In secondary school, I had my first encounter with what I felt was some form of tribalism. It wasn’t that I was unaware that such feelings existed, after all my parents had rubbed into my ear how I shouldn’t consider marrying any woman that wasn’t from Imo or Abia state when the time for marriage came.

Many of my Yoruba teachers in school at first impression or would one time or the other assume I was rude and lacking in home training because I did not bow or tilt my head when I greeted them. They would call and scold me for it and I was always scared one of them would transfer it into my grades although that never happened. In some ways I saw it as “Un-Igbo” to do such when greeting elders, the words would suffice then often accompanied by a handshake in Igbo culture but not…