COMING FOR AMERICA

We sat so close to each other that our knees were almost touching. The gorgeous miss didn’t seem concerned with the secretive sensations heating my inner loins. It appeared to excite me more than it affected her. She patiently explained what electronic mail was, the process of emailing, receiving, sending, composing, forwarding, replying, and the other information she thought I needed to know.

She clicked a few keys on the keyboard, let her eyes dart over the screen for a quick moment, and then revealed something I could have never anticipated her to know, “You have lots of spam.”

Wait a minute! I thought. Did she just say I have lots of sperm? I nodded, wondering how she could know something so personal and secretive. Does the computer with all this bright screen facing us have X-rays that can reveal internal stuff like that? When I recalled being told in class that the computer has a built-in camera, it made sense. Furthermore, when I asked my buddies how to connect with American girls, I was made aware that they are straightforward and tell it like it is without batting an eyelid or beating around the bush.

She confirmed this advice by stating in no uncertain terms, “Be careful. Don’t just let anything in; you might get a virus.”

Her expression changed as if she were concerned about something very serious. She reinforced my conclusion when she warned in the most cautious tone of the day, “A virus is the last thing you want.”

The manifestation of utter concern told me she had every intention of being my girl, and that was why she was warning me not to mess with other girls because I might catch a virus.

I was still scrutinizing her features when she continued, “It’s challenging to get a virus out once it infects your operating system.”

As if she knew what was on my mind, I thought of telling her how she would be my dream queen and how we could finish each other’s sentences. But I did not want to come across as feeling already cocky and locked in because I had heard that such presumptuousness turned off many American girls. I changed tact and assured her, “I hear you loud and clear. I won’t risk it; trust me.”

She gave me a sideways look and continued, “The most important thing about protecting yourself from a virus is not to play online games.”

Thinking she meant meeting strange women online, as the Resident Adviser had warned me, I gave her my word. “No, I will never do that.”

Before I could calm my senses, her soft bedroom eyes beamed at me. “I can still get rid of the spam for you.”

Bingo! My dream had come true quicker than I had the right to anticipate. I felt erotic heat rising in my entire body, which caused me to move as if I were getting ready for something, and that was when she assured me, “It’s a piece of cake.”

Instantaneously, an excited pump ricocheted right into the center of my puffed chest. My face brightened as my heart smiled at the thought of her codeword ‘cake.’ Thinking about how sweet a cake is, my attention quickly transformed with overwhelming lust, and I could feel sensuous adrenaline cascading up my already tingling spine. While lost in these erotic thoughts, the revelations turned into melodious music to my ears. At that moment, my toes rubbed against each other, and I swear I started to feel an itchy tickle in my nose and pressure building in my chest and abdomen like someone about to sneeze to release the endorphins and feel good.

How can I be this lucky so quickly? my thrilled inner voice asked quietly.

Right away, a sense of insatiable sensual excitement rippled throughout my body. The rising heat in me plunged my mind into a frenzied drive. I felt warm and moved closer, ready to tell my newest desire: I’m a straightforward and health-conscious man who doesn’t play risky games that would catch us a virus.

However, before I could open my mouth, she looked at me and asked, “Do you have a clean hard drive?”

I was about to tell her how my low driver was still fresh since coming to America, that it had so much reserved firepower and was eager to get up and go helter-skelter. But she suddenly poured cold water on my salacious thoughts. “I don’t have time right now, but I can show you how to insert your floppy later on.”

I groaned inwardly because waiting for her to do the needful would be like a stomach-eating ulcer. Unable to hold it together, I struggled to keep my hands to myself but failed. I leaned forward and rested my elbows on my knees, trying to think of how to tell her just how much I appreciated her titillating gesture for later. However, she clicked a link, and many lines of what she called unwanted emails popped up. As I continued to feel all my salacious emotions, she paused for a few seconds to read a few lines.

As if our body chemistry had undergone some form of titillating osmosis that caused her to sense what was cascading through me, she said, “Playing games is the easiest way to get a virus, and you might not realize you have it.”

I thought she was talking about how many healthy-looking people could be infected with HIV and not even know it.

I assured her, “I know that for sure.”

With her smooth face glistening beneath the bright fluorescent light, she cautioned, “Just don’t fall for that I Love You virus; it will have a devastating effect.” I nodded as she continued, “It just proves how sneaky people are that a small virus can affect lots of systems.”

“I hear you loud and clear,” I declared with a jutting passion that made my day much better.

She emphasized the severity of the situation. “Don’t forget our systems are always vulnerable. When you go home, get some virus protection.”

I opened my mouth to crack an assuring joke: “Don’t worry. I’m so strict about the safety of my operating system that I staple a condom on my underwear just in case luck smiles my way.” But I changed my mind to reassure her, “Don’t worry about that; I will protect you and me at all times.”

She looked puzzled and questioned, “Protect me from what?”

“From any of the devastating viral infections.”

“You can’t do that; my PC is already protected with the most up-to-date anti-malware software.”

“Your PC?” I asked, looking for clarification.

“Yes, my personal computer.”

I thought she was using the term personal computer to mean her Area 51. As if she had sensed my raunchy deliberations, her tinted red lips had already formed the perfect curve when she disclosed, “See, this is spam, the unsolicited emails people send to your inbox without permission.”

“Dang it!” I cursed quietly, and not wanting to look like a fool by asking any more questions, I hung back.

She clicked the delete all button, looked up at me, and pronounced, “See, I have gotten rid of all the spam.” I nodded, struggling to calm down my juiced-up nerves that had misinterpreted that unsolicited email spam as sperm.

After nearly an hour of tutoring, I had a better understanding of what email was.

“I’m sorry for all the trouble,” I apologized.

“Be my guest,” she proclaimed in a susurrant timbre.

I nearly asked her what time I could come back to be her guest. However, I didn’t want to seem overzealous or desperate. So I hesitated, hoping she would tell me when and where on her own, but she did not look like she was going to disclose the gameplan.

To send her a covert message that I was really on my way out before she gave the details of her invitation, I reluctantly said, “I think I have to start going. Thank you very much.”

The moment I reluctantly stepped away, she declared, “Okey-dokey!”

I stopped mid-step, thinking she called me “okay donkey” to insinuate her suspicion of a well-endowed stud. My gaze quickly dropped to my fly, and a sly eyebrow shot up at her, but she was not paying me much attention. I decided to sound comical as well as trendy, instantly adopting Ray Charles’s voice from the famous Diet Pepsi commercial, and blurted, “You got the right one, baby, uh huh.”

Instead of responding to my happy-go-lucky wisecrack with equal zeal, she froze me with a sharp glance over the desktop and asked skeptically, “Got what right?”

I winked, “What you just said. It’s so right on.”

She stared at me, her surprise the first genuine emotion I had seen, and asked, “What did I say?”

I raised one of my eyebrows teasingly and reminded her, “You said okay, donkey.”

“No, okey-dokey just means everything is okay.”

“Oh!”

That was all that came from my mouth. Feeling foolish and struggling to calm down from all the heat that had cropped up in every cell of my body, I did not trust myself enough to say another word.

“I’m glad I was of some help.” She smiled, got up, and bid me goodbye.

My mind switched back to the computer class, reminding me that someone who learns music late in life will play it in their grave. With this thought and knowing the computer class was a prerequisite for other courses, I headed to the lab, more than determined to burn the midnight oil, practicing and practicing.

When I took my seat, even though the intense grip of lust had not fully receded, I couldn’t stop thinking about how my competency in email communications and Microsoft Word applications would also open many doors in America. Realizing I was in a country where nearly every solution to a problem involved the use of a computer made me very aware that anyone who did not know how to operate these machines would have a difficult time functioning in America.

It was not until much later, in a class on how to keep our computers safe from virus infections, that I learned “I Love You” was a computer virus that swept through banks, securities firms, and web companies in the United States. This computer worm, one of the most destructive viruses of all time, was disguised as a love letter in an email with “I LOVE YOU” in the subject line. When it was opened, the message was re-sent to everyone in the recipient’s Microsoft Outlook address book. The virus spread quickly and damaged about forty-five million computers in a single day.

With such revelations, I couldn’t deny that as a native of the motherland, my technological background in computer literacy was utterly underwhelming.

Every time I went to class, I felt like I was carrying the weight of my underdeveloped world upbringing on my shoulders. On such days, I calculated the odds of making it through successfully. When they didn’t look promising, a sense of utter powerlessness consumed me, beckoning me to accept my situation and quit.

However, with nothing to lose, I refused to let this reality be a barrier because I had no alternative. I recognized that since coming to America, I had learned how to adapt to new situations, challenges, and habits. With this mindset, it wasn’t surprising that on some days, I stopped beating myself up and just went along for the ride, letting these everyday computer challenges arrive at their own pace.

Amid these varying degrees of reactions, the thought of what I endured to get where I was and the exorbitant fees I’d paid was enough to motivate me to do whatever it took to move on to the next challenge. From then on, it felt as if quitting would be like going to the store, paying for items, and leaving without taking them just because I couldn’t push the shopping cart to the exit. Furthermore, the deadline for withdrawing had elapsed. If I dropped the class, I would receive a straight F, messing up my Grade Point Average. Under these circumstances, it made no sense because I would have to retake the mandatory prerequisite.

At this dawning moment, it became clear that America would not pause for me to learn about computers and then catch up. Left with no other choice, I realized I was all I had, and it was up to me to lift myself and face the technological challenge head-on. This realization meant refusing to use phrases like “too hard” in any sentence and never citing them as a reason to dismiss something someone with comparable intelligence could do.

Such optimism filled me with the zeal of a newly crowned missionary who would do everything in his power to succeed even where others had failed. Soon, it was only a matter of time before I realized that I was becoming better and more confident each time from all the endless exercises I did in the computer lab.

This understanding led me to discover that if I stayed on task and adhered to a systematic approach, I would eventually find the proverbial needle in my third-world haystack. The more this recognition dawned on me, the clearer it became that difficult situations inspire ingenious solutions. Henceforth, I was determined to work harder because my success in this class would depend on what I did every day.

In no time, I discovered I didn’t have to go very far from what I was doing because, at no cost, I already possessed the most important key to success: my head. Inside was the brain, the natural garden of knowledge that controls what I learn and remember.

That meant the technical competency I wanted to achieve could only be realized if these mental faculties were cultivated constantly. The best way to plant it in my cerebral farm was by hitting the textbooks and nurturing it through practice to make it perfect. If I stayed committed, I was sure my knowledge would grow, and I would reap endless rewards from computers in America forever.

This fervent awareness motivated me to take the initiative, and my eyes started to glow with uttermost determination. Even when I was in my dorm room, I didn’t do anything by halves. I rolled up my sleeves and studied the textbook to learn how different key combinations functioned. I made sure I used all my weekends to study and complete all the homework for the next class, familiarizing myself with all the questions and readings for the coming week. I understood that if I covered all the material, I would be ahead on my assignments and would familiarize myself with the following class exercises to keep pace with everyone else. Little by little, my persistent mind began to embrace its self-created optimism.

After staying at it over time, my confidence increased significantly. Everything that once seemed complicated started to look like a no-brainer. I was now navigating with ease around computer screens, keyboards, and printers—the same machines that had initially intimidated me. Toward the end of the class, immense pride filled me with a sense of impending accomplishment. When the class finally ended, a fleeting sense of triumph enveloped me. I briefly covered my face and took a deep, thankful breath. When I looked up to leave after the final exams, I felt like a dog with two tails—it was hard not to chuckle at my initial paranoia.

My necessary technological adjustment was finally complete, and I was ready to function in the electronic world of the United States. With this newfound understanding, I could feel my upcoming journey into America’s high-speed universe had just expanded beyond my wildest dreams. This realization was more than captivating because when I left Africa, I never imagined I would one day be competent in the push-button electronic world that would dominate my life from the moment I woke up until the time I went to sleep.

When I stepped out of the building, my face caught the full strength of the rising autumn wind as if it were ushering in a new epoch of my computerized advancement in the United States. On my way to the residence hall, I exhaled a sigh of ultimate relief. The moment I inhaled, fresh air filled my lungs, leaving me feeling revitalized and exhilarated.

Since Friday is a holy day of worship for Muslims, and out of respect for his faith, I usually stayed away from our room on Friday afternoons to give Moe his private space to carry out the most important Islamic prayer of the week, called Jumah. I yielded to the delightful mood of this phenomenal achievement and detoured to treat myself to a nice celebratory early dinner at McKenny Hall.

The moment I took the first bite of my first-ever Kung Pao Chicken with rice, my taste buds exploded, and that was when it hit me that without appreciating the struggle, the good times wouldn’t be as sweet.

Sated and now sober from being drunk with excitement, I exited the building and saw the day setting beautifully in the glow of the evening. At the sight of the retreating splendor of autumn, my thoughts galloped ahead, and anticipation painted my new hi-tech world in rose. The wind followed suit and spun dead leaves out of my way as if some divine power was finally clearing my newly opened road to success in America. It was the final affirmation that the gloomy days that swept in monotonous despair were now a thing of the past. In one, two, three steps, the eagerness of a driver willing to drive nonstop until he reached his destination enveloped me.

When I arrived in my room, the road to the American dream was now wide open. By the time I closed my eyes, I felt like I was born for this. But little did I know that just because the technological challenge was over, it didn’t mean the social challenges had stopped. I was about to find out the hard way.

Given the experiences to come, it was as if, after narrating all my challenges to my peers, I had not understood the slang they used to warn me:

Fo’ shizzle my nizzle, check your bungee cord, I give you my word, cous. The blind leap into Uncle Sam’s backdrop ’bout to turn up and go batshit crazy..