So I was driving home the other night and saw the ex and his new girlfriend. Just as I had predicted, he was giving a little time for the dust to settle before he came out so to speak. It was exactly a week after telling me he was surprised that I was ignoring him, and can’t we just be friends. Now normally, I don’t usually waste my time holding a grudge against anyone, but I do for him. Not because he dumped me, but because he said that “I am not the first man to dump you am I?”, then told my mum I was an alcoholic having it off with his friend. But I have nobody to blame but myself. I was not working and the devil really makes time for idle hands (and minds), had I been working instead of spending my days watching MasterChef, I would have realised that I need to see a Psychiatrist because I was crazy to see that this guy was anything other than a waste of time.

You see this is the guy that I have tried to avoid all my life. He is not just common to Ghana but men all over the world. He is the guy who will borrow his friend’s 4×4 (or rent one out for the day). He will take you out and tell you that he will give you the world, he will tell you that he is a business man with his office in the City and lives in Buckinghamshire. That is until you find out that he lives in one room in somebody else’s council flat in Bermondsey and he while he works in the City, he failed to mention that it was cleaning the floors of Tower Bridge McDonalds. He will tell you all the successes of the people in his family – His Dad is a Lawyer, his mum is a Restaurateur, and his uncle is the Member of Parliament. With all the lies there is an element of truth, but these are other people’s successes.

This is not an ex bashing day, if anything it is an efia bashing day because I look back and think, what were you thinking???

If I start with Exhibit 1

He told me he was 35, but his driving license shows 1981, he then told me he has lots of dates of births for different documents. Really, what was I thinking. Not only did he lie about his age, he has multiple dates of birth. A hustler, an oportunist, a liar, a thief. Well duh.

Exhibit 2
He had a child, and then it turned out there were 2 children. Last count it was 3, but I am not too sure if it is plus or minus. The first child lives with him, the baby mama literally gave birth and dropped him off at the father’s house and never saw him again. I don’t know why or how a mother could do that to a person she gave birth too, but then who am I to judge.

Exhibit 3
He was building a house. Turns out it was for his dad, but I guess if his dad has no plans to settle in Ghana then it is more or less for him

Exhibit 4
His dad lives in the States and is a Medical Doctor. Now that is the truth. Except, I was having a conversation with his dad over the Christmas and he was telling me that he was starting a new job. So I asked how the job market was doing now after the recession. So he tells me that it is slowly picking up, although the nursing profession is really doing well, he has been offered two positions. Now colour me stupid, but why would a Dr MD be telling me how the nursing profession was.

Exhibit 5
He wanted to get married at a Registry Office, then have a blessing a year later. Why, because he knows a lot of people. In fact his exact words were, “I get crowd, and your cousin too he get crowd” so it is better to get married in a court house and then have a big bash after. Besides, when his friend Desmond got married he didn’t get his wife an engagement ring, she got it 5 years later. Colour me stupid once again but nothing in that paragraph made any sense.

Exhibit 6
He wanted to move to the States, his dad said I would have no issue with a job and accommodation. It was sorted. He didn’t know if I didn’t want to go because I was insecure or something.

Exhibit 7
You take your girlfriend to a party, and decide to kiss on another girl, and then tell your girlfriend that it is just a peck so why should you be annoyed.

Exhibit 8
Tells a girl, I respect you because of your age. Well if that was respect, I would hate to see disrespect.

Exhibit 9
Borrows my car continuously, and returns it with an empty tank. On one occasion he borrows my car and returns it back 3 days later with not just an empty tank, but it is blinking. Then tells me that when he had money he used to always fill up the tank.

Exhibit 10
Father of the girl you claim you want to marry asks you to come over for a chat, but you are always busy (mostly following Desmond around). You actually make a date on the last occasion, but then Desmond calls you to go see something in Kofordua, and you don’t actually tell the man until he calls to ask what’s up.

Exhibit 11
First pre-marital counselling you ask the counsellor, if it is ok to have a registry office wedding and have a blessing later. A counsellor, in a catholic church, she tells him that it would be classified as living in sin in the Catholic faith, and what’s the point of having a blessing later, just get married in the church. The next Sunday, he couldn’t make it because his mummy was sick. We didn’t make it to the third. Although he tells my family later on that he was travelling to Kofordua chasing contracts and that is why he could not attend the meetings.

Exhibit 12
Post of photo of himself with a girl he was at a wedding with, and then said “you should ask who it was, I was the best man and she was the bridesmaid at a wedding”. Cool, so what about the comment “I am not ready for marriage”. That’s when he suddenly remembered he was in a lot of pain, and went to sleep. When the subject came up again, apparently his cousin uploaded the picture and I guess made the comment too.
Although Exhibits 1 – 10 suggest this was a relationship that should have not gone past “hello”, he was surprised when I got up to give him his drinks back, then he told everyone that my mother was the cause of the break up. A few weeks before he managed to convince some poor innocent that he was going to love and marry her.

Exhibit 13
My blackberry spoilt, so I asked for the phone I gave him back. The phone cost 20GHS if that, he retaliates by taking back my car battery because he gave it to me.

Exhibit 14
He tells my uncle and my friends that I don’t eat, all I do is drink, when I asked him why he keeps bad mouthing me, he tells me that he never said that. So everyone else is lying and he is the only one telling the truth.

Exhibit 15
He has two accents, the one that he talks normally with and the one that he acquired from the United States of America. It pops up when he is talking to foreigners or in player mode. I remember we were chatting to a British guy once and he asked me where I stayed in London. Then he asked him where he stayed in the US. The response was that he has never been there before, but he went to a good school (Kofordua Sech Tech?), I don’t even think that kids at the American International Schools come home with an accent.

Exhibit 16
On or around the day of the break up he asks me if he has ever lied to me before. I truly believe in his world, he is telling the truth.

Exhibit 17
I told him, I hate it when guys call to say they are coming over, and don’t turn up. He was good at first (well every con man is, until he gets what he wants). Then he will call at say 9am, tell me he is on his way and then turn up at midnight, or not at all. Half the time he would be using my car, but I am not supposed to say anything as it is nagging, and I am not making it a nice environment to come home to. He tells me that even if he calls to say he’s on his way and he turns up late or not at all, I should be grateful that he turns up at all most times and he takes me out (to the spot at the top of the road, and the spot at the top of his road)

Exhibit 18
He tells his cousin that when I return he is going to take back the drinks, then when I return I ask him when is he coming for his drinks and he says “I never said that”, he is very fond of that phrase.

Exhibit 19
In front of my parents and his, he says “when we first met, I drank, she drank”….maybe I am an ididot but is that appropriate talk for the parents. Why didn’t you give them the details of our sex life in addition

Exhibit 20
He tells me that at the last count my cousin was not talking to his wife for 8 months (we had stopped talking at that point for 3 months). So I guess I should have waited out the remaining 5 months.

I could think of more, but I think you get it. At the time I kept thinking, “is he for real?”, and then I don’t know why I was giving him the benefit of the doubt. I guess I was bored and when he was in entertainment mode he was a funny guy. It was that part that was like “it is better than being alone”, but then I realised that it was inevitable that I was going to end up at square one anyway so I finally ran out of patience, got mad and told him what I thought about his behaviour. The language used a few more expletives than I have probably ever used in my life. But at that point I was a volcano about to erupt, and that’s basically where it ended.

Well we all have our blonde moments. This was a near fatal blonde moment. However, deep down, I knew it wasn’t going to happen. I am even surprised that it got as far as the knocking. I thought it was one of the promises that he was going to break (he was going to fix the A-C in my car, get someone to sort out my generator, he was going to paint my house, the list goes on).

But hey, if I didn’t go through this experience, you wouldn’t be reading this very entertaining piece of prose.

Goes to show, no matter how hard we try, we the strong willed can go a little crazy sometimes.