Japa: Should your friends know about your relocation plans?

If you have been on social media anytime within the 24 hours prior to this article, you may have come across a conversation on whether or not your friends deserve to know about your relocation aka japa plans. For those wondering what japa means and its origins, here is a quick lesson we created on the subject a while back.

Here is the thing about that ongoing japa chat though: the peculiarities of our society and their effects on peoples’ decisions cannot be ignored. This is Nigeria and everyone born and bred here knows how superstitious, religious and/or spooky people can be about things they consider sensitive. There is a reason why people hardly post any pictures of their baby bumps until the baby has been born. There is also a reason why parents and older aunts, uncles and even religious leaders would always warn you to stay guarded about your progress and plans as much as possible. The logic behind all of these quirky Nigerianness is the same reason why people are reticent about their japa plans, even to people who consider them friends. [Note that we didn’t write people you consider to be your friends. We will get to that later.]

The fear of village people: Following from the above and on the knowledge of Nigerian ways and norms, it’s not difficult to deduce that people are just scared of ‘village people’ and they believe that the lesser the number of ears that hear the plan, the better the chances of said plans succeeding. Is that fear rational? Definitely not, but that’s how things work around here mostly, and even if a person would want to do away with such nonsensical ideas, their family members [side-eye to mums and dads] would drum it into their ears that such plans are better divulged after they’ve moved and settled into their new destination. Usually, that'd be a few weeks or months afterwards. Quite a good number of the ‘new dispensation’ tweets people post to announce their relocation on Twitter are posted after this order.

But what’s the point of friendship if relocation plans are kept secret? This writer totally understands why people don’t tell friends about their relocation plans. But there has to be an exception. The essence of friendships is to share things like this, to be there for each other, to hold each other’s hands in difficult times, and share triumphant moments. Keeping a big move like this from someone you call a friend is surely not consistent with the ideals of friendship and everyone honest with themselves knows this.

Yes, friendships have limits and you may have some really awful or super-personal secrets that can’t be shared even with your closest buddies. One would understand if you kept from your friend a secret of yourself doing vile sexual things – like sleeping with a dog -- for money. I don’t think anyone would blame anyone for wanting to take such secrets to their grave but relocation plans? It doesn't fall within grave secrets, I’m afraid. You really can’t call someone your real homie or real babe and then not tell them you’re travelling out of the country for good.

Now, this is where the distinction between people you count as friends and those who count themselves as your friends comes into play. It’s OK to let people you don’t have a close relationship with find out online. If anything, it’ll show them where they really stand in your life. But you can’t risk losing real and close friends by not sharing this info with them.

How soon should you tell your friends about your japa plans? That’s a different thing entirely. Obviously, you want to tell them before leaving the country but how soon should you do it? One week before the trip? As soon as the plans begin? Right after your visa is approved, or just as you are about to board the plane? This is the tricky part that everyone has to now decide for themselves based on the closeness and trust in every particular relationship.

Personally, this writer would suggest that once it’s stamped, settled, confirmed and sure that the move is happening, then you should let your friends know. If you prefer sooner or later, that would be OK too.

But one thing is sure, if your friends are going to hear of your relocation on the eve of it, then you might as well get there and spend six months before telling them.