To be blunt, the fact that Mwai Kibaki gave Kenya a public holiday in celebration of Barack Obama’s election is ridiculous to me.  I know that most of the world is thrilled with the results of the US presidential elections.  Here in Chicago, the excitement was and continues to be palpable.  The night before the elections, I walked down Michigan Avenue and breathed in the air of anticipation.  Folks were smiling nervously, rushing to their destinations, waiting for history to blossom.  And it did.  On Tuesday night, we watched as the Obama family took the stage and the president-elect gave his glorious victory speech.  I sat on the edge of my sofa and wiped a tear or two as I smiled at the screen.  I was overwhelmed by this beautiful sight.  Implications for  generations of people in the United States and around the world are far reaching.  Apart from numerous domestic celebratory calls, I received so many calls and texts from  friends and family in West Africa.  I know it’s as much a triumph for Africans as it is for the rest of the world. (However I can’t help wondering whether the African exuberance would have been as intense if Obama’s father had not been African.  I am too familiar with the frail and shaky bridge that exists between Africans and African-Americans, but that is food for another bloggish thought.)  When CNN flashed the ecstatic crowds in Kenya that night, I understood the elation. After all, the late father of the president-elect was Kenyan.  But then I heard that the president of Kenya,  Mwai Kibaki, declared November 6th a public holiday and my heart fell.  What this means is a whole day of lost productivity in a country still recovering from its own post-election unrest, continued ethnic tensions, harsh poverty, and a serious problem of HIV/AIDS.  To me, this public holiday was not a bright idea.  Instead it sheds light on the level of judgement of Kenyan leadership.  Even the US did not declare a public holiday.  Why did Kibaki feel the need to call this holiday for Obama’s victory?  What does he expect in return?  What message does this send the Kenyan people about the expectations they should build on the Obama presidency? All in all, an unreasonable action.

Comedian D.L. Hughley has a new show on CNN.  When I first heard about it I was both curious and anxious.  It is a major coup for a black comedian to actually have a show on CNN.  CNN is seen all over the world.  I often marvel at how quickly my family in Nigeria get the US news, even before I do.  If there is a tornado somewhere in the midwest, my father-in-law calls from Nigeria to see if we are fine, ever before we hear the news.  So CNN has a major reach.  To my knowledge, since Bernard Shaw, this would be the first really major African American to host his own talk show on the channel.

The first thing that I wondered was why was this slot not given to a serious African American news/talk person like Tavis Smiley?  If you ever get a chance to listen to or watch Smiley on NPR or PBS, you know how seasoned and smooth he is as an interviewer.  And there are others like him, such as Gwen Ifill, who consistently does such a great job with the vice-presidential debates.  So why did CNN go with an African American comedian?  I suppose the success of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert may have something to do with it.  Another African American, David Greer, just premiered his own show, “Chocolate News,” on Comedy Central.  I haven’t seen it but I read a review that said it was funny, though not quite as funny as Stewart and Colbert.  Yet again, the standard has been set by the mainstream and African Americans are judged on those standards.  That notwithstanding, the relevant point here is that these are comedy shows. People watch them and know they are infused with a heavy dose of humor and sarcasm.

This brings me to the reason why I was anxious about Hughley’s CNN show.  The CNN audience is very different from the Comedy Central audience.  For the most part, people tune in to CNN for the news, which comes with a very occasional smattering of chuckles provided by the dry back-and-forth between the anchors at the tail end of a show.  I’m familiar with D.L. Hughley’s humor.  It is neither occasional nor dry.  It is sharp, direct, cynical, and often irreverent.  Unlike cross-over comedians like Bill Cosby or Eddie Murphy, you have to know Hughley’s frame of reference to get the hilarity of his jokes.  Would a general CNN audience be able to access the context that undergirds his work?

I came across the show, “D.L. Hughley Breaks the News,” over the weekend while I was flipping through channels.  There he was, with a look on his face that immediately tickled me, but I was nervous.  He had some serious guests, among them former Bush press secretary, Scott McClellan.  Hughley asked McClellan to explain something further because he – Hughley – only had a GED.  I laughed.  So did McClelan, but he seemed a little uncomfortable.  I’m sure he was wondering if it was “PC” for a white dude to be laughing with a black dude about his apparent lack of higher education.  Then Hughley made a joke to the effect that the country must be in really bad shape if they are getting ready to vote in a black president.  Again, this is funny; but for the straight-laced CNN audience, how literally would they take Hughley?  Most of them don’t know of the long history of black comedy where black folks can laugh at themselves.  I wondered, what if they take him literally?  Seriously, I know a lot of folks, both here and abroad, who don’t get African American humor.

So, in the end I am left still nervous about Hughely on CNN.  I’m glad he got a major show on a major network but I worry about how easily a mainstream audience will accept him.  Television shows come and go rather swiftly (just ask Arsenio Hall!).  So, regarding D.L. Hughley and CNN, we’ll just have to wait and see.

I contend that there is a difference between “hip-hop fans” and “hip-hop headz”. The fans enjoy the music that is readily available on BET, MTV, and whatever “Hot 92” FM station rules the air waves in any given city. The “headz” go deeper, seek out the stuff that may not make it to the top of the Billboard charts. The fans listen to hip-hop; the headz love hip-hop.

So here I go with a statement that many “fans” might take issue with. The “hip-hop headz” may agree. I think Nas is brilliant. I will even go so far as to say that he may be one of the greatest MCs of all time.  The “fans” reading this will insist that Lil’ Wayne is greater, that TI is the king, and that Young Joc is what’s hot right now. I vehemently disagree.

If “hot” means great beats and meaningful lyrics, Nas has been consistently hot. In my mind, lyrics in black music must do something more than rhyme. The “art for art’s sake” argument cannot suffice for black folk because they have always been on the periphery of social and economic power.  Of all people, our art must inspire, tell our stories, do something.  The music that Nas creates always does something.

His new album is untitled presumably because of all the upheaval that was generated when he said he would call his album “Nigger”.  I’m sure that Nas’ pans were complicated by all the publicity surrounding the Don Imus hullabaloo, followed by the Oprah scolding of language in hip-hop, and the NAACP burial of the N-word. When I heard he was planning to use the N-word as the title, I grimaced thinking he might be looking for a way to sell albums.  What definition of “nigger” was he going for, I wondered.  Was he going to insist that the word has been redefined and reclaimed and therefore, all good? I worried.  With a title like that, he was sure to get so much publicity and curiosity, people would go out and buy the album.  Was this the ulterior motive?

But then Nas pulled back and decided to let the album go untitled. When it came out I saw the brilliance of the artist. The cover art shows the back of a black man with markings of the whip that marked African slaves. The lashes form the letter “N”. The image reminds one of the pain and evil of slavery.  It conveys the very etymology of the word “Nigger” and leaves no doubt as to the meaning that Nas puts to the word.

When I listened to the album, the MC’s genius was confirmed. Here is a thoughtful artist, one that walks in the ancient footsteps of the West African griots, those praise-singers and story-tellers who reminded the people of their histories.  On his song, “Hero”, he speaks of the universal apartheid that makes one set of rules for black artists.  He says that the censors should “try telling Bob Dylan, Bruce [Springsteen] or Billy Joel not to sing what’s in their soul.” In the track “Yall my Ni**as” he speaks knowledgably about the harsh historical legacies of a colonial map that has harmed African people for decades. Every track on this cd is outstanding but I especially recommend “NI**ER.” and “Black President.”

I appreciate the fact that Nas seems to lack the usual crime-infested drama that accompanies too many rappers. But here is the smartest thing about Nas.  In spite of his relatively media-boring persona, his career has evolved in such a way that he is now mainstream.  He is not quite as widespread as I would like but he is definitely more accessible than he used to be.  The “fans” don’t have an excuse for not listening to Nas.  

Recently, the New York Times ran a cynical piece about the King of Swaziland. When we think of African kingdoms, we usually think of  them with pride. After all, these kingdoms are evidence of how Africans ruled in ordered splendor before the invasion of European colonization.  So, I was irritated when I saw the article in the New York Times. None of the Africans I know like to see our people ridiculed by the western press. 

But alas, I had to agree wholeheartedly with the skepticism of the article. This month, the  40-year old King Mswati III, spent millions of dollars on his birthday celebrations.  Forbes has listed him as one of the wealthiest monarchs in the world.  He has 13 wives, each of whom received a brand new BMW and palace when he married them.  Apparently, eight lucky wives flew to Dubai to shop for their weddings.  A few months ago on MTV – or was it VH1 – one of the king’s daughters was listed as one of the wealthiest young monarchs in the world (along with Prince William and Harry of England.)

I have two questions:  First of all – never mind that he is a king – why does this one man have 13 wives?  Seriously. I wonder about the self-esteem level of those thirteen women. What were the 12th and the 13th wives thinking when they said yes?  And does the 13^th think she will be the last?  He’s only 40 years old.  The man could keep going on and on.  Some years ago, the king was ill.  The reports were that he was stressed and overworked.  Keeping thirteen wives happy and fulfilled is bound to stress any man, I imagine.

The second, more important question is this:  Why is he living so lavishly when Swaziland is one of the poorest countries in Africa with some of the highest rates of HIV/AIDS infections and deaths.  The life expectancy in Swaziland is about 35 years.  I suppose the real question is this:  what is the condition of a leader’s conscience when he and his family live so well on the nations money, yet the people are dying of poverty?  What does the king say to himself when he is alone at night and has time to contemplate on life?  I guess there are no such contemplative times – his thirteen wives probably keep him well away from the rigor of quiet nighttime self-reflection.

Everybody looks good in a black church.  Folks dress up and come out, everything ironed and polished.  Nails look shiny and colorful and hair is glossy and freshly done.  I appreciate the care that we give to our appearance.  I know that it is not a prerequisite to worshipping God in spirit and truth, but it does make me feel good to see us all dressed up.  It reminds me of church at home – Nigeria – where people dress up too.  So I sit in church every Sunday and enjoy the view.  But my eyes invariably shift to the heads in front of me.  My eyes go down one row and up another.  I try to calculate the percentage of women who “wear” their own hair.

These days, I am distracted by my hair calculations.  Why, I wonder, are there more black women with false hair than black women happy in their own hair?  I see long Pocahontas-like black hair, curly ringlets worthy of little Shirley Temple, short spiky bone-straight hair, horse-tail pony-tails – the variety is impressive.  But for me, they all say that we, as black women, are just not content with the hair we have.  The argument that we cannot do anything different with our hair does not hold water with me.  We can wear cornrows, afros, braids, afropuffs, dreadlocks, and we can even straighten and curl the hair we have (although this last option often takes one down a slippery road to baldness and then to wigs and weaves).  There seems to be some urgency out there that pushes us to cover our own hair up with synthetic adornments.  Are we chasing a secret fantasy?  In donning these wigs and weaves, what characteristics do we hope to portray?  Do we hope that people will suspect we have European blood somewhere in our family tree?  Have we bought into the global narrative that the beauty of other women is better than our own?  I only ask these questions because all the wigs and weaves out there are copies of European, Asian, and Latina women’s hair.  The texture of these wigs is never that of black folk.  If you see an afro wig out there, it is usually marketed to the Halloween crowd.

 And why is it that the East Asians (Chinese and Koreans) have the monopoly on this market? If you want to get the best variety of “hair”, you must find a beauty supply shop in a predominantly black neighborhood.  These shops are usually owned by Asians.  I know a black woman who tried to get into the market and could not compete with the Asians.  How did the Asians come to find out that black folk around the world would be ready to spend millions of dollars on this false hair stuff?  What does this tell them about the self-esteem of black women?  I sometimes wonder if they snigger when the black women come in stroking the sleek wigs and trying on pieces that look ridiculously unnatural. 

 And yes, this is a global market.  Shipments of wigs and weaves find their way from Asia to Africa too.  When I first started wearing my hair natural and then switched to locs, I got more grief from Africans than I did from Americans.  Recently, a Nigerian friend tossed her own long tresses and told me that if I was at home, they would have to send me to join a religious cult because my hairstyle is not worthy of a woman of high society.

 This hair issue is just a small part of a much bigger problem.  Last weekend, the 6 year-old daughter of some African friends of mine was watching “The Cheetah Girls” with my daughters.  She was excited about two of the three stars of the show.  When I asked her why she did not like the third character who is a black girl, this little African girl told me in a matter of fact way, “She is not pretty because she is not white.”  I rest my case.

I happened to catch the beginning of the Miss Universe pageant on television tonight.  My children glanced up at the screen when the contestants from Nigeria, Ghana, and Tanzania and some of the Caribbean islands were announced.  These were some lovely black girls who stood out amongst the 80 participants.    Then they introduced the judges and my heart sank.  Not one of the judges was black. But I thought, Hey, this is 2008. Maybe these judges think a little more broadly than back in the day. But then they announced the 15 finalists and I realized that things have not changed much.  The only African to make it into the top 15 was the South African girl, a lovely colored girl.  The other girl who had some black blood in her was Miss USA. Neither of these girls is dark-skinned.  So I am left rather frustrated, angry that not one of the darker-skinned girls made the short list. I caution myself against over-sensitivity.  Perhaps these particular black girls just weren’t smart or talented enough?  Perhaps - but let’s keep it real.  Looks are the most important element in these pageants.  I thought the black girls were beautiful.  But as they say, “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.”  None of the beholders - the judges - seem to value dark skin.  Many of the finalists were from Central and South America, home to thousands of people of African descent.  None of the beautiful Latina finalists was black.  Interesting.  So why is this called “Miss Universe” when the Universe is not represented in this competition?  This show is watched all over the world.  What message does this send to little girls with dark skin who do not have that long straight flowing hair.  This is not a new concern.  It is an old concern and it seems to be never-ending.  This just means that we must work harder, speak louder, to show our black daughters that although the universe says otherwise, they are indeed beautiful. 

I ran into a Kenyan couple last weekend at a party in Chicago.  I thought I was being gracious when I mentioned to them how excited they must be to see Barak Obama do so well in the US presidential primaries.  To my utter amazement, they eyed me suspiciously.  So I persisted, “You know, he is half Kenyan.”  They vehemently responded, “No.  He is American!”  “But his father was Kenyan,” I stammered.  They huffed and puffed, “Well, he would do well to forget about that and identify as simply an American.”  I was speechless! 

I had never come across Africans who were so unwilling to claim a successful son of their soil!  For instance, I’ve watched Nigerians puff their chests with pride at the mere mention of Seal, Sade, or Akeem Olajuwon, even though some of these international stars hardly acknowledge Nigeria as home.  I’m sure folks from Benin and Senegal are equally proud of actor Djimon Hounsou and R&B singer Akon respectively.  So this encounter with the Kenyans was astounding.  Obama is no mere sports figure or entertainer.  He’s running – rather well - for the most powerful job in the world.  Why did this Kenyan couple not jump for joy at my suggestion that he was sort of one of them?

The man must have seen the shocked look on my face because he finally said, “Well, you know his father was Luo.  Those Luos are claiming him.  If Obama was nothing, they would not want to have anything to do with him.”  He said this with a very slight smirk.  His wife nodded vigorously. 

I now understood and was saddened.  This couple is Kikuyu.  Over the past year, we have seen the deeply rooted tensions between the Luo and the Kikuyu come to the surface.  The hostilities are so strong now that this Kikuyu couple would rather erase Obama’s Kenyan-ness than concede that he has Luo blood.  I insisted that Obama was part Kenyan but they refused to budge.  In their minds, the fact that his father was Luo expunged his Kenyan identity.  This is a fundamental African problem.  Many of us see ourselves more in terms of ethnicity than in terms of nationality.  This does not have to be a bad thing.  It could be a thing of pride and purpose if we could neatly complement each other.  However, our visions are fragmented and our destinations are paved with bitterness and hostility.

As I struggled to reason with this Kikuyu couple, I realized that this was an argument that would only frustrate and depress me.  I finally shrugged and changed the topic.

A student of mine was wondering aloud one afternoon.  She wondered about the different rules and standards to which black and white folks had to live up to.  She says, for instance, that it is fine for black folks to say “I’m proud to be black” but when white folks say “I’m proud to be white” people get uncomfortable.  She says that whites seem racist when they proclaim pride in their heritage but when blacks do the same, they are considered regal and confident.  It seems that as we have crossed over to the new millennium, racial equality sometimes plays out in a rather imbalanced way.

All the talk of reverse-racism in the US means that we are always checking ourselves to see if we ourselves, so often the victims of racism, are free from that same sin.  For instance, often when I write, I have to be careful with using the word “black” to refer to people of African descent.  I always want to capitalize the “B”.  But whenever I use the word “white” I am never tempted to capitalize the “W”.  What does this say about me?  And when I remind myself that it seems unfair to say “Black” and “white”, another part of me says there is so much historical power in “Black” that we have earned the right to capitalize the B.  I remain uncomfortable though.  So, to solve the dilemma I usually just use lower case for both words.  Keep them equal, I tell myself.  But they are never equal. 

Recently, Republican congressman Geoff Davis had to apologize to Barack Obama for saying, “That boy’s finger does not need to be on the [nuclear] button.”  Of course the worst part of this statement is not “the button” but “the boy.”  What is more offensive is not the reference to Obama’s foreign policy abilities but the painful historical memories of referring to a black man as a boy.  Appalling.  Congressman Davis apologized profusely.  But here’s the flip side:  Last night I was watching HBO boxing with my husband.  In typical fashion, the weeks leading up to the fight were filled with trash talk from both fighters, which HBO gleefully aired.  Bernard Hopkins, a black man, said he would never let this “white boy” (Joe Calzaghe) beat him.  If Calzaghe had called Hopkins a “black boy” HBO would have had to edit that out, for sure.  They did not think twice when it was the other way round.  

So back to my student’s concern.  How healthy, really, are race relations when one group has earned the right to “Say it Loud, I’m Black and Proud” while the other group seems uncomfortable in their own acclamations of ethnic pride.  If all is well, and race has been erased, and we can stomp proudly into a free and equal American dream, why do we still tiptoe?

The fact that most Haitians live well below the poverty level should baffle us all. It should make us sit up and wonder how it is that such a proud nation, with such a revolutionary history, that started off as such a leader in the African Diaspora has fallen to this level. An article I read last week reminded me that today, there are many Haitians that are so poor and hungry that they make cookies out of dirt, salt, and a little oil.

This is tragic. My focus is not really on how Haiti has reached this stage. Of course, there are all sorts of theories about how US foreign policy and old French powers have interfered with the democracy that has limped along in Haiti. There are other theories about corrupt leadership. There are elements of truth in all of these ideas. My real focus is the present. How is it that the most powerful countries in the world have allowed this to happen? If the powers can spend billions of dollars removing a tyrant in the middle east, surely these billions of dollars could have been employed to help get rid of the tyrant of poverty in a small country like Haiti. I’m not talking about the World Bank or IMF. The debilitating effects of their “help” on the people of a country in need is legendary.

So now, more and more, I am coming to the realization that we cannot keep looking to the outside for salvation. Those we think should help have other priorities. So the real solution for countries like Haiti must come from within. Last week hungry Haitians, finally frustrated and fed up, stormed the palace and rioted. Today, the senate voted to dismiss the prime minister. I’m anxious to see what happens next. I’m eager to see if Haitians will finally succeed in pulling themselves up, regardless of what their wealthy neighbors do (or do not do) for them.

I’m often asked what I miss most about living in West Africa. I certainly miss the obvious things like family, friends, colleagues, school mates, the food, the music. The list could go on and would probably be the same for any immigrant who has left home and started a new life in a new home. But there is one more thing I miss dearly - the interpersonal connections that are so natural and basic to life in Africa.

Here in the US I go to my local Jewel grocery store and I am often tempted to chat with the cashier and negotiate the prices of the things I have put on the counter. Then I remind myself that the cashier does not know me, nor care about me as my rice seller in the market did at home. And certainly, this cashier has no say in the price of the food items that appear in my basket each week. Those prices are determined by an invisible coporate presence and controlled by mysterious global markets. I miss the way I used to be able to chat easily with market sellers who actually seemed to know me and my family.
Each morning in the suburban town where I live, I catch a bus to the train station. The same people sit in the same spots every weekday morning. Since this is a routine, I see the same faces every day. But for the most part, nobody says anything to anybody else. Eyes are blank, people stare straight ahead, as if meeting the eyes of someone else is a taboo. You mount the bus, hand the bus driver your card, and shuffle past familiar faces without so much as a “good morning.” In West Africa, you come into a space and you say good morning because, although you may not know these people personally, they are part of your community. It is polite to greet people and wish them well. It is expected. It is the “done thing.” So I wonder what would happen one morning if I got on the bus and paused before taking my seat. What would the reaction be if I stood there and said loudly, “Good morning, Y’all!”
Then the other day, as I was waiting for the train, a man in front of me shouted suddenly and broke into a sprint towards another cluster of people who were waiting for the train. It was only at that point that I noticed a man yards away who was standing very close to the tracks as the train was approaching. The “rescue-man” reached the man just as the train was approaching. I wondered why the other people closer to the man, who must have seen him leaning towards the tracks, did not pull him back. Again, they were minding their own business in the way that is supposedly modern. In Africa, someone would have interfered. They would have shouted and pulled him away noisily. I wanted to hug the man who had run from a distance to intervene because what he did was such a beautiful gesture in this environment.
This always bothers me because I wonder what “community” means in this context. Community means something very different in the US. A certain US politician loves the African proverb, “It takes a village to raise a child.” Although I grew up in an African town, the sense of “the village” was always around me. I see very few “villages” here. I’ve adjusted because that is what you do in a new environment. But I do miss the “village” aspect of Africa, that sense of community that seems so human.