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24^th May is a significant date for Africa it is the African Day when for the first time African leaders converged in Addis Ababa to discuss ways to unite Africans and completely put an end to Colonisation. The department of African Studies of the University of Vienna marked this day by inviting the outspoken Pan-africanist the great Proffessor PLO Lumumba. When I read that the great Prof will be in town I was so excited since I knew it was a chance to get to meet one of the greatest most eloquent speakers and champion of African Unity in person. I therefore promptly requested Professor Bodomo, the head of the department at the University, to meet the great PLO Lumumba for a chat.

To my surprise I got a lot more than I asked for. Professor Bodomo asked if I could pick PLO from the airport and escort him to his hotel. This was an opportunity that I could just dream of now it was going to be a reality. With the help of a fellow Kenyan friend we organised a Limo to pick up PLO a feat which he really appreciated.

As we sat in the Limo I was totally speechless it was like in a dream. I was riding in a Limo sited next to Prof. PLO Lumumba. I was so awe struck that all the stuff I had prepared for days to talk about and ask had evaporated. I struggled to keep my cool I felt like slapping myself back to my senses. The Prof though was very gentle asking about life in Austria and interesting nitty gritties about the city of Vienna.

Most of you did not have the chance to attend his lecture I will fill you in on the most memorable lecture I have ever listened to and I will also with pleasure share with you behind-the-scenes stories of the Great PLO Lumumba as I spent a lot of time with him and his wife.

PLO and his wife are great listeners. I could observe how he paid attention eyes fixed on me and an occasional node to confirm he was still with me in the conversation. I had expected that he would do all the talking and I would be there just listening in awe as I am not much if a talker myself. But PLO was like always ready to learn I felt like he was mentally preparing for his next speech. I was not wrong because in his speech quoted a lot of stuff that we had talked about.

At a shopping mall I watched as PLO picked up a piece of paper that was lying on the ground and dispose it in a trash can he did that again when we were walking on the streets of Vienna and after lunch at Mc Donald’s, Prof. PLO Lumumba put the trays in the tray rack and used the serviette to clean up the table ready for the next diners. I was deeply touched by these acts of humility and self-lessness. I was walking and sitting with a living African Legend with an Encyclopaedia in his head and probably smarter and more successful than 99% of the people we passed on the streets yet so down to earth. I remembered a Kenyan artist was invited to perform in Vienna she demanded for luxury transport, bodyguards in Vienna a city where the president uses public transport and buys his grocery at the supermarket like everybody else. Then there is PLO whose work has changed lives and inspired and could lead to greater phenomenal achievements. He would get a red carpet laid across the streets for him to step on; he deserves it or be brought to Vienna in a private jet; he deserves it. But PLO did not even complain at the sight of his hotel room which was a booking mistake that landed him in a low standard hotel. On transferring him to the correct Hotel PLO told the receptionist he recommends a desk in the rooms so that people who like to study, like him, can have a comfortable place. Someone else would have tones of complaints.

I have written enough about the behind-the-scenes with Prof. PLO Lumumba let me indulge you with his speech. This what I captured with my notes. I cannot 100% reflect how fascinating his speech was as more often than not I was carried away by the magnitude and importance and urgency of what he talked about. In other words my report is watered down in comparison to what PLO said in his lecture.

‘As you grow older you get more modest’ were his first words. Very true and the meaning of that statement became eminent as he continued with his speech. He was not here to entertain and flabbergast the filled-up hall with his eloquent speech full of exotic terminology as most of us were accustomed to. Rather PLO kept the audience glued to his silver-tongued discourse by enlightening us with an articulate accurate rendition of African History spiced with all important dates and names of great African leaders all that without a script in his hand leaving everyone bewildered at the vast knowledge the great Professor has on our Continent and his history.

The History of Africa starts with the slavers period so have the Western world led us to believe. The Prof. fondly refers to them as conceptual west. The truth of the matter, PLO suggested, Africa was already civilized when the Westerners were living in Caves. Fire, organised communities and use of simple tools all started in Africa. Critical persons from the Bible, Abraham, Moses, Solomon, Jesus all came to Africa. Our History goes way beyond the slavery period. Africa was the beginning of modern day civilisation. Our civilisation was disrupted by the westerners who and the Arabs who brought Religion and Slavery to Africa and made away with natural resources that was used to develop their lands.

Slavery and Colonisation has never stopped hitherto. Colonialists never left. The whole process of colonisation was to thingify the Africans. The Colonisers have always been ahead of their game. They gave the Africans new names, new religion, new language. By doing this they killed a part of Africans that gave them identity. The Africans would argue amongst themselves that their colonisers were better than the other. English colonies argued that they were better than the French and vice versa and all laughed at the Portuguese colony ass it was too small. That’s how brainwashed Africa became. Africa was led to believe that the West has a divine duty to tell us what to do and how to think. Up to today it is still the same English colonies call themselves Anglo-phone, French Franco-phone etc. The head of the common wealth is the British monarch and major Banks in French colonies have their headquarters in France. The colonizers still control their colonies through Aid.

Being African is not being black skinned or white skinned. African is a state of mind. Arabs are schizophrenic they say they are African inly when it is convenient for them Colonel Gaddafi is the only Arab leader who openly identified himself as an African and an Arab.

The paradox of all this is that Africa has been on the fore-front in international development and modernisation. Africa is the cradle of humanity. Africa has always been rising. Half of the African population was involved in the Agrarian revolution when the Westerners came and took slaves to work in their fields. The natural resources used in the industrial revolution came from Africa.

African countries have, on average, attained independence in the last 50 years. Our leaders since then so the need for total independence through the formation of African Union. In a bold speech by Kwame Nkurumah on 24^th May 1963 in Addis Ababa, he saw a sense of urgency in Africa uniting. He admonished the leaders not to live the summit before forming a political union based on defence, foreign affairs and diplomacy. A common citizenship, a common currency, a common monetary zone and a common central Bank. ‘We must unite in order to achieve full liberation of our continent.’ There was a sense of enlightenment back then.

The colonisers have always been ahead of their game. They created a state designed to fail. Efforts to create a united state of Africa was met by challenges there were coupes and governments toppled. Coupes were as frequent as breakfast. The state of destabilisation left the vision of African unity to be a dream.

The problem is we Africans vilify ourselves too much. We are resilient. Despite slavery and colonisation and the mass looting of our natural resources we have shown the western world that our diversity is our strength. The British is Great Britain politically but at the world cup they are England, Wales, Scotland etc. The western world would not stand if it had diverse cultures and languages as do African states.

African countries are doing very well. Botswana is the only country in Africa to have a surplus in their budget. Kigali Rwanda has made amazing noteworthy development despite the genocide in the 90s. Equatorial Guinea has GDP of $35000 per capita the highest in the world. Africa has the potential to arise. Bad leadership is the biggest problem. We are part of our problem; our docility is our undoing. In order to move forward we need to be politically awake. Democracy is protected by eternal vigilance. Gains are made through demands. The diaspora community needs to be on the fore-front in the struggle for total independence from the colonialists.

We begin by loving ourselves. We should not rely on foreign Aid. Foreign Aid is designed to keep Africans in Economic diapers. Westerners do everything for their own benefit. We must organise ourselves. The African diaspora needs to unite so that it can be able to enforce demands on the African states. We the diaspora are the eyes and ears of Africa. After living in your house for a while you start considering the cobwebs as part of your furniture, a visitor will be the one to point out that something needs to be done about the webs.

At dining a table you are either the diner, the servant or the food. Africa has been the food for long enough. It is our time now to be the diners. The Africa diaspora needs to demand for observer status in the regional bodies, AU, ECOWAS, SADCC etc. Africa will arise it starts with us. His closing remarks were a quote from the late great Martin Luther; ‘“If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.”

I am 100% sure I am not the only one who has had enough of this ‘Racism’ Shit. I have been thinking about it for some-days now and it is time I put this idiotic ideology to sleep and bury it completely.

Human kind have advanced in knowledge, skills and rational, philosophical reasoning immensely over the years. Great thinkers have been able to demystify and explain unbelievably hard phenomena. There are books and material on basically all kinds of challenges that you may encounter in your life and we Humans are in-agreement in many of this aspects irrespective of skin color.

What defeats my logic is how in this age and era Racism is still a topic. How with the modern day education and development where people are able to interact with each other all over the world without the need of even knowing the language, how is it possible that so many of us are still chained to a phenomena that is way too old for our time. That there are black people and others are white.

I AM NOT BLACK and if you call me black you are showing me that you are still stuck on an ideology that my great great grandfather learnt of when he first saw Europeans coming to his land as missionaries in the 1800s. In other words you are too stupid to differentiate reality and fiction.

YOU ARE NOT WHITE and if you think you are, you are still stuck in the ideology that Christopher Columbus and other explorers fashioned to try and explain why they looked different from the native people they visited ages ago.

It is so an amateur way of thinking to categorize Humans by the color of their skin. Dude, my skin color is not me it is just my skin. Which doesn’t make me more or less human, more or less intelligent, more or less trustworthy, more or less lovable than someone of a different skin color.

Think of it, we have built amazing cars, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Tesla, Ferrari, I could go on and on. The manufacturers didn’t make this amazing cars in one color I bet you know why. But if you would take the color off they are all the same, the body, the engine, interior its the same. Yeah…, some idiot will try to take me out of context and say that some are customized…. of course they are, according to individual preferences. Why aren’t we intelligent humans saying that a red Tesla should not get a parking spot in the mall because it’s red or why are we telling the owner of a Yellow Bentley, ‘you cant fill upyour tank here your Bentley is yellow’

Now was God drunk or high to create us Humans in different skin colors? Would it be better if we were all of the same color? and to stick to that line of thought from the cars, we customize ourselves according to individual preferences. Men grow beards other don’t. Women grow long hair others short.

We are physically the same and I will not accept to be judged by my physical appearance. The only difference is, there are those light skinned idiots who will look at a dark skinned fella and feel superior to them and there are those dark skinned idiots who rant ‘racism’ every time they feel something unjust or unfair is done to them.

I will try make it is as clear as possible in the most layman terms I can think of. You and me, we are the same whether you like it or not. Your biological mama and papa’s egg and sperm came together to create you just like my mama and papa’s. For heavens sake Eggs and Sperms look the same irrespective of the owner’s skin color. The embryo, that tiny you in your mama’s womb, I looked exactly the same at that age. Fast forward to when I die and am buried 6 feet under, if they took my bones out and your bones will look the same as mine. The beginning is the same and so will the end so don’t dare think that your are special or different from other humans because of the color of your skin.

‘Whites’ are black and ‘Blacks’ are white. These two colors have been used to separate good and evil. Black magic, Black market the Night is Black and all sorts of evil take place at this time. White on the other hand stands for good, purity, White-collar-jobs, Jesus rode on a white horse, wedding dresses are commonly white. It is totally wrong, at all levels, to call a person black or white just by looking at the color of their skin. I might have dark skin but I am white; I pay taxes and follow the law and I am nice to people. The light and dark skinned fellas who go shooting other humans for whatever reasons are as black as hell, the most evil imagination possible.

Look at me, what you see is not me. That is my body which I did not choose to be born in, but I love it and take care of it. You, don’t fool yourself that what I see is you. You never chose to be born in that body of yours. My character, my personality, my likes, my dislikes, my actions and reactions that’s me right there. You wanna know me; you have to look beyond what your eyes can see.

Let us not allow a centuries old ideology to govern our way of  thinking. Humans are much better than this. If you share my opinion then lets work together and bury this ideology that is living way beyond it is time.

A day whether good or bad should always end with good thoughts. When you go to sleep your subconscious mind wakes up and if you feed it with positive thoughts, happy thoughts just before you trail away into dreamland you will have nice stuff to dream about and most likely your morning the next day will start off on a good note.

Welcome to my first blog where I am going to share my thoughts, opinions, experiences and reflections on how to keep happy, to enjoy life, to overcome challenges, to live and to love.

My blog will be based on research, day to day occurrences, and more often than not my personal opinion toward trending topics and life’s challenges.

I have decided to finally start blogging so that I can be a voice of courage, of hope, of happiness and of love; for myself, for my kids and for many other children, women and men who are going through tougher conditions than I am and struggling tooth and nail to get to see the next day. I am blogging because there is already more than enough finger pointing and complaining and playing the blame game. We are all so stressed by the stuff going on around us that most of us naturally do the easiest thing to do: find someone to blame. We are filling our minds with so much negativity that it robs us of the opportunities to witness precious little moments that come across our lives every single day.

I want to be happy and everyone does and it is not easy neither is it hard. If it were easy to be happy then we would not be witnessing all the mess going on around us.

Therefore for my first blog, I am writing this just before retiring for the day, I want us to take the first step together towards being happy and that is by filling up our subconscious mind with positive thoughts before going to sleep.

My positive thoughts for today are of all the amazing people that have walked in to my life, my schoolmates, family, friends, colleagues, strangers I met while on holiday, at a seminar in the supermarket, at the bar, neighbors the list is endless. Those people who have put a smile on my face and created moments that are unforgettable, as well as those who wrecked my moods and left impressions that are unforgivable. We are collectively responsible for NOT having doomsday coming yesterday. That, we should be proud off, we will leave to see another day.

I rest my case with this parting shot. As I close my eyes and drift away to dreamland I appreciate everyone that has come into my life. Those that came and stayed and also that left. That guys is a good late night thought. Cheers!