How school visits gave us wives

Love letters [iStockphoto]

In the '90s, high school visiting days were a godsend for young lovers. It was the perfect time for boys to meet their girlfriends without being noticed by their parents, who would raise hell if they found out their daughter was dating.

It took military-grade planning to ensure that the day you were visiting the girl did not fall on the same day that her parents and siblings were visiting.

This included conducting surveillance on her home to gather information about when her parents would visit, as visiting days were usually on weekends.

Getting information about the family’s visiting day was not only expensive but also time-consuming because there were no mobile phones.

Often, it involved befriending one of her siblings to leak information about the parents’ plans. If that failed, you risked going to the school and lurking in the shadows until you were sure the coast was clear.

By this time, your heart would be running like a twin-turbo machine in anticipation of seeing your heartthrob. Often, the boys carried very humble gifts for the girl: a simple plastic flower, a small love card, and, of course, a letter filled with all the sweet nothings in the world.

Inside the school were photographers with film cameras, and getting a snap or two for the day was more than a blessing and a sign of true love. Since the film couldn’t be processed on the same day, you would wait for the photo until the end of the term. Each photo set you back the princely sum of 20 shillings.

The strategy was to lie that you were the girl’s relative. You spent a brief time together talking about school life and academics. You’d also squeeze in juicy gossip about the village. Then came the time to be introduced to her classmates and "deskies" (desk mates). Her classmates would tease you, particularly those who did not have a boy visiting them and might have designs on you.

One more photo with her classmates was inevitable. The cost of producing a copy for each of the classmates was the boy’s burden. At times, this was disastrous as the cost ate into the paltry fare, but you had to make the classmates and deskies happy. Otherwise, they might badmouth you and kill the budding love.

Once all was said and done, it was time to dive into matters of the heart. It was the moment to pledge one’s undying love. Here, all manner of hallucinations, fantasies, and wild visions came into play.

These were the times when village lovers promised to get married immediately after school. You even went into details, including discussing how many children you would have. These promises and fantasies would melt lovers’ hearts.

This is where many lovers started their journey of love. A few months later, all the promises would be broken, and heartbreaks of calamitous proportions would follow. Then, some other boy or girl would storm the love scene with fresher, bigger, wilder promises and steal the broken heart.

Many parents came to know of the mischief when it was too late. They would learn that the boy had actually been visiting their daughter for more than two years. The cat would get out of the bag often during the last academic year when it became too difficult to hide the affair.

Of course, some affairs withstood all challenges and ended up in blissful marriages a few years later. Many millennials will tell you that they married their high school girlfriend or boyfriend.

This explains why, in villages, many people have married from within, as love that blossomed in high school came to fruition thanks to clandestine school visits.

The photos of yesteryear in school uniform, with the school gate, school bus, or administration block in the background, constantly remind these couples of their tender love days.