Back to my roots?

Back to the keyboard first. It's tough remaining faithful to a blog, especially when you have work to do and not too much time to spend online. I however will never say die; this blog is here to stay so you can count on that.

I am an African. How can you tell? Well, if you ever get to see my pictures then you'll notice I have an African nose, full and dark-ish African lips, though the rest of my skin is a bit on the lighter side. My elbows and knees are kinda dark too, come to think of it. No, I haven't bleached my skin, that's just the way I've always looked.

Enough about my physical features. So I'm African, but unless you heard me speak you could easily mistake me for someone from......anywhere really. Especially Europe or the States. Partly because of my skin colour but also because of how I dress. Typical western garb. When I'm feeling corporate then I wear a collared cotton shirt, short sleeved with dark cotton trousers and of course black leather shoes. If I'm in a casual mood, then its jeans and a tee shirt or corduroys and a tee shirt topped with my favourite (and only) leather jacket. How African is that?

What I'd really like is to come up with some unique garb that would identify me as something other than just A GUY. Even if its some hides and skins on top of or mingled with my current threads, I wouldn't mind. But its not as easy to do as I used to think. Ever since I was a kid, I don't recall ever even seeing anyone in the traditional gear of my people (the Akamba). Its only after my dad bought me a book that had pictures taken of my people in the early 20th century that I got a clue. We actually used to wear skins and walked barefoot less than a century ago. Men wore loincloths and perhaps some amulets and earrings of some sort; women dressed mostly the same with sometimes bigger loincloths. No tops were necessary it seems, but that was ok since we live in the tropics, plus everyone was that way so it wasn't pornographic.

Having been brought up overdressed as I have it would literally make me sick if I threw off my regular clothes and resorted to wearing skins daily. It would also be the quickest way to get my friends carting me off to Mathari mental hospital without a second thought. My poor feet would blister in a day if I dared walk the distances I do while barefoot. So now what?

My South African brothers and sisters seem to have a better idea. Watching their music videos is quite revealing about them. They too are victims of westernization but because of their seclusion during the apartheid days they have maintained a lot of their original culture(s). Most musicians sing or rap in isiZulu, isiSotho, Xhosa etc. mingled with some English words and the theme of some of their better music is for the youth not to forget their culture. View the youtube video at the top left of page for a sample; it's by Bongo Maffin, a group I'm really digging right now because of that particular song. It has the three group members getting rid of their western clothes and ending up dressed in their stunning traditionals then standing in a museum for guys to come view. (Hmm. Museum....why there? Irony?)