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THE DISEASE OF ILLITERACY

One young graduate once married a very beautiful primary school graduate. The lady was so beautiful that when she dressed nobody would take her for a primary school graduate. She looked so elegant that one would pass her for a senior civil servant.

As a housewife to a graduate, many well educated friends, colleagues and relations of her husband usually spoke English to her whenever they visited the couple. The husband did not feel comfortable with his wife's inability to fluently speak good English in reply to any of the visitors' greetings and discussion. Whenever she speaks loud incorrect sentences, her husband usually feel embarrassed. So the husband chose to teach his wife few responses to greetings. He did this to reduce the level of embarrassment which he faced. He taught her few English words, phrases and sentences which are in common use.

One of the phrases her husband taught her was "likewise myself". This was to be a common response to the sentence "I am happy to meet you for the first time." The husband had emphasized that she must always reply "likewise myself" whenever any visitor expressed happiness at meeting her.

One Saturday afternoon, one visitor came for a visit to the couple's home. The visitor was introduced to the wife and the wife to the visitor. The visitor got up and bowed, saying as he faced the wife "I am happy to meet you for the first time ma." The woman, having forgotten the correct way of answering at that point, said with confidence "lakalaka myself." The visitor realized immediately that he was facing an uneducated woman. The husband just shook his head and said "illiteracy is a disease".

He was really and embarrassed but was determined to eradicate the illiteracy in his wife. So he enrolled her for an adult literacy program. She happily attend the program and became a fully baked graduate as her husband. She could speak fluently good grammatical statements and her husband did not have to suffer embarrassment anymore.


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