OF MEN AND THEIR MOJOS

Have you ever bothered to look at the posters adorning walls in dark corridors of commercial buildings? I usually don’t as I have about a minute before I run past these corners that reek of urine before I can let out my breath and breathe normally. Once however, on my way back from a photocopying shop which is located in once such spot, I happened to drop the contents of the file that I was holding and had to spend about 2-3 minutes collecting them. It turned out that it was more than 3-4 minutes that I spent there as I tried to retrieve the documents with one hand while holding my nose with the other.  As I finished the task I looked up and saw them- the posters!

There were these comical pictures of men with enlarged privates and strange expressions on their faces and written in bold “ Are you suffering from VD,  hydrosil, erection problems, herpes or fistula?  For uninterrupted and enjoyable sex life contact Dr XYZ – phone no xxxxxxxxx” . To say that I was amused would be an understatement. I had to control myself from laughing aloud ( it would have attracted a lot of attention considering that I was the only woman there …).  I went back home and shared this information with my husband asking him if he had ever noticed them.  He said that he had but the interesting thing was that most of these posters were located in dark smelly buildings or around walls where men usually urinated.

We wondered what kind of  people these were – both the men who sought help from these so called docs and these quacks who put up posters about the cures that they could offer? “ May be I should go to one of them and see what happens’ teased my husband.  He tried to imitate a man with one of the problems mentioned in the ad “ Sir, I saw an advertisement when I was pissing on the wall of the hospital on 2^nd cross street… and I was wondering if I could see you” ?  His tone was conspiratorial with lots of pauses and I was hugely entertained.

But jokes apart- I wonder what ails men so much that they cannot go to a qualified doctor and openly state that they have some sexual problem? Besides, as I found from the advertisement, the problems like fistula or hydrosil were not even of sexual nature though I guess, they were located around the privates. I guess it is something to do with this thing called    “ MOJO”.

I remember watching this film,  where the hero - Mike Meyers ( who is supposed to a be spoof on James Bond )starts yelling suddenly “ I have lost of my mojo”!  Those days I was not so computer savvy and therefore, had to wait for about two years before one bored afternoon, I googled this word “MOJO”. It threw a wide range of possibilities by way of meaning but the one that seemed to fit best with the context in the movie was  “a slang word for self-confidence, self-esteem or sex appeal.”

  So folks, when a man’s self esteem and sex appeal are all so closely interlinked, it is a complicated issue. Unlike us women who acknowledge openly our problems of middle age around the reproductive organs – ovarian cysts, fibroids in our ovaries etc , men I guess find it difficult to talk about these things and much less seek help. As a result they have to contact these quacks and probably whisper out their problems and then shell out a lot of money while hoping for the best.

From the way our society is constructed there is very little openness to talk about problems that relate to sexual dysfunction. Women take it more easily in their stride because upbringing has taught them that their job is not to enjoy sex but to produce children. Men on the other hand have been brought up to believe that it is their right to enjoy sex and part of being a man involves being a “ star performer” on this domain.

Ultimately, I guess it is not about the physical nature of the problem that requires attention, it is the mental state that makes these issues out to be big ones. The guys who are benefitting most from this are ofcourse these quacks who must be laughing all the way to the bank!