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Ilham is 30 and he spent years looking as if he was pregnant. His kinsmen even nicknamed him "the pregnant man".
Ilham lives a few hundred miles away from Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, in a local tribal village. Do you have any idea what the daily life of an African tribe is like? Well, Ilham's tribe is fairly typical. They have no modern conveniences to speak of.
The nearest hospital is 200 miles away. When doctors visit the village, they bring medicine, but it happens very rarely. And the villagers don't come to the city because they cannot afford the journey. They have no electricity supply and very little water. They're lucky if they can bathe once a month. There was a population transfer programme to relocate them to Kibera, but that remained on paper. It feels like living in a trash can since Ilham's house is made out of garbage.
When Ilham was 16, he noticed a small solid lump next to his navel. It was the size of a chicken egg until it started to grow rapidly. Ilham's father said there was no reason to take him to the city hospital. The local shaman just had to banish the evil spirits that had possessed him. After that, everyone seemed to forget about Ilham and he was left alone with his unusual affliction.
Months would pass without any signs of the lump growing and then it would visibly enlarge within the span of two weeks. It didn't really hurt, but it made him overbalance forward when he walked. He looked as if he was 8 months pregnant. He hid the belly under an oversized shirt until it was just impossible to hide any longer. He half-believed he was in fact pregnant.
Once, the doctors came to the village to deliver medicine and Ilham complained to one of them. The doctor barely touched Ilham's body before he recoiled and said he couldn't determine what was wrong with him on the spot. Ilham needed to be properly examined before starting treatment. That was expensive though. Ilham used to be able to make 1 dollar per day if he was lucky, but he had completely lost his capability to work and make money.
Ilham's neighbors and even his close friends never missed the chance to tease him. Once, his friends stopped him on the street and told him: "So how's your baby coming along? When will he be born? We can't wait to see him! I'm sure he's going to grow up into someone extraordinary, like the chieftain or the president. I mean, you're the first man ever to get pregnant!" Isn't this insulting to hear?
Taking care of himself was a chore. Ilham couldn't dress without help, and all clothes were too small for him, so he had to wrap himself in rags. Eventually, he stopped leaving the house at all. He was sitting in his stuffy garbage hut and suffering. What had he done to deserve this?
Then one day, Ilham got an idea to charge tourists for taking pictures with a pregnant man. He presented himself as a groundbreaking sensation. After a while, he was able to save up a few hundred dollars. He was delighted to have found a source of easy money. While his neighbors made a dollar a day, Ilham could earn as much as 5 or 7 dollars. He was even richer than the chieftain. When the doctors arrived for another visit and saw Ilham lying in his bed, crushed by his own enormous belly, they said he was going with them. Ilham gave the doctors all his savings and squeezed himself into the car.
As soon as Ilham arrived at the hospital, they conducted a series of tests on him. In the morning, the doctor said they'd remove his pregnancy tomorrow. Ilham stared at him, unsure if he was kidding.
When Ilham woke up after the operation, he kept feeling his stomach for the lump that wasn't there anymore. His doctor said he was an ordinary man now, perfectly able to get married and to get his wife pregnant. He explained Ilham had a tumor that had been growing for several years. The older cells solidified and new cells accumulated around them.
Back home, Ilham paraded around the neighborhood showing off his slim body. He hadn't even been able to stand upright for a few days after the operation. According to his doctor, he needed to find a new center of gravity. And Ilham found it. Even better than that, he found a girlfriend just three days after he was released from the hospital.
Ilham leads a normal life now. He's moonlighting to save up enough money to move to the city. He's getting married soon! He remembers his time as a pregnant man with a smile. It's Ama's turn to be pregnant now!
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