Being Ijaw in the UK: An oddity among fellow Nigerian youth

Within the diaspora, I feel my tribe’s erosion of cultural identity acutely.

“Ijaw? What’s that? Do you mean Igbo?” The first time I heard these questions was when a girl I’d met in secondary school asked me what my tribe was. We had bonded over our mutual green and white heritage, however, the look of confusion she gave me when I told her I was Ijaw would be mirrored by every Nigerian youth I met over the following years. Small jokes would be made about how “unknown” my tribe was and if I was sure I wasn’t getting it mixed up with Igbo. Although I laughed my way through, constantly being treated like my ethnic identity was nothing more than a verbal blunder became frustrating.