The trip to Africa is winding down, and last night’s episode starts out with the ladies in a feel good mood. Moved by their visit to the orphanage, the women are reminiscing about the children they met, remembering how fortunate they are and toasting each other. For a quick minute, it seems as if the women are truly able to think beyond themselves, haute labels and see the big picture for a change. But it was just a short, sweet momentary lapse in the ongoing wars constantly being waged between the Smalls and the Talls.
The first outing this week is a trip to a museum showcasing Xhosa culture. Certainly there are many cool things about the Xhosa, but they must be on the cutting room floor. What viewers hear is men get to order their wives by asking a father or brother to go fetch one. Most modern ladies don’t like to hear they can be fetched into a new married life at someone else’s behest. They also don’t like to hear cheeky herbalists who pose like medicine men make rude, faux predictions. Which is the second thing the ladies encounter at the Xhosa museum.
After a tense day of sexism at the Xhosa museum, the ladies gather for slumber party antics in Marlo’s room, which looks like a boutique of carefully merchandised “new money” treasures. The ladies may have briefly entertained us with some frank sex talk, providing a bonding moment for Kandi and Marlo and some comments by Shereé that we think we need a diagram to understand, but the topic of conversation soon goes back Marlo’s obsession with designer duds. Marlo claims that her love of fashion goes back to her teenage years. Maybe that’s why she bounced so many checks in her past? Is it her many stints in prison issue clothes that makes her so obsessed with labels, even traveling to South Africa with her own Chanel blanket? One thing we learned this week, we don’t have fancy enough clothes to go on a safari.
Marlo manages to ruin the lunch without even being there, when Kandi mixes things up by asking NeNe what she really thinks of Marlo and her showy ways. Marlo is clearly NeNe’s new BFF, especially since her relationship with Kim went south last season, so NeNe is sure to take a cheap shot at the Smalls concerning their relationship with Kim to deflect the attention. In the wild, any of the Atlanta Housewives would be the pack leader, so in an argument of who follows whom, nobody is going to win.
Later the Smalls give Kim a call, so the Bravo audience doesn’t have to live without her for a second week in a row. It seems like an innocent catch-up, but Shereé weirdly does throw Kandi under the bus by telling Kim that Kandi couldn’t imagine her being able to hang with the other ladies in Africa, let alone at an orphanage. It was strange that Shereé put the wrong and potentially offensive words in Kandi’s mouth, since the implication seems to be that Kim wouldn’t want to hold any black babies. Even we had to play back the tape, which clearly shows that neither Cynthia nor Kandi says this. Plan for real and very uncomfortable fireworks to fly on this misunderstanding next week. Yikes!
What is surprising is how Kandi seems to have lost her candy coating. Toward the end of the dinner and the trip, she’s getting a little too real. Sure, there are some inconsistencies that could use some clearing up, but sometimes it’s better to keep the peace than to be right. Cynthia’s sums it up with her one-liner, “As quickly as things change, they stay the same.” Even in Africa.
That nouveau riche naivety had some of them throwing practicality out the window and expecting ‘the help’ to make life easy for them in spite of their decision.
As a descendant of African slaves in the US too, I was ashamed to see some of the ladies treat ‘the help’ the same way that Black people have been treated even up to there Grandmother’s generation. Someone asked to be carried, another demanded makeup and hair services. Ridiculous. We obviously have not learned from our history to be considerate and respectful of all people regardless of station and situation.
Can you imagine what those folks told their families when they went home? The same stories those ladies’ grandmothers’ used to tell their parents!! That’s shameful.
The ladies may want to read up on how real money behaves and treats their help; it would increase their sense of decorum and help them to be truly classy ladies. Or better yet, read the Bible.
Kudos to the orphanage trip though, that was a wonderful idea, and polished up their image as a group considerably. HOpefully, there are long range plans for helping the people in need that they met.
That nouveau riche naivety had some of them throwing practicality out the window and expecting ‘the help’ to make life easy for them in spite of their decision.
As a descendant of African slaves in the US too, I was ashamed to see some of the ladies treat ‘the help’ the same way that Black people have been treated even up to there Grandmother’s generation. Someone asked to be carried, another demanded makeup and hair services. Ridiculous. We obviously have not learned from our history to be considerate and respectful of all people regardless of station and situation.
Can you imagine what those folks told their families when they went home? The same stories those ladies’ grandmothers’ used to tell their parents!! That’s shameful.
The ladies may want to read up on how real money behaves and treats their help; it would increase their sense of decorum and help them to be truly classy ladies. Or better yet, read the Bible.
Kudos to the orphanage trip though, that was a wonderful idea, and polished up their image as a group considerably. HOpefully, there are long range plans for helping the people in need that they met.