Beijing. Or as it is pronounced back home, Bhezhing! We wuz there. September 1995. It was a beautiful summer. It rained endlessly some days. But mostly it was nice and sunny. For more than two weeks, thousands of women filled the streets of that populous nation. You would think we would have been invisible. Yet how could big women like some of us not be visible? Everywhere we went, we caused a stir. Some of the women and dozens of children, (plus a few boldly lascivious men), came up to touch our hair. Our beautifully, braided, plaited, curled, straightened, dreadlocked, African hair. Some went further, feeling our bodies. They were fascinated by our ample butts. Little kids dug their curious fingers just to make sure the butts were real. Were they soft? Hard? Mushy? They giggled with delight when we shrieked in horror, or anger, or just scaring them away. Clearly they had never seen such. And in such large numbers too.
The taxi drivers jostled to take us to our various destinations. We were a curiousity. I could imagine the stories told back home to fellow drinkers, wives, nay the whole village/compound, "I touched one. She felt so soft. I swear she was THIS HUGE! And that hair, it was done in very complicated plaits like? Or was it for real? I don't know. It was very....different. I wish I had a camera. I swear, it looked like she was carrying tiny little snakes all over her head...like this...and that going like that...". Trying on clothes in the markets was a giggle fest for Chinese women and ourselves. "ha ha madam, no, no, madam, not size, not size you. Not size you, please madam..stop! Stop! Arms flying about, horror, hands acrosss shocked mouths that I thought I could even fit in those seemingly voluminous dressing gown. I gave up after a while. The women happy that no stitches had been ripped, they would give me little silk scarves to placate me. Giggle. Giggle.
The whole country must have dined on stories of these colourfully wonderful women from all over the world who had taken over the city of Beijing for the 4th world conference on women. I can happily say, to paraphrase that stuff which we used to write on tree trunks, "we wuz there". It was an amazing experience. That would be the understatement of the century. Amazing just doesn't begin to describe how it was. In Shona we say, being told how it was is like having somoeone describe something that is on your back, (note this saying was crafted in the days before mirrors so take that into context), i.e. something that you can't possibly see or imagine.
Any women's rights activist worth her salt had to be in Beijing. Pretenders too. Curious on-lookers. Plus the development tourists.
Just as curious as the Chinese were about us, we were curious about China. My friend Lisa's mum arrived in Beijing from Santa Fe, and immediately declared in her gruffy American accent, "this is what in the United States they call a foreign country!"
For a start Chinese food didn't taste like....Chinese food! Years later I have learnt that the so called Chinese food we eat outside of China, or Thai out of Thailand is made for Anglo-Saxon palates, and is not the real deal. After a week, my friend Nomsa and I started craving fast food, chips, chicken, beef. We happily found what was probably then the only MacDonalds'. The next day we jumped for joy when we happened upon Hard Rock cafe. We even bought the t-shirts emblazoned Hard-Rock Cafe Beijing.I just couldn't take chances with all those snakes in cages in front of fine restaurants. I was not an adventurous eater. Eating something with yellow plain curry used to be my idea of high risk.
We even took the time out to go pay homage to the body of Chairman Mao. Silly us, nobody had warned us that this is not a feat to be attempted on a Saturday. Nor had we read the literature. By the time we made it to the square, (9.30 am and this was the crack of dawn for Nomsa and I), the line of visitors was snaking round three or four blocks. We gave up instantly. Getting a taxi back to our hotel was another nightmare. Taxi drivers had been given their proper drill on how to handle these foreign visitors. After answering half a dozen questions from a rather important marshall of sorts with a walkie talkie, we were shoved into a taxi and the driver was told to take us straight to our hotel. Reqeusts to be dropped off at the silk market were met with a deaf stare from the driver, who suddenly lost his ability to communicate in English. The whoe city was teeming with intelligence officers it was like being on the set of a spy thriller. I caught one reading through my notebooks in my room. At breakfast or lunch they came ever so close to collect your plate, lingered just a little bit longer, just to catch some more of that "plot" on sexual and reproductive rights. Talk about power and control.
We were not in Beijing for the sights though. We were there to get a new international consensus, a program of action for women's human rights world wide. And we got it. Signed, sealed delivered, the famous Beijing declaration and platform for action. Some of us had worked for this since the early 90s, through the many other UN conferences preceding Beijing; Vienna, Copenhagen, Cairo, Dakar. To look back it sounds rather stupid that the women's movements were mobilized under a very simple slogan, Women's rights are human rights. Well aren't they? I hear my 25 year old daughter ask? Aren't women just human like everyone else so what is special about women's rights being human rights?
To think that 15 years ago, not every government in the world thought that women's rights were human rights sounds unbelieveable today. But it wasn't. Even today, the practice is still very much the opposite. Women are still not regarded as human beings in their own right in many families, communities, countries, etc in the world today. I always tell how in my father's language (Shona), you will hear someone say, "toda vanhu chaivo", i.e. we want real people, people. In my mother's language, Ndebele, they will say, "sitsho abantu khanye, khanye, abantu abazwayo, haikona abafazi". Bad translation - real feeling and thinking persons not women! You can still hear that in 2010. This very 21st century.
But I digress. We got the Beijing platform for action. It was not just the document that we came away with. We came away with dignity, pride, and as we say in my language (you have by now figured the languages my parents and I speak are different right?), with our chests in the air. There is no translation for that. Beijing became a synonymn for something powerful, something to be feared. It became a swear word for bad women like me. Women who knew their place in society and were going to occupy it with no qualms at all. In popular parlance though Beijing was something/someone real men and "good women" must stay away from. In meetings, churches, workshops, public transport, on the radio and tv talk shows we were publicly castigaed as "vakadzi veBeijing". The women of Beijing is a bad literal translation.
In 1999 I met a cute young Zimbabwean boy and started dating him in Johannesburg.
The fellow liked me a great deal and started introducing me to his friends. One fine Saturday afternoon as we drove down Jan Smuts Avenue with one such friend, me sitting in the back, the two of them in front, the friend asked, "you keep calling your girlfriend EJ what is her real name?" "Ah sorry, its Everjoice" boyfriend declared very proudly with a wink at me in the rear view mirror. The friend who was driving suddenly screeched the car to a stomach churning halt. Looked back at me with his bloodshot hungover eyes, and screamed, "Everjoice, Everjoice Win? That Everjoice? The Beijing woman?"
My poor IT expert lad, who I eventually gathered did not read current affairs and could not tell his Beijing from Biarritz asked in a puzzled tone, "Beijing woman? What is that? What does it mean?". The friend started up the car, shaking his head, worried, upset. Needless to say after this, where the hare went is where the dog went too. Mr IT vanished into the bowels of Egoli. His loss.
Older men were no exception. My father, to this day, when he and I quarell over some thing, (normally power and control in the family), he will glare at me and say, "remember this is my house. My family. This is not Beijing". This is meant to silence me instantly. In mixed organisations, when men want to silence a woman who is speaking her mind or questioning something, calling her a "Beijing" is meant to be the highest form of insult. Enough to silence a scaredy cat forever.
I will forever remember the Beijing process...not conference, process, as that which awakaned me to the diversity of women. We landed in Beijing in all our diversities.For me personally the learning was what we would call Fast Track - in Zimbabwe. I had been born and raised to think there was only one type of woman in the world. Heterosexual, married, divorced, widowed, single, but invariably with children. Reproduction the final badge of belonging. It was through the 1990s that I came to meet and know lesbian women, (I am still "discovering" others, trans, bi, inter....I am a Methodist villager, please understand), many of whom have become great friends and co-Beijingers. I will never forget the furore that was raised back in Zimbabwe by media reports that "lesbians will also be in Beijing". This was just before Mugabe made his dreadful comment about homosexual men being worse than dogs (this was to come in 1997 at the Zimbabwe International Book-fair, and of that lots later in another blog).
The media head honchos were incensed. So were some of the "nice and decent" women who worked in NGOs as well these media houses. One was dispatched by our public broadcaster to specifically take pictures of this abberation. On the first day of the NGO forum she came rushing at me breathlesslelly, "so are they here? Those lesbians? Have they arrived? Have you seen them? But you people how could you allow them to come here?" She fired dozens of questions, her lovely big eyes bigger than ever.
All I managed to say was, "I haven't seen a crate being off-loaded from any of the airlines marked LESBIANS. But as soon as I see it being off-loaded I will come find you".
The said woman has since become a journalist with an international broadcaster and lives in the United States. It was some of these hated women who have been the staunchest human rights defenders and who supported those fighting oppression in Zimbabwe, including defending the rights of journalists like hereself. I wonder if her views have changed since? Maybe I will ask. Heteronormativity is a huge mountain to climb, (there is a new word for you. We say learning does not end).
To think that barely 15 years ago, violence against women was not recognized as a human rights issue somehow feels so unthinkable today. In Vienna 1993, at the World conference on human rights where women's movements put the issue on the conference agenda and got it squarely in the declaration some African governments could barely conceal their anger that we had brought this issue to as one put it, "an important and serious meeting of governments, not a family gathering". A Minister from Uganda tried to make jokes about it to my colleague Florence, but deep down he was enraged. You have to say this in your best Ugandan English for full effect.
"Now you, you Mrs Florence (put the L), are you people mad? Mad? You people. You want the UN to discuss how and when I beat one of my wives? If I slap her, she must run to the police? And to the UN? To say the honourable so and so beat me? And then?
This is not serious business for governments surely? Please you women. Let us enjoy our lives. Don't spoil things for us. Go home now".
The fellow was laughing, but quite seriously glowering at us. Threatening in his tone even.
But there the language was adopted in the Vienna Declaration and in Beijing too! I should find that Minister one of these days to check how his blood pressure is doing.
15 years later, at least a dozen countries on the continent of Africa have at least one piece of legislation on violence against women. Some have two or three. Millions of women have been educated about these laws by women's organisations, (remember the Musasa project's one hour domestic violence program presented by the fanstastic Rudo Kwaramba on ZTV anyone?). Ah the Beijing women not only came back from China with a piece of paper, they invaded living rooms. At prime time too. Squirm, squirm.
I am so happy to claim my little badge of honour as a Beijing woman, (my dislike of cheap easily torn Chinese goods flooding markets in Southern Africa and putting millions of factory women workers out of jobs not withstanding). The Beijing conference was not just a big conference. It was a watershed. It was that moment where one says I felt and SAW the earth move. For real, not the other times we fake it. The many jibes and nasty name calling aimed at those of us who went and or subscribed to Beijing, are a sign of our success, as so many feminists have declared. The attempts to scare others, women, men and girls, from us, by this name calling have not been largely successful. Young women like my daughter who was recently sexually harassed in the hotel she works have Beijing to thank for giving them a language in which to describe what happened, why it is wrong, and it is Beijing that in many cases gave them laws and policies that they can wave in front of the harassers' noses and demand redress.
It was the processes around Beijing that showed the world there was something a global feminist movement. A movement with a voice, power, with leaders, with resources, and networks. It was we the women of Beijing who got all the sticks and stones thrown at us, but who have remained a resource for other women, with our organisations, our shelters for abused women, our legal advice centers, our research centers, we have put other women in decicion making positions. Ordinarily it is the women who believe in what Beijing means who are simple friends, neighbours, and co-workers at the other end of the phone line/email/fence/who can support other women when they want to claim their rights.
Today as I walk around anywhere in the world, I do so with great pride and as we say in Shona, Nemutsindo...I have no idea how to translate that, something like, the earth shakes. Not due to my plus size, but due to the fact that I am, and therefore I can. Beijing gave me that mutsindo and I carry myself with equal erm, weight..
The last two weeks, I was at the UN Commission on The Status of Women meeting in New York, seeking to re-live the spirit of Beijing 1995. It was rather difficult to do that in freezing temperatures that enveloped the city of New York as we arrived for the NGO forum. Heavy snow fell on the night of February 25th and by the 26th the city and its environs were snowed under. It took me an hour and a half to land, 2 hours to get my luggage out, and another hour and half to get from JFK to New Jersey. It was truly hard to re-live the moment and muster the excitement.
After a few mugs of coffee and the famous New York bagels though we thawed and got going. Just seeing all those women I have journeyed with since that time was enough to lift my flagging spirits. We reminisced about those glorious 1990s. What the series of UN conferences had meant. Not just as meetings, but as spaces to connect, energize one another, find one another in all our finest diversities, and most importantly lay claim to our space on this planet. Some of us are older, wiser, grayer, but hands down, we all looked fabulous! We have become better dressers and make up artists as we grow wiser.
As more women came into New York so did the temperatures rise and the sun peeked through for our benefit. It was wonderful to see lots and lots of young(ish), looking women, clearly better dressed than us all old foggies put together (who said feminism isn't sexy)? They were excited, energetic, with serious attitude, impatient at the slow pace of registration at the UN, kicking up snow dust. They spoke very loudly too about their impatience at the pace of fundamental transformation in the world. The revolution is very safe hands with this group in charge. What with their blogs, their tweeting, and face-booking, ah, a far cry from those days of snail mail, and sending packages by courier to only one office in Cameroon where everyone had to collect from. Or waiting till you met someone who knew someone who could carry their ticket to Gabon. This is a new world.
The diversities got more diverse by 2010. A young sex worker from Uganda (I promised I have nothing against Ugandans!),shocked her Minister who had declared there were no sex workers in Uganda walking the streets and they arrest them. She stood up. Impeccably dressed. Not a hair out of place, and declared "Minister I am so happy to meet you here at the United Nations. But we must talk when we are back home". If the earth could open up..?
The woman had come with a whole group of organised sex workers from many parts of the continent.
As for those lesbians the journalist wanted to see in Beijing, she would have been spoilt for choice. All kinds of sexualities were there. Everywhere.
Education has a lot to learn, goes that old saying.
As to the contents of the Beijing plus 15 meeting let me leave that for another day. For now, I am just so glad to say, We wuz there in 1995. We wuz there again in 2010. And by Jane or Jove, we shall still be there when the 5th World Conference rolls into town. It better be Beijing in summer again, please,just for good measure, and to irritate those who haven't gotten the message.If you are a woman of whatever variety, and missed 1995, help me in campaigning for Beijing Cut 2. This is my new project. Only one condition, you have to believe deep down in your heart that ALL women are entitled to enjoyment of their human rights. And be prepared to fight for that.
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Saturday, February 27, 2010
sorry I am late!
I am a day late! But promise not to be a dollar short! New post coming this weekend. Watch out for it.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Unpacking my suitcase
I have carried this packed suitcase around for five years. More accurately, 10, if we count from 1999.
Every night I would re-pack it again. The next day, I would pick it up. Ready to leave. Each day was the same. I scoured the websites for news. The good news. I developed the habit of sleeping with both my mobile phones on, fully charged, and next to my head on the pillow. Every little "ting-ting" woke me up. I cursed loudly when the stupid adverts came through from the service provider. Every call home, from friends, I listened intently for that encouragement. I wanted to hear them say, please come now. Everything is great. It will be wonderful if you came back. I lengthened the calls, just in case they would say it. Telkom made a small fortune off me.
Today was the day. Tomorrow I would just pick up this suitcase and head for the airport. I carried the suitcase with me on all my travels. Guatemala was a nightmare since I could not roam on my South African mobile for an entire week. Drat! I worried myself sick when I went to visit project areas where there was no network. I was convinced I would miss that vital sms. That all important call. Still I wait.
I have lived in this holding pattern since 1999, the first time I left my home in Harare, Zimbabwe, to come and work in Johannesburg. At the end of my two year contract I strangely accepted another job in the UK. After six months, I fled back home. In 2004 I moved back to South Africa, where I had vowed - rather too loudly to anyone who cared to listen - that I would never ever return. At that time, I rationalized it to myself - and also to those who wondered why I was going back again; oh it was different this time. I was only going so that my son could get everything he needed. You know kids. They just want too much stuff which is no longer available here in Zim. Oh its really because my new employers have moved to Johannesburg. So technically I was being "forced" to move. I really didn't want to. Well, the internet connectivity was much better, and air travel much more direct rather than hop skipping and jumping from Bangkok to Harare via Joburg.
Mmm, I really didn't see myself staying there, no. Not really. I was just here for the job. Give me my Harare any time. On and on I went.
I willed myself to dislike this country, its people, and everything about it. That was easy enough to do. I just rode on the wave of negativity that I found in abundance. Crime! Corruption! Bad governance! The ruling party is just just like our ZANU PF! I wallowed in all of it and comfortably wrapped myself in this blanket of anger and gloom. This was familiar territory. After all, I am from a country where unhappiness is dyed in your wool.
Everything irritated me. Everyone. And they just couldn't get anything right. The locals spoke too loudly, hai! The taxis were a bloody nuisance, with their loud music, their ceaseless tooting for customers outside MY window! My window - which faces Corlett Drive, a busy highway. The doctors here just didn't "see" well enough. I went back to see my Dr. Audrey when I went home. The hairdressers just couldn't twist my locks properly. I needed my Phineas, dirty little salon towels and all. He is my perfect Phineas. Don't speak of the banks, the post offices, the plumbers, the tailors, the whole lot of them!
The food in the restaurants was just too..bland. And badly cooked. Ugh, they need to get lessons from my 40 Cork Road on how to make a decent vegetable lasagne. As for the cocktails? Yikes, my daughter should run courses for these bar men. The security guards just irritated me. No good reason, I just got irritated by them. Looking all happy and yapping loudly to each other as if they have no care in the world.
I turned into a Rhodesian and muttered through clenched teeth - these people!
I developed a routine - home, office, mall, home, office, mall. My little triangular existence. I only went to church three or four times and stopped. The preacher was too slow. The choir too old. The rituals too white and boring. This was not the Methodist church of vaJevo and Bishop Mukandi. Sundays are for sleeping till mid day. If I wanted to watch a movie, I would catch it on my long haul flights. I made sure I went on interesting routes for this purpose. It took a lot of effort to get me into a local cinema.
I discovered there was a beautiful public park down the road from my flat after three years. I never went that way. Too scary. On foot? Besides, what was there to see? Just more locals and their dogs? The sun could shine all it wanted, I just wasn't going to go out and enjoy it. Or see it. Not here. I would only soak it up on my mum's lawn in Gweru.
The gym is also down the road. I hated the whole concept of gyms anyway, I told myself. All that showing off and seeing to be seen. I was not one of those types. Even two articles in magazine echoed my exact sentiments. The gym was just another social place. And I was not here to be social.
I was only here on a temporary work permit. Everything about my life had to also say, "temporary". Three years ago I was offered the opportunity to buy property. I just took it because..well...it just sounded too easy, a nice thing to do. Not that I wanted to do it, mind. I did not want to look like I actually "lived" here. When immigration officers asked me where I was arriving from - it didn't matter whether I was telling the one in Portuguese speaking Brazil, or the bemused one in India, I would launch into a rather agrressive explanation; I work in South Africa. I don't LIVE LIVE there. You undersand? I live in Zimbabwe. That is my country. That is my home. I am going back there. Anytime now. So I am not "from" South Africa. I am from Zimbabwe. I have nothing to do with South Africa. Once I was told to take a seat and wait on the side at Rome's airport because my story sounded too complicated and fishy. I fumed at these idiotic officers who just didn't get it.
I launched into the same long explanations to complete strangers who tried to make conversation. Being a black Zimbawean with a history of migrant labour in my blood, this sounded like an important concept to explain to people. There is a difference beween home-home, and house. Home-home is kumusha, ekhaya, like in Shurugwi, my village, where my grandparents are buried. That is where I grew up telling people I was "from". Then there is home-house. The one in town. Where you just stay, but you don't actually "live", because nobody is technically from a town.
Sounded like a similar thing in this context. I work-stay in Joburg. But I live-live in Zimbabwe. How difficult was that to understand?
Everything in my flat screamed "temp", transit lounge, waiting room. I could not buy those lovely coffee mugs because, I would only need them for my real coffeee drinking when I went back to my real home. Those chairs would be great - yes, in that year when I go back. Oh the lovely pictures I saw in the gallery, I could just picture them on my proper walls back home. I made lists of what to get when the time came.
Every little chink I got, I skipped into Zim. To see my family and real friends. I didn't want to make any here. My son was shipped back home every school holiday. I would arrive all excited and full of energy. I wanted to see everyone, everything, do all the nice things I wasn't doing in Joburg. I called everyone as soon I touched down, as I waited for my luggage - let's have lunch, let's have breakfast tomorrow, what about a braai? I kept a little temple in my house, ready for my arrival. Nobody could stay there. It was my space which I wanted to find exactly as I had left it. I kept a car ready for my arrival, all year round.
I went on binges, eating everything I didn't allow myself to enjoy away from home. Even the air smelled different and the sun shined brighter because - this was home.
I finally put down the suitcase in January. I have been unpacking it, bit by bit, and I am still in the process. Last Christmas I finally realised that my family and friends get exhausted by my excitement when I visited Zim. They all have full lives that they live when I am not there and they are not going to stop and entertainm me. I realised that I could no longer understand half the conversations that people who live in Zimbabwe have. I can interject here and there. But it is no longer my conversation, and I don't own it the same way they do. Sometimes I can not relate to the jokes, or the "language" they speak. It feels like another country. Which is what it is. Still my country of birth, but not mine in the same sense anymore. I am learning to let it go.
I still love my country. But I also love where I am now. I am learning to love it each day. I have opened myself up to loving South Africa, my not so new home, it's people, and it's sunshine.
I have also come to realise that I can love both countries. This is not a monogamous sexual relationship. I have already imbibed the spirit of my host President! Liking where I am does not make me dislike my home. I feared that liking South Africa would make me unpatriotic. When I came back to Joburg after Christmas, I was so happy to be back I worried about this new feeling. I texted a few friends and got back some wisecracks. These friends saved me from this painful space that I had entered.
Once I started unpacking this suitcase that I have carried around in my head, I have been amazed at the beauty all around me, and the amazing people around me. There's the very friendly Sunday newspaper vendor at the traffick light outside my window. The security guards in my office building and apartment complex. The beggars who fight for prime time spots at the same traffick light in Shona and Zulu who have become my buddies. I take long walks in the park near my apartment and happily declare, "oh I feel so refreshed", just like a proper yuppie. This is me the villager come to town, enjoying walking as if I never walked 5 kilometres to and from Nhema School St Francis Mission in Nhema!
They have amazingly fresh food at the Woolies down the road as well. I walk there and chat to the staff. I buy the washed salad, the ready to eat meals, and the ice cream is to die from. The little pleasures of life suddenly feel more pleasureable because I want to enjoy them.
My friend Nancy has been my saving grace. She zoomed into town a year ago and my life has not been the same since. Well for a start she has a car. So off we zip to drink coffeee, see that person, and that one. We sit in the sun on Sundays and read the papers. We follow it like giant lizards...from brunch through to sundowners, then its back HOME to sleep.
I even enjoy local football on tv, ok, one day at a time, I haven't reached the going to a stadium part. I still haven't figured out which team has more Zimbabweans so I can support it! I even follow one soapie. I love the radio stations, the opennesss, the democracy (and its not a cliche). I even called into a talk show recently and gave an opinion. It felt good. I so enjoy the politics. I can watch, listen, laugh, get all heated up as if I have a stake in this country.
I love my country of Citizenship. It will always be home-home. It will always be my first love. My family is there. My BEST friends are there. I invested all my youth in that country, and I am emotionally invested in it. My ashes will be scattered there when I die, (family take note). I still carry my green mamba with great pride (apparently that is what my national passport is called in ex-Zimbabwean white circles). I haven't quite gotten round to applying for permaent residence because it feels too, permanent. I still listen to the news about my country. I feel deep pain every time I hear something terrible that has happened. But I have had to learn that I can not be in this permanent holding pad anymore. I have a life to live. I have children to imbue with a sense of optimism and joy for life. I can't keep doing this to them anymore. They need to make their own choices about where they want to live, and what they will call home. I was holding them in the same holding pad.
For anyone struggling with being away from home, I highly recommend reading Children of the Revolution by Denaw Mengestu. It will change your life.
I don't know when or if I will be going back to live-live in Zimbabwe.
For now, I have almost finished unpacking the suitcase. I will enjoy this space and all its wierdness. Cocktails anyone?
Every night I would re-pack it again. The next day, I would pick it up. Ready to leave. Each day was the same. I scoured the websites for news. The good news. I developed the habit of sleeping with both my mobile phones on, fully charged, and next to my head on the pillow. Every little "ting-ting" woke me up. I cursed loudly when the stupid adverts came through from the service provider. Every call home, from friends, I listened intently for that encouragement. I wanted to hear them say, please come now. Everything is great. It will be wonderful if you came back. I lengthened the calls, just in case they would say it. Telkom made a small fortune off me.
Today was the day. Tomorrow I would just pick up this suitcase and head for the airport. I carried the suitcase with me on all my travels. Guatemala was a nightmare since I could not roam on my South African mobile for an entire week. Drat! I worried myself sick when I went to visit project areas where there was no network. I was convinced I would miss that vital sms. That all important call. Still I wait.
I have lived in this holding pattern since 1999, the first time I left my home in Harare, Zimbabwe, to come and work in Johannesburg. At the end of my two year contract I strangely accepted another job in the UK. After six months, I fled back home. In 2004 I moved back to South Africa, where I had vowed - rather too loudly to anyone who cared to listen - that I would never ever return. At that time, I rationalized it to myself - and also to those who wondered why I was going back again; oh it was different this time. I was only going so that my son could get everything he needed. You know kids. They just want too much stuff which is no longer available here in Zim. Oh its really because my new employers have moved to Johannesburg. So technically I was being "forced" to move. I really didn't want to. Well, the internet connectivity was much better, and air travel much more direct rather than hop skipping and jumping from Bangkok to Harare via Joburg.
Mmm, I really didn't see myself staying there, no. Not really. I was just here for the job. Give me my Harare any time. On and on I went.
I willed myself to dislike this country, its people, and everything about it. That was easy enough to do. I just rode on the wave of negativity that I found in abundance. Crime! Corruption! Bad governance! The ruling party is just just like our ZANU PF! I wallowed in all of it and comfortably wrapped myself in this blanket of anger and gloom. This was familiar territory. After all, I am from a country where unhappiness is dyed in your wool.
Everything irritated me. Everyone. And they just couldn't get anything right. The locals spoke too loudly, hai! The taxis were a bloody nuisance, with their loud music, their ceaseless tooting for customers outside MY window! My window - which faces Corlett Drive, a busy highway. The doctors here just didn't "see" well enough. I went back to see my Dr. Audrey when I went home. The hairdressers just couldn't twist my locks properly. I needed my Phineas, dirty little salon towels and all. He is my perfect Phineas. Don't speak of the banks, the post offices, the plumbers, the tailors, the whole lot of them!
The food in the restaurants was just too..bland. And badly cooked. Ugh, they need to get lessons from my 40 Cork Road on how to make a decent vegetable lasagne. As for the cocktails? Yikes, my daughter should run courses for these bar men. The security guards just irritated me. No good reason, I just got irritated by them. Looking all happy and yapping loudly to each other as if they have no care in the world.
I turned into a Rhodesian and muttered through clenched teeth - these people!
I developed a routine - home, office, mall, home, office, mall. My little triangular existence. I only went to church three or four times and stopped. The preacher was too slow. The choir too old. The rituals too white and boring. This was not the Methodist church of vaJevo and Bishop Mukandi. Sundays are for sleeping till mid day. If I wanted to watch a movie, I would catch it on my long haul flights. I made sure I went on interesting routes for this purpose. It took a lot of effort to get me into a local cinema.
I discovered there was a beautiful public park down the road from my flat after three years. I never went that way. Too scary. On foot? Besides, what was there to see? Just more locals and their dogs? The sun could shine all it wanted, I just wasn't going to go out and enjoy it. Or see it. Not here. I would only soak it up on my mum's lawn in Gweru.
The gym is also down the road. I hated the whole concept of gyms anyway, I told myself. All that showing off and seeing to be seen. I was not one of those types. Even two articles in magazine echoed my exact sentiments. The gym was just another social place. And I was not here to be social.
I was only here on a temporary work permit. Everything about my life had to also say, "temporary". Three years ago I was offered the opportunity to buy property. I just took it because..well...it just sounded too easy, a nice thing to do. Not that I wanted to do it, mind. I did not want to look like I actually "lived" here. When immigration officers asked me where I was arriving from - it didn't matter whether I was telling the one in Portuguese speaking Brazil, or the bemused one in India, I would launch into a rather agrressive explanation; I work in South Africa. I don't LIVE LIVE there. You undersand? I live in Zimbabwe. That is my country. That is my home. I am going back there. Anytime now. So I am not "from" South Africa. I am from Zimbabwe. I have nothing to do with South Africa. Once I was told to take a seat and wait on the side at Rome's airport because my story sounded too complicated and fishy. I fumed at these idiotic officers who just didn't get it.
I launched into the same long explanations to complete strangers who tried to make conversation. Being a black Zimbawean with a history of migrant labour in my blood, this sounded like an important concept to explain to people. There is a difference beween home-home, and house. Home-home is kumusha, ekhaya, like in Shurugwi, my village, where my grandparents are buried. That is where I grew up telling people I was "from". Then there is home-house. The one in town. Where you just stay, but you don't actually "live", because nobody is technically from a town.
Sounded like a similar thing in this context. I work-stay in Joburg. But I live-live in Zimbabwe. How difficult was that to understand?
Everything in my flat screamed "temp", transit lounge, waiting room. I could not buy those lovely coffee mugs because, I would only need them for my real coffeee drinking when I went back to my real home. Those chairs would be great - yes, in that year when I go back. Oh the lovely pictures I saw in the gallery, I could just picture them on my proper walls back home. I made lists of what to get when the time came.
Every little chink I got, I skipped into Zim. To see my family and real friends. I didn't want to make any here. My son was shipped back home every school holiday. I would arrive all excited and full of energy. I wanted to see everyone, everything, do all the nice things I wasn't doing in Joburg. I called everyone as soon I touched down, as I waited for my luggage - let's have lunch, let's have breakfast tomorrow, what about a braai? I kept a little temple in my house, ready for my arrival. Nobody could stay there. It was my space which I wanted to find exactly as I had left it. I kept a car ready for my arrival, all year round.
I went on binges, eating everything I didn't allow myself to enjoy away from home. Even the air smelled different and the sun shined brighter because - this was home.
I finally put down the suitcase in January. I have been unpacking it, bit by bit, and I am still in the process. Last Christmas I finally realised that my family and friends get exhausted by my excitement when I visited Zim. They all have full lives that they live when I am not there and they are not going to stop and entertainm me. I realised that I could no longer understand half the conversations that people who live in Zimbabwe have. I can interject here and there. But it is no longer my conversation, and I don't own it the same way they do. Sometimes I can not relate to the jokes, or the "language" they speak. It feels like another country. Which is what it is. Still my country of birth, but not mine in the same sense anymore. I am learning to let it go.
I still love my country. But I also love where I am now. I am learning to love it each day. I have opened myself up to loving South Africa, my not so new home, it's people, and it's sunshine.
I have also come to realise that I can love both countries. This is not a monogamous sexual relationship. I have already imbibed the spirit of my host President! Liking where I am does not make me dislike my home. I feared that liking South Africa would make me unpatriotic. When I came back to Joburg after Christmas, I was so happy to be back I worried about this new feeling. I texted a few friends and got back some wisecracks. These friends saved me from this painful space that I had entered.
Once I started unpacking this suitcase that I have carried around in my head, I have been amazed at the beauty all around me, and the amazing people around me. There's the very friendly Sunday newspaper vendor at the traffick light outside my window. The security guards in my office building and apartment complex. The beggars who fight for prime time spots at the same traffick light in Shona and Zulu who have become my buddies. I take long walks in the park near my apartment and happily declare, "oh I feel so refreshed", just like a proper yuppie. This is me the villager come to town, enjoying walking as if I never walked 5 kilometres to and from Nhema School St Francis Mission in Nhema!
They have amazingly fresh food at the Woolies down the road as well. I walk there and chat to the staff. I buy the washed salad, the ready to eat meals, and the ice cream is to die from. The little pleasures of life suddenly feel more pleasureable because I want to enjoy them.
My friend Nancy has been my saving grace. She zoomed into town a year ago and my life has not been the same since. Well for a start she has a car. So off we zip to drink coffeee, see that person, and that one. We sit in the sun on Sundays and read the papers. We follow it like giant lizards...from brunch through to sundowners, then its back HOME to sleep.
I even enjoy local football on tv, ok, one day at a time, I haven't reached the going to a stadium part. I still haven't figured out which team has more Zimbabweans so I can support it! I even follow one soapie. I love the radio stations, the opennesss, the democracy (and its not a cliche). I even called into a talk show recently and gave an opinion. It felt good. I so enjoy the politics. I can watch, listen, laugh, get all heated up as if I have a stake in this country.
I love my country of Citizenship. It will always be home-home. It will always be my first love. My family is there. My BEST friends are there. I invested all my youth in that country, and I am emotionally invested in it. My ashes will be scattered there when I die, (family take note). I still carry my green mamba with great pride (apparently that is what my national passport is called in ex-Zimbabwean white circles). I haven't quite gotten round to applying for permaent residence because it feels too, permanent. I still listen to the news about my country. I feel deep pain every time I hear something terrible that has happened. But I have had to learn that I can not be in this permanent holding pad anymore. I have a life to live. I have children to imbue with a sense of optimism and joy for life. I can't keep doing this to them anymore. They need to make their own choices about where they want to live, and what they will call home. I was holding them in the same holding pad.
For anyone struggling with being away from home, I highly recommend reading Children of the Revolution by Denaw Mengestu. It will change your life.
I don't know when or if I will be going back to live-live in Zimbabwe.
For now, I have almost finished unpacking the suitcase. I will enjoy this space and all its wierdness. Cocktails anyone?
Thursday, February 11, 2010
My cup runneth over
Forty five. 45. Or more accurately, 45!!!! I have always had a thing about numbers that are multiples of 5. In primary school, I rejoiced when counting out loudly and increased the volume when I got to them. So one more time - FOoooortyyyy FIVE!!!!
That is how old I am today. I am suitably middle aged. As the born agains would chant - it is good to be here! It is a wonderful place to be.
Let's start though with the the bad bits of becoming middle aged. As far as my children are concerned I literally have one foot in the grave. "When you were younger.....? In the old days how did you....? I don't really expect you to understand mum because you are....?" So begin some of the choice things my almost 16 year old son says to me increasingly. In their eyes I belong to the museum. A relic. If I wiggle my butt to hip hop I get dirty looks as if to say, "please honey don't embarass us, you don't even know who the singer is". True at some level though. I can't be expected to surely distinguish between bad music, and bad music. Gone are the days when music was deeply meaningful and artists were just people. Mmm yes, those were the days.
It is the same out on the streets. Here in South Africa total strangers refer to me as "mummy", or "mama". I am told that is supposed to be a mark of respect. A honorific like "madame". Well if that is the spirit how come my white friends are never referrred to in this way? Worse, one of my exes had saved my number on his mobile phone as Mummy 2! As you can guess there was a mummy 1! Yikes! How and why we both got "mummified" in this way I don't know. I am just happy to be a mummy to my little brood thanks, and not the entire universe. What happened to "sisi", or the generic, "aunty". I can live with that. Mummy?
As I walk around in the malls (a modern form of entertainment which I can now thankfully participate in with great gusto and frequent regularity,thanks to the generosity of credit givers), I have learnt that when I see a guy walking towards me with a big smile, he is not actually smilling at me. He will be smiling at the little nymphette behind me. All of 13 or 12 years of age. Internet dating sites are even worse. Yes I have taken to trawling those too - the quest for the frog heats up at this age - men my age are looking for toddlers. They even have the audacity to put that on their profiles. Isn't there some sort of international covenant we can craft against this at the United Nations? "I am a laid back lad, easy going dude, looking for fun in the sun, romance and good times. Preferred women of of all races aged 18 to 25. James 52.East London". Eeek.
I guess I could pass myself off as a nymphette. My face is what George Bernard Shaw would have described as "aged anywhere between 18 and 50". The joy of wrinkle free melanin enriched skin. With a little help from a great French cosmetic house with the white and red brand. Trust me it works girls. I have also been blessed with breasts that doesn't sag. Well of course with a little help from Bravissimo. If you don't believe me ask my friends Revai and Priscilla. We all swear by that bra maker. Among us we shall keep Bravissimo in business for a very long time. Chest out, shoulders back, foundation garments on, little smudge of war paint, I am good to go. I can give that James a great time any day of the week.
Unfortunately the other bits of my anatomy aren't quite behaving themselves anymore. There is the middle age spread which in my case has just completely gone out of control. Even the foundation garments aren't sufficient to contain it. It's like flour to which too much yeast has been added, spilling all over the place like that.
I had a waistline once. I swear. It was down there somewhere.
Speaking of down there, nobody told me it turns into a silver lawn? One day there was just one, pretty soon the entire village was silver. I am too native to go back for Brazillian wax. Twice was enough. This was in the days of he who called me "mummy 2". As Prince Charles once said, The things we do for England! Ei?
I get this sense that half of my brain is gone. Some days I can not remember where I am and why. Just this morning I woke up freezing cold, and I thought climate change had really hit Southern Africa. It took me 30 minutes to remember I am in a hotel room in London.
The older I get, the more cynical I have become. That goes with a crisis of faith. My poor mother doesn't know where she went wrong with me. I grew up a decent Methodist. I could sing the whole hymn book with eyes closed. If you know the Methodist hymn book (the Shona one), you will know this is no mean feat. I knew my Corinthians from my vaEfeso, (Ephesians to you Anglicized lot). I did my good works and God was in my life. I don't know what to believe in anymore and where this God is these days, ref. Haiti and my country falling apart at the seams.
But today I want to celebrate this wonderful milestone in my life. I live in a region where women's life expectancy is down to 36 years. I have lost numerous relatives and three siblings, all of whom passed away before they turned 42. It is a great tragedy when turning 45 is a huge deal, as my birthday today is. I don't take for granted reaching this milestone. I am deeply grateful to that higher power, wherever she maybe. As Oliver Mtukudzi sings, "hauzi huchenjeri kusara takararama", (it is not because we are clever that we are still alive). I am sure there is a greater purpose in HER plans for me.
It is absolutely wonderful to be this age, wobbbly bits and all. For a start I can declare that I have arrived. At so many little bus stops and I am still going. I am now officially allowed to be a cantankerous old woman. I can say anything. To anyone. And get away with it. I can blame it on menopause. Or whoever gets offended can dismiss me as past it anyway. Whichever way, who cares I get away with it.
I can stridently insist on my rights (and more). As a woman this is not to be scoffed at. With age come all kinds of privileges. All I need to do is to look daggers at someone that I want to fight with. Keep looking. Hard. Shake my silver locks. Then let out a loud sigh, and hint, just hint that this might be followed by a shrill protest/demand. Quick as a wink, I get what I want. I don't need to bang tables anymore. I just stare you down.
My children know when I just look at them like that, they better behave/change/give up that seat for me/do what I said.
As for the men, ah well that's a walk in park. Arms across cleavage. Head to the side. Slight shake of the silvery locks. Toothpaste smile. Yes mummy!
As I turned 42 I noticed that a lot of the angst I had in my life was slowly ebbing away. Body issues. Fears about everything from floods to ...well everything really. By last Christmas it was all gone. Vanished. I can't even remember why I ever had this much angst. Things that seemed to matter when I was 30 suddenly don't seem to matter anymore. Like reading and responding to every email. What to wear or not to wear. I suddenly feel like I have so much time, and so many possibilities to do a whole lot of things, from what to buy, to what to wear, just sitting and reading, eventually doing some work. I don't feel like I have to prove anything to anyone anymore. Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt, owned the factory, sold it to the next loser.
Speaking of factories, the biggest liberation came when I got rid of excess baggage three years ago. Excess baggage a.k.a the uterus. I love what it gave me, but it just had to go. No point lugging around something excess to requirements. And even if someone paid me, I would not buy it back. Ever. It is wonderful to finally feel I am a person, and not my uterus. I am no longer defined by it. Nor do I need to plan my life and travels around its moods. All that seemingly trite stuff older women say about being in touch with their own bodies at this age is all TRUE. As the little slogan on my favourite jammies says, I know what I want, and where to get it.
I am grateful to be in this place today. Not this freezing city, please! But this middle age. I feel as if my life has just begun. I am privileged to have lived through so many historical moments. In my own small way, I am glad I have contributed a few things to other people's lives in this world. I am privileged to have been part of feminist groups and social justice struggles. I have not just been a fly on the wall of humanity. I have been living on the frontline/s. Roll on 90!
My cup runneth over.
That is how old I am today. I am suitably middle aged. As the born agains would chant - it is good to be here! It is a wonderful place to be.
Let's start though with the the bad bits of becoming middle aged. As far as my children are concerned I literally have one foot in the grave. "When you were younger.....? In the old days how did you....? I don't really expect you to understand mum because you are....?" So begin some of the choice things my almost 16 year old son says to me increasingly. In their eyes I belong to the museum. A relic. If I wiggle my butt to hip hop I get dirty looks as if to say, "please honey don't embarass us, you don't even know who the singer is". True at some level though. I can't be expected to surely distinguish between bad music, and bad music. Gone are the days when music was deeply meaningful and artists were just people. Mmm yes, those were the days.
It is the same out on the streets. Here in South Africa total strangers refer to me as "mummy", or "mama". I am told that is supposed to be a mark of respect. A honorific like "madame". Well if that is the spirit how come my white friends are never referrred to in this way? Worse, one of my exes had saved my number on his mobile phone as Mummy 2! As you can guess there was a mummy 1! Yikes! How and why we both got "mummified" in this way I don't know. I am just happy to be a mummy to my little brood thanks, and not the entire universe. What happened to "sisi", or the generic, "aunty". I can live with that. Mummy?
As I walk around in the malls (a modern form of entertainment which I can now thankfully participate in with great gusto and frequent regularity,thanks to the generosity of credit givers), I have learnt that when I see a guy walking towards me with a big smile, he is not actually smilling at me. He will be smiling at the little nymphette behind me. All of 13 or 12 years of age. Internet dating sites are even worse. Yes I have taken to trawling those too - the quest for the frog heats up at this age - men my age are looking for toddlers. They even have the audacity to put that on their profiles. Isn't there some sort of international covenant we can craft against this at the United Nations? "I am a laid back lad, easy going dude, looking for fun in the sun, romance and good times. Preferred women of of all races aged 18 to 25. James 52.East London". Eeek.
I guess I could pass myself off as a nymphette. My face is what George Bernard Shaw would have described as "aged anywhere between 18 and 50". The joy of wrinkle free melanin enriched skin. With a little help from a great French cosmetic house with the white and red brand. Trust me it works girls. I have also been blessed with breasts that doesn't sag. Well of course with a little help from Bravissimo. If you don't believe me ask my friends Revai and Priscilla. We all swear by that bra maker. Among us we shall keep Bravissimo in business for a very long time. Chest out, shoulders back, foundation garments on, little smudge of war paint, I am good to go. I can give that James a great time any day of the week.
Unfortunately the other bits of my anatomy aren't quite behaving themselves anymore. There is the middle age spread which in my case has just completely gone out of control. Even the foundation garments aren't sufficient to contain it. It's like flour to which too much yeast has been added, spilling all over the place like that.
I had a waistline once. I swear. It was down there somewhere.
Speaking of down there, nobody told me it turns into a silver lawn? One day there was just one, pretty soon the entire village was silver. I am too native to go back for Brazillian wax. Twice was enough. This was in the days of he who called me "mummy 2". As Prince Charles once said, The things we do for England! Ei?
I get this sense that half of my brain is gone. Some days I can not remember where I am and why. Just this morning I woke up freezing cold, and I thought climate change had really hit Southern Africa. It took me 30 minutes to remember I am in a hotel room in London.
The older I get, the more cynical I have become. That goes with a crisis of faith. My poor mother doesn't know where she went wrong with me. I grew up a decent Methodist. I could sing the whole hymn book with eyes closed. If you know the Methodist hymn book (the Shona one), you will know this is no mean feat. I knew my Corinthians from my vaEfeso, (Ephesians to you Anglicized lot). I did my good works and God was in my life. I don't know what to believe in anymore and where this God is these days, ref. Haiti and my country falling apart at the seams.
But today I want to celebrate this wonderful milestone in my life. I live in a region where women's life expectancy is down to 36 years. I have lost numerous relatives and three siblings, all of whom passed away before they turned 42. It is a great tragedy when turning 45 is a huge deal, as my birthday today is. I don't take for granted reaching this milestone. I am deeply grateful to that higher power, wherever she maybe. As Oliver Mtukudzi sings, "hauzi huchenjeri kusara takararama", (it is not because we are clever that we are still alive). I am sure there is a greater purpose in HER plans for me.
It is absolutely wonderful to be this age, wobbbly bits and all. For a start I can declare that I have arrived. At so many little bus stops and I am still going. I am now officially allowed to be a cantankerous old woman. I can say anything. To anyone. And get away with it. I can blame it on menopause. Or whoever gets offended can dismiss me as past it anyway. Whichever way, who cares I get away with it.
I can stridently insist on my rights (and more). As a woman this is not to be scoffed at. With age come all kinds of privileges. All I need to do is to look daggers at someone that I want to fight with. Keep looking. Hard. Shake my silver locks. Then let out a loud sigh, and hint, just hint that this might be followed by a shrill protest/demand. Quick as a wink, I get what I want. I don't need to bang tables anymore. I just stare you down.
My children know when I just look at them like that, they better behave/change/give up that seat for me/do what I said.
As for the men, ah well that's a walk in park. Arms across cleavage. Head to the side. Slight shake of the silvery locks. Toothpaste smile. Yes mummy!
As I turned 42 I noticed that a lot of the angst I had in my life was slowly ebbing away. Body issues. Fears about everything from floods to ...well everything really. By last Christmas it was all gone. Vanished. I can't even remember why I ever had this much angst. Things that seemed to matter when I was 30 suddenly don't seem to matter anymore. Like reading and responding to every email. What to wear or not to wear. I suddenly feel like I have so much time, and so many possibilities to do a whole lot of things, from what to buy, to what to wear, just sitting and reading, eventually doing some work. I don't feel like I have to prove anything to anyone anymore. Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt, owned the factory, sold it to the next loser.
Speaking of factories, the biggest liberation came when I got rid of excess baggage three years ago. Excess baggage a.k.a the uterus. I love what it gave me, but it just had to go. No point lugging around something excess to requirements. And even if someone paid me, I would not buy it back. Ever. It is wonderful to finally feel I am a person, and not my uterus. I am no longer defined by it. Nor do I need to plan my life and travels around its moods. All that seemingly trite stuff older women say about being in touch with their own bodies at this age is all TRUE. As the little slogan on my favourite jammies says, I know what I want, and where to get it.
I am grateful to be in this place today. Not this freezing city, please! But this middle age. I feel as if my life has just begun. I am privileged to have lived through so many historical moments. In my own small way, I am glad I have contributed a few things to other people's lives in this world. I am privileged to have been part of feminist groups and social justice struggles. I have not just been a fly on the wall of humanity. I have been living on the frontline/s. Roll on 90!
My cup runneth over.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Remembering Bob
No, that other one isn't dead! Yet. But if he does die I will write a blog remembering what he meant to me. There is a story there...
I am not a morning person. Come to think of it I am not any time of day person either. It takes me a good 45 minutes to get myself out of bed. When I am in my flat in Johannesburg, or my home in Harare, I put out one hand. Slowly. The other one remains where it is. Too cold. Too numb. Too exciting. Hey this is not that sort of blog.
I reach out under my pillow. Yes I am one of those strange people who goes to bed with my mobile phones and radio remote control under my pillow. I flick the cd player on. I crank up the volume, " I want to disturb my neighbours, blow them to full watts.....". As I do this, I look up across the wall. My eyes light fully open now. They alight on his beautiful photo on that postcard I bought in a dingy shop in Brighton. He looked so handsome. Smiling that gorgeous half smile. Dreadlocks beautifully swept to one side. I put up the volume some more. Thank God I am right on a busy road, the neighbours have never complained about it. Or maybe they just think I am up to my "darkie" ways, I will never find out. "Love to see when you are moving to rhythm. I love to see when you are dancing from within. It gives great joy to see such sweet togetherness. ..These are the days when we tread through Bablylon...Jump, jump, jump, Nyabhingi....!"
At this point, I get out of bed, and try to do this jumping bit. Trust me, its quite a sight. My day is set up. From this moment on I am ready to face the world.
I love Bob Marley's music. I have all his cds. Even the old original versions of the Wailers' songs. It is the closest I have ever got to being a fanatic about anything. My late brother Jabulani, who was a music and soccer fanatic introduced me to reggae and Bob. I was very young then, and I had no idea what the music was about. I could not understand half the lyrics either. This was in the days before cds, internet lyrics, and those now ubiquitous cd. sleeves where its all there.
In those days we kept song books. These were little hard covered note-books where you wrote down the lyrics of your favourite songs. If you had a boyfriend, he would write one for you. I got one when I was in Form 2, full of saccharine songs like "you to me are everything the sweetest song that I could sing oh baby". The very nice, but really boring boy had no idea that this was not my music. I wanted to understand what "bredren, I'n' I" meant, and who "Jah" was.
All I knew was that this was important music. When Bob Marley played, my brother went into a kind of trance. He would sit on his bed, or on the floor and pay serious attention, imitating the Jamaican patois to the best of his ShonDebele abilities. This was different from how he would respond to Black Sabbath, or Led Zeppelin. This was different. This was music for the soul. I got hooked. The first vinyl record I ever owned, was Bob Marley's Coming in from the Cold, which I won in a competition on Zimbabwe's Radio 2. I still have that LP - as we called them.
The day Bob Marley died, I was so devastated. It was the first time in my life I understood what death meant. My brother Admire had died in 1976, but I was too young then to understand what it meant. It all felt like an unreal dream. When Jabu and I met during my school holidays after Bob's passing we listened to his music the whole week. Every day. Into the wee hours of the morning. And we wept as if our mother had left us.
Tomorrow marks what would have been Bob Marley's 65th birthday. I am sitting in this place where I hardly know what the social scene is like. My friend Percy who should know where they have a Bob Marley memorial night says he is off to relax in some mountains. I don't know why someone born in the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe wants to see more mountains. Methinks he has been hanging out with too many white people, " We had a fantastic time in the quiet mountains....it was sooooo peaceful...." Mountains? Where there're centipedes and other goggas? But I digress.
If I was in Zimbabwe, (the hankering after my home, again), I know I would go to Harare gardens and dance all day on Saturday with "vana dread". We would skank, scream, and toast to Marley's wonderful life. But more importantly, we would listen to his music and FEEL what it means to many people throughout the world. I will not let the day pass quietly though. The party has already began. Since this morning, I have been playing Bob's music non stop.
Now that I finally understand the lyrics, (thanks to the sleeves and the internet), I can fully appreciate what he was talking about. It doesn't surprise me that every time I travel to any part of the world, and visit very poor neighbourhoods, the only music I hear on the radios, in the community halls, or on the public buses is Marley's. Because my hair is dreadlocked, I get greeted as, "eh Bob Marley!". In Ghana last May, the young men in the street markets kept referring to me as "Ras!", and I would get that fist bump handshake, then happily, I got a discount on whatever I wanted to buy. In Sierra Leone, one guy kept following me playing his Rastaman live up! I didn't feel threatened. Eventually he came close enough and we listened to his radio together. He was very excited to hear me sing the lyrics perfectly.
In Haiti, (oh Haiti!), last September, Marley's music played loudly in so many places.
In many Asian countries people in remote villages are very fascinated by my dreadlocks. They can't understand how the twisting is done and if it can be undone. So in my effort to explain the difference between locks, extensions, and braids, I keep saying, "my hair is my natural hair...you know...like Bob Marley?" Suddenly their eyes will light up, they will mimick a singer, and we know we are communicating. Not just about the hair.
And since I am sitting in this country where sex and the sexual life of a big man is in the news, I have to reflect too on my hero's sex life. Like many men of his kind; famous, powerful, popular, he just seemed to not know where to "put it". And he did put it in too many places. Children everywhere. That is the bit I struggle with. But that is the subject of another blog.
Tomorrow, I will have a one woman celebration of Bob Marley's life. I will put on my rasta cap and groovy colourful dress which my friends Nyaradzo and Trevor brought me from Jamaica. I will get up to my favourite song, based on the speech by Haile Selassie, (before he lost direction), "WAR". I have re-written the lyrics to suit my struggle as a woman.
Until the philosophy which holds one sex superior, and another inferior,is finally, and permanently discredited, and abandoned....
Until the shape of a person's genitals is of no more significance, than the colour of their eyes,
Mi say War....yeah....
Until that day, the dream of lasting peace...world citizenship,
The African continent
Will not know peace,
We African women will fight - we find it necessary -
And we know we shall win
As we are confident
In the victory
Of good over evil -
Good over evil, yeah!
Good over evil -
Good over evil, yeah!
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Living on the frontline2
Several people have asked me; so what is this blog about? Why a blog? Who am I hoping will read it?
My one new year's resolution is very simple - WRITE! I love writing. But I never have enough time to actually write. Actually that is not true. I always find excuses not to write. I am too tired. I am too hot. Too cold. I will write tomorrow when I am sitting more comfortably. There is not enough light in this room. I have so much work to do. Who will read this? Will the editors like it?
How will this play out on the net? Back home in Zim? So I censor myself. I write one paragraph and delete half of it. By the next morning I don't want to look at my laptop again.
By last December I had 19 pieces in all states of incompleteness. Some are two sentences. One is a whole 9 pages.
So this year, I shall write. Because I love to. I want.
This blog is for me. First. I am talking to myself. I believe this is an affliction that is common among people of my ilk - middle aged semi-retired-bored-looking for new lease of life types. Or maybe its the brimming full of ideas but nowhere to take them bit. Whatever it is, I want to write so I don't talk to myself loudly along Corlett Drive.
I have "so much things to say...so much things to say", as Bob Marley sang so beautifully. About my personal experiences in this life. There is a new experience each day. I am living on the frontline of LIFE itself. I am not a silent fly on the wall. I am here. I see. I feel. I think. I do.
Iwill write about my family. Or more accurately, what is left of it. Since 1993, I have lived on the frontline of HIV & AIDS. They are both still here. Wreaking havoc in our lives and bodies. As a woman, I have a particular experience. I have been promising myself that I will write a book about it. Maybe these can become the first chapters of that book. We shall see. But it's not doom and doom in my also ever expanding crazy extended family. I have raised the most wonderful children - even if I say so myself. I have loving, wierd, sometimes a pain in the wrong end of the body- cousins, nieces, nephews, brothers and sisters, each a book in her/himself. I love them. They are my life's frontline and keep going. I will write about them and to them.
I am living in hugely fascinating country. For the last six years I have lived with one foot raised to leave. But I am here. This country is a story a day. I have a front row seat in its wierd and whackiness. I want to write about that.
My own country which I have been under the illusion that I will be going back to tomorrow, next week, next month...Sigh...is yet another front. My head is there. But my body is here in Johannesburg. My head will think, feel, see. And my hands write.
I have a wonderful job (yes really, even though I moan about it sometimes, it's a wonderful job, in a great organisation, with amazing people!). The job takes me to all kinds of interesting places. From China to Haiti. From Mozambique to Sierra Leone. I meet very interesting people. I eat strange and wonderful food. I will tell those stories.
And where would I be without my friends. They are shield, my front liner-cavalry in this sometimes dreadful world. They make it worth getting up in the morning. There are the loves and the heartbreaks. These will get a blog or seven!
So what is this frontline? It's everywhere and it's somewhere. There are many front-lines.
It's my life. My space. My perspectives.
I am happy to share this frontline with you.
My one new year's resolution is very simple - WRITE! I love writing. But I never have enough time to actually write. Actually that is not true. I always find excuses not to write. I am too tired. I am too hot. Too cold. I will write tomorrow when I am sitting more comfortably. There is not enough light in this room. I have so much work to do. Who will read this? Will the editors like it?
How will this play out on the net? Back home in Zim? So I censor myself. I write one paragraph and delete half of it. By the next morning I don't want to look at my laptop again.
By last December I had 19 pieces in all states of incompleteness. Some are two sentences. One is a whole 9 pages.
So this year, I shall write. Because I love to. I want.
This blog is for me. First. I am talking to myself. I believe this is an affliction that is common among people of my ilk - middle aged semi-retired-bored-looking for new lease of life types. Or maybe its the brimming full of ideas but nowhere to take them bit. Whatever it is, I want to write so I don't talk to myself loudly along Corlett Drive.
I have "so much things to say...so much things to say", as Bob Marley sang so beautifully. About my personal experiences in this life. There is a new experience each day. I am living on the frontline of LIFE itself. I am not a silent fly on the wall. I am here. I see. I feel. I think. I do.
Iwill write about my family. Or more accurately, what is left of it. Since 1993, I have lived on the frontline of HIV & AIDS. They are both still here. Wreaking havoc in our lives and bodies. As a woman, I have a particular experience. I have been promising myself that I will write a book about it. Maybe these can become the first chapters of that book. We shall see. But it's not doom and doom in my also ever expanding crazy extended family. I have raised the most wonderful children - even if I say so myself. I have loving, wierd, sometimes a pain in the wrong end of the body- cousins, nieces, nephews, brothers and sisters, each a book in her/himself. I love them. They are my life's frontline and keep going. I will write about them and to them.
I am living in hugely fascinating country. For the last six years I have lived with one foot raised to leave. But I am here. This country is a story a day. I have a front row seat in its wierd and whackiness. I want to write about that.
My own country which I have been under the illusion that I will be going back to tomorrow, next week, next month...Sigh...is yet another front. My head is there. But my body is here in Johannesburg. My head will think, feel, see. And my hands write.
I have a wonderful job (yes really, even though I moan about it sometimes, it's a wonderful job, in a great organisation, with amazing people!). The job takes me to all kinds of interesting places. From China to Haiti. From Mozambique to Sierra Leone. I meet very interesting people. I eat strange and wonderful food. I will tell those stories.
And where would I be without my friends. They are shield, my front liner-cavalry in this sometimes dreadful world. They make it worth getting up in the morning. There are the loves and the heartbreaks. These will get a blog or seven!
So what is this frontline? It's everywhere and it's somewhere. There are many front-lines.
It's my life. My space. My perspectives.
I am happy to share this frontline with you.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
2010!
It's finally here. The year that is synonymous with something marvelous ....which is going to happen. I live in a country where the year means a lot; "2010 is coming! We are waiting for 2010! Will you be in Joburg in 2010?" I heard a lot of it last year. One woman even said, "hee, if this 2010 doesn't come, there will be trouble". As if the year itself was not going to dawn, or God was going to order it cancelled.
I dont know why I am feeling excited about it myself. Its as if something big and important is going to happen. Fifa World cup aside - am so looking fwd to seeing those gorgeous and not gorgeous men on my soon to be bought giant screen tv. Yet, that can't be all. I don't know what's coming. Or what I want to come. But whatever it is, I am waiting for it with open arms, and other parts of my anatomy if need be.
I am excited. I am so calm its unbelievable. Its like I am on some kind of tranquilizer. This is me for heaven's sake. End of last year I was stressed out I was ready to collapse and scream at the world. Suddenly, I am calm as, the little stream in my home village. I turn 45 next month. I don't know why 45 feels so - ominous? Important? Exciting. But it's the one birthday I am so looking fwd to for the firs time in my life. Even 40 didn't feel this interesting.
My son turns 16 in May. He will be able to drive me around after that - yeah!
My mum turns 75 in December. That's totally exciting.
Roll on 2010. Bengikulindile!
I dont know why I am feeling excited about it myself. Its as if something big and important is going to happen. Fifa World cup aside - am so looking fwd to seeing those gorgeous and not gorgeous men on my soon to be bought giant screen tv. Yet, that can't be all. I don't know what's coming. Or what I want to come. But whatever it is, I am waiting for it with open arms, and other parts of my anatomy if need be.
I am excited. I am so calm its unbelievable. Its like I am on some kind of tranquilizer. This is me for heaven's sake. End of last year I was stressed out I was ready to collapse and scream at the world. Suddenly, I am calm as, the little stream in my home village. I turn 45 next month. I don't know why 45 feels so - ominous? Important? Exciting. But it's the one birthday I am so looking fwd to for the firs time in my life. Even 40 didn't feel this interesting.
My son turns 16 in May. He will be able to drive me around after that - yeah!
My mum turns 75 in December. That's totally exciting.
Roll on 2010. Bengikulindile!
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