Paris

I was a visiting professor in Paris last fall and it was the first day of class. I was making copies for my 10:30 class at the faculty lounge where two female professors were kibitzing by the coffee machine.

“Oh, yeah,” one said. “Soon as I learned he’s Nigerian, I discounted everything he’d said as fraud.”

“Smart move,” agreed the other, nodding, “nothing good’s ever come out of that country. ...”

I cringed, held my breath and skedaddled on to my classroom, where my students wanted to know my nationality. I’m American. “Bot Professa,” an African student’s hand flew up, “ware you from originally? I hear the voice of Africa.”

I inhaled deeply, chuckled but ignored that question.

When I left Nigeria for the United States in 1980, the plan was to earn an M.B.A., a doctorate in economics, and then return. It was my moral obligation to help develop my country, whose oil wealth financed my education. An M.B.A., a Ph.D. and 32 years later, I’m still here, abroad. In 1992, when I applied for a position at my alma mater, the University of Ibadan, the dean replied, “Why on earth would you want to return when everybody’s trying to escape?” No one’s been paid for over three months, he explained, and universities are on strike half the time.