I Chase The Truth

It is with a heavy heart that I embrace this Monday morning, watching the rain rolling in across the rooftops of the town as I ponder and mull this last weekend, seeking to label and box the multitude of experiences and feelings I carry from it. Such sadness overwhelms me as I identify what I feel: disgust at the weakness that is often mankind. But it is with a certain new-found strength that I realise the overwhelming emotion prompted by my feelings: determination to feed my soul, chase the truth and speak it out, despite the fears.

My traditional-church upbringing still chases me with shadows I fight to conquer. With each ghost that I destroy, I see a little more truth and goodness behind an experience I otherwise summarise as destructive. There was love where I saw expectation; there was generosity where I saw conditional gifts of persuasion. There was kind advice where I saw judgement and there was compassion where I saw only betrayal.

But today the ghost is not dead and the anger is fresh; there was not honesty. We did not talk of what went wrong or how, the reality of unforgiveness and the capability to wound that wounded people are capable of, how trials are not sins and can be shared, how sins are common and not absolute. We did not talk of the pitfalls or failings of the leaders, and when they failed us, we were lost. We did not talk of the commonality of temptations and when we were tempted, we were alone with no one but Guilt for companionship. Life is hard and must be worked at in a team, we were told. Now go home alone and reflect on that until next Sunday. This silence is a wall against hope; suppressing humanity does not make it good. Ignoring temptation simply feeds its power.

Today, we have lost two people to dishonesty. People are my life. It is with great sadness that I watch the rain, seeking to label and box the enormity of silence. It is with determination that I determine to be real. I chase the truth and pray for the strength to live it.

We Are Individualists

We are willing to reveal highly personal and potentially shameful things about ourselves because we are determined to understand the truth of our experience. http://www.enneagraminstitute.com/

Mourning Miriam Makeba

Miriam Makeba, or Mama Afrika, dies this morning in Italy. Collapsing on stage after her performance at a concert, she dies in the early hours of this morning from a heart attack. Present tense, because it is today and the world is still waking up to the news as the sun makes its path of Monday Morning across the globe.

I saw her, past tense, in London in 2005, dancing and singing, her voice considerably quieter than recordings in her youth, but her vibrancy no less diminished. She was bright and big, a loud colour of life on a city stage, grey rain misting my view of her. Cold hands of damp held my breath in awe.

My feet were wet and my coat jacket dripped drops of cold onto my jeans. We waited patiently, liberal lovers of all things Afrika, diaspora-determined to see this moment of history. I am glad I did, present tense. I close my eyes today and she is brilliant red against the grey. The memory of rain is cold in my bones but her voice sings, past tense victory into present tense complacency. The meaning of her life is powerful, her achievements solid in a shaky world of uncertainty. Her tune is an anthem to the free and the forgetful are in awe of it. She shook the smoggy streets with her song and the red in the grey glowed warmly.

Present tense, she lived. Now, she has gone.

Say No to Violence Against Women

Victory for Breakfast: Obama is Our Man

It is hard to sit still after Elections for Breakfast. A decidedly sweet taste in ones’ mouth persists after Obama’s landmark victory – he has done it! For months we have watched and waited, speculated and wondered, laid bets, made guesses, passed judgements and reflected on which way the race would go. My staunch left-wing leanings persist from my student days, and it is with sincere delight that I celebrate the presidential victory of a black man in America.

Driving to work through the streets of Arusha, I consider what Obama’s victory means for us here. The lack of hope and confidence can be seen in the many faces of this country. Obama’s sunrise chant of ‘Yes we can’ is not only the summation of his success, but the promise of ours. America, whose global reputation has been truly soiled by Obama’s predecessors, is the champion for the underdog everywhere. As Obama himself said in his victory speech, his triumph is a victory for the marginalised. His success is not defined by nationality, gender, skin colour or sexuality, but by the experiences of people all over the world, today and for centuries before us.

It is easy to get caught up in the emotion and symbolism of Obama’s triumph. His victory speech was satisfyingly unsentimental. It displayed, not his emotions at such a triumphant win, nor the embellished Hollywood sentiment so associated with America, but rather the calm reliable maturity of a man who deserved to win. His stance, as much as it may have been one of battle to secure him an initial victory, was no less persuasive or honourable with victory in its pocket. He spoke as a man who means what he says, will do what he promises, and will stand solidly for what he truly believes in. The world watches expectantly: we have waited for this change.
Obama is our man.