-E-
HOW THE WEST WAS WON
Tarzan's voice startles me. It was late, very late. Nearby some star crossed rooster was crowing even though it was 3:00 a.m. in the morning.
I was supposed to be sleeping. I had been writing. Now I was lying in bed. Thinking. Thinking. Unable to sleep. Lying quietly. Lying still. Thinking.
"Can't sleep, can you?"
I don't bother looking for him in dark. In fact, I raise my arm and cover my eyes.
"You know old chap, it seems to me your people have forgotten how the west was won. I'm talking about you Black Americans, is that what you're called this year? I do so want to be correct."
In the dark I hear pages rustling.
"Oh, it's changed. It's African Americans now. Well, that's romantic. Af - free - can? Really! You guys are afraid of Africa. You're like lions who were born in a zoo and have never been let loose in the wild. I don't mean to offend you, old boy, but you can't drink the water, find the food distasteful, and would always prefer to ride in a private car rather than walk or crowd into a bus. So what's African about you?"
I'm tired. Tired of thinking. Tired of looking through the wall of my eyeballs at people in the dust and knowing that those people are me, yet I am not fully comfortable with them. Tarzan is trying to rile me. I answer his question with a question.
"And what does any of that have to do with how the west was won?"
Tarzan smiles.
"Oh, it's fifty questions time is it? Well, I shall answer your questions one for one as you answer mine. Goose and gander. Fair enough?"
The rooster crows again. Tarzan smirks.
"I'll start with an easy riddle for you. Why does an African rooster crow at night?"
"Because day's work is never done. We can't stay up too late nor rise too early."
"That's plausible, but the real answer is simple: because he wants to. You fellows are always looking for some big picture answer. Sometimes the answer is very simple. You know what people do? They do exactly what they want to do."
I respond quickly, - And likewise, people don't do whatever it is they don't want to do, unless, of course they are forced. -
Our eyes engage each other. Neither of us blink. Finally, Tarzan raises his brandy sniffer.
"Cheers."
He throws back the entire shot.
"Shall we walk some, old chap?"
"Tarzan, I don't want to walk with you."
"Why, afraid you might learn something?"
"The only thing I want to learn from you is how to kill you."
Tarzan takes a seat, crosses his legs, looks toward the ceiling, and, after a few moments, begins speaking in a contemplative manner. "You know I sometimes stayed in the bush for years without seeing a White man and it didn't bother me."
"It wouldn't bother me if I went for the rest of my life without seeing a White man."
"I'm glad to hear you are feeling a bit better. You know you can't reduce everything to race."
"You should talk. Isn't that a little like the pot calling the kettle..."
"All I meant old chap is that can you be yourself when you're living among people who are different from you?"
"You're assuming that Africa is different from me?"
"I'm not assuming anything. I was merely commenting on what the bush was like for me and wondering whether you're up to the challenge."
"Tarzan, why do you visit me and carry on these conversations, especially since you know I intend to kill you?"
Tarzan ignores me at first, then he crosses close to me, stands close enough that I can smell the peach brandy on his breath and looks me in the eye.
"The only reason I come is because you call."
Pause.
Someone knocks at the door. "Yes," I call out through the door. It's one of the workers awaiting breakfast instructions. Have Tarzan and I been talking that long? I open my eyes and there's light in the room. I must have fallen asleep. I tell the man what Nia and I want for breakfast and inform him that we will be down in forty-five minutes.
I begin thinking again about how the west was won and suddenly realize what Tarzan was saying. In order to win the west you have to leave where you were born and settle somewhere in the west. In order to win we will have to go to the battleground, live in the bush. Walk deep into Africa's night. Alone and go for years without...
"Now, you're getting the hang of it. You just might catch on yet. See you in your dreams."
I look up. I thought Tarzan was gone. Tarzan winks at me and nonchalantly walks through the wall.
***
No man can return to anything he has destroyed. That is why Tarzan can not return to Africa. The people Tarzan encountered when he first arrived no longer exist. Tarzan destroyed them.
Tarzan the ruler can not return to Africa.
But of course, Tarzan can and will continue to frequent Africa as an investor such as a hotel owner, or as a physician and industrial engineer, as a missionary caring for the bodies and souls of the poor and/or an educator working to insure future skills, as a mandated economic consultant turning the screws on the economy, and certainly as a technical advisor teaching everything from computers to catering, tourist services to office administration. Nevertheless, it will not be like before.
The innocence Tarzan first encountered is finished. First, some of us met the Europeans man to man, warrior facing explorer. Then king to ambassador and merchant. And, as slavery progressed, eventually, we all -- woman and child, as well as man -- had to face them. Slave to master. Conquest to conqueror. Raped to rapist. It was then that we submitted, physically overpowered and, eventually, also psychologically overpowered. Then the Whites graduated from men, from conquerors, to gods; their far off countries became "heaven" in comparison to the colonial hell we suffered in our homelands. Then the crulest cut of all, the colonialists handpicked and educated our leaders. Everything has been shit since then.
But even though we still suffer from that scenario, nevertheless, at least we know that the Whites are not gods and that we are not animals. The old myths Tarzan perpetuated are ruptured. Though a certain gullibility remains exploitable and though the effects of the myths linger, naive acceptance of the god=White myth is done. The magic of the myths is no more.
We Africans have a better understanding of ourselves as a whole because Tarzan forced us to recognize that we had a commonness that was not so apparent to us before Tarzan's arrival. We never conceived of all of us being Africans until after Tarzan made it impossible for us to ignore both the problems and the potential of embracing ourselves. Before Tarzan we were Ashanti or Ibo, Mandingo or Fulani, but not Africans. Zulu and Ndebele, Tutsi and Hutu. But not Africans as a common denominator.
Indeed, the sad truth is that we often considered each other the enemy. Some of us even mistook Tarzan for an ally against our neighbors whom we had known for ages, our neighbors whom we regarded as age old enemies. How naive we were. Thank you Tarzan. You cured some of us forever of our innocence with respect to our alienation from each other.
Of course old myths die hard. Even after the spell is broken the effects linger on. We are still struggling with being our own worse enemy. Still clawing through the cocoon of colonized thinking that wrapped around and continues to smother the very African identity which emerges from it. Like the worm called a caterpillar, after a gestation period of confinement within the shell of colonialism, in order to be the beautiful butterfly we are destined to become, we must break through the cocoon or else the cocoon will become our coffin. We will literally abort unless we break free.
Even after all we have suffered (or is it because of all we have suffered), there is a pretty steep price to pay for our freedom. After many, many years of struggle, we still ain't free. Most of the original freedom fighters have been discarded, the original leaders discredited or forgotten. Toppled in coups. Replaced in elections. Brought down by economic conundrums. Or something.
Its almost like the whole African world is caught captive on a slave ship and fated to toss and twist forever on the churning seas of the Atlantic. The bulk of us enchained below. A thin professional crust entertained on deck. And Tarzan's kin at the wheel.
So now I am returning to Africa with a bundle of questions for it, for myself, for my survivors on the Black side of the water. Chief among these questions is what does it mean to break free?
Freedom, I believe, is not a thing to possess but a process we must struggle through each and every day if the sacrifices of slavery are to ever bear fruit. Is sankofa (the Akan bird faced backward but moving forward) our destiny?
We Pan Africanists in the diaspora are guinea fowl searching yard. We peck the corn but not every kernel is eaten. Sankofa. We must retrieve but not every tradition should be carried into the future.
I have come both to embrace Africa and to criticize Africa. To embrace myself and criticize myself.
To embrace, to hold, to touch.
To critique, to question, to make choices.
We will inspect and peck, but not all the food of this ancient ground will be eaten.
It is such a funny thought: I am not returning to Africa, I am going forward into Africa. Going forward. Steady. Forward. Forward. For what?
***
(Excerpt form the PANAFEST Opening Address by Ghana's President, Flt-Lt. J. J. Rawlings at Cape Coast, Ghana on Saturday, December 10, 1994.)
However long you may have been away, we know that many of you yearn to be reunited with your ancestral home. I assure you on this happy occasion that a warm welcome awaits you here. Our traditional extended family has ample room for all its members.
In bringing this family together again, I hope that we will experience more than just an exercise in nostalgia for the lost years. It should strengthen our determination to work together for the development of Africa and raise the dignity of people of African descent.
The integrity of the family permeates every level of social, political and economic institutions as also does family disintegration. At this festival we are laying emphasis on strengthening the family because it is the building block of our societies.
Membership of a family implies more than a shared past. A family also looks to the future, and I trust that before PANAFEST '94 is over, links will have been forged which will lead to positive and practical action in uniting the extended African family in a purposeful drive into the future.
But we may also look at the African family in its narrower and generic context. For those of you in the diaspora, the separation and break-up of the family suffered by your ancestors centuries ago might have influenced your concept of the family.
More recently, the experiences of the slums, of inner city crime, the drug culture, the loss of parental control, the emphasis on material things, have also struck at the foundations of the family. The declaration of the International Year of the Family is an attempt by the world community to restore the dignity and integrity of the family.
Whilst in some of you, this has been a source of strength, self-discipline and motivation with which to confront the scourges of the modern world, in others it has led to cynicism, apathy and a penchant for finding scapegoats to blame our troubles on, instead of bravely facing up to our difficult circumstances and striving to improve our lot.
One of the most troubling aspects of this last reaction is the loss of respect for each other.
The African family here in Africa is also under serious threat. Some of the factors could be traced to the colonial period, when policies were introduced which laid siege on our traditional values.
The current urban drift also adds a further strain by destabilizing relationships in the rural areas through the easy association that pressures of city life impose on vulnerable new comers.
But much more disturbing is the bombardment of our young people by the international media, through TV, films, video, magazines, etc. with what can only be described as the lowest common denominator of international pseudo-culture.
The powerful international media message is about individualism, self-gratification, material values and a cynical lack of respect for any moral authority which stands in the way of the instant attainment of perceived wants.
Our traditional African values which define the responsibilities, duties and respect owed by the individual to the family and to the community, to the ancestors and to the land, are threatened by this flood of empty media hype served as the latest international trend, fashion or personal ideology.
My Brothers and Sisters, Nowadays there is so much talk about the world becoming a global village. Modern communication technology especially television is 'shrinking' the world and homogenizing its cultures. However that process has tended to either exclude or subjugate the cultures of our peoples.
We have to be honest to admit that distressing though this is, a good deal of these unproductive and sterile material which undermine the values and ideals of our youth originate from Western and Christian sources.
It is part of the purpose of PANAFEST '94 to challenge this picture of media imperialism and offer to the world the true African identity.
***
Our first evening in Ghana is spent at the DuBois Center. A friend of Stephanie Hughley told her she should check out a performance by the Pan African Orchestra. I first met Stephanie when she joined the National Black Arts Festival staff as artistic director in 1990 -- she's now on staff with the 1996 Cultural Olympiad. We are hanging together in Ghana.
The opening performance is by a traditional, predominately percussion music ensemble. They are good. In honor of the holiday season, they even do a rhythmically rich and melodically inventive version of Handel's "The Messiah."
The Pan African Orchestra follows. The instruments are all traditional African instruments, including a one string fiddle-like instrument which is bowed. There are twenty-some musicians. One row of musicians on wood flutes also double on traditional "horns" (the mmenson) and percussion, two string players, and a brace of percussionists. They file in like a European orchestra and remain standing until the conductor seats them. Instead of a baton the conductor wields an enchanting instrument.
"Televi" is a percussion instrument of the Ewe people of Ghana. It's basically two small balls, probably gourds, which have something inside so that they rattle when you shake them. The two balls are connected with twine. One ball is held in the palm of the hand and the other swings around the outside of the hand. As the free swinging ball wraps around the hand it clacks sharply as it makes contact with the ball that is held in the palm. At the same time the player shakes the ball that is held. So you have a shaking sound on the regular beats and the clacking on the down beats or the syncopated off beats, depending on how the televi is played. The conductor is ambidextrous and plays one in each hand as he directs the orchestra, his hands held shoulder high, shaking this swinging, percussive metronome.
The Pan African Orchestra reminds me of Wynton Marsalis' efforts at developing jazz as a classical music. The repertoire and styles unavoidably look backward in an effort to identify and preserve the high points of the historical musical development. In a similar manner, this ensemble uses traditional instruments, traditional themes, and attempts to perform them in a traditional manner faithful to the origins but also reflective of "high art" standards. The string instruments, for example, are tuned each time before playing. The overall sound is quiet swinging, even when full out percussive, they are never riotous. The overall effect is sonorous and contemplative.
Part of me admires and loves these and similar efforts to quantify and preserve the classical aspects of our traditional cultures. But unfortunately, the very process removes the communal dynamic. We sat and listened to a performance rather than participated in a ritualistic outpouring. Some of the flute players read from scores and all of the musicians were directed by a conductor who controlled the whole performance. No one danced, although I'm sure we could have (or, perhaps, should have) if we really wanted to. This aural archiving of the traditions is important, however, it is not the future of African music.
Over the two week period, I will hear the Pan African Orchestra three more times: between addresses at the opening of the colloquium, as a feature at one of the Cape Coast Castle performances, and at the closing program. Each time I enjoy them. But the question remains, this is past, what is the future? What are we headed forward toward?
Ironically, even though a major part of PANAFEST is a presentation of music and dance, most of the performances are either weak or incomplete -- incomplete because in far too many cases, the main headliners either don't show up or, when in the country, don't perform as scheduled. Based on my experience as a festival producer, I'm sure a great deal of the no shows are due to the fact that deposit moneys were not put in place early enough to guarantee the presence of headliners. I had looked forward to hearing artists such as Youssou N'Dour and Angelique Kidjo in an African setting.
One of "THE" headliners, Stevie Wonder underscores another weakness of the program. He actually arrives but does not perform at the major concert. (I learn later that he did perform on an untuned piano -- a piano tuner could not be found in time.) One unconfirmed report is that he did not finish the preparation of his music and equipment. I don't know what the real story is. but I do know that the majority of the performers are entertainers in the Western sense and project only a limited Pan African consciousness. I saw or heard no contemporary performances that were worth writing home about as exemplary of cutting edge new directions in African music.
The closing program featured a line up of musicians, most of whom were scheduled to perform at the gigantic 18-hour show but, for one reason or another, didn't get to perform. The personal highlight for me was a performance by a legendary Ghanaian highlife vocalist who seemed to be in his fifties or sixties. His set got people up and dancing to his topical songs, one of which welcomed us to Ghana and spoke about pulling the African family back together. His warmth and sincerity were matched by his musicianship and professionalism as a performer. Unfortunately, because there was no printed program and because my ear was unattuned to the emcee, I didn't catch this performer's name.
The two final performances were the negative highlights of the well intended but mismanaged closing program, which was in itself, already too long and meandering. The first climax was Kanda Bongo Man of Zaire with an exuberant display of soukous. His band, including a European keyboardist, was in top form. The drummer in particular was awesome as a percussionist and expert as a second vocalist.
Dressed in a red suit with a black sash and red Zorro hat, Kanda sang and dance with the fervor of a true "soul man." He sweated and gyrated. He funked it up and dropped some pelvis swivels on us that left no doubt about his prowess as a love man. He also had a female backup vocalist whom he did not feature and dancers whom he did.
Two African female dancers came out and proceeded to put their backfields in furious motion. A follow-up number featured the larger of the duo and she had muscles controlling her muscles, able to ripple her bared stomach and micro move her ample buttocks. Later they did a comic routine dressed as White women with bustles. Then, out came a "real" White woman as a third dancer and this combination of pelvis thrusting feminity proceed to do an even more "exotic" floor show. All this time Kanda Bongo Man is whooping with delight and directing the female traffic, occasionally joining them in a chorus of twists and shouts. Needless to say, the whole dance floor is filled. Each song is met with rapturous applause. A thunderous ovation demands an encore. Out come the dancers and there is now a second White woman completely the female zebra in heat routine. They put Raquel Welch and Paula Abdul to shame.
Oh what a show!
What it all had to do with Pan Africanism I'm not sure. But, that's entertainment!
The anticlimax was provided by Princess, a contemporary urban music vocalist from the USA. She can sing, but coming on just before midnight, after five hours of a wide range of performances and presentations (the obligatory thanks and awards to sponsors and short speeches from dignitaries) and immediately behind Kanda Bongo Man was the worse possible slot. Moreover, she didn't have her own band. A male cohort served as bandleader directing a Ghanaian contemporary music ensemble which did a competent job of serving up slinky, funky backbeats and melodies. Princess, dressed in a tight, hip-hugging, semi-sexy, Black outfit, did the in vogue, gospel-voiced, apolitical, ingenue routine currently popular in the States -- a routine which Diana Ross propelled to both its apogee and nadir. It was embarrassingly inappropriate as the closing performance at PANAFEST.
Princess, in all fairness to her, probably really wanted to sing at PANAFEST, and undoubtedly has genuine feelings for the goals and aspirations of PANAFEST and African people in general. The rub is that, politically, African Americans are underdeveloped. At this moment, abetted by the willing compliance of young African American entertainers desperate to develop their fledgling careers, the state of Black music in the States has sunk to an abysmal level of apolitical non-relevance and mindless sexual hedonism. Princess is far from the worse of the lot. She has talent and, in time, may even become a major artist. But, the question is direction.
In the United States, and elsewhere in the diaspora, there are literally thousands of socially relevant and aesthetically exciting artists who would have loved to perform at PANAFEST. Clearly artists such as Sweet Honey In The Rock should have headed the U.S. delegation of artists. But the problem is not just the state of the entertainment industry but also the orientation of those of us in charge of programs such as this. We go for the "big names" and for people who work in the vein of the big name performers. We are invariably disappointed, but we have no one to blame but ourselves for not closely examining our criterion for including artists.
On the other hand, PANAFEST was able to put itself financially into the black by selling television and video rights, and, no doubt, a lucrative deal could not have been closed without the presence of "big name" entertainers.
***
African Americans are a dangerous fire. Africa needs our light but the burning must be controlled, otherwise, as the examples of Stevie Wonder and Princess illustrate, instead of being illuminated, our hosts will be burnt.
I pay very little attention to most Black pop videos, the flaunting of light skinned, barely clothed, women. The macho posturing. The gaudy and glitzy ostentatiousness. The fantasy settings: sleek cars, fabulously laid out homes and apartments. The fancy, hi-tech accouterments and personal accessories. The drinking, dancing, drugging. The modern day minstrel shows.
When I see these same videos in Ghana I am forced to pay attention.
When you see these videos in Ghana, what you see is cultural imperialism in Black face. You see shamelessly misleading adverts of fantasy masquerading as reality. And all brought to you with a beat. The baddest beats in the world. Beats so bad even the drums of Africa are incorporating the African American backbeat.
Traditional African drumming eschews the thumping backbeat. The rhythms are both more complex and more varied. But there's still nothing like basic African American funk whether watered down into Western pop or dropped full force, uncut in the various manifestations ranging from the jumping jive of Louis Jordan to the digitized rumble of phat rap samples and beat loops.
There is a battle going on for the souls of Black folk, and unfortunately albeit not inconsistently with our history, people of African descent are on both sides of the battleline.
When you get to Africa, turn on a television and see one of these 90s videos, you see a lot more than you do sitting home on the urban plantations of America.
Imagine yourself explaining the cultural significance of any random half hour of BET soul videos. Explaining the meaning of this madness to people for whom this is their main contact with African Americans. Fellow Africans who want to claim us as sisters and brothers. What do you say?
-F-
ONCE YOU'VE BEEN THERE.
I used to wonder how could one ship load of Portuguese or English be enough to conquer mighty, mighty nations. I don't wonder any longer. The answer is obvious once you have been there.
But you must be in Ghana, on the coast where the English were, pass through the five walls, the triple gates, walk through the stark, hard stone courtyard of the 15th century Portuguese fort which served as a slave castle -- a holding place for the exportation of enslaved Africans. Be there and feel the weight of walls, the thickness of canon, the cold iron of twenty pound (or heavier) shot, descend those steps and shiver listening to the echo of your footsteps in the clammy cavern, hear the waves splintering on the rocks with a poltergeist roar that pounded the last sound of Africa into your ancestors' woolly heads.
After you have experienced the soft tones of the gentle Ghanaian people, eyes wide, men holding hands, women leaning against each other, everyone touched. After being there, you know.
Once you have been there you will know why, after he secured a toe hold on the coast, we never stood a chance against Tarzan. A thousand spears could never have destroyed a single fort door. And we were just too humane to ever assume that someone would destroy our world. Even today, without airplanes it would be hard to take the fort, especially if the soldiers inside were better armed, ruthless and under the illusion that you were not even human.
And especially if Lord Greystone's predecessors had collaborators: kings who sold. Merchants, mercenaries, and middle men who directly profiteered off the slave trade. Guides and translators who traitored.
Our PANAFEST guide now is a young Ghanaian woman named Ivana -- yes, a Soviet name. Someone said to her "that's Russian?" And she said "yes"; but she should have said "Soviet" from when the communists worked in solidarity with the liberation movements. Sure they had their own agenda and were pushing their own philosophy, but they helped when the West refused. Refused even medicine and clothing to the liberation movements. Or worse yet, the West sent aid to emerging states, aid which was a Trojan bomb wrapped in IMF (International Monetary Fund) total tinkering with a country's economy. Tinkering at the level of a stern pa-pa parceling out fifteen cents daily allowance with a solemn lecture that if you buy any candy, even a penny's worth, all of the dole will be cut off immediately. And you better not get caught hanging with the wrong crowd.
Structural readjustment is what they call this tinkering. Young college trained economists from the West are the de facto regulators of large sectors of the economy -- including the national airline company.
We flew in on a leased, Ghana Airlines jumbo jet. Even though native Ghanaian pilots are available, the terms of the lease dictate that certain experienced ("certain experienced" is a euphemism for "White" or White acculturated) pilots and crew members be used. In the international leagues you don't even get to choose your own team players -- that's the essence of structural adjustment.
In Cape Coast a young vendor explains that Western clothing is dumped on Ghana as part of IMF trade regulations. African clothing is more expensive than the Western commodities. So generally, the people acquire the cheapest apparel available. Even so you still see a lot of Ghanaians in traditional garb. IMF makes it difficult for Africans to dress in African styles.
Ivana may or may not know about the terms of foreign aid, about the IMF and about the Soviets. Right now she and a fellow guide, also a young woman from Accra, want to see the slave castle. Ivana had tasks to complete and by the time she got to the castle, the dungeon doors were locked. I will ask Ivana later why she has that name.
Ivana was born into a family of priestesses of traditional religion. She does not plan to become a priestess but she explained the whole ritual to Stephanie as we stood in an open square near the fort in downtown Accra. The kings of the area were there enthroned beneath gold encrusted umbrellas. Linguists whom you must speak through to talk to the king -- assuming that you can even get that close -- sit holding wooden staffs which are topped with solid gold emblems. I spot the sanfoka symbol atop one of the staffs and know that is the symbol for "return and fetch it." From a distance of twenty feet or so, even I can see that real gold has a shine that is deeper than glitter. Real gold is impressive, especially when thick and intricately carved. Or so it seems to my untutored eye. Immediately, I reflect on the African American penchant for wearing gold rings, necklaces, bracelets and earrings.
This is the night before we visit the slave castle on Cape Coast which is a long drive outside of Accra. This is our second night in Accra. The first night we went to the DuBois center for a concert. Actually this is the beginning of the third day because it is shortly after midnight and we have been told that there will be a special ceremony, an atonement ritual in which the chiefs will beg the ancestors for forgiveness because of what some of them did in collaborating with the slavers.
Even though it is video taped, this is not simply a staged event. It is in a poor part of town. There are no politicians around making speeches. There is no Christian preacher beginning with a prayer to "our lord".
What is here are hundreds of poor Ghanaians watching as their chiefs announce the purpose of this gathering. A bull is led out, later a goat. They will be sacrificed. Three different sets of drummers.
Other than the chiefs and the priestesses, no one is dressed up. People wear whatever they wore yesterday, whatever they will wear later today. Whatever they will wear tomorrow.
They stand in the dirt. Some laugh in the background. Some are somber as they watch the ceremony. And as they watch us, their American brothers and sisters.
Although the event was impressive, it really was not for the benefit of the diaspora. This was a necessary step toward facing up to the painful negative realities of our history. No concerted effort was made to make sure that all of the diaspora attendees to PANAFEST were brought to the ceremony. It was not held in the national stadium or the national theatre. In fact there was not even a bus to bring us to this field in the poor part of town.
This was a step that the continent needed to take. I watched from a distance and understood that although it was specifically about the slave trade, this purification ritual was not about me as a "diaspora survivor/descendent" of that trade. This was about those who had collaborated in sending me away.
What was most interesting to me is that this was the traditional chiefs speaking to the masses and not the contemporary elected officials speaking to the educated. I knew that the traditional chiefs needed to atone, but I question why weren't the "contemporary chiefs" also present to assure the people and themselves that they would not fall victim to a reoccurence of this historic collaboration.
Until repatriation of the diaspora is the law of every African state, and especially of West African countries, the betrayal will not have been fully reversed. Just as they sent us away, they must bring us back, otherwise our return will be seen as a threat and resentments will abound. The reintegration of the family that was torn asunder is no simple task. In fact it is emotionally taxing. Sometimes, like when I am standing there, one a.m. in the morning watching "them" slit the throat of a sacrificial bull, I find pause and wonder just how much I want to return if this is what I am returning to.
Part of me is in the crowd of simple people, looking at the chiefs, listening to the words, looking at us, watching the ritual and trying to sort it all out. At least five or six people say to me in broken English, welcome home brother. Unlike the chiefs, the poor people intuitively know that our positions are interchangeable. It could have been them in the dungeon, and now returning centuries later ignorant of the mother tongue, a stranger in my motherland.
Part of me is with the dispassionate observation of the media cameras angling for a better or more dramatic shot, taking it all in indiscriminately without any filter other than the consciousness of Tarzan the video director dictating what should be observed and remembered and what did not matter. Stephanie and Nia did not bring their cameras because they thought this was going to be a sacred ceremony. They were very disappointed when they saw the media video equipment. The world has changed so rapidly, Africa's growing pains are illuminated, and everything takes place within the public glare. Africa has no privacy.
Tarzan spends most of his time looking at the chiefs, observing the rituals, talking to an interpreter who explains what's going on. Very little of Tarzan's footage is of the people. Nobody translates what they are saying to each other.
And there is another tortured part of me on that killing ground, my throat slit. Even though I do not want to think it, I have had enough experience with Black political leaders to know that not only would they sell us out, but they will even fake elaborate rituals of seeming sincerity if they think that is what it will take to maintain their power. I try not to make a judgment about these men whom I never met.
At one point there is a delay. I find out later that Ivana told Stephanie the purification ritual required the participation of the women but the chiefs had not involved the women from the beginning of the program, even though the priestesses were there dressed in white.
When the men finally got around to asking the women to participate, the women first said "no." After giving them a piece of their mind, the elder sisters relented and the ritual went on.
Like, I said, even when they are sincere, sometimes politicians are still only thinking about themselves. Perhaps, like that bull kicking in the dust long after its throat had been slit and its blood had been gathered in a pan, and used in the ceremony; maybe, like that bull whose carcass was carted off on a flatbed wagon drawn to the field by two young boys, a cart whose two wheel flaps had pictures of a brown Jesus on them; perhaps like that bull, like that goat, perhaps I was simply being used as a sacrificial vehicle to assuage the guilt of these traditional politicians.
It may sound totally cynical to view myself in this way, but the truth is, at some point it crossed my mind.
The truth is that Black politicians have a history of selling us out.
The truth is that I was in the dungeon, thanks in part to the chiefs.
The truth is it will take more than the slaughter of one bull and one goat to account for that.
—kalamu ya salaam