ktravula – a travelogue!

the Nigerian Ghoul in an American Forest

Browsing the archives for the Opinion category.

Father’s Day

With poet Eugene Redmond. April 2010

Yesterday I had one of those long conversations with a friend about the strange nature of parenthood, and my participant observation on fatherhood and its many complexities, and how relationships with fathers inevitably shape our outlook on the world whether we like it or not. How could I have forgotten that today is Father’s Day?

There are many questions I would ask if I could sit my father down for one whole day in a conversation, many of them about his childhood and how his childhood adventures shaped his later preoccupations. I would ask for specific details, facts, and pointers, and I would write them all down because of a time that my child(ren) might want to ask me about their grandfather at a later time. I may not take all his advice on life, writing, broadcasting, women or children, but I would delight in listening to them for an umpteenth time while wondering, “What would I be like when I’m his age?”

This generation exists because of the last one, and the cycle continues. Happy Father’s Day to all fathers out there, including my own, and my adopted fathers, intending fathers, and to my brother, and to my brothers-in-law. You make the world go round. Or do you? ;)

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Father’s Day was published on June 20th, 2010, with the tags , , , under the Observations, Opinion, Soliloquy category. There are currently 2 comments on this article so far.

His Remarkable Journey

It’s not always a bad thing to live in a town where electricity is barely on for seven hours a day. In two days, I have completed a feat I couldn’t while I was in Edwardsville. Larry King’s autobiography My Remarkable Journey. Covering adventures of the young son of immigrant parents from Europe, the book tells the story of how the Jewish kid Larry Zieger who never went to college made it through the very many interesting historical epochs of America to become the famous Larry King recognized worldwide for his voice, his show and his suspenders.

Like many autobiographies, there is the question of whether Larry the broadcaster was the same as Larry the autobiographer-the-writer who was able not only to remember in great detail many of the remarkable events of his childhood, but was able to write them in very fine prose in the 294 paged book. How much of it is fiction or embellishment of the ghostwriter, and how much is rooted in real facts of the broadcaster’s pen and memory?

He wrote of his first meeting with JFK, (it was a mild car accident in which Larry had run into the future president), he wrote of walking mistakenly into the full glare of cameras in the courtroom during O.J. Simpson’s trial without being a witness, how he won a lottery on just $2, and how he almost bribed the president elect Richard Nixon before the latter assumed the presidency. There are very many tender and happy moments in his life, and he recounts them with nostalgia. His many marriages (he was married eight times to seven women), his arrest and financial troubles at a time, his heart attacks and surgeries, and his relationship with his first son Larry King Jr. who he met when the latter was already thirty-three years old all took pride of place in the book.

For decades, the now seventy-seven year old man had helped people to open up themselves. In this work, he does it himself and does a good job of it. Fans and friends who would like to know his opinion of George W. Bush, Nelson Mandela, Barack Obama, Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton among others would do well to pick up the book. Talking about retirement, he hinted that his contract with CNN would be up by 2011, and he still doesn’t feel the need to retire. Hear him: “If I went off the air, what would it do to the ninety-nine year old woman who credits her longevity to watching my show every night?” That’s Larry King.

I’m now unto V.S Naipaul’s Miguel Street. This time, unlike the man making “a thing with no name”, I’m sure I’ll complete it in record time.

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His Remarkable Journey was published on June 19th, 2010, with the tags , , , , under the Observations, Opinion category. There are currently 1 comment on this article so far.

My Dad and I

A guest post by Angura Rani Elke

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Today is the birthday of the first man that I ever loved, my father. I met my father on October 22, 1956, you see that was the day that I was born in Jahnsi, India.

My Father’s name is Bharat Bhooshan, a second generation preacher. My Grandfather and my Papa were both ordained as Methodist Preachers. Papa moved to United States of America in the fall of  1961, reuniting with my Mama. She came here in Januarry of 1961, leaving their five children in the care of my dad’s mom. During this time my parents were doing college credits because they were here on student visas. Life was hard for them, but they were a team. They worked at anything and everything they could do to make money for their children back in India.

My parent’s worst nightmares were coming alive. My brother (their only son) lived with an aunt and was diagnosed as being an eplepitc. I was crippled by a quack of a doctor when my two sisters were in boarding school. My little sister and I lived with our grandma. Its funny to think about the past and not feel sick at what my parents were doing here and what was going on in India to their children. Physical, verbal, emotional and yes sexual abuse was going on and they had no idea. My brother finally came to America in 1963. My little sister and I came in 1964, I went into to a hospital almost right away, I somehow had gangrene up to my knee. My older sisters finally made it to America in 1965. That is when the healing began for all of us.

Papa got his first church in Northeren Wisconsin, He became a United Church of Christ Congrational preacher. We lived in Elco, Winsconsin. We were the only ”dark” people that some of them had ever seen. We lived here for three years, moved to Appleton, WI, which was another town that had never seen our kind. Wisconsin is very cold in the winter and very pleasant in the summer. Papa had his first heart attack in 1978 at the time I was living in Arizona going to college. They moved from Appleton in 1979 to Grantfork, IL. 20 miles from Edwardsville (where I now live.)

My relationship with my Papa was a very smart and loving. I was the tomboy, that wanted to learn from everything, the only one that went to college out of the five kids. I was the one that would listen to him and let him feel that I knew what he was saying. We would go for walks together. You see. I was the one when I could talk, would tell my mom that I didn’t want my diaper changed by anyone but him. So, ya stubborn was a good word. When I came to the USA, he would carry me up and down the stairs from the apartment that we lived in. When the pain was unbearable he would make a concoction of milk and brandy, it would knock me out. I loved to read books which I got from him or I bought and he would read them. I could talk to him about anything. I remember having a talk with him about getting high on pot, he said Batie (darling) I got high on Jesus Christ. I laughed and we talked about how life has more meaning with Christ in our life. Pot will make you feel good for a while but Jesus Christ will be with you forever. I miss him so much.

He had a total of four heart attacks. The last time I saw him before he went to surgery he was happy and told us his Alice was coming to get him. You see Alice was my Mama’s name. By golly she did come get him, partners forever and ever.

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I met Rani in Edwardsville, Illinois at a get-together for the Rotary visitors from Nigeria in April (I think). She’s one of the most fun adults I’ve met in my life. I hope you enjoyed reading her story which she managed to write impromptu immediately after I asked her today. I hear that Rani also means “queen” in Hindi. She could as well be an author, don’t you agree? (Previous guest-posts here.)

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My Dad and I was published on June 10th, 2010, with the tags , , , under the Opinion, Travelling, adventures category. There are currently 2 comments on this article so far.

A Case for Blogging

‘”The book is dead” – Ikhide. “Ikhide is dead.” – The Book ‘ – Grafitti.

There is no doubt that new technologies taking over the culture of publishing have sort of made the book redundant. But how total is that overthrow of the almighty good old hard cover material once known as the book? In the beginning, there were scrolls, nay, first there were hieroglyphics and scrawling on stone cave walls. And that was after communications went on via drum beats, gongs, and loud whistles across farm fields. Skip to the present, across generations of texts, scrolls and patches bearing thousands of important scriptures, texts and messages for generations.

We have the ebook, and many electronic ways of communicating ideas, almost like the book. Almost like most ancient means of communication. The iPhone could as well be a smooth but feathered pebble sent across from a far village to transmit a short message from a dying man to another – aroko; a phone call a mystical connection of voices between distances. Even babalawos might be able to explain that with some of their ancient texts. The man rubbed his head three times, chewed on the sour kola as he stood on top of the hill and called the name of his son seven times, and from where he was thousands of miles away, the young man rose from his sleep, dusted his mat, and headed homewards, without even saying goodbye to his expectant wife… From generations to generations, communication has evolved and will continue to do so, surprising each generation after the other. The graphic design of a recent cover of the Economist has Apple boss Steve Jobs holding two iPads on either arm. The headline was The Book of Jobs but the image was that of Moses returning from the mountain with two stone tablets – each as big as the iPad – in his hands.

The book should die, if it must, as soon as possible. For one, it will remove the pressure of traditional publishing, and an author of a short story in an anthology of eleven might not have to wait forever to lay his hands on the first copy of such a work. Where does the book get off with that distinct characteristic of charm that breeds suspense, and an always pleasing first touch, smell and feel? Try as we may, that first touch never fails to surprise and to please. Yet I protest. How many words does it take to write a novel? Forty to a hundred thousand? How many words have I written on this blog so far? Over two hundred and twenty- seven thousand words and over a thousand nine hundred pictures. Bollocks! Die book, die! A magazine editor won’t publish an already blogged poem. Bollocks. A newspaper requires exclusive rights to published articles and won’t allow for reprints on the author’s blog. Die book, die!

But who am I kidding? Until the Nobel Committee decides on a day in the distant future to award the Nobel Prize for Literature to an author that writes using only the blogging medium will that day have truly come when the book is totally dead. And members of that Nobel Committee would have to have been first generation digital natives, born and bred in the world of hypertext. Until then, maybe we could do with a little amendment to the criminal code that gives the opportunity of only a phone call to an arrested suspect. If you want to arrest and lock me up, why don’t you give me internet access instead. All I need is twenty minutes for my next post, then you can have me in for all the time you want. At least until the next day when the next blogging cycle begins.

The book is dead. Of course it’s not. But long live its very many other manifestations, including the one you’re now reading.

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A Case for Blogging was published on June 5th, 2010, with the tags , , , , under the Observations, Opinion, Soliloquy category. There are currently 6 comments on this article so far.

What Shall We Do With The Next Election?

According to a recent insightful post at Nigerian Curiosity, there is a looming civilian coup in Nigeria, and we are not paying enough attention. According to several clear pointers, it is not likely that the next election holds on schedule if it holds at all. A new chairman for the electoral commission has not been appointed, and the acting one has confessed that there are no enough funds, infrastructure or time to conduct the a free and fair election next year. The next president is expected to be signed in on May 29, 2011 and the electoral body needs at least six months to prepare for the election if it must be credible. INEC must also leave at least four months (I don’t know if this bit is in the constitution) between the time the new politicians are elected and the time they’re sworn in – so as to give room for all needed litigations.

The questions are:

When will the new chairman of the electoral body be announced by the president?

When will the new Electoral Laws be passed by the Senate in time to guide the new INEC head to conduct a free and fair election?

What does the constitution say about a situation where polls are inconclusive by the end of the four years tenure of incumbent politicians?

Is anyone really listening that none of these seem feasible in the next couple of months due to the nonchalance of politicians that stand to gain so much from the chaos that will mandate them to retain their seats in the absence of an election?

My Suggestions

Let us all send strong letters, opinions, articles and phone calls in the way of our elected officials to do the right thing right now. Let’s have your own suggestions. The time to act is now.

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What Shall We Do With The Next Election? was published on June 5th, 2010, with the tags , , , , , under the Observations, Opinion category. There are currently no comments on this article so far.

New Interesting Blogs

I stumbled across the blog 17 years, 8 months, 15 days last week, I think, from my WordPress stats page. It details the journey of a woman returning from Canada to Nigeria for the first time in years to reunite with the father of her baby. From the little I’ve read on the blog, it is a moving and interesting story of faith, hope and love.  Check it out.

The Nigerian Blog Awards 2010 have provided a new opportunity to discover new blogs by Nigerians all over the world. Check out their webpage for blogs by Nigerians listed on the right. And remember to vote not only for KTravula.com for the categories it is nominated for, vote also for fellow KTravulans Aloofaa, Bookaholic (writing), Bumight (student blog),  Jaycee (personal development) Myne Whitman, Nigerian Curiosity, Nigerianstalk.org, Nnedi Okorafor (writing), Solomon Sydelle and Verasitically Livin’ (use of media). They have all given me interestings to read during the year.

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New Interesting Blogs was published on June 3rd, 2010, with the tags , , , under the Opinion, Soliloquy category. There are currently no comments on this article so far.

Desertification

Much has been said about the encroaching Sahara desert on much of the other parts of the continent. What has not been much available are physical evidence of such encroachment. I have followed closely the adventures of Nigerian Chief Newton Jibunoh who had driven across the Sahara in the 60s and lately a few years ago to call attention to desertification, but I was not chanced to see the photo result of his trips. The man has driven from London to Lagos via the Sahara desert about three times now.

While flying back into the continent two weeks ago, these were the pictures I took of the desert areas of Northern Africa from Algeria until parts of Northern Nigeria.

The sad fact, according to reports of the road trip, is that much of Northern Nigeria that were still arable about a decade ago are now covered by desert sand and dunes. Much intervention is needed, and fast, before we lose even more lands to the encroaching desert – the largest in the world. Check out this satellite picture from NASA.

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Desertification was published on June 1st, 2010, with the tags , , , , under the News, Observations, Opinion, Soliloquy category. There are currently 2 comments on this article so far.

Book Review

I’ve been reading the book Cultural Hybridity by Peter Burke, a book that explores much of the concepts of hybridity in human cultures and relations. There are ample evidence from the history of humankind that prove hybridity, even more than we always immediately recognize. From the old Yoruba, Igbo and even Hausa cultures of Nigeria to that of old Rome, Jewish, Brazilian, Spanish and much of Europe, the author cites very many instances of cultural hybridity (also called “borrowing”, “syncretism”, “assimilation”, “adaptation”, “fusion” and even “homogenization” among others) and the way attitudes and opinions to such hybridity have evolved over the years.

One memorable quote from the book was from Edward Said: “the history of all cultures is the history of borrowing.” I find that apt, and the book confirms it with very many instances of both rebellion against and acceptance of cultural exchange by different cultures and societies of people across the times.

Published in 2009 by Polity Press

142 pages.

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Book Review was published on May 28th, 2010, with the tags , , , under the Academic, Observations, Opinion category. There are currently no comments on this article so far.

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