many people probably think that it will be difficult to communicate with Nigerians, since they speak some exotic language, completely different from any of the European ones. But it is not. They are dominated by well-known English to us all. His wife knows him well, so there are no problems in communication. In addition, no one forbids spouses to speak Russian. No wonder the Nigerian lived in our country for several years. During this time, of course, he managed to master our speech quite well.

Longing for Russia, according to the wife herself, appears only when she thinks about her loved ones and about winter. Apparently, one had to live for some time in Africa in order to understand the true charm of Russian weather conditions, which are characterized by frequent frosts. She hasn’t seen snow in years. But without it there will be no full-fledged celebration of the New Year.

Child

During the time she lived there, she had a child. She, according to Nigerian traditions, called him two names: local and American.

She likes the local parenting program: after 12 months they already go to kindergarten, and a few months later they master reading, counting and writing. On the streets there you can often see a three-year-old child going to the store for shopping.

Conclusion

So, a Russian woman really likes to live in Africa with her beloved man. She has a good relationship not only with her own husband, but also with his relatives. The man himself, as he planned many years ago (even before going to study in Russia), found a prestigious job, so this family has no problems with money. He now works for a Nigerian hotel software company.

Russian wives in Africa

Soon after the festival of youth and students in Moscow in 1985, “national cadres” from Africa literally poured in to study in the USSR, among which there were many potential suitors. Still, our girls needed some courage to take this step! This was the first wave of Soviet brides to Africa.

For the inhabitants of the USSR who were still living behind the Iron Curtain, marriage with an African was considered exotic. In addition, Soviet girls could not take out and legalize their own diploma of education, they could not leave without the written permission of one of their parents. And it was, in fact, a one-way ticket: they said goodbye to their relatives forever.

The meager philistine information about Africa was rather negative for them. Girls were intimidated by poverty and harems. They were called “women of easy virtue” and “adventurers.”

How many Russian wives now live on the Black Continent?

According to the most rough estimates, there are from 40 to 50 thousand of them, together with minor children. In Morocco, for example, there are from 3.5 to 4 thousand of them, and there are countries where only 3-4 Russian women live in marriage with local residents.

The geography of mixed families covered almost all countries of the continent. But the statistics are very uncertain. If before 1993 our local consular services were engaged in this and practically all citizens of our country were registered, then after the period of “enlargement” of embassies and consular services on the continent, the situation has changed. Women sometimes had to cross two state borders to get to the Russian embassy to solve their problems. Mandatory registration has been abolished, which means that a certain percentage of women have gone into the shadows. And if an armed conflict took place somewhere, and this is not uncommon for Africa, and an EMERCOM plane was called in to evacuate our compatriots and their children, many times more of them could come than according to the list of the embassy.

Why do Russian brides choose African grooms?

Often these positions were combined with such a reason as “a forced step caused by previous marital failures." One was embarrassed by her height and married a Ugandan late, the other was “not listed” on the bride market in Krasnodar and found her happiness in Benin. It is curious that psychologists note that many women from these marriage unions have the so-called complex of romantic infantilism.

There are women who just like this type of man.

There are many examples of love, when women lost their heads over the physical beauty of black men. Here is what Sasha, a Muscovite, told about her aesthetic impressions from meeting Saleh, an athlete from Senegal: “When I look at him, it seems to me that he does everything differently: he moves, speaks, looks. He is very graceful… Kissing, hugging him is not easy, it’s like a constant dance. I have never experienced this with European men.”

Africans know how to beautifully look after, come on a date in a suit and a white shirt, with champagne and flowers for mom. Especially in the provinces it was exotic. And it was the girls from the provinces who willingly made such contacts. There was a case in the Rostov region when an African groom was even offered to choose a bride on a competitive basis.

What are Africans guided by when choosing a Russian wife?

Motivation includes such general things as love, compatibility, pregnancy of a partner, the desire to legitimize intimate life, the desire to find a life partner suitable for educational or professional status, an attempt to improve living conditions during study, and more recently, business in Russia and citizenship RF.

In addition, many Africans are attracted to women of the white race, in whom they see the standard of femininity, a symbol of prestige and status. By the way, on a national basis, Russians, Ukrainians and Belarusians predominate in the "bride contingent for Africans”. Women from the Asian republics of the former USSR are extremely rarely included in the statistics. Among the motives for such a choice of a bride, there may also be opportunistic interest. Interestingly, in one of the Soviet provincial cities in the 80s of the last century, a peculiar situation developed when Nigerian students - future doctors actively married Russian students and graduates of medical universities and colleges, in advance “staffing” free staff for private practice at their homeland.

It is unlikely that all our girls imagine what awaits them in distant Africa.

Often women left who could not find Africa even on the world map. They were unaware that they would have to go to a country where there may be a different religion, where polygamy takes place. That a husband can forget about your birthday, be two hours late for a meeting. It’s okay there.

For many Africans, side connections are normal. Many Russian women have not escaped adultery. Someone parted, someone turned a blind eye to it. Some husbands sought happiness among “their own”, suddenly discovering that not everything in Russian women meets their criteria for married life. Romantic ideas often did not withstand a collision with reality. One woman told me how she almost turned into a pillar of salt when a group of half-naked men jumped out of the tall grass - it turned out to be her husband’s relatives who had gathered to joyfully meet the young couple.

When the newly-baked husband and wife descended the airplane ladder to African soil, not just the climate changed for the compatriot - the husband himself changed: he returned home, where his word and the word of his family are law. A Russian woman who went to Kenya with her husband said that in Moscow both love for children, and interest in scientific work, and attitude towards his wife - “all this was a mask." At home, he became completely different …

The fates developed in different ways: someone lived in a hut with an earthen floor, and someone lived in a villa with servants. But our women adapted almost everywhere.

And how many terrible stories, when our compatriots fell into the epicenter of ethnic conflicts, coups, military operations. This happens very often in African countries. One Russian woman who married an African military man, who later joined the guards of the then President of the People’s Republic of the Congo, Marian Nguabi. The president was killed, her husband was accused of participating in a conspiracy, sentenced to death, which was later replaced by an indefinite exile, and she was almost shot. Saved by the fact that she was a citizen of the Soviet Union.

Another Russian wife still cannot forget how they were evacuated during regular unrest in the Republic of the Congo (then it was called the People’s Republic of the Congo). The eldest son, according to her, matured overnight. When they ran through the airport to the plane and the shelling began, he fell to the ground, covering his younger brother with his body.

An incredible story happened to a woman from Rostov-on-Don. She herself is a doctor, she took a half-breed child from the orphanage. I started looking for his father and found him. They got married and all together left for his African country. It was a happy family.

Then the hostilities began there. The father went missing, the mother and child hid in the woods. She died of malaria. And the boy had to be saved. The alarm was raised by his Russian grandmother. We mobilized all diplomatic possibilities and delivered the boy to Russia.

On the whole, our women are well and kindly received in northern Africa: in Morocco, Tunisia, and to a lesser extent in Algeria. But in some countries (Kenya, Sierra Leone) Russian wives are disliked.

A mestizo child born in Africa is perceived more simply, more cordially than in Russia. He quickly adapts to African reality. In mixed Afro-Russian families, as a rule, there are not so many children, on average 2-3 children maximum. These are the so-called "quality” children, they receive a lot of attention, they are not just working hands in the family, but children in whom they invest in order to get “their own elite." Mestizo children are a complex, not always painless combination of two cultures, two races. Many of them speak two or even four languages, including the local dialect.

Mothers introduce children to Russian culture. Little mestizos easily quote Pushkin and Lermontov, sing Russian songs, participate in theatrical performances. The circles of the Russian language, libraries with Russian books are tremblingly preserved in associations of compatriots and in Russian cultural centers. The flower of patriotism blooms in a foreign land. Their children in today’s wealthy mixed families are often sent to study in Europe or America.

The flow of students from Africa has declined sharply in recent years. Now the bar for higher education in Russia has been lowered, and the cost of education has increased. Previously, many students came according to the quotas of Soviet public organizations. Quotas for Russian cultural centers still exist, and although they have been greatly reduced, they are still not completely selected.