Do not wash your hands with spittle!

https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7040/6968375517_5ebbe736b0_b.jpg

I can give you wings,

But I can't fly for you,
Give you an appetite,
And provide the food,
But can't eat for you,
Give you opportunity,
But you have to seize it,
Make grace and strength available,
But you have to tap into it,
Offer you love,
But you must accept it,
Give you life,
But you must live it,
Give you a vision,
But you must heed it,
Take you to the stream,
But you must drink,
Or else you live in all you ever need,
Yet direly be in want and need,
And that my child,
Is the greatest tragedy of our time.

Do not live by the seaside,
And wash your hands with spittle!

Brussels © November 2014 afesehngwaHilary

Socialized to be lost in masks of perfection!

Socialized to wear masks,

One, two, three multi-layered masks,

Many, varied, colored and bland,

Socialized to always look sanitized,

Prudish and prim and smooth and perfect,

Socialized to always make life seem and look cinch,

And the toughest challenges like an ever welcome breezes,

Who are you?

Who are you today?

Who stepped out of the closet today?

In trying so hard to hide,

Hide that little crazy part of you,

Hide chinks and mistakes and scars,

That imperfect side of you,

In trying so hard to  hide that which completes who you are,

You have hidden all of you,

All of who you really are,

You don’t exist,

The real you is gone, gone, forever hidden,

You are lost,

Lost, lost, lost,

In that ugly mask of  perfection you wear,

So blame nobody for misunderstanding you,
For not knowing you,
For being incapable of relating to you,

Seek perfection but be you!

Brussels © November 2014 afesehngwaHilary

Undeserved gift of now!

https://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4025/4369994795_470516efae_z.jpg?zz=1

To think you are too young,

Deluded to be too strong,

To syndicate tomorrow’s imagined miseries,

Into many avoidable sorrows of today,

To postpone to live that which could be lived today,

Hoping to live in a tomorrow,

Full of uncertainty and uncontrollable mysteries,

To be steeped and trapped in the drunken stupor,

Of the tragic illusion that the next moment certainly belongs to you,

When you have the undeserved gift of now,

Reality will inevitably sink in,

Either with the subtlety of insidious water currents,

Or with the bang of an overpowering tsunami,

Now is all we got - undeserved,

Let us live in it,

Fully, unapologetically!

Brussels © November 2014 afesehngwaHilary

Cuba - Unfairly caricatured and castigated by the west, but a truer friend of Africa

http://drum.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/mandela-castro.jpg

Depending on whether you read history through a communist/ socialist or democratic lens from either side the cold war curtains, Cuba and its revolutionary leaders are either incorrigible villains or welcome pawns in diplomatic and non diplomatic offensives against sworn enemies of the other side of the curtain. The danger is that either extremist views of this latin American nation can suck out objectivity and blind reason during the historical writing of the Cuban story, caricaturing or deifying the imperfect country. Which country is perfect? None, even those who think they have earned a right to judge every other.

The fact that Cuba was the first non - African country which Nelson Mandela visited after his release from prison piqued my curiosity. As I searched and learned about Cuba it became clear to me that Cuba is the only country I know who had any interference or influence in the African continent and its liberation and liberation movements whether proactively or invited, which was unselfish in their mission to the countries on the continent, driven by only one thing, a compulsive desire to help. I am yet to find any evidence any where that Cuba helped in return for any of the treasures which virtually every country beyond the continent came for, oil, rubber,  cobalt, diamonds and countless treasures buried in the womb of mama Africa. When Mandela visited Cuba in 1991 he said: “We come here with a sense of the great debt that is owed the people of Cuba ... What other country can point to a record of greater selflessness than Cuba has displayed in its relations to Africa?”. Many cold war battles were removed far from the land of those who fought them to battlefields on African soil, driven by greed and fought with total disregard for the owners of the land. Cuba was a breath of fresh air and a welcome exception.

Around the 60's shortly after the successful Cuban revolution under the leadership of the Castros and Che Guevara, revolutionary drums and bells echoed across the globe, with Cuba in many ways  helping nurse  the independence revolutionary calls and actions which swept across the continent of Africa. Given the way America views Cuba today and the way it has viewed it for years, it is interesting to come across this account of the journalist Jean Daniel Bensaid who hints that President JF Kennedy was supportive of the Fidel Castro led revolution: "In an article in the New Republic, Daniel claims that Kennedy asked him to pass on a message to Castro: "I believe that there is no country in the world, including the African regions, including any and all the countries under colonial domination, where economic colonization, humiliation and exploitation were worse than in Cuba, in part owing to my country’s policies during the Batista regime. I believe that we created, built and manufactured the Castro movement out of whole cloth and without realizing it. I believe that the accumulation of these mistakes has jeopardized all of Latin America. The great aim of the Alliance for Progress is to reverse this unfortunate policy. This is one of the most, if not the most, important problems in America foreign policy. I can assure you that I have understood the Cubans. I approved the proclamation which Fidel Castro made in the Sierra Maestra, when he justifiably called for justice and especially yearned to rid Cuba of corruption. I will go even further: to some extent it is as though Batista was the incarnation of a number of sins on the part of the United States. Now we shall have to pay for those sins. In the matter of the Batista regime, I am in agreement with the first Cuban revolutionaries.”"

http://spartacus-educational.com/JFKdanielJ.htm . This is however would not be the first case where a supported ally became and vilified villain - Go figure.

Cuba was invaluably instrumental in the wars of independence and African revolutions of the sixties. Patrice Lumumba, Amilcar Cabral, Agosthino Neto, iconic African revolutionaries caught between capitalism and communism, sought or received the help of Cuban comrades with Che Guevara on the ground in the Congo fighting alongside Pro-Lumumbists in the jungles of the Congo. To secure the independence of Guinea Bissau Amilcar Cabral secured and leveraged technical and tactical strategic support of Cuba to topple the Portuguese colonial war machine.Cuba also played a critical role in securing the independence of Angola and eventually Namibia’s,  paving the way for the end of the obnoxious practice of Apartheid in South Africa. This is just to name a few. You can watch both parts 1 and 2 of  "Cuba - An African Odyssey" here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UE8EBb4CW8A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZUptYb_BSE

Castro and over half a million Cubans took part in Africa's revolutionary wars which ended colonialism with no sight on or plundering of  African's wealth. Recently Cuba has sent hundreds of medical personnel including doctors and nurses to the battle against Ebola, fighting daily on the front lines to defeat this monster, again with no motive or hidden agenda related to Africa's wealth. Regardless of what anybody may say, Cuba has historically demonstrated time after time to be a truer and selfless friend of the continent of Africa. Even historians can only be entitled to their own opinions, not their own facts.

Oslo © November 2014 afesehngwaHilary

True learning!

https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3929/15547214905_dd9bfea998_b.jpg

A true and thorough learning,
Within and beyond the narrow confines of classroom walls,
Will magnify your ignorance,
In one breath quench a thirst and satisfy a hunger,

In another breath deepen the profundity of intellectual thirst,

And broaden the scope and boundaries of truth,

Grow an unquenchable yearning and desire for learning  knowledge and wisdom

True learning will tame your pride and humble you,
It will amplify your humanity,
And grow your empathy,
For empathy is better than sympathy.

© Oslo 2014 afesehngwaHilary

Potent Lips

https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3881/15235972051_381bdd2014_b.jpg

Lips which unmistakably eventually chime in portentious tides,
Curled into a beautifully potent charm in one instant,
Lips which smile into a brilliantly blinding sun in another,
And with that quick flash while the subject is blinded still,
Lips which house a razor sharp tongue unleash words trenchant like a blade,
Lips with charm enough to deceptively soothe the most savage breasts,
Potent lips armed with ammunition to unsettle and topple the finest men.

Brussels © November 2014 afesehngwaHilary

Down payment with precious 27 years of a Life - Mandela... lessons for my African generation!

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/99/Mandela_Bust_at_Southbank.jpg

Never before in history has the world paused in a moment packed with a flurry of a medley of emotions to focus all attention on the thresholds of a prison gate. Though many a young person may have scant memories of that time,as a little boy of 11 then, I have the relevance of the events of that momentous moment etched on my mind, just as surely and indelibly as they are on the pages of history. Coming from a continent where it wouldn't be so wrong to say it is largely ruled by a cabal of bandits who are driving the continent with an engine of greed to the edge of a fatally steep precipice; 11th February which every year commemorates XX years of Nelson Mandela's release from prison, manages to stir a healthy pride in me for our collective humanity through the African Statesman named Mandela. Mandela belongs to a crop and league of statesmen who only come to a generation every once in a while. He is among the few which Robert F Kennedy talked about when he said "Few will have the greatness to bend history itself, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation. It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped." 

 As he walked through the doors of his cell, he brought away with him a freedom which to a large extent liberated both the oppressed and oppressor in the despicable apartheid South Africa. Madiba was a political genius, a charming negotiator, an enduring hard worker who despised and mocked the low road of unforgiveness and rose to the majestic heights of forgiving and finding partners in his jailers. Few who know or have heard of him can hold themselves back from having some admiration for the man... Even as I salute Mandela and all his compatriots in the struggle, dead and alive, I must confess that I have caught myself wrestling with some offhanded thoughts of him...Without being privy to the details of their marital squabbles, I cannot help but wonder how he could not leverage and bring to bear his charm, ability to forgive and genius in salving his ailing marriage to Winnie Mandela who in no small way stood by him and made significant contribution to the struggle... Could a marriage be more difficult to fix than an apartheid south africa? that is a question for another time and day. Before anybody crucifies me for having the temerity to even remotely make reference to something so personal of the giant, let me clarify that my probing mind was only wondering ... mostly in order to learn... I have the utmost respect and admiration for mighty Mandela but Nelson Mandela was a man, not God and his failings humanize him...everything that he is, is part of the history he wrote with his life... if we can learn from his strengths, we can learn from his weaknesses...  As I salute the legacy of Mandela I think of lessons my generation and I can draw from his journey.

While Mandela made the down payment with probably the most precious 27 years of his life, there must have been some who shamelessly watched from the sidelines of passivity as the apartheid drama unfolded to the finale which saw the beginning of their emancipation, yet savored the prize for the price payed with precious lives... as many toiled for change at home, there must have also been some who gave the struggle an invaluably important voice from exile... So as young people whether at home or abroad I hear a call today for us to become a little more selfLESS and give a little of our brains and time by thinking constructive, bold, actionable ideas directed towards the self healing of Africa, a request I believe any and every young person can meet...

Mandela could well have easily traded his jail time for a life of ease abroad...Mandela had a plethora of choices.  If you read South African History well you will also notice many many many blacks ran away from the country. In fact Mandela had more choices than we have today as a people of Africa yet he walked the hard road.  "Although considering Mandela a dangerous "arch-Marxist",^[172] in February 1985 Botha offered him a release from prison on condition that he '"unconditionally rejected violence as a political weapon". Mandela spurned the offer, releasing a statement through his daughter Zindzi stating "What freedom am I being offered while the organisation of the people [ANC] remains banned? Only free men can negotiate. A prisoner cannot enter into contracts."^[173]"-  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nelson_Mandela

It would of course be naively akin to wanting to live forever to expect to find a path which leads to the mountain top which was obstacle free. When a people are bent on developing, if they don't find the path they will make one, and both involve an indefatigable hard work... When Mandela dreamed many years ago it would have been easy to say he was living and dreaming in sky-scapers of a future which he could not afford... it was not a passive inactive dreaming even against the barrage of pessimism from within and without which probably came his way... it was an active waiting which never lost hope and which was never idle even from a jail cell. We will only become noble and develop by the things we do... one thing however which the way forward cannot tolerate is any excuse for not giving or for not participating... inaction is always the easier road and great men and women never walk that path...Many Africans have walked down that path long enough and we have the results to show - needless to name them here but we can begin to say, not any more... inactivity will always seek to stand in the way of action, we can not let it, not any more... As a bright future beckons our generation to put our act together and step up, steering away from the mistakes of our forbears, history is watching and will judge us... No action is small, none is dumb, all is important... we can belong together and whether we realize now or not, we can rise together... the ball is in our court, the choice is ours...

It cannot be easy... It takes time and I am painfully aware of our impatience as a young people. We cannot be in the process of building an airplane and flying it at the same time, so it will be important to go back to the drawing boards. We cannot expect results before the work is done... We cannot expect a harvest before the planting season has come... The failures of yesterday cannot stop us from succeeding today unless we choose to... If there is any hope for Africa, we must stubbornly press on and we must, together with like passion driven minds, from within or without Africa either find the path forward, create one or die trying, God being our helper... We will like to see results in our lifetime but lack of results in our lifetime and potential for change only in another must not stop us from acting today in anyway we can... I am convinced in the power of ideas, I have seen their magic, their charm enthralls and the right, bold, actionable, root cause removal oriented ideas to real problems will always attract their funding in the long run... I believe, I am a believer in the things unseen, that is where tomorrow's reality is... those who wait to have enough to give never really give... Today let us begin to drive the last nail on the coffin of selfishness and burn it so that like a phoenix selflessness might rise from the ashes in stead. This is for me and you and you and you, wherever you are, from there, we can begin to make a contribution to turn the tide of avoidable suffering which plagues our people and collective humanity. Each and every one of us needs to ask ourselves - what can I do? and do it knowing nothing is too small!

Brussels © November 2014 afesehngwaHilary