Politically incorrect

My Mali visa experience---heaven!

2009-11-17T11:53:00.000+02:00

A few weeks ago, I went to the Mali embassy to get a visa. I was armed with the usual: a bank statement, a valid passport, a copy of my travel itinerary, a letter from the host, a letter from my boss, my payslips - pretty much everything I could think of that could help ease my application process. Oh, and of course the obligatory visa application fee.

Well, imagine my surprise when I arrived at the Malian embassy (or was it a consulate), and behold, no queue. It gets better. I was treated with such courtesy, I would not have been surprised if someone had turned up to ask me if I wanted coffee or tea! First impressions! Anyway, the officer went on to ask me to sign my name, provide my details, and to give her my passport and a letter from my host. Believe it or not, all of my other extra papers were completely unnecessary here. None of that fuss about whether or not you will disappear in Mali or anything. No fuss about why you want to go to Mali, and if you are sure its just a conference. No interviews! No scrutiny of the visa to see if its fake. Nothing. Nada. Just,

"Come back next week and it will be ready". and

"Ah, you are from Kenya. So you speak Swahili?". I nod, smiling generously. She smiles back and says, "Asante."

After paying my low low visa application fee, I left the place feeling extremely good about myself, and Africa! Imagine if all those conferences on Africa or about African studies (within which I am squarely located), took place in different parts of Africa? How hassle free would my life be?

Part of me was perhaps particularly impressed by the Mali embassy experience because of my recently not too pleasant experience at the German embassy. First, I had to get up extra early (ouwwwch) because the embassy operates between 07h00 and 10h00. The embassy is in Pretoria and I am in Joburg, so basically, this means I had to wake up by 05h30. The queues were long, and I later learnt that people began lining up as early as 05h30!

I remember lining up the first time until 09h30, then getting to the counter and being told that although my application was fine, I had forgotten to include a letter from my employer. Now, normally, embassies include all these in their websites. In the case of the German embassy, there was no checklist online. I therefore collected what I thought they would need. Of course I did not think of a letter from my employer. I remember feeling extremely frustrated. Not only had I woken up extra early, but I had also paid a huge cab fare to get to the embassy on time. Now I had to repeat the performance. And the application fee was not cheap either.

My Mali experience made me think about the visa experiences both with South -South travels, and South-North travels. I also thought of what it meant to be a North-South traveller. South-South Travels were clearly much easier than South-North travels. Just recently, there has been a raging debate about the difficulties encountered when looking for a visa to France (14 Nov Travel, Saturday Star). That debate is reflective of what most of us have to quietly endure whenever we want to travel outside the country, specifically towards Europe or the US. People speak of the harshness of officers, the cold dismissal in spite of all efforts one might have put into trying to travel etc. It is all so familiar.

Given how horrible some of these experiences can be, the good ones have to be recorded. Bravo, Mali.

My tortured relationship with Face Book

2009-11-09T15:50:00.000+02:00

There are two kinds of people – those who like expressing themselves and those who don’t. I have often wondered which category I belong to, given the manner in which I fret over any little thing I write, wondering if people will like it or not, and if not, wanting to find out why. I suppose, like many people who are still cultivating a public image within an ever growing new media scene, to find a personal voice is still extremely difficult.

Given this difficulty, it is quite possible to understand why Face Book would give me, and some people who are just like me, the creeps. This is the one space where all the people you know-some quite close to you, others acquaintances, and others yet, mere net friends-come together, and you are forced to peddle different identities in order to come up with one mega identity of YOU. The difficulty in trying to find a net-identity is that sometimes you come off as quite odd to friends who only know one side of you and not another. As humans,we have what Achebe calls concentric identities, and the way I interpret this is that we each have identities formed by context, but also dictated by context. we have ways of speaking to others that is fragmented, non-linear. So for example, if my friend A only knows me as ‘the calm, cool and collected person’ imagine her shock and horror when she realizes that actually, I can be quite irrational and abusive, this, just by following how I talk and respond to my other friends. Or, if B only sees me as the nerd, then they get surprised at the number of ‘activities’ I engage in and record on my facebook update. It is precisely because of this inability to juggle the many faces i show in public that I find Face Book difficult to deal with.

First, I can never tell just how many of my friends follow my entires. Recently, I was shocked to learn that a note I had written in the heat of the moment during the Semenya Saga was circulated and being used to argue something totally different, and I was perhaps, inadvertently caught up in a debate I had not originally planned to be part of.

I also realised that when you select or allow someone to be your friend, they do not always 'really' know you. This i found out when I attempted to proudly assert my Feminist ideals and to claim that as a major part of my identity. I received one consistent comment from a guy who, truth be told, I have never met and who therefore knows nothing about me, and the strong feelings I habour against bigots etc. The short of it, it got me off Face Book.

I realized I was torturing myself by being there. I was trying too hard to get all these friends of mine to talk to me honestly about issues. It did not take me long to realize that in spite of the 'friendship status', Face Book is just a collection of strangers!

My new philosophy is simple. I have healthier relationships with my friends in real life than online. In fact, I would never want to lose a friend over some debate about whether or not being a Feminist means you are an ungrateful |#$%*! Those are debates \i had when I was a young idealist. Now I am a realist with little time to haggle over meaning.

A Part of me is glad I am a regsitered user of FB and that I can reach as many people as possible and vice versa. But there is a part of me that will just chill...i do not have to update my status for my friends to know they can reach me. and If I have something I have to say, I pretty much still prefer my blog.

But eish...all in a day's work.

The Sensitivity of being blacker

2009-10-16T10:41:00.000+02:00

dear bell hooks,

its an honour to finally write to you, you, whose name defies rules and order, you who is fed up with what is supposed to be. i believe that you have brought to my life what i did not have before, for before, i never had the courage to spit into somebody's thoughts and express the anger i feel inside. you liberated me.i do not say these words to flatter you, for perhaps i will never meet you, but i say them to liberate myself, of thoughts, feelings and chains that tie me up so tightly i can only smile politely for fear of crying out loud.i come from a society that is near-free of direct racism. until i travelled to my present country, i had not encountered the kinds of direct racism that i experience here. as such, your words on racist ideologies are new to me. however, i understand discrimination, ethnic discrimination, color discrimination among blacks, for I lived in a society of blacks only until I was more or less a grown woman. i understand black on black discrimination all too well, and like the child in toni morrison's bluest eye, i am the one who one day realised i was different because i was a shade darker than most of my friends, and i learnt early in life to regress and hide in the shadows. i come from a community where dark skinned people have a special place in childhood taunting games called mchongwano. in these games, there is a series of choice phrases used to shoo away the dark-skinned person - dark-skinned people are so black they do not have shadows, or so black, day turns into night when they walk into rooms, or so pitch black that it is possible to see their fingerprints on charcoal. but such games are taken as norm and fun, more like the 'yo mama' jokes/games in the african american community. we all grew up accepting these games, in fact, playing them, embracing them, laughing at ourselves.however, i have asked myself in the recent years, just how dangerously we have embraced white ideology. why do we automatically see ourselves as more beautiful and acceptable because of our skin-tones, why have black people generally bought into the concept of the ‘whiter the better’? and why oh why do i have to constantly be dragged into it? for every time dark skin is scoffed at, i feel it as if it were a personal insult. it does not matter if this takes place in the media, or in song, or in social circles i am part of.

it is our thought patterns of ourselves as black people that have led to such dire consequences as having dark skinned brothers and sisters trying to smear themselves with skin lightening creams, what ngugi wa thiongo so eloquently writes about in his stories, and in the process burning themselves and hurting themselves. often, it is something we experience within our own social groups, the slight disapproval because the many years in the sun has only managed to make you darker, the lack of 'fairness' of skin, that pumps new skin-cream products into the market, the flurry of it all! sometimes i play a game. i watch tv adverts in the hope of catching a really really dark alek wek like model being used to promote a beauty product, or being used as a mark of true beauty, or even in music videos, just one glimpse that we as black people are beginning to realize that we are one, and all beautiful. i lose all the time, but still i try. i remember listening to a radio programme on a local fm station. it was a late night show where callers were being encouraged to use the medium as a space for finding new love. the dj had people calling in to describe what kind of men/women they had in mind. most of those who called had one consistent demand: they must be light skinned! yo! imagine a poor teenage girl or boy sitting somewhere longing for love but never having the courage to go the route others were taking!in your books, specifically black looks and salvation, you suggest that black people have to learn to love themselves from inside. but i am in a society where black people have embraced the violence of oppression so much that it is spilling onto their ability to love and embrace each other. i am in a society where to be of a certain skin tone means people will want your blood at a certain period and point in time. i write this to you, not in a splurge of self-pity, but as an outsider. for i am outside of me as i write, me who has reached a stage in my life where i no longer matter. but certain issues have to be voiced, recorded. i believe if we want to fight the bigger monster called white supremacy that has made sure the black person's lot has remained at the level of destitute, that we have to love one another. but we are all so busy struggling to get better, richer, lighter, better, richer, lighter and standing in line to receive compliments. i trust that we should develop a new way of looking at ourselves, a new way of appreciating ourselves and a new way of understanding, so that the generation that comes after us may begin to understand how we survived in a system as vile as the one we live in now.

yours,

skinless
Posted by dear bell hooks at 5:28 AM
1 comments:
TGWCR said...
She has no place in paradise

Dear bell and skinless

Have you ever read something that made you feel like you’d been punched in the stomach? I felt like that when I read Egyptian writer Nawal el Saadawi’s short story ‘She has no place in paradise’. The story is about a rural dark skinned Egyptian woman, born into subservience, observing her Muslim tradition and Egyptian culture unquestioningly. She served daily, was beaten by her father, given into marriage to an older man who also beat her and showed her no love or care, even she says when he lay on her. Her husband died years before, and the story begins with her own death and entry into what seems to be paradise. This dead woman relates the story matter-of-factly and in the end, she finally she proceeds to the red-brick palace-like house that she sees in the distance and enters a bedroom bathed in light. On the bed she identifies her husband, clothed like a bridegroom sitting between two women. “Both of them wore transparent robes revealing skin as white as honey, their eyes filled with light, like the eyes of houris [virgin of paradise, according to Islam].... Her hand was still on the door. She pulled it behind her and it closed. She returned to the earth saying, to herself: There is no place in paradise for a black woman.”

I can’t explain to you the pain I felt at reading these words. As I mentioned earlier, it wasn’t an emotionally drawn out morose realisation, but I was rather bothered by the ‘factual’ way with which the hierarchy which situates dark skinned women at the bottom was stated. I wanted to scream out against it. I am a caramel coloured woman, not light or dark skinned, but I have long understood the importance of white or lighter skin. My Indian culture is full of racial idiosyncratic behaviour that values the fair skinned woman as a trophy, not only for her ‘beauty’, but for the fair skinned children she is likely to produce. Lucky for me, both the Tamil and Muslim sides of my family are all dark skinned, so skin colour was not an issue (as long as none of us ventured across the racial boundaries, which proved a lot harder as I grew older). But I did notice what friends of mine went through when they were judged by the colour of their skin and was shocked as I gained more black and coloured friends to realise that the fair skinned/dark skinned woman dichotomy seems to plague various communities of people of colour around the world.
Last year I got a group email from a Kenyan man friend which read,
‘I have been to alot of places in this world but honestly, I have never seen a country that is so full of extremely beautiful women as Ethiopia. Got here this morning, going back soon but, honestly, I don’t wonna go home, it’s just too damn much. ...I have never seen a concentration of so many cute light skinned sistas as I have seen today. I swear it’s a wonder. Kama the wildebeest migration in the mara. It’s on that level.’
Another mail recipient answered back, ‘Then, again you need to go to Venezuela & Brazil and see the real wildbeast migration’. At this point I spoilt the party by writing an irritable response to my friend questioning why he had sent me such sexist drivel, not only showing black men still being hung up on lighter skinned women, but then comparing them to wild animals. My friend M. apologised profusely, saying that it was just a lot of ‘jive’ talk between him and his ‘boys’ and that he was sorry he got me involved in any of it and that they were a decent bunch of blokes with proper relationships with their women. What is interesting about this mindset is that the men who hanker after light skinned women are themselves often quite dark skinned but see no contradiction with this. Time and time again I have heard men – and women – from my own Indian community and from other African countries speak of the fair skinned woman as a prize, an embodiment of purity and a signifier of social standing. There is no reference to this women’s intellect, to her deeds, her education, her beliefs.
So what hope is there then for a dark skinned woman in a world that reflects white? My friend D. is dark skinned and I remember when I first saw her, that I admired her ‘ebony planes’ (insider joke). Not because it was exotic, but because it was unblemished, because she was strikingly beautiful, because certain colours that she wore accentuated the contrast and hence her individuality and because she is terribly smart. For the same reason, I have liked the model Alek Wek. When I see her on the pages of my magazine, I don’t confuse her with any other model. She is outstanding and yes, there are many other women from Sudan who might look like her, but there are none on the pages of my magazine. Alek Wek does not sit in some comfort zone of model look-alikes i.e., the light skinned black woman with an acceptably small nose and lips, dyed hair and emerald/light brown eyes. Alek looks like women I see around me, images that I have seen of other African women. She is unashamedly dark skinned, and while there may be a whole Western world out there that might want to exoticise her darkness, there is a generation of black girls that are growing up seeing a dark skinned woman on runways and glossy fashion magazines.
More and more recently I’ve been questioning the genesis of this obsession of Other cultures with fair skinned women (especially within their own culture). Is it simply a matter of colonisation and Other cultures being exposed to the ‘charms’ of blonde hair, white skin and blue eyes? As much as I could understand that, a part of me says that can’t account for all of it. I mean within cultures there have been ranges of skin colour which still value fairer skinned people. I must confess to not knowing literature which could help me understand where this mentality comes from, yet it is so pervasive in so many cultural products and forms. Can we blame the Greeks for this too? Anybody know any good readings out there, please feel free to let me in on it.

TGWCR

February 26, 2009 7:20 AM

Being African is a misfortune

2009-10-13T18:09:00.001+02:00

Dear bell hooks,

I am glad this forum exists, for where else would I vent, where else would I show my disgust at the endless gaze of Africa that the rest of the world clings to?

The global media has embraced and standardized Africa's image as the get-away safari destination on the one hand, and the starvation-poverty-disease continent that swims in eternal hopelessness; they have held Africa in this light as proof that Africa, the homeland of most of the world's black population, will never be as advanced as the 'white' continents. Africa, of the inferior race. Africa of the corrupt shortsighted leaders, and of the world's surviving primitives.

This 'dark continent' image has turned my continent into a pityful and sneer-worthy non-deserving continent. This continent where I have lived all my life, been happy in, and successful in, survived in. This Africa, from which fellow Africans have run away, embrassed to be associated with it, in preference for the heavenly west as portrayed in the media. Our young people, barely out of high school, are being ensnared by this image of the West, an image they hold on to, until they arrive in Europe or North America, and realise they are nothing more than modern day slaves. Some exist illegally, in the hope that the system will not detect them. Others live on the mighty green card, awarded to foreigners who have to pay using their lives.

And yet, these people withstand humiliation. Rather this than go back to the motherland and be seen as a failure, they argue. Rather this than the laughter of the damned. If Ben Okri slept in the streets, who am I, a nobody, to think I deserve more? While back home i would have been assured of a warm meal and a warm bed, it is better to be here, where my sense of purpose and sacrifice is sharpened.

But is Africa really that bad? Ought we be ashamed of being called Africans? Ought we be ahsamed of being black? What about the laughter and the education and the cultures? what about the joy of playing in the dust with friends whose names you will always remember even in your old age? What about the normal lives we lead? Are these successes not worthy of the media's precious spaces? What about the fact that Africa produces super-intelligent human beings? How else can you explain how Africans have excelled with minimum resources usually made available to students their ages in the West? What about the punishment of existing in a double life, that of the home and that of school, both heavily demanding and both equally important? The double burden of being the educated one, and the provider? and yet we survive in the same world as kids who have known nothing but over-protectiveness, whose every need has been tended to? If it is about survival for the fittest, who most deserves to survive? whose survival skills has been sharpened beyond question?

And so, while the only sport where Africans have outperformed the rest of the world is athletics (minimum resources required to achieve this goal), it is also the most inferior sport. After all, isn't it defined through funny looking, non-English speaking (hence lacking eloquence) black people from some god-forsakken land whose name periodically pops up to remind us that the world's first black leader hails from a father with humble beginnings.

It is easier for the West to typecast Africa using images of starving children. That is our public image. we are content with this image, because it prevents us from dealing with this complex continent. We marginalize and fragment its narratives, because we do not want to cause trouble, raise the expectations of the masses of Africa, give ideas of possibilities.

If the world is currently geared towards the superiority of capital, how can Africa be integrated into this dream? Easy! By making them give us whatever resources they have, so we can continue being the superpowers; by attracting the best brains using green cards, scholarships anything that will move the most diligent, strongest of them out of their holes, and making them grateful for the opportunity.

Now Asia rises and threatens to become the world's next superpower. Can the West let this happen? This would be extremely bad, because a breakdown of these societies would mean a change of power focus! Now we cannot have that. The under-dog race will edge its bony arse closer to the 'it' and soon we might just become powerless. This would be a big let-down. So we must fight on, we do not want to become the 'empy' continent.

So even now, while African crawls on its knees, hangs its head in shame as it begs for money from the Big Brother, accepts the disguised and sometimes open insults from the west, it continues to hope for release, relief. The West on its part continues to hold an image of eternal desperation and primitivity to measure how far its come and how far it can still go.

To succeed, it needs a failure.

Warm regards,

Hopeful African

The complex issues of sex and gender...A (slightly) different take on Caster Semenya

2009-08-24T19:50:00.000+02:00

Sexualities and genders are so complex that to categorize them in the black and white is to create disillusionment. I deliberately pluralize the terms because of my awareness that there are many shades of grey that exist in between and that push us to treat these issues more problematically.

I had a discussion with a friend today, and her take, though she agrees with the feminist readings some us of us have given to the whole Semenya saga, is that Semenya was set up right from the beginning. My friend's argument is that if we are to use heteronormative models that define femininity and masculinity, then Semenya was definitely set up.

She argues from the point of view of the numerous stories that have been traded in the public sphere in the past few days including that :

1) The IAAF were not the first to raise concern about Semenya's appearance, marked and identified as masculine. Her school teacher says he always assumed Semenya was a boy, until she turned 13 (not sure what happened to make him change his mind). Semenya herself says she has often been asked to go to male toilets, because people thought she was male.

The point is really that Semenya's case raises our attention, yet again to the complexity of categories of gender and sexuality.

Being a fun of 'House' a television medical detective series, I know that a person can be identified as a woman, but have a male sex (testis that failed to drop, too much testosterone etc). These things happen.

However, they complicate our lives because we have been trained to see the world in b&w. When something falls slightly out of the norm, in the grey area, then we want to take it out, look at it, study it, and work out why it is different.

But this was not my friend's point. Her point rather was that if indeed Semenya does 'look' masculine, has an adam's apple, is flat chested, and speaks like a man, why didnt the SA sporting association take steps to prevent the kind of attention and consequent humiliation she underwent? Why wasn't she protected from the media frenzy about doubts regarding her sex?

One can argue that her difference (away from the norm-only then can we identify her as different, from what though, not sure) had to confront the world, not so it could be picked on, but so it could in itself confront the world and show that it existed.

But, to continue with my friend's argument, in competetive sports, any reason for unfair advantage, any slight reason, was obviously going to raise questions. Beyond race and gender discourses is the issue of money/prestige. The economic basis of such sports demands that people 'of the same kind' compete and the best wo/man' is given a chance to win. This economic structure demands that people can be identified in certain ways, ways identified as normal.

Semenya entered into the race, performed extraordinarily well, and won her gold medal. But because there was something 'different' about her, the questions came. Why was she better than the rest of the women (common with all outstanding performers - in the same way that people asked what made Phelps different? Was it his swimsuit? did it give him an unfair advantage? What makes the Williams sisters different? Why are they so good?).

In Semenya's case, the questions began with her physical look (again questions that have been asked of Mutola and them who all looked muscly, strong, excellent). The more the look intensified, the more it turned into a gaze.

Fact: Semenya is an excellent athlete. Fact: Semenya has grown up as a woman. Fact: there was bound to be confusion about her because of how she looked.

What my friend got me thinking about is the fact that Semenya's case confronts us with the complexities of gender and sexuality that we have not even began to confront. Where are we at, in the space of dealing with the significant but confusing arena of multiple genders and sexes?

If in fact Semenya is found to have a high testosterone level, what then? where, as gender and sexuality scholars, does this leave us? What will we say? How do we begin to develop a language to say/argue that if Semenya identifies as a woman, then she is a woman? How do we begin to make her story, and that of many other female athletes who have been subjected to these kinds of humiliations, how do we begin to make them part of the norm? Where, in other words, do we go from here?

Thus in reading the works of Prof. Pumla Gqola and others, and how they have engaged with the debate so far, it is important to note that these questions are now being asked, and that we have the opportunity to ask even more questions to change the unidimensional way of looking at people who fall in the 'grey areas.' We need to keep pushing the debate, and look at what it means to exist in a world where gender and sexuality (or-ies) can no longer be seen as black and white.

Semenya's story raises debate about the state of race and power, in the way that the gaze has once again been turned towards the exotic other.

Her story also speaks about the gap of understanding how sex and gender can be grappled with beyond the norm.

My prayer is that Semenya continues to excel in her field and recieve the same kind of glory that other champions have received. I pray that she is celebrated, for becoming one of the best youngest athletes South Africa has ever had. I pray that her story inspires even more similar stories of those who have been sidelined because they look different. I pray that she has her day of glory, and that rather than be treated with suspicion, that she be able to proudly celebrate who she is, has become.

Can history teach us anything?

2009-07-31T05:19:00.000+02:00

Reading about Obama's Health care proposal and the fact that it is quickly becoming his archilles heels, is troubling to say the least. At the same time, to read about Kenyan leaders sitting around a table to decide their fates (I believe every single person responsible for the chaos in Kenya, the inter-ethnic wars, the deaths, the displacements, the continued hatred must be tried) is disturbing. But what do these examples have in common? History.

What is the historical explanation for liberal (translated as socialist) leanings of the first black (or is it mixed race) president of America? What dynamics are not projected, are not brought out through the present reports of Obama's apparent 'failure' to meet a promise he made during his presidential campaigns? Is he being 'crucified' by the more conservative news reporters, being held as an example of another naive liberalist whose time has run out? What is the historical context through which Obama's current situation can be explained? Are there issues that one can begin to see emerging from beneath the seeming wholesome blanket of logic and reason contained within the newspaper reports we are reading today?

While this might sound like a defence of Obama, it is in fact one perspective for understanding the large historical meanings of his successes and failures. Yes, it has been said already - he is carrying the burden of the black people on his shoulder, alright. But what is the nature of this burden? Is it not that the success of Obama might just mean a step closer towards closing the racial gap which still boldly rares its ugly head as is the case with the arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr.? Would Obama's success in office mean the erasure of stereotypes that have accompanied black people through time, repeated over and over, explicitly and implicitly through narratives, media reports and other cultural sources? Perhaps not, but his success sure means that black people can walk the streets and be proud that they too can, and for once not feel like second class citizens. The issue is of course bigger than I am projecting here, but in many ways, this is what his failure or success would mean, at least to me.

Similarly, should we disregard the fact that the seemingly new found friendship between Kibaki and Raila camps is for the good of the nation? Does this seem remotely familiar and repetetive? Has this not happened before? Severally? I have been following the progress of the 'envelope' issue as it has come to be known. Rather than face the harsh unknown international court for their sins, Kenyan leaders have miraculously, almost overnight, found a new friendship. Kibaki and Raila eating from the same plate in a remote village in Nyanza? Unheard of. Unless of course both are running away from a bigger monster? Reminds me of Moi's popular phrase, 'No stone shall be left unturned'. Often, this phrase was followed by a lot of state secrecy and whatever issue was being resolved would actually end up being burried way deeper, leaving the public guessing and rumor-mongering about truth. But Kenya never has a truth, just a lot of fluid lies. Kibaki and Raila friends? Why didn't this happen a year ago, when lives could have been saved?!!!

Ethnicity, race, class and gender (its not by mistake that everyone sitting around Kibaki's table was male-or were there women in that picture? didnt see) have to be read in the context of history, in which power relations are explained through a careful study of structures and norms that have been created to support the systems that dominate society.

I am not interested in answers right now (it being four in the morning and all, or is it 5) but I am more interested in expressing my sadness at the way events are unfolding globally. My global reality is confined to the spaces I know and I am familiar with. So Kenya, and I guess America (vested interests) become my global realities.

I am saddened by the chaos still going on in Kenya. Even though life is relatively normal now, Kenya still suffers the aftermath of last year's violence. From the increasingly difficult economic situation to the impossible political cul de sac, and what about the homeless people who cannot be properly resettled because of land disputes? Who is the voice of these poeple? But can one understand what is going on without empirical studies of historical facts? Does history help us to acquire a different persepctive on what is going on?

I am sad because if Obama fails, black people will have failed, and no matter how objective one wants to be, this is a truth. Race in America is still so sensitive that Obama has to apologize to a racial profiler just to keep the balance of presidency intact. I am saddened because we still live in an extremely lopsided world. Only history can set this straight.

Perhaps quite unrelated, I am saddened by the rising chaos in the streets of South African towns in the name of strikes. How will this end? What do these strikes potend? Will they end in the same kind of violence we saw erupt last year in March? Or worse? What is Zuma's position in all this? But even more important, how are these recent actions being interpreted? Are these interpretations at face value or do they go beyond?

Obama's speech in Ghana on Africa - afterthought...

2009-07-13T01:03:00.000+02:00

http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2009/07/11/obamas-speech-in-ghana-on-african-development/

I am not sure how many people have had a chance to read Obama's speech, but I have and wow! I must admit I began reading it thinking, 'what new thing could he possibly say about Africa?' But as is now well-known, Obama has a natural talent when it comes to making beautiful coherent speeches. I cannot say it any other way.

What was most striking about his speech?

1) That he recognized that the future of Africa lay in the hands of Africans, particularly, and this is most important, on its young people. I particularly liked the line,

'Africa does not need strong men. It needs strong institutions'. Think I will adopt it in my emails and things. Mantra, like.

I so badly hope all these male egos are listening, instead of turning our countries into political hell-holes. I especially hope the message is sliding down to Kibaki, Odinga and all those 'strong' men who think we need them, and who caused the troubles we found ourselves in, in 2007 in Kenya. Especially now that everyone is trying to swindle their way out of prosecution by the International court at the Hague. I still cannot believe they can be so self-centered.

But back to the important speech. As I read, I felt hailed by Obama. He recognized that some of us were struggling against all odds, to contribute towards the building of firm structures that would see Africa soar one day, even though we no longer believed in our politicians and their two-pence politics. He acknowledged that some of us were still willing citizens of collapsed states. I believe that was a bid deal. In his words, freedom is my inheritance. I thought of all the damage already done by the big word tribalism in Kenya, for instance, as I read the speech. I thought of the suspicion that grew out of this word, and how I no longer felt free in my own skin. I also thought of how people killed and burnt in the name of tribe. where is our sense of dignity?

2) Another important issue that Obama raises is the idea of an African partnership. I mean, how cool is that, conceptually? A world where we will no longer be thought of as the unwanted distant poor relation, but as equals. Mmmm. what a beautiful world that would be.

Of course I have a bit of a problem figuring out how this second point would play itself out, especially in our very capitalist world. First, isn't the logic of capitalism built on the idea of hierarchy between the rich and the poor? If Africa joined the ranks of other superpowers one day, who would be the poor relation?

3) The point about the climate change was also especially important. Would have been awesome if he had mentioned Wangari Maadhai though, for everything she has fought for all these years. I mean, I remember planting a tree because of her when I was younger...but let's not digress. Sometimes I wonder how much of our current problems we would be able to solve if we took better care of our environment. All this madness about paving way for civilization has caused such havoc in Africa, once beautiful and green.

4) Obama also spoke of the health situation in Africa, prompting me to think about the state of Africa and its diseases. Statistically, we are lagging behind. Imagine a world where the structures worked so well, that all those malaria deaths would just be a thing of the past. yeah, if only leaders did not feel it was compulsory to slice 20% of moneys earned from the taxpayer etc.

5) Aid- I saw he also mentioned something crucial about our continued dependency taking us back to the point of a partnership with the west as an alternative. I thought about it some more. I think Africa has become comfortable in its status of beggerliness. I mean, leaders shamelessly beg for aid, so they can slice off 20%, and send their children off to some Western countries to 'get the best' of that world. That way, even if their countries are being called shameless, their own futures have been taken care of. Puts a bit of a question mark on what we call the African Middle class or is it 'upper' class, if such a thing even exists? Me thinks this is a roundabout form of money-laundering, this investment of people's (taxpayers' money) on one's children. Of course I am speaking of politicians and in many ways government officials.

Let me stop shooting my mouth like this. I might actually say things I really do not want to say just yet.

I hail Obama, and thank him for his wonderful speech. As always, I think it touches any right-thinking African. Now, if only we could implement his ideas.....

and please, oh please, stop fighting each other, and just damn grow up!

Special Time Magazine edition on Michael J. Jackson

2009-07-05T00:41:00.000+02:00

Time Magazine has released a fascinating piece on MJ. Amid beautiful pictures from before I was born, there are interesting and disturbing pieces about the life and times of MJ (reminds me of JM Coetzee's Life and Times of Michael K). In the article by Richard Corliss, Tommy Mottola says, 'There's nobody before Michael Jackson, and there will never be anybody after Michael Jackson, that can do for video what he did. It put MTV culture into the forefront...he totally defined the video age' (TM 33). There is no other way to capture the kind of influence that MJ had on the cultural scene.

The Time Magazine articles are clearly marked, beginning with the article by John Cloud 'With a dramatic pause, the world mourned the death of a brilliant but troubling idol'. He goes on to capture the death of MJ using theatrical metaphors: the three acts. The shock, the confusion (of death) which he compares quite rightly with Elvis Prestley's death, the Celebrity Tragedy, and lastly the stage when we let the investigators do their job.

This article is however, quite ambivalent, capturing what MJ's death meant to a horde of us fans, but also quite regularly inserting the dissapointing years of MJ's life into the mix, thus making this a more dominant aspect of what the man was.

David Von Drehle's article 'A Little Boy with Outsize Gifts takes charge of His family's band, then leaves it far behind', is the article some of us die-hard fans want to see and read. It is a pithy recount of MJ's early life as a musician, his ambition, as well as his loneliness. It is no woner later in life, he'd find himself fraternizing with little boys, in the hope that he would be able to get what he had lost as a little child. Unfortunately, the social structures do not allow for adults to 'go back'. Once you have crossed over, that's it. MJ was caught between audlthood and childhood.

MJ is quoted as having said, 'There was a park across the street from the Motown studio, and I can remember looking at those kids playing games...i'd just stare at them in wonder-i couldn't imagine such freedom, such a carefree life-and i wish more than anything I had that kind of freedom, that i could just walk away and be just like them'. To have been a child star, stringing out songs such as 'ABC' and not have been affected by it... And to think of how hard their father drove them, is unimaginable. How those boys did it, is something to wonder and marvel at.

But just a side thought: if anyone watched 'Dream Girls', they would know just how manipulative the music industry is. The fact that Jermaine for instance, was dropped out of the band, and later that he performed duets with Whitney, is interesting. Just like the character of Jeniffer Hudson is thrown off the wargon to accommodate the non-talent of the Beyonce character, seems to me in parallel with the Jackson 5 story. Only, in this case, everyone of those boys was talented. I mean, I listen to MJ, true, he is electirfying (i will always admit this), but so were the other boys. I hate that they fell off, just because of some greedy producer's....

Anyway, I was trying to review the Time Magazine special Edition....

I think Richard Lacayo's Piece, 'Deformed by surgery. Warped by Fame. The Sad end of an American Icon.' captures the real effects of what Michael had been and what he died as. It highlights the massive debt he incured throughout his trials, his determination to be a 'neutral' colour (neither black or white: a brother from another planet), and his woes as a possible child molester. Those were the sad years of Mj's life, consisting of betrayals, broken dreams and possible feelings of failure. It's a pity he died feeling the hatred emanating from those who did not believe in his innocence.

There are those of us who believe in second chances, and who know that the world is not always a good place. I still believe quite strongly, that MJ's was a tragic case, because the world did not understand him, and had no place for his eccentricities. It cost him his life.

And so, while he might be in a better place, he is definitely wondering what went wrong. I am too.

TRIBUTE TO A LEGEND: KING OF POP

2009-07-03T21:03:00.000+02:00

Who is it...

Death is a difficult thing to deal with. A dear dear person told me that if you are the one that dies, its easy. It only takes a few minutes and you are gone. Its harder on the ones who are left behind. We don't want to die because we don't want those left behind to struggle with loss. They miss us, they want us to come back.

MJ's death has had an impact on those of us who grew up listening to his music, and even if sometimes we pretended he did not exist, even if we looked away during his difficult times, we do acknowledge his death.

His death means something to us. It means that something significant has been taken away from us, and we are no longer able to say sorry, neither can we make up for lost time. His death forces us to re-analyze our positions, question our own high moral standards and say, what went wrong, why did he become someone no one recognized? What happened?

Who was he?

Will you be there....

A few years ago, when I was still a naive high school girl, a classmate, quite musical, convinced the whole class to sing to MJ's 'Will you be there'. We hummed and she sang in her clear voice. I remember, our physics teacher walked in mid-song, but we all went on singing, rebellious, as if he wasn't there. I suppose he must have figured that we were just a bunch of hyper-active girls, because he let us be, and we never punished for this transgression. Thinking back, I think this was a moment in time, when I realised that if you really wanted to, you could transcend anything that stood in your way. But I digress. What was MJ's message?

A few days ago, a friend and I wondered about the arm band MJ wore on his hand all the time. A few internet searches led us to an answer: he wore an armband everyday to send a message, each band represented every child who died of hunger. MJ was an activist.

Black or White

How many people do you know who advocate for a non-racial world? We are all either for white, black or up for co-existence. But we all embrace our differences as if failure to do so would be to lose our very lives/identities. I watched the 'Black or White' video the other day. Granted, I immediately went on the defensive, why must Africans always be Masaais or whatever brand of Africans normally used to represent the continent?

But I also thought, wow, he really was making an effort. In his own way, he was trying to use his celebrity status to make a difference! While I might be over-stating it, one cannot escape the fact that when he started writing his own songs, he became so much more conscious of what was going on in the world.

We are the world...

There is a time, when we should hear a certain call, cause it seems its written in these lines. Cause its a chance we are taking, in leading our own lives, It seems we need nothing at all, I used to feel....

We are the world, we are the children, we are the ones to make a brighter day, so let's start giving...

I am Bad

However bad you are, I think we all should always know we can have a second chance. I did not know MJ personally. Never would have. But I think he made a change in my life. He was someone who tried, in his own stange way, to make a difference. I suppose sometimes that's all we need in life. Biblically, we cannot afford to throw stones, because inside, we all all bad.

I remember once, Oprah publicly denounced MJ for comparing himself with Nelson Mandela. I remember at the time thinking how the world made us who we are. The moral lense through which we are judged in this world, especially under the glare of this world, makes its near impossible to make a meaningful contribution in this world.

For the next few days, I will listen (some more) to his music and try and figure out what made him so great. He was a genius, and its a shame he passed on.

Focus on Zimbabwe: Nervous Conditions (2)

2009-02-17T15:25:00.000+02:00

Tambudzai:

While this is the central character of the book, I held on to her until this point because she puzzled, excited and reminded me of me so many times I felt dodgy and guilty. Tambu has (had) so much spirit and ambition, and did not mind her brother dying for her to achieve her dreams (not the part that reminds me of me). But Tambu’s sense of rebellion is mapped around a concept of progress that has been handed to her by circumstances. First, she sees the poverty in which her family exists, and is given ample opportunity to discover the other side of the coin through her observation of her uncle’s family. She is constantly comparing herself with those who are celebrated as being worthy, and questions why she herself has not been found so.

One has got to admire her determination when she makes that trip to the town centre to sell maize that she has painstakingly planted, even against Nhamo’s evil attempt to destroy what she had worked so had for. One has also got to admire how much she wants to get into school, for she is able to see that it is because of education that Babamukuru has been able to achieve all that she has. Of all the characters in the book, she is surprisingly the one who most resembles Babamukuru. She is a real rags-to-riches case, but has a whole lot of determination that drives her towards her goal. The author of The Secret and any Obamaniac would be proud of Tambu!!!!!!!!!!!

But Tambu, like Maiguru is a tragic figure. In all her determination, and in all her willingness to obey Baba, she is under-appreciated by him. He refuses to see her potential beyond the fact that she will get a good husband and be in a position to help the rest of her family. Also, and this is the part of her that most reminds me of me, she is quite uncritical of what is going on, and when she knows she should be critical, she struggles to push these thoughts to the back of her head. I say it reminds me of me because often, I found that fighting the system was so much harder, such hard work. It was often easier just sitting back and accepting what was going on.

No, I am not proud of this, but that is the truth. Often, you want to get there so badly, you are willing to ‘suffer’, punish yourself to reach there. Always, an invisible hand is swinging opportunities in front of you, and you have to humiliate yourself to get there. Sounds pathetic but that’s exactly what Tambudzai and to a large extent most of us have had to go through to get to where we are. But I do not necessarily blame myself for it, just like I do not blame Tambu. What were her options? Defying Babamukuru like Nyasha did is a luxury of course she could never have afforded! Only Nyasha, whose blood ties disabled Babamukuru’s powers had the audacity to challenge that blanket god-like power when no one else could.

Perhaps also, Tambu’s being a child also worked against her. Look at Lucia who countered Babamukuru all the way but still got what she wanted out of him.

I suppose the weakness of Tambudzai is even more tragic because she was helpless in her limited knowledge of what she could or could not do. Like an overwhelming power against her, she had to suffer an intense patriarchy to get to what she wanted.

Eventually, Tambudzai just suffers from the fate of ending up in a catholic boarding school. I remember going to a catholic boarding school, and some of those things that Tambudzai heard about these places are actually true. There were often young girls who were marked for entry into the convent. Their school fees were paid by the church and when they were ‘ready’ they would discreetly be recruited into the schools. It was always funny when some of them actually fell pregnant because that always meant the end of their careers in the nunnery and of course a huge disappointment on the part of the nuns. But maybe we are yet to uncover new forms of resistance!

One last focus on Tambudzai: her relationship with Babamukuru. Particularly that fateful day when she dared to say she did not want to be part of the wedding procession!!! Babamukuru’s generosity is finally and completely put to the test at that point: he begins by torturing Tambudzai with ways in which he had been generous to her, and Tambu can only stammer in reply. That GUILT that she feels at that point would be a source of interesting reflection. It is a guilt filled with fear, the fear of that invisible hand taking away everything you had ever dreamed of….

But in the end, just like in the case of all the other women, Babamukuru decides not to push it too far, because he knows deep down, Tambudzai is so much more than he had expected. However, he punishes her, because she dared to defy him, a god! The character of Tambudzai is therefore one of guilt, fear and most of all extreme punishment and humiliation that she has to endure just to get to where she wants to go! Mppph!

Nyasha:

I had to leave her for last. There is a book I read in my high school, it was a set book, chosen for purposes of being examined on it at the end of the year. I think it was called Mashetani, ‘The Devils’. The details of it are hazy now, but I remember someone who suffers from a nervous breakdown because he or was it a she could not understand why everyone was so readily accepting socialism when he could see through the evil behind the architecture. I think it was that. The book was written by a famous Tanzanian writer whose name I forget now, but it was a stunning book, the kind we should be reading more and more rather than watching sex and the city:-)

Anyway, what I got from that book reminded me of Nyasha, or is it that Nyasha reminded me of that book? Either way, it is with great sadness that I regard such characters, the geniuses who think ahead of their times, the intellectual who suffers because she can see beyond what is blanketing the truth. While the theme of the alienated intellectual is pretty common in African writing, it is still normal one of the most tragic characters.

Mohammed Said Abdallah. That is the name of the author of Mashetani. (Sorry, had to put that in).

Anyway, Nyasha is a beautiful creation. She says and identifies those aspects that are wrong with the system, the colonial and patriarchal systems. Unlike Tambu, she has the language and tenacity to identify these things and naturally falls out of favour with her father. However, the author refrains from using her forcefully as the voice of reason but uses her to explore the dilemma of the intellectual born way ahead of her time. In a tightly and unapologetically patriarchal society such as hers, clearly there’s no winning the war with Babamukuru and the rest of the men (and women, think of Tete), but she goes ahead and says what she thinks is right.

Unfortunately she has a nervous breakdown, and during her moments, it’s clear she takes issue with the system and how people are accepting what in her mind is poison to their society. That she is Babamukuru’s biggest critic should not go unnoticed. She criticizes the power of capitalism, male power, presence of white people, the way in which the system is all for consuming the minds of the natives. Perhaps the whole book is about her, and Tambu and their inner turmoil’s, as they are the two characters most explored in this regard.

I think I need to re-read the Wretched of the Earth before I undertake the arduous task of reading the sequel to this book, The Book of Not. Eish!

Focus on Zimbabwe: Nervous Conditions (1)

2009-02-17T12:45:00.000+02:00

A lot has obviously been said about Tsitsi Dangarembga’s Nervous Conditions (1988), with the immediate relationship to Franz Fanon’s Wretched of the Earth (1963) possibly being the obvious beginning point. But given that I have promised to record my thoughts on every book I read this year (and enjoy), I will add to a large existing body of literature on the book.

My first reaction to Nervous Conditions was one of disappointment, not because it was a bad read, but because so much had been said about it, yet, I missed the immediate sense of greatness of the book. I had thought it told a melodramatic tale of suffering that would send me to uncontrollable levels of sadness – my immediate reaction? Nervous Conditions was actually a very ordinary book.

Ordinary in the sense that it told a story most of us African girls/ladies grew up with and still have to contend with. Ordinary in its pickiness of daily life. Ordinary as well, in its constant reference to pain and sadness we have felt and suffered. We who have grown up against the grain. Yes, ordinary.

Yet in its ordinariness, it was a great novel, full of things we all feel we should have said, captured out of our zigzagged histories. Yes, ordinary. So that in its great engagement with the afflictions of colonialism and patriarchy, it really was saying a story that is ours.

This review will be based on the characters of the novel, those who touched me, and realities I live and have to contend with.

Babamukuru:

My first choice, because I think beyond the patriarchal power he exercises that minimizes every other person, he was in fact a great man. Babamukuru represents to me, those Africans who followed the preaching of the White missionaries, “read hard and you will reap the rewards, you will get out of your abject poverty, and you will prosper. But in your prosperity, remember to use your education, to break the African yoke, the circular yoke of poverty. Use your education to save your family, and raise them above the conditions of their current living.”

Sounds familiar?

For most of us who have had the benefit of a good education, the reality is we do not always come from good economically stable families. We come from families full of loved ones who in spite of every effort, continue to remain where our parents were, never moving out of those cycles. Like Jeremiah, Babamukuru’s brother, there are those members of the family who do not even want to try and are content with grovelling for the money at every opportunity. Then there are those who have given up like Tambudzai’s mother. Then once in a while if you are lucky, there are the Lucias who do everything to get out, break free from the yoke. It is often an amazing moment for everyone, and especially for the one who wanted this to happen so badly, the one who resembles Baba. So in spite of his God like status, which goes against the grain of any decent feminist critic, one has to look at what Baba is after. One has to sympathize with what his family has to put up with, in order that Babamukuru’s family rises out of the Yoke. Take for instance, Maiguru.

Maiguru:

Maiguru is everything some of us would never want to be: the perfect wife. She obeys a stubborn egoistic man at her peril, to the point that when she eventually decides to run away, Nyasha, her extremely brilliant daughter celebrates.

I think Maiguru is a tragic figure. It is the 50s, she has a Master’s degree (some of us still feel very great in this day and age just having a basic degree!) and she has all manner of opportunities open to her. But clearly, she is the product of an evil patriarchal system that is hell-bent on keeping women somewhere just below a one week old baby boy (remember when Babamukuru tells Tambudzai that he feels the need to start saving money for Dambudzo, Tambu’s one week (month) old baby brother. His vision is that Tambu should finish school fast get a job and a good husband. Babamukuru’s focus thus turns supremely towards a baby boy whose potential is yet to be measured, and is willing to sacrifice Tambu’s education at the Catholic school for him. Convoluted I know but this is the system from which Maiguru emerges. So when she packs her bags and leaves Babamukuru, we are all relieved. Like Tambu and Nyasha, we hope she will never return to Baba, we hope and pray that she will escape from the utter selfishness displayed by him.

But she comes back.

And even though she begins demanding more of him, and asserting herself a lot more firmly, we are disappointed that she still treats him and spoils him with praises and that no one appreciates just how hard it is to be part of such a man’s life. We are told when she leaves that Babamukuru continued existing as if Maiguru never left. Of course he would exist, what with all the women (Anna, Tambu and Nyasha) standing to be held accountable if none of his meals were made, or if his shirts were not clean. The machinery that keeps him going is the same one he humiliates.

Chido:

I particularly love the character of Chido, mainly because he is the ‘absent’ man in the novel. You see, in a novel where Jeremiah the lazy drunk and Takesure have bigger rights than brilliant women such as Mama Tambu, Lucia, Nyasha and Tambu, you have got to celebrate the power of the absent one. He is not absent in the way that Achebe’s Nwoye or even Okonkwo’s fathers are, he is absent in a good way, a healthy way, a way feminists would appreciate (radical?). So while I may not want to say much more for fear of spoiling it, I think Chido represents the salvation of the novel. If more of those characters were as absent, I suspect the four women would be a lot happier.

I think both Tambudzai and Nyasha need a lot more reflection before I write what I thought of them, but you get the general drift.

I won! I know I did!

2009-02-06T13:00:00.000+02:00

Once in your life, the thought of winning a million shillings or rand, or dollars (varied value notwithstanding) fills your head with dreams and tantalizing thoughts and possibilities! You think of how you will build a biig house with lots of space in it, and design it with ultra-modern lines and squares just like you always wanted. Then you'd have your loveliest colours sprinkling the otherwise serenely white room! Ohhhh!

But the reality is that you have got to work for your money, Like a donkey, and so that beautiful house will come, but through sweat. But still we dream.

Well, a few days ago, I filled in a 'raffle' ticket at one of the big stores, and wonder wonder, I got a call yesterday. This was basically how the conversation went:

Caller: Hallo, is this Ms D. L
Me: Yes?
C: How are you?
Me: Ok?
C: That's good. Ms L, I am just calling to let you know that your raffle ticket was selected and you are a guaranteed winner-
Me: Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
C: Listen, you will need-
Me: Oh my God! I won Something! Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! God, is this being recorded?
C: No its not being recorded, I am just calling to let you know that you were among the lucky ones.
Me: what did I win?
C: There is a range of things you stand a chance of winning. You could win R 50,000; a Mecer laptop, a getaway at a Resort of your choice; or a (sth) inch plasma TV!
M: I won sth! Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
C: Maam, you will have to come to our offices tomorrow at 18:00 to claim your prize. There will be a draw and you will have to pick one of the items I have listed for you. Now, for marketing purposes-
Me: OMG!
C: For marketing purposes, we have to get your details, like do have a credit or cheque account, where we can deposit the money?
M: Not yet! I mean, I have a savings account.
c: Oh, Savings. That's okay. And do you have a job?
M: Yeah?
C: what is it?
M: Currently am doing a contract job at X.
C: What is your salary package?
M: Sorry? Sorry, I didnt get your name please
C: XXX
M: Ok. I am still not quite employed so I don't have a package yet, but will soon enough.
C: okay, I hope you know this is just for marketing purposes and nothing sinister. Now we will want you to come in tomorrow and sit through a presentation and then we will have the draw and you will win your package.
M: Presentation? will it be on national TV?
C: No no, its just us, we need to tell you a little bit about our company.
M: Oh, okay then. good. Just send me you address and I will be there.

Now, I know what you'all thinking. How can i be so daft? Thing is, this was the first time I was hearing of something like that. I hang up, and was soon day-dreaming about a holiday resort, consoling myself with a plasma TV, toying with the idea of a new laptop, but mostly, just eyeing the R50,000! Wow! I would shop till I dropped.

Then I began sharing my excitement! Those who did not know, like me, we as excited as me. But those who knew, just said...you go check it out, but don't sign anything.

That got me....'guaranteed winner? presentation? what the-' Okay, I became bold and asked. Four different people later, i am glad I asked.

Turns out the company that called me is part of a bigger marketting gig carried out by small companies that use these 'winning' moments as opportunities to sell timeshares. For the uneducated like me, "A timeshare is a form of ownership or right to the use of a property, or the term used to describe such properties. Timeshare properties are typically resort condominium units, in which multiple parties hold rights to use the property, and each sharer is allotted a period of time (typically one week) in which they may use the property" (Source: Wikipedia).

Now in a rich society, maybe these things really work, but imagine money being deducted from my 'inyana' salary every month towards a timeshare for a holiday resort somewhere, maybe for a week! Why should I pay for somethig I have not even planned for? Why! why did my one moment of glory turn so sour so suddenly? I am renewing my bid to read more, learn more and discover more this year. this will go down as my one near gloriuos moment of fame!

Ok. my presentation is at 18:00 today, only I will not show. I will sit at home and catch up on the sleep I never had!!!

If you knew about this kind of thing, take note and learn some more, if you didn't don't fall for anything. I am lucky its only my pride that got bruised!

Reading and its merits

2009-02-04T16:11:00.000+02:00

Those who know me well...and I mean well, know that I love to put my feet up and ease into my hand-me-down couch to watch...Sex and The City:-) Friends, Harry Potter (the whole lot of them), Desperate Houssies, name them. I even got to watch the first series of Allie McBeal and Nip-Tuck. All of these I collect, and watch and rewatch until I get value for my money. And for those who try to dissuade me from this habit, I say, "this is not one of the ways to get out of this alive..."

But once in a while I sit down and read, and read a good book. Leave alone the usual academic sort. I mean, I slept really late reading a book on Media Theory. Now, that is not exciting. Exciting is when you read a book and become completely cut off from the world. I used to feel that way what I was younger. It was mainly with African Writers Series, and later Mills and Boon, Harlequinn Romance, name them...oooohhhh, the joy of getting lost in that world, so woolly, cozy, fantastic, so not part of the harshness of reality of everyday life, so nice, fine...

Anyway, the African novels always filled me with a sense of adventure. Even though I am an African, I always found stories written by Africans (in the age pre-dating discourse and theory-oh i miss those days), so rich and intense. For instance, it has been years since I read Kenjo Jumbam's 'The White Man of God', but ask any of my friends, it is a book I always quote. Its wierd that years later, after reading 'HouseBoy' (Ferdinand Oyono), I realised just how popular the theme of the young boy child and the white catholic father was. But when I first read Jumbam, I was hooked. I also remember a book called 'The Great Siege of Fort Jesus!' The adventures of war right outside my doorstep still make me shake with excitement.

But enough about the yesteryears.

I just finished reading this book by Hanif Kureishi called 'The Buddha of Suburbia'. It is a fascinating read about the identity crisis of a young man, whose mother is white British and father Indian. It explores in great detail his sexual experimentations, which are at once experimental and dangerous, yet daring and forward. It is nihilistic in a twisted way, and reads more like a humourous recording of everyday life. I found myself muffling bits of laughter that threatened to escape from my mouth every few minutes as I read into the night. Of course it was not a hard read, and the politics therein were concrete experiences of London and South London. Me, who is yet to travel to these places could see the place that was painted in Dicken's writing re-emerging even as the time represented changed. It was an awesome read.

And I remember having a similar experience with 'Spud' by South Africa's John van de Ruit. With characters bearing names like Spud, Rambo, Mad dog, Rain Man, Gecko, Fatty and Boggo, the book was surreal yet rooted in my own boarding school reality way back when I hated the experience. I say surreal because it does not always remain in-sync with my experiences-I went to a boarding school where frequent visitation was prohibited, so i only saw my parents once in a long while. Also, the school in 'Spud' reeked of privilege which is not what I can say of MY boarding school, but hey, boarding school is boarding school, miserable, annoying and desperately lonely. Survival is key, and this one must learn, even before figuring out where the toilets are upon arrival!!! Well, 'Spud' was a great read, and often i found myself laughing out loud. I had not read something so good in a long while. I must read 'Spud: The Madness Continues...'

so anyway, where was I? ah, the merits of reading books that make you smile. Reading generally is very active, as opposed to watching TV. you feel well rewarded after you start a book and find out it contains information, narratives, anything really that is beneficial to you, even if just in excercising your brains to stop them from vegetating from too much TV...

I know it when I pick a good book. I finish it.

I am right now contemplating my next read. I know. I have so much work to do right now, but it still makes me happy just knowing I can sneak a few chapters down the time line, even as I battle with bigger issues of planning and sorting myself out for the rest of the term/semester. Its just good to know sometimes that when you read, it is something you will enjoy. So this year, apart from resolving to read more of the newspapers, I want to make sure I produce book reviews of everything I read. That way, I will always come back to this website to self-grade, and ask myself if I had made any progress or if I was still stuck watching my series, and exploring You Tube and the like. I still believe life offers the greatest ironies. I had to get to this stage of my life to realize there are still things i care about that have nothing to do with the selfsih capitalist agenda of bettering my career or making money. It is something I enjoy doing, and its one of those things that comes naturally.

Nuff

Friends

2009-02-01T17:15:00.000+02:00

It is amazing that this is what we have become, so many years after trying so hard to be here. I look at all my friends now, and am really proud that we actually got here.How we have escaped from life's snares and withstood pain so deep, hard to fathom, leave alone explain. Mostly, I just sit and marvel at what life has thrown my way.

Yes, I worked hard, but just as hard as any of my other friends.

It stings that I have lost so many friends along the way, but my father always told me never to measure myself by the number of friends i had, but by the number of friends I was able to keep.

And I adhere to this rule. If I can keep a friend, then they are worth keeping.

We swim in and out of life's loneliness, confused and needing attention, acceptance. those of us who are not into that sort of thing raise our noses with disdain, everytime another group closes us out. But in the end, we all want love, and we all want to be loved. We all feel stronger when we know that no matter what, there will always be someone who can touch us and heal us and tell us we will be alright.

and that is why we have friends.

Friends, not just to decorate our private halls of fame, not to hold up as trophies, that other people may come and praise, worship, recognize, admire...

No. we have friends because they are extensions of us. yes. Extensions.

And that is why I quote my father so much. he believed that in his lifetime he made a lot of friends.

But not all of them were friends.

There were those conveniently chosen for a specific job: My rave friend, my drinking buddy; my apartment hunting buddy; by money-lending buddy; my cute buddy (to snare with more hot looking friends).

Compartmentalizing.

That is what we are all good at, and yet...

Who are we really? who are our friends? are they the ones who hold back your hair as you throw up at a party when you've had too much to drink/eat???

are they the ones who help you mourn your loved ones and hold your hand when no one else wants to?

are they the ones who allow you to sneak into their homes when your life's has lost meaning?

are they the daring ones who will defend you when no one has the courage, guts or interest?

are they the ones who will invite you into their homes, and share their meal even when they know they have nowhere else to get more?

OR

Are they the ones who hang onto you because you have something they want?

are they the ones who only mention your name because someone they like knows and likes you?

are they the ones who quickly disappear when real issues land on your feet?

Mmmm...I sit uncomfortably with the word friend, because often, I get confused. I never know where the line is drawn, close myself off, open up, scream, jump around, come back to my senses and remember my father's words, mingle, woolly ideas all over my head, wondering if what I know is worth anything and if a friend if going to help me unravel...

The mysteries of my world.

I wonder.

Nigga eyes

2009-01-20T18:04:00.000+02:00

Why did I get married
The best man
Maddeah's Family reunion
Hairspray
Jerusalema
I think I love my wife

Yep! If you have watched 'I think I love my wife' you will understand immediately what it is to have nigga eyes. To be specific, in the movie, Nicky, a character seducing Richard, played by Chris Rock, listens to his ipod for a minute, gives it back to him and says, 'You've got nigga ears!'. Basically, what she was saying is that all he listened to was black music, Whitney Houston, Anita Baker, the works. Now, that is how I will explain my holiday. I had nigga eyes. I watched one all black movie to another, and I had a blast!

There was something magical in the experience. Till then, I had always imagined that watching an all black movie was some kind of rebellion, and had hardly ever paid attention to how very the same, and different black people are. This December, I watched movies that addressed racial injustice (Jerusalema, Hairspray) to those that spoke to the everyday reality of black people. I instist on using the word black, because much as these movies could have had white people in them, it was moving to know that black people had normal lives and problems that did not involves crime (I think I love my wife, the best man and why did I get married).

Its interesting how over the years, Hollywood has sidelined the black man's experiences, and how between African American films and African films, there's nothing but sex, crime and poverty. I mean, think about it. when was the last time you watched an all black movie from hollywood? Normally, its very clear cut, bad blacks and good whites, jailed blacks from a rough neighbourhood, and white cops who come to restore order. In cases where black people are good, it has to be a face that has already been introduced to the masses, aka Denzel Washington (who by the way looked so good the other day during the Obama Inaugral celebrations, Will Smith and Samuel L. Jackson (just recently re-watched the Negotiator). The other time you will see a black face is when its a comedy, ie Chris Rock, and Chris Tucker etc. Oh, and the other day, I watched Usher in the movie 'In the Mix'. ouch, who saw that dance move he pulls at the end during his wedding? Cmon, can't they just let us forget for a minute that it is Usher, the Usher? Sort of reminds me of Aaliyah in 'Queen of the Damned'. They just had to show us her tummy and her moves....

I digress, as usual.

Anyway, I was saying, if it is not crime, then its africa and poverty, and trust me, I do not even want to go into the pain of describing that 'saving africa' affair.

Anyway, in between my watching a friend of mine who adores Nollywood made me side-watch a moviue or two. I say side-watch because I sad there grumpy as hell, waiting to switch back to hollywood. I remember I was reading 'Spud'the book, but secretly paying attention to the extreme melodrama on TV. I remember even watching this Tanzanian movie (East Africans still have a long way to go to catch up with Nollywood), and this one woman just kept being attacked with misfortune. I was touched more by my friend's reactionto the movies! She was completely fixed on the screen, and when it ended, i could hear her excitement at the way it ended.

For me, that is what we all ought to feel when we watch a movie. It is how I felt when i re-watched 'Best Man'. It was a beautiful movie about pride, forgiveness and true love. But it was also a movie about faith. it was not the same as Tyler perry's maddeah series, which is very didactic in terms of its lessons. It was about something that could happen to any of us.

It made me realise how escapist my romantic movies (the type I love watching) are. Mmm...

It was extremely refreshing to know that there was hope for us, we as a people, beautiful and great.

The thing that made me smile today

2008-11-21T15:17:00.000+02:00

Barack Obama plans to nominate Hillary Clinton as US Sectretary of State.

Not sure why it made me smile, but it did.

I really do not have much to say about it yet, but I wanted to record it:-)

I will definitely say something on it when am good and ready!

Unmasking the devil

2008-11-19T13:22:00.000+02:00

Part of living against the grain is having to put up with so much hate and prejudice. I say 'put up with' because that is essentially what it is. It is about walking down some corridor and having somebody avoid your glance. 'Avoidance'.

Avoidance, as defined by Gordon Allport, is the intensional prejudice against a member of an out-group by avoiding contact or relations with members of this group. It could be that blank smile dished out as if it be a priceless gift to fight for, or the conscious movement to the wall everytime you have to share a corridor, or perhaps just sheer inability to occupy the same space with the person, whatsoever.

But perhaps, the more obvious one is antilocution, where people feel free to speak with prejudice among like minded friends (Allport 2000). The internet has made this an extremely attractive aspect, and people think they can abuse it the way they want.

Take for instance, a recent web-war with Søren Dalsgaard,

http://scdalsgaard.wordpress.com/2008/11/04/african-obamania-mere-tribalism/#comment-1207

In this war, Dalsgaard writes for a Norwegian public, assuming of course that either his readers are clueless about Africa in general and Kenya in particular, or that they are 'like minded' in their prejudice.

hence his tragic title "Kenyan Obamania: mere tribalism!!"

For those of us who have had to suffer in silence for a while as the world moves about us as if we do not exist, this is a golden opportunity to vent. Not because we dislike Dalsgard, but because he, at this particular moment in history, represents everything we hate, and disapprove of. He represents what we feel is wrong with the world.

He moves on from using words such as 'the average african', 'frenzy' filled Kenyans, 'tribalists' and whatever else to sum up experiences that are indeed more complex than he gives credit to, as mere tribalism.

Maybe in such cases, one ought to move on, and ignore yet another attack, that criticizes one because of skin colour, but also because one comes from the poorest continent in the world. Maybe, in spite of the opportunities the internet offers us, we should continue to respect the power structures, and respect those who call the shots.

Maybe one mustn't get agitated when, on actually deciding to read the blog, one comes across a line like this,

"In Africa, however, it is about getting your own tribe in the most powerful position in the world."

Even our celebrations have to be measured, and judged. Our joys become frenzies. We become the everage africans.

"When will African politics distance itself from ethnicity and focus on politics instead?", he asks?

Perhaps his post was meant to be a reflective piece, informed by his experiences in Lamu and elsewhere, proudly and candidly displayed in a series of pictures in his blog

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nairobbery/?saved=1.

But do mere observations by someone who has been to africa as a tourist qualify as authoritative source? To the extent that he reduces our joys and celebrations to mere frenzied tribal displays? We, who have lived and gone through so much in the same countries, expected to remain muted and silenced forever in history? Is this what is expected of us?

Perhaps, yes, we are too hard on such sorts. They are but a mere speck in the larger structures of power that dictate how we are seen, percieved, understood.

Perhaps he just expressed what many are feeling. That while the 'developed' nations of the world see Obama's win as a rational move to tip the scale of world politics towards a favourable angle, the Africans specifically, see it as a way of getting a tribal king in.

Tribe. yeah, me too. It annoys the crap out of me, that word.

But to continue, it always amazes me how quickly we have to be disciplined and reminded to know our places, even today, in so-called democratized societies that are in fact so warped, only a certain skin colour can ever trully prosper. We are taught to be patient and wait for our turn, even though they know, and we know, that our turn may never come.

To digress, I had a dream last night, and our tribal king had gone to some African town, and people were booing him. He was not recognized there, because he had failed to recognize them. Tit-tat. The tribal King was pleading because at the end of the day, he was of there, but no one wanted to listen.

I woke up.

But there is a moral. The tribal king and all, may not be as closely linked to our lives as others want to see it. He does not change the fact that I still have to get up every morning to get to my destination point and get some work done. Neither does he change the fact that I am now buying cooking oil for such a disgustingly ridiculous amount (did I hear Amen?)

But the fact that he is there, reminds me that in spite of having to wait my turn, I will finally get there. I will break those boundaries that right now seem so strong and inflexible. I will in my own right, be able to throw a tuntrum without someone calling me irrational and emotional. I will be able to celebrate without being called insane. I will be able to look at a wandering tourist in the eye and know that he is just trying to as hard as me.

Yes we can.

To belittle what has been achieved just so as to feel better is a cheap way of trying to feel relevant in the world. Just work hard, stop trying to damn hard to close off opportunities for others. Just do your thing. Move on. It is in deed a very short life!

It is sad, that even as I write this, somebody's butt is being kicked metaphorically or otherwise for no other reason but...

In a world that is so free, its amazing how jailed we are, how much negotiating we have to do just to get a breath of fresh air every damn day.

It's amazing that I have to put up with people who pretend it ain't a big deal that I have to work extra hard to prove myself at work, or school, and that it aint a big deal that I can spell, and count and use the internet, and go to college, that it aint a big deal that I can be the best of what I can be...no it's just another day, so moving on.

But that's just it. It aint a big deal...to them. It is a big deal to me.

If there was a way to speak, i could. I would let it all out, and have it known. But so far, it lands on deaf ears, so i fight on, and on.

Of Race and Gender in the White House

2008-11-07T14:26:00.000+02:00

I have been holding back on saying anything about the Oba-mania especially in Africa. But also, generally on what it means for the black race, in America especially, and in the rest of the world, for two reasons. First, I think at such moments, everyone has something to say, and so what I say or not say will probably have very little impact. Secondly, I have been looking for the counter-story, the excesses of what Obama's victory means.

Well, I have decided to break my fast. I think if I do not say something now, the time will never come. Anyway, my curiosity begins with the fact that Obama is obviously a black man. Today, I heard on CNN that the Italian Prime Minister, Berlusconi (sorry got this wrong the first time) in his congratulatory speech to Obama, said that he welcomed Obama, who he thinks is a good looking young man, with an even skin tone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, one can throw a chair and jump up in the air in anger, but truth be told, Berlusconi said what a lot of people think is politically incorrect to say, and are therefore keeping mum about.Is his reduction of Obama to a cute guy with a light skin tone just that, or is there more to this statement?

bell hooks writes about racism in an interesting way, that it is not only between races, but also intra-racial. She draws attention to the way in which even among black people who have been cultured to think of themselves as better or worse than the next black person because of the colour of their skin or as mentioned above, skin tone, there is racism.

In reading Berlusconi's comment about Obama, it is clear that the 'even skin tone' refers generally to the fact that at least Obama's colour is closer to the white skin than most black people. But I digress.

I have been interested in the way race is playing itself out presently, and even more interesting, how gender is rudely cast aside, and blamed for the failure of the republican Party. By gender of course I mean Palin. I will return to this presently. In part of my research into the question 'is America ready for a black president' I have uncovered some pretty uncomfortable truths. For the extremists, the answer is more obvious. It is the subtle ones that are a bit uncomfortable. For instance, in a blog about whether Obama had been elected because he was black or inspite of it, one person, arguing that race had nothing to do with it, continues to say something seemingly unrelated to the Obama race question,

"No, there arent any indigenous Australians capable of running for PM.
None have the experience or the desire to do anything but scrounge up more welfare payments for fellow aborigines."

I know, this is about Australians and aborigins, but why does it make its way into the Obama discussion? What is being threatened that other white governments and societies that have their share of native non-whites (not as is the case with polilical refugees, illegal and legal immigrants etc who have no claim to the land)feel they have to come up with a new narrative to comfort themselves that their relevance is dwindling or threatened? What is it about native American Indians that makes another person say they are less likely to ever get into the white house? Wasn't the war against Apartheid a sure sign that race can be pushed aside in search for humanity and freedom?

Ok. Next issue: Why is race a bigger issue than gender in these elections? bell hooks has mentioned previously in her analysis of the OJ simpson craze that the case had been reduced to a race thing, and no one was paying attention to the fact that a woman, albeit white, had been abused and then murdered. Okay, little comparison here but why is it not a factor that history would have been made if we had had a female president (Hillary) or a female Vice President (Palin)? Why is it easy for America and the world to accept these defeats that to accept race? Big question, but in all this I am also following the media's reports about Palin, who is now being shooed away in disgrace, when we all know she had been of mateiral importance for McCain when he needed a woman to be his running mate so he could beat Obama.

I feel let down by this. i feel that we had our moment, and now, because of Palinisque effect, it is gone. we of course here, means women. Now all the men in power will always have an excuse to not get a woman, because all she will think about will be buying new clothes (ala Palin's mad shopping spree of $150 000 in the middle of an economic crisis) or be a pretty face with nothing much to say. In fact, the more I think about it, the more I believe the fall of Palin has more significance than anyone is acknowledging! It will hurt a lot of female aspirants, it will be held as an example to justify why women ain't no good in positions of power.

Palin will continue to be in the media for all the wrong reasons, while Hilary Clinton, will as we have seen already, be tucked into the books of history, as one of the rare cases of women trying for the white house. Maybe there are more examples, I do not know, but so far, that is my take on it all.

But when all is said and done, I think Obama's win has symbolic significance for all of us black people, especially some of us who continue to face racism in our day to day dealings. The world is changing and with it our ideas, and opinions. Let us all keep hoping that it will get better. And let's all pray for Obama. I hope he continues to inspire all of us for many years to come.

If only Kenyan elections were like these...

2008-10-16T16:13:00.000+02:00

Last night, I sat up patiently and waited to listen to the final pre-election debate between McCain and Obama. While I admit I was half asleep when it began, I found myself paying attention to what McCain was saying, how Obama was sitting smilingly next to him, taking punches, even as McCain threw harder punches. I wondered at the way the election campaigns were being monitored and how, even a single pause or blink caused the polls to take a dive/dip. Everytime Obama stammered on a word, the graphic lines representing the undecided votes from both males and females dropped, when McCain was trying to swim out of a difficult spot by bullshitting, the dip was so huge. And when both spoke honestly and cadidly about issues, the graphs reached the upper limit.

Watching this, I began nightdreaming about the possibilities it held for African Countries, where physical brawls and public humiliation of opponents was still very much the name of the game. What if we started seeing elections as a platform for allowing citizens to decide on what they wanted, rather than using it as an opportunity to bribe, cheat, humiliate, fight, be abusive, or whatever else African leaders are always upto during such times? It is still a dream in Africa that we will achieve the state that USA takes for granted, where election capmpaigns are organized and the battles do not have to involve or rbuise the public, where citizens still have a large amount of power, and where presidents (potential) are taken to task about their manifestos...

Its a dream world, but a good one nonetheless.

Being foreign

2008-10-15T15:57:00.000+02:00

I am still rattled by the police raid. I have been asking myself a lot of questions, including, why did I agree to leave Kenya to come to SA? Before I came down, did I even know about the existence of xenophobia? perhaps in the dictionary, but really, did I really understand what it meant to be foreign?

To be foreign means having to renew visas regularly. Each time you renew it, you are filled with trepidition. Will they ask me to buy medical aid for next year? Will it mean, as usual, that I will have to pay a year's worth of medical aid at once? Meantime, Its the middle of this year, can I use my medical aid for this year? What if they deny me a visa, what then? will I get a letter from the relevant faculty confirming my status as a legal foreign student?

Its always about paying more than anyone else, going through so much more pain, waiting, suffering. even at the banks (foreign xchange) and forex exchange bureaus, where majority of the customers are foreigners, you get that special vybe, like people are doing you a favour by serving you.

I suppose I am okay because I have a choice as to whether or not I want to remain in this country. I can move if I want to. But that will not solve the issue of being short-changed on my rights because I am a foreigner. I wonder how I will feel when I eventually go back home. Sometimes I think I will be treated with contempt there as well. after all, why did I leave the country? why am i back? why couldn't I just have stayed away?

I hope I did not make a mistake to leave my home country. This feeling of alienation is probably always going to be with me, but i hope I manage to handle it better with the years.

Sigh.

Police Raid - Is this even legal?

2008-10-13T17:09:00.000+02:00

Today, I caught a glimpse of what people who have been on the receiving end of police raids go through. At about eleven in the morning (I had just woken up, having slept late marking essays) - I heard loud pounding on my door. Yeah, this was surprising, given that I hardly ever get visitors, albeit door-pounding ones. I open the door to this stream of cops. Okay, at first, it was a policewoman, who immediately got into this monologue in Zulu. I told her I wasnt quite following what she was asking me, upon which she asked,

"Are you Zimbabwean? Where is your passport?"

Okay, I am kind of used to the idea that being foreign in SA places me in a certain position of disadvantage sometimes, but even this was new. Surely they should respect the privacy of my home? But no. I told her I was Kenyan.

"Where's your passport?" She snapped.

" In school."

"The law says you must have it on your person at all times. I must arrest you."

Okay, this was not funny. I was in my damn PJs and this woman is threatening to place cuffs on me for the first time in my life, for a crime I wasnt sure I had committed? I calmly explained to her that I was a student at Wits, and if she wanted, we could walk to campus, and I would give her my passport, which happened to be in school. Meantime, another officer had strolled into my tiny kitchen. The first cop kept asking if I lived alone, as she made her way to my bedroom, and opened my wardrobe and things. At this point am beginning to get irritated.

"so what must I do?" she asked.

"You can wait for me outside, I will run and get my passport".

"No. My job is to arrest anyone without papers."

Then i remembered I had a certified copy of my passport. I found my wallet, pulled it out and gave it to her.

"Where is the police stamp?"

"Its certified, officer".

"No, it must have a police stamp". Pause, "so what must we do? Give us something!"

Its only then that I noticed I was being harassed by this woman. The other cop was busy going through my CD collection.

"Are you selling these?"

I frowned. That is my CD collection. Its in a CD holder. It contains different CDs. How could I-

"Next time, you must have your passport. Otherwise we will arrest you!"

"Close your door!"

Okay.

This whole bizzare episode could not haqve lasted more than 20 minutes, but I felt the effects of it. I could no longer focus on the essays, even though I had a one oclock deadline. I am still asking myself if its even legal to do what they did. Or I am expecting too much from the Law? Are surbabian homes raided in the same fashion, or is it just flats located in a particular area? How many more times should we expect these raids?

God, its gets wierder everyday, doesn't it?

And the award goes to...miss kwa kwa

2008-10-06T14:21:00.000+02:00

Book: Miss Kwa Kwa
Author: Stephen Simm
Publication date: 2006
Publisher: Jacana

After months of listening to my friend go on about Stephen Simm's Miss Kwa Kwa, I finally read it. And boy oh boy, was it a read! It begins with a typical slowness that marks books of this kind, books designed to make you crack a rib in laughter. The creation of the character of Miss Kwa Kwa begins innocently: Black girl in search of opportunity, even at the expense of destroying one man's life, the King of Kwa Kwa, Pieter Depeenar.

It is a book with many faces, humor, mistaken identities, and stereotypical representations. Through laughter, we are forced to engage with serious racial and class issues in today's south africa. For instance, because she is black, the first mistake that anyone who meets her makes is that she is stupid.

This more so in Kwa Kwa, where racial prejudices are still very deeply embedded, where blacks are only seen as farm hands and domestic workers; where white farmers' wives play bridge, and where white people still command the unquestioned respect from black subjects.

In other words, a small town.

A town that Miss Kwa Kwa finds too small for her. Miss Kwa Kwa is the ambitious alter-ego of Palesa Moshesh, a quiet but brilliant girl whose ambitions know no bounds. She wills her personality to be absorbed by her other side, Miss Kwa Kwa, ambitious airhead, beautiful, and as daft as a blonde doll. I mean, how else would one explain her answer to the question, "In a country characterized by such racial and cultural diversity, what culinary delight do you most enjoy?" to which she replies innocently " I'd like to take this opportunity to enrich my vocabulary and ask you what does that mean?" anyway, the perplexed interviewer explains, "what's your favourite dish" to which, unfazed, Miss Kwa Kwa replies, "Oh I see, I see! My favourite dish is ... Tupperware."

Did I introduce you? Meet Miss Kwa Kwa.

Behind the facade of stupidity, she is as sharp as a razor. She makes her way to Jozi, convinces a TV station to hire her as a television presenter, where she gets fired of course, before engaging in a series of exciting adventures, including her bulling a possible mugger and taking his gun away... you have got to admire her. And I think the best part of all, is that she really believes in what she is doing.

Like when, after losing her TV job, she, wearing her Tiara, stands by the robot with those begger signs reading, "TEN YEARS OF DEMOCRACY: Asking a rand per year".

Trust me, I laughed my way through the pages, hardly putting it down. I can't wait to read Miss Kwa Kwa 2. It should offer me even more laughter, which I have been needing more of lately.

As Onyango-Obbo sees it

2008-09-25T14:59:00.001+02:00

At the rate it is going, South Africa could soon be expelled from the African Union for “setting a bad example” to the rest of the continent.

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CHARLES ONYANGO-OBBO: Is power-sharing the panacea?
African leaders, generally, hate three things. First, anyone who tries to take power away from them, even legitimately at an election.

Secondly, another African leader who shows that you can leave power when your second term is up.

Thirdly, a leader who resigns “prematurely” just because the public has become disgusted with their rule.

First, in 1999, when the iconic “Saint” Nelson Mandela would have won a second term without even getting out of his bed to campaign for president, he walked away from it and retired to his village.

His deputy ,Thabo Mbeki, duly stepped up to the plate and won the election.

Now, with less than a year left before he retires, the ruling African National Congress has revolted against Mr Mbeki. Instead of rounding up all the dissidents and feeding them to the crocodiles, he announces that he was respecting the ANC’s wishes and stepping down!

Before the continent had fully absorbed the shock of his actions, on Tuesday, it was announced that Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka too was resigning, along with 10 ministers, and three deputy ministers.

Mr Mbeki has a thousand faults, and he drove folks like myself to near-insanity with the way he mollycoddled Zimbabwe’s strongman President Robert Mugabe when he was ruining his country and tormenting its citizens, but on the whole, his achievements were quite remarkable.

While his critics have slammed Mbeki for being too business-friendly and not doing enough to tackle poverty and inequality, he presided over South Africa’s longest period of steady economic growth.

Mr Mbeki was, without doubt, the most intellectual African of the last two decades. Some years ago, an American magazine reported that when he travels abroad, aides usually go and knock on his hotel door at 3am, and remind him to go to bed because he has an early morning meeting. Sometimes, they sneaked back at 5am, only to see the light still on. Mbeki would still be either surfing the Internet, or reading a book.

The Internet was to be part of his doing, for there he met some chaps who had some crackpot views on Aids, and argued that it was not caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), but by various conditions arising from poverty.

MBEKI BOUGHT INTO THAT VIEW, which influenced his approach to fighting the disease even as South Africa became the country with the world’s highest infection rates. Mbeki’s government was slow to get on the ARV bandwagon, and become an object of hate for many Aids activists in the world.

South African newspaper The Times, quoted human rights campaigner Zachie Achmat, who had a memorable confrontation with Mbeki over HIV and Aids, saying: “This (Mbeki’s departure) is long overdue. Personally I would have liked to see him impeached for causing the deaths of many hundreds of thousands of people living with HIV...”

His attitude towards Aids, though it changed to conform largely to the conventional scientific view, nevertheless led his Health minister to encourage sufferers to treat themselves with a concoction of ginger, beetroot, and a mix of lizard tail powder or something like that.

Mr Mbeki was paranoid, and thus became the architect of the slash and burn culture that saw him hounded disgracefully out of office. In the end, the monster he had created devoured him.

Mbeki was aloof to a fault. You have to look hard to find a photograph of him holding a child, like other African leaders like to do. In the 2004 elections, he showed his aversion for the lowly moments of political rallies by campaigning mostly by walking through neighbourhoods and talking to small groups of people. Mbeki is not one to join traditional dancers, and would never don monkey skins and prance around on the stage.

He would never do a Raila Odinga, and turn up as the Prime Minister used to, with his wife Ida wearing uniform clothes for a public function.

He was also sometimes famously tactless. One case, not written about in South African media, but the subject of every dinner you have with journalists in the country, is how he treated Mandela.

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One of the reasons Mandela broke up with the fiery Winnie Mandela, is that she was cheating on him. One of the incidents happened when she was flying with then president Mandela in the same presidential plane from a foreign trip.

While the “Saint” napped at the front of the plane, in the back Ms Mandela was doing Satan’s work, making out with a young ANC activist. Mbeki later appointed this impertinent lad to head a major public corporation.

To the very end, Mbeki remained true to form. When he delivered his resignation speech, he was regal, and absolutely dry-eyed. A very presidential performance.

Conspiracy theory?

2008-09-22T17:23:00.000+02:00

This year has been one heck of a strange one. My world as i have known it has turned on its head.

I am talking about the madness in Kenya (with the killings, the hate, and the displacements)

The xenophobic attacks on foreigners in South Africa

The crashing world markets! Between the Lehman brothers, AIG and now the series of banks that had to be rescued

Mbeki stepping down as president

Gordon Brown and the Isreali PM (not sure)

Its as if the world is reacting to an invisible fullmoon; as if we have been infected by some virus that is setting things in motion, ensuring that the world changes and things do not remain as they have been.

I think this is how discoveries are made, how geniuses are created. events such as these, which require superhuman brains to fathom. It may seem unrelated, but why is everything happening at the same time? Why can't the concept of predictability apply here? Is the world conspiring against us? Is the end coming??????????????

I have been reading Awake! so no, am not going crazy.

But seriously, what is happening to set these events off? Between the earthquakes, the tsunamis, the whirlwinds, hurricanes and so on, and the human initiated ones, am not too sure we are safe anymore (been watching sci-fi).........

Or maybe I just have too much time in my hands.

TV don’t teach nobody nothing!

2008-09-15T17:32:00.000+02:00

I was reading Barack Obama’s Dreams from my Father the other day, and flowing with this man’s poetic language, when I bumped on a line that made me put the book down. He was talking about Maya, his sister by his Indonesian step-dad. He said,

“I scolded Maya for spending one evening watching TV instead of reading the novels I had bought for her” (DfMF 123)

I remember my feelings at that particular moment. Affront. Indignation.

Ok. I lie.

I remember wondering if in fact it was true that television did not teach anybody anything. I was astonished by how much I wanted to defend television. I felt a powerful emotion towards this piece of machinery, especially given my rather African background. Isn’t it true that the world has come to believe that radio is the one technical gadget that defines Africans? And isn’t it true that television in Africa has been regarded as the luxury that only the few rich ones can afford?

I remember growing up without television, until I turned nine. Then my dad brought into the living room this (it seems to me now) rather small strange looking television set. It wasn’t as big as our neighbours’. It was squeezed, reminded me of maths. You see, our teacher taught us the essentials of a cubicle. It was like a square, only three dimensional. That is how I imagined a real life cube to be. Small, compact, perfect. And it was black and white. I loved it.

Anyway, from the time this thing made its way into our house, I was glued. I never could explain it. My father could never explain it. In fact, my father tried to pry me away from it with everything he had. On some nights, when all the other children were asleep, and I was left there, staring into this machinery, my dad would stumble into the sitting room, reeking of alcohol, for he loved his beer (of course he had just arrived home). He would try to string enough words together, words that were designed to threaten me from the television.

“You have school tomorrow, what are you still doing up?”

Or

“This thing will make you go blind!”

I would calmly turn around and tell him I was doing homework. That without TV I could not do my homework.

Too drunk to argue, he would leave the room, sighing, and possibly look for my mother to blame for the destruction of one of his daughters. Nonetheless, they basically left me alone.

My older siblings, realizing that I got away with it, began joining me in my night vigil, watching, droning, thinking.

But none of them ever understood what it was that drew me to that television. It wasn’t the images per se, it was the comfort it brought me, the knowledge that a better or worse life than mine existed out there. It was the way in which I could lose myself in some senseless movie for hours without blinking, and the way I would be irritated when my mother chose a particularly interesting TV moment to send me to the shops, which were far away, at least by my standards. A kilometer journey was way too far, because I had to make the journey back, and then I would miss half of my He Man cartoon programme, or Sheera. I despised it when mum came home, bountiful, loud, interefering.

Yes, I watched way too much TV.

Then I grew up. I went to boarding school, where there was none. I entertained myself with watching people, following routine, numbing myself against the inevitable drone of class, games time, dining time, preps, sleep. I read novels. I discovered the hidden world of fantasy. I got lost in it. First, it started with the interesting stories from African writers. Kenjo Jumbam, I remember. I loved The White Man of God. I was fascinated with the child’s point of view that the author employed. I read. I later discovered Mills and Boon, and I thought I would die from the enticing romantic stories. Still, I discovered other romances, books that were taken away from me before I reached the end of these tantalizing narratives. The pain of loss that I felt then, I cannot dare to recount.

Meantime, in between, our television set was stolen, so for a whole year, as my mother pestered my father to buy a new television, we listened to radio. I got lost in the fantastic stories of Radio Theatre. Most of them were about romance, and AIDS. I enjoyed listening to the triumphs of the voices, and was as defeated as the characters were, when disaster struck.

Then I went to college. There was TV, but then there were so many other things going on. And so, once again, my love for TV was in abeyance.

Many years later, I could finally afford my own TV. I watched. I bought every single television series I could get my hands on. I hated movies, because they ended. I bought the entire series of Friends, bought Ally McBeal, Desperate Housewives, Nip/Tuck, Prison Break, 24….the list is endless. I was a woman possessed.

Then one day I asked myself, what had I learnt watching all this TV? People are busy reading. There is this new fad all over me. People no longer buy TV sets because its so …. Working class? People now only listen to Classic FM, or read M&G, or just read plain old classics.

Elizabeth Gaskell. Theodore Dreiser. Charles Dickens.

What was I doing to myself, enjoying this?

To make it worse, I wasn’t even a fan of news, and newspapers. I was doomed.

I was often chastised for not being more receptive to good books, and newspapers, and the news. But what was I supposed to learn from all these, if not repeated narratives of war and destruction, and mayhem, and cheating politicians. What was I supposed to do with things I had absolutely no use for? How was I supposed to learn from all these?

I thought. Then repeated the last series of Ally McBeal. She was funny. Very confused. Too much angst. Like me. But still quite funny.

Perhaps TV was bad, but it was definitely good for my mental health.