Tomorrowland 2013 | official aftermovie

A new chapter...

I remember when I first read The River and the Source. The TV had just blown up and I was bored out of my mind. Bored children are a nuisance to their parents so my mother gave me this book, which was the current set book in high school at the time. I took it up immediately and I was introduced to Akoko Obanda.

Akoko happens to be one of the strongest women characters I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet. And I read extensively. She was a trail blazer who, while respecting the culture of the land, was not afraid of the unknown. She was beautiful, spirited and a formidable opponent. Her temper! Legen-wait for it-dary! One of my favourite lines from her was, “I would not trust your uncle Otieno although he is as black as the bottom of the pot I boil maize and beans in.” If you’ve seen those big pots in the village and how darkened they are by soot, you understand why that statement always cracks me up. She was the very definition of fearless and I wanted to grow up and be just like her.

Ten years later and I still haven’t yet grown up! I’m 23 years old, still in school, still single and still staying in my mother’s house, still relying on my father for my upkeep. I don’t know about you but that is the very definition of a child. Which is worrisome because by this time Akoko was married with her first child and dealing with her meddlesome in-laws. She’s not the only one, because the percentage of girls in my age cohort that I found in Ante-natal clinic, labour and maternity ward was overwhelmingly large. There’s also a large number of my very own classmates from high school and primary who are already moms as evidenced by the increasing number of baby photos as profile pictures on facebook. It’s such a rollercoaster between a mushy moment and a barf-fest. I’m sorry but it is, especially when they insist on shoving it down our throats how happy they are how their babies are their best mistakes and how the rest of us are missing out on the joys of motherhood. Sometimes I think they try to convince us so that they can convince themselves. Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s the bravest thing to have a child especially when you’re still an adolescent and still figuring out life as you go along, but I would rather see pictures of my friends going to amazing universities and doing amazing jobs coming up with exquisite campaigns and being trailblazers in their own fields, like Judy who is on her way to the Forbes list. If Akoko was around today I’m sure she’d be heading her own company by now, I kid you not. Read about her and tell me you don’t see her in that corner office.

Speaking about Akoko, it was a sad day in my life when I realised I couldn’t be her. Why? Simple. I’m me. I can work just as hard but I like to rest too. A recliner on a deck with an ocean view and a glass of Johnnie on the rocks is my ultimate kickback day dream. I worry too much about my next move and the idea of change can lead to a major mood storm before I conform. She was a straight up go-getter, I have to talk to myself for days before I try a new direction. Or I irrationally do something before my mind finds a way to negate it. She followed through with all she did. I can’t even finish tooting that horn before I lose interest. She looked at her husband dead in the eye when he came to ask for her hand in marriage. I would hide myself behind a pot of plants before I would let myself talk to someone I fancy, okay that was definitely hyperbole. I wouldn’t hide but I do know there’s a beauty about walking on the opposite side of the path. Akoko was the ultimate and I’m a work in progress.

A work in progress. A phrase that best describes where I am right now. I do have my own vision of how the future me looks like. The doctor. The wife. The mother. But I do remember a quote that mentioned God laughing at our best laid plans. Judging from my past and present I’ve given him a bucket load of laughs and I don`t think I’m about to stop any time soon! I’d figured by the time I was in fourth year I would have settled so many sectors in my life. More time spent at the hospital, literally living away from home, confident in my medical skills done with the raeving scene and I would have at least that one guy to always talk to about everything. Yet here I am, moved back home, not sure if I’m making it to fifth year next year, still dropping branula lids and not a love interest in sight.

That might seem like such a sorry state but I’m happy. Confusing is it? I did say I was a work in progress, didn’t I? Let me paint a picture for you. Picture your breaking point, now picture mine, my previous post tries to colour it all out for you. I was miserable and my family was worried. I stayed at home and within a few days I could feel the old Diana come back. You know what I love about family? They know you but still can’t get rid of you; they love you and build you up. I started to slowly come around and I reconnected with my family and it became harder and harder to go back to Ngumo. The house isn’t a bad incentive too. So I stayed.

Two was when my father fell sick. I rushed home to make sure it wasn’t anything serious. Now I lost my uncle last year and calling it a shock is an understatement. He died way before his time and right now my father is the last surviving male in his nuclear family. He misses all his brothers and father terribly. I am terrified that he might leave us unexpectedly just like my uncle Chris. I stay at home to spend as much time as I can with him and at least sleep knowing he’s just a few doors away. Plus he’s the best in terms of giving advice, you know the older you are the wiser you become and so on and so forth. The man works harder than anyone else I know, and that’s saying something since I spend most of my days with academics and monkey see, monkey do. I’m still waiting to reach my old man’s momentum though.

I fell in love with the hospital again, specifically obstetrics, the non-examination part of course. I enjoyed that rotation, enough to literally hang around pregnant women giving my pregophile tendencies free reins. My only problem is why we don’t make enemas part of basic obstetric care, like in a mini- section… no, I’m not letting it go! I still need to go back and I’m not so worried because medicine is learnt and lived for a lifetime.

The hallways at King Georges hospital have never stopped being crazy and the fact there isn’t that one main guy to talk to doesn’t deter me one bit! I’ve been blessed in another way that I’m now just beginning to appreciate, all the boys, sorry men, who are not ashamed to call me their friend! We can talk about anything, crack jokes and still sit down and study seriously. I have a whole gang of male friends which for the first time in my life feels a tad overwhelming. And cool. Really cool, it’s cold! Genuine bromances are sweet to watch too and I get to see them daily, here’s to you Twiri and Owen. If Akoko met all these men she’d have them as her friends too, though I’m not sure whether it would be appropriate to her. She’d break the rules though, because she’s that amazing! I should know, I hang out with them.

 I continue to make my path everyday with the greatest lesson I’ve learnt so far is being able to love myself. Love myself and understand that I’m going to make mistakes. Daily. It can get tough, it can get worse but it will end. It does. Not forgetting that getting myself back up after a fall is what’s the most important to do, and a pretty pair of heels may be just around the corner waiting for me! The road to womanhood has never been more chaotic than is mine, but God damn it, it’s mine…

Birds, sugar, butterflies, rainbows....Fuck that shit

Whoever said that there’s light at the end of the tunnel must have been on some weird form of crack. I’ve been waiting for that light for the longest time and there has been nothing, not even a struck matchstick. Now before you all start calling me up as most of my good friends are wont to do. Relax, I’m not whining again. I’m not even going back to the really dark place I was at some weeks back. All I’m going to say is that I’m adjusting to the dark. And there are some beautiful designs right here.

Being in a bad place is awful. What’s worse has to put up a front for the world to see. Because ain’t nobody got time to deal with your depressed ass. And there are people who have it worse!!!  So you really have no right to mope around like a half decapitated corpse. Thus you self medicate- Trying to remember positive things, giving yourself little goals like getting through a whole day, trying to live like a little hippie, giving yourself funny little slogans. Then you keep yourself really busy. Busy enough to not think. Thinking hurts. Thinking leads to dark alleys. We all know my perpetual fear of alleys. Thinking leads to heavy hearts and weak bodies.

Have you ever flogged a dead horse? Me neither, that’s animal cruelty. Animal necro-cruelty (cause they’re dead). It felt something close to it though. Have you ever met someone so bloody positive it makes you want to punch them? Just so you could remove that stupid grin and that aura of positivity from their essence? Then we can both be miserable together- the perfect ambience. Telling yourself half-hearted positive shit ends up being just that- a big bowl of shit. I would get so angry sometimes it would be overwhelming. The night ending wasn’t helping either, because it would mean human contact again. So much human contact, when all you want to do is curl in bed and not move for a really long time. I kept wishing I could freeze time; everything at a standstill; then I could scream for eternity and walk away.

I hate disappointing people, including myself. However the past few months have been a whole big dollop of disappointments culminating to the big cry out in the ward. I refuse to be ashamed of it though and everyone should cut me some slack about. Restrained stress always ends up in a dramatic release, and with Diana Abuodha, theatrics are never far behind. You can’t please everyone I know, but that doesn’t stop me from trying. It gets worse where leadership is involved. After the amount of critics I had post-high school, inclusive of a former friend, I always strive to be a more ‘democratic’ leader. What I learnt, is that the fourth form captain and the paediatric representative is that they both had their own set of challenges, and both did have their own depressed moments. However the paediatric one has been more emotionally challenged which is weird because of the expected age- maturity status and has literally been on the verge of a mental breakdown. This has been due to the progressively high output failure that I’d been courting for weeks. I mean how do you read so much and the output not reflect it? It has caused anxiety attacks in many a moment these few months. The fall into oblivion has been slowly inevitable without much awareness.

It’s hard to do that when you have the most amazing friends around you, who would go through any lengths to help you. If you just ask. I couldn’t. Everyone had so much to deal with and in reality dealing with both that and me would have been out of their depth. I loved them too much to burden them with what seemed to me at the time to be a kaleidoscope of worries, fears and attacks on my psyche. It’s no wonder my immune system was so vulnerable. The only time I felt some relief is when I developed some form of apathy to life. I didn’t want to live anymore. I don’t mean seriously offing myself, though I can’t fully rule it out, I mean I didn’t want to participate anymore. I didn’t marvel at life anymore and laugh at its inside jokes. From the moment my eyes opened all I looked forward to was closing them again.  I just maintained a routine. It was expected. Anything out of the ordinary would have raised eyebrows, leading to questions. Lord knows I hate probing questions. I thus allowed myself to die internally whilst maintaining an outward appearance. Dying is really a simple business once you decide to just embrace it. It’s kind of scary how happily I adapted to this form of life, how little scenarios of quaint deaths filled my mind at times. I still had that little obstinate bulb of optimism that things would get better, given that one element-time.

Time is all I have these days. It’s the one thing you’re granted and yet easily taken away from you. Weird, right? As I said earlier, I’m still in a dark place, but it’s not so bad anymore. There are some beautiful designs playing out right here I’d never paid attention to.

Mementos; Struggles; Confusion

I’ve been dreaming incessantly lately. Different realities with their different timelines. We all stare at each other in different mirrors. I slip into normalcy in whichever dream I slip into. It is so easy to choose this route, none is wrong and every decision is right. I’m only awake for a few hours of the day, when everything is quiet. The night is such a forgiving time, never judging nor imposing its expectations on you. It calms me down, letting me slowly peel off every skin holding me in bondage.

I dream of your broad dark shoulders. The little scar on the broad of your back, imprinted on the back of my mind. A memory my hippocampus stole from my occipital lobe. Only returned when needed. Always when my eyes are closed. How did it get there? When? The events surrounding that day, what were they?

They say nothing is new in this world. If so, then why do we live? What are we doing here if everything that we will do has already been done? Is every thought a reproduction of someone else’s mind? The blood that courses through my veins, is it really truly mine? What if there’s an exact replica of all my cells respiring in some other body form? Were we just born to die? To propagate the same fucking gene through the ages? We recycle so much in this life, our books, our fashion and even the gender roles that ‘society’ dictates. I tire as easily as I am motivated. My friend would quip that I was born in the wrong era. I don’t think so. With more than twenty centuries already passed, it excites me to traverse the past. Like entering archaic ruins and imagine them when they were once whole. Where they held conversations, wrote letters, triumphed or failed. Where they fell in love and ended long term friendships. I believe if you go far enough, you’ll end up exactly where you began.

I see the rays filter in through the wind on an early afternoon, the dust speckles dancing in circles, revelling in their daytime ball. Most of the dust in homes originates from human skin, did you know? I smile and continue to whisk the batter in the bowl, enough with these questions. I feel a touch on my ankle length skirt and look down at the little boy, happy to be near his mother. My little dark skinned child. Swooping down to steal a kiss, I continue whisking, singing, and staring at the afternoon sun. Don’t we both just love it? Yes Diana, I know you’re here, go back to your present. Live a little.

I’ve been looking for words. They had left me you see. I found some of them in letters. Letters full of humour and life lessons. Letters with stories to make you laugh and others will render you numb with pain. Letters that make you question or strengthen your faith. Letters with scrawny scratchy handwriting and others had written using typewriters. Reading them, I instantly wished the Post office was still relevant and not just for high school students love letters and success cards. I still don’t know how to actually post a letter. I think that’s sad. It kills me that there’s a generation that is intent on mutilating the language, expecting us to follow suit. It enrages me. I fight with my sister all the time about this. I enrage her. Our back and forth texts are our constant fights for dominance. I will win eventually. Or will she? Will this attempt at relevance by the younger generation endure? Or will they soon join the rat race and bend to ‘the man’?

I found more words at the drums of Shostakovich. I lapped it all up with glee. I was amazed at his easy flow with them. He played around with them and bedazzled you with even bigger words. Words you never expected in literary discourse, words that made you feel like you were still in elementary school. You had to be quiet, the big boys were talking. I was filled with envy. They were not even my words, those that had abandoned me, the heartless bastards. He was so raw, so very raw with them that I would blush at the very indecency he used them. I let myself swim in his world, burning with envy and wishing to steal them and run away with them. Was it Picasso who had said that great artist steal ideas? However I didn’t dare. They were his. They could never be mine. We wouldn’t fit. I had to find my original words I understood that but first I wandered in his land. It was only when Hillary reminded me repeatedly to write again did I finally pack my bags. So we have Hillary to thank for the first step. Thank you Hillary! I looked for them where they first disappeared. In my very own mind. I’ve teased, threatened and bribed it to give them back. Slowly they came, reluctance in their stead. They came in snippets, while I napped, while I walked, while I listened to music. I would whisper them back and savour them as they echoed through my very being. I would write little notes and leave them alone. Type a few lines on a Microsoft word document, delete them and sleep content. They were coming back. They were back. I guarded them jealously, I wasn’t sure if they were strong enough to hold on their own in this world. The Coke band changed everything. I don’t know how he knew I was just stalling. I hate being given something I do not deserve. He’s shoved me to action.

I’ve been throttling her repeatedly in my dreams. She keeps showing up acting like we could renew a friendship. Doesn’t she know bridges have already been burnt? She lit the match but I fanned those flames. I have no interest in building new ones. I don’t have the budget for it. The cost of cement, sand and stone is high and I cannot afford the labour. Her pseudo-piety is what infuriates me the most, acting like the protector of good morals. What are these good morals? Who labelled them good? She dared to hurt one of my friends I wringed her neck, she dared to offer him to another to love, murder became my intent. He is mine.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions. I intended to stay away from him. He shows up and I follow. Is this how iron feels in the presence of a magnet? There’s something about him, around him that appeals to me. So many have tried, keep trying and I second guess myself. My heart still looks around whether or not my mind respects them. My body is tame, a passive viewer in the festivities. He shows up and nothing works right. My body betrays me. My mind- numb, my heart-content, my soul tags at his mercilessly. We fight for dominance. This is new to me. A man who defies me as openly as he’s pulled to me. A man who makes me want to rule and be ruled. A man whose future is too bright, how does he not see it? He hides his goodness, I wonder why. I want to take care of him. I want to tell him every day that he’s going to make it big in his life. I want to tell him to stay. This has to end. It’s becoming ridiculous this angst. I’ll take care of myself now.

It’s my friend’s birthday. Or is it mine? Definitely my friend’s. We threw a surprise party and are having an amazing time. I’m dancing. I’m always happy dancing. I make all my friends join me, clapping in glee. I am experiencing that buzz that one only gets from alcohol. God knows what I’ve taken. A hand stretches over to me, turning round I extend my own hand to his. Who else but him? I hug him tightly as he laughs at me. He tells me he’s back. I look at him and hug him again. His shower scent, yes, it’s him. I’m sure of it. I’m not dreaming him up, am I? I don’t care. I’m home. He’s home.

I love my family, my culture and my country. The elections really brought the ugly side of some of our friends. We failed to respect each person’s opinions. We all wanted to protect our personal interests, covering our own backsides. Elections were so sensitive an issue that we’ve chosen to bury our heads in the sand for the sake of ‘peace’ without actually addressing the underlying issues. When will we be able to talk frankly without offending each other? We all saw how we voted along tribal lines, yet there were small pockets of hope in the name of radical voter in some areas. Voter apathy may arise after this due to the feeling that nothing ever really changes.

 The Old Guard are trying to sneak themselves into the new government. There is this perverse political ideal of ‘It’s our time to eat’ perpetuated in the country. When did a post of public service become a seat of financial windfall? I tire easily after reading the newspapers or watch the news. Bikozulu put it the right way, there is no problem with being proud of your tribe, it’s the stereotyping and lack of tolerance coupled with bad tribalism that leaves a bad taste in one’s mouth.  A friend of mine thinks that what we need is a civil war. I don’t think so. War begets war. War brings about a cacophony of problems; never solving the initial issue. What we need are radical thinkers, voters who think for themselves, leaders who are accountable. People free from the country’s baggage that it seems everyone carries, maybe that’s why we don’t walk with our backs straight, our heads held high. It’ll only work if we don’t let this bile fester in our hearts, spilling it to our babes while they still lie on our bosoms. For haven’t we heard some of these stories and stereotypes from the mouths of our very own parents?

A yoga mat rests on a stripper pole, a complimentary contrast. I’m busy sketching lines on drawing paper. Lines that want to tell a story, hopefully showing an inkling of what I envision. Smoking a joint seems to give the scene such a risqué view, yet it’s what is needed to complete it. That and the man shirt and socks I’m busy moving around in. Brushes, pencils and pens lie all over but have nothing on the books in the room. Books lay everywhere. Pages open in some, others closed. The balcony doors are fully open bringing in the warm breeze, the lace curtains welcome it. Enya plays in the background. Again she shoos me away. Diana I can’t draw with someone looking at me, surely you know that!