emofine:

well maybe in my region there are not too many or perhaps I am not recognising them as some Nigerians say that Northerners appearacne is a little different. Well once when I was in primary school, some of us foreign students were asked to list our ethnic backgrounds. Others said Yoruba etc and when it came to me I proudly said Isoko and people where like who? I was so embarrased lol that for a long time I never told people my ethnicity I just used to say Nigeria. However once when I was 15 a Nigerian asked me which region I was from, I said Delta and he said where's that, I was shocked by his ignorance because at the very least he should have heard of MEND lol

but now I'm older I'm not really offended I understand that happens when you are from a smaller ethnic group.

lol yeah I hear that once you can speak Hausa they tend to accept you as one of their own lol I was born in Nasarawa - so that is the middle belt to be precise but I have been to Kano and Kaduna.

so you are in America? are there many Northerners there?

oh I hear that there are some similarities between Hausa and Arabic and Hausa, do you agree? can you understand Arabic because of your knowledge of Hausa?

and how similar is the Hausa language to Fula?

lol i can imagine how emebrassing that would have been, by the way don't you think that your culture is somehow being swallowed by the majority ethnic group (urhobo), i see this is very common in the south where the smaller groups are swallowed by the bigger groups, isnt that a concern to you guys (from the minorities)?

interesting, i usually go out of town, i get invited to a number of weddings, events so i tend to meet alot of northerners since, in a month or so i will go out of town to a wedding of a hausa guy, by chance i get invited to these events so i tend to be lucky and i get to get alot of contacts

yes there is some simialrities between hausa and arabic, i know a little arabic, i can go for example to a arab country and i will be able to understand the basics, not because of hausa but also because i studied arabic. fulfulde and hausa are not similar in fact there is a difference

Inked_Nerd:

Wow, there's lots of interesting information here. You guys are doing a great job in this cultural exchange. It's weird, we're all one as Nigerians but at times I feel like a stranger with my fellow Nigerians

lol Inked Nerd I undertsand but that is the beauty of it as well, we will never get bored there is simply a lot to learn 

namfav:

lol i can imagine how emebrassing that would have been, by the way don't you think that your culture is somehow being swallowed by the majority ethnic group (urhobo), i see this is very common in the south where the smaller groups are swallowed by the bigger groups, isnt that a concern to you guys (from the minorities)?

I don't see it that way, we are similar in many ways but we have seperate identities. The closest people to my family here in London (since we do no have many people from my ethnic group here apart from one lady) is Urhobo. I am older so I am no longer upset, I fully understand infact it gives me an opportunity to educate other Nigerians plus I feel a lil unique that I'm not from the major ethnics lol 

It's quite funny actually because my fathers closest friend here is an Urhobo man - in fact they both travelled to the UK from Nigeria together so basically all my life I knew the man and his family. You know in Nigeria when you know somebody for soooo long we begin to believe that they are family because when I was younger I just took him as my blood uncle, his wife as my blood aunt and his children as my blood cousins it actually took a long time for people to convince me that we are not related by blood - I was actually upset as well when it sunk in  Lol

In fact I thought the Urhobo man was Isoko because when he and my father used to sit down and talk, unbeknown to me at that age, my father was conversing with him in Isoko whilst the man respended in Urhobo so I just assumed they were both speaking Isoko. My father told me one day that they are speaking their individual languages but because they do not always understand what the other is saying they embed english lol

interesting, i usually go out of town, i get invited to a number of weddings, events so i tend to meet alot of northerners since, in a month or so i will go out of town to a wedding of a hausa guy, by chance i get invited to these events so i tend to be lucky and i get to get alot of contacts

hmm you're in the loop, as for me not so much. To tell you the truth my family does not really affiliate themselves with other Nigerians (I don't believe it's because we are from a minority ethnic group) but we prefer to keep to ourselves - we are quite reserved actually.

yes there is some simialrities between hausa and arabic, i know a little arabic, i can go for example to a arab country and i will be able to understand the basics, not because of hausa but also because i studied arabic. fulfulde and hausa are not similar in fact there is a difference

how frequent is Arabic spoken in Northern Nigeria? Is it spoken more than English for example in fact how frequently is English spoken in Northern Nigeria?
Many people tell me that Hausa is the most simple language to learn in Nigeria - do you agree?

emofine:

lol Inked Nerd I undertsand but that is the beauty of it as well, we will never get bored there is simply a lot to learn 

I don't see it that way, we are similar in many ways but we have seperate identities. The closest people to my family here in London (since we do no have many people from my ethnic group here apart from one lady) is Urhobo. I am older so I am no longer upset, I fully understand infact it gives me an opportunity to educate other Nigerians plus I feel a lil unique that I'm not from the major ethnics lol 

It's quite funny actually because my fathers closest friend here is an Urhobo man - in fact they both travelled to the UK from Nigeria together so basically all my life I knew the man and his family. You know in Nigeria when you know somebody for soooo long we begin to believe that they are family because when I was younger I just took him as my blood uncle, his wife as my blood aunt and his children as my blood cousins it actually took a long time for people to convince me that we are not related by blood - I was actually upset as well when it sunk in  Lol

In fact I thought the Urhobo man was Isoko because when he and my father used to sit down and talk, unbeknown to me at that age, my father was conversing with him in Isoko whilst the man respended in Urhobo so I just assumed they were both speaking Isoko. My father told me one day that they are speaking their individual languages but because they do not always understand what the other is saying they embed english lol

hmm you're in the loop, as for me not so much. To tell you the truth my family does not really affiliate themselves with other Nigerians (I don't believe it's because we are from a minority ethnic group) but we prefer to keep to ourselves - we are quite reserved actually.

how frequent is Arabic spoken in Northern Nigeria? Is it spoken more than English for example in fact how frequently is English spoken in Northern Nigeria?
Many people tell me that Hausa is the most simple language to learn in Nigeria - do you agree?

oo, that is interesting, i don't know what to make of it because i thought you would say that because you have an identity you will feel a little bit agrieved if you were mistaken for urhobo (which is a bigger identity) all the time as i heard certain people complain about something similar but i guess i am the same also, sometimes because i grew up with hausa at home, i do not feel in any way offended when i am referred to as an hausa, at home our culture was fulani and everything but grew up with the hausa language, i went to kano (from katsina) when i was young so you can imagine i lived with alot alot of hausas, but i imagine if i went back to katsina full time i can embrace my parents language more and more as i will be surrounded by mostly other fulani who fluent in fulfulde, i didn't have that luxury of settling down in 1 place with the same people

i heard that alot of communities (mainly from the south) have a tightnit community in places like london so i am surprised

it is not widely spoken or else nigeria would be in the arab league, classical arabic is understood here and there but it is far from frequently used, i think hausa is easy to learn but it depends how eager you are to learn it but it is not really too difficult

namfav:
i think hausa is easy to learn but it depends how eager you are to learn it   but it is not really too difficult

cool, I'll definitely learn it someday 

@Namfav,

Being a southerner myself, its feels very much as if northerners and southerners are in different countries though we all found ourselves in the same country. It feels so strange. I've never been to the north but intend to do so sometime in the future and I know most southerners feel this way but are discouraged by the incessant violence etc.

Even without the violence, the issue of sharia and its practices springs up. Decades and decades of "hostilities" between the two regions has imbibed a sense of extreme suspicion in the minds of the peoples of these regions.

Nevertheless, I hope we can get it right sometime as a country. BTW, if I intend to visit the north on tourism/ adventure purposes, which part would u recommend?

we, i personally don't really know how we can ease the suspicion quick, maybe there should be a national debate between the north and the south because some things are based on falsehood, maybe if there is a debate we can debunk some myths like northerners are illiterate/uneducated or southerners all think the same, i don't think northern and southern peoples hate each other, as you said there are suspicions but they are based on misunderstandings

which part as in state if you are talking about state in kano there is alot to experience