Obatala: Creation needs a clear head

Spring, Easter & Creation
The devil tempts but doesn’t force. (Guyana)





Water and chaos were all that existed in the beginning, the Yoruba say. Obatala, one of the orishas (lesser deities) was losing patience with those who didn't share his dream of taming the disorder below heaven.

“What is the use of our powers,” Obatala asked Oludamare, the Creator-God “if we don’t ever use them?”

“The power is yours. You can do what you want with it,” Oludamare said.

“I want to create a world out of chaos,” Obatala said.

“Done. You have my blessing,” Oludamare said. “Just make sure you talk to my son who knows the future. He will tell you what you need to do to succeed.”

"I am on my way, Oludamare. Thanks."

"And stay away from....."

"I know, I know. I can't thrive and drink," Obatala said.

On the advice of Oludamare's son and other orishas, Obatala collected maize, a palm nut, a chain of gold, a five-toed chicken, and a calabash of sand. In addition he carried an egg so sacred that he wrapped it in his shirt, close to his chest.

Seven days after Obatala left to climb down the chain of gold toward water and chaos, no one had heard from him. So Oludamare sent another orisha, Oduduwa, in search of Obatala. Oduduwa, found Obatala drunk on palm wine from a heavenly feast. When Oduduwa could not rouse Obatala, he took the chicken, the palm seeds, and the calabash and completed the journey.

Oduduwa scattered sand from the calabash over the water and he dropped the chicken on the sand. The chicken scratched the sand, and vast land sprang up wherever the sand was scattered. Oduduwa then planted the palm nut in the earth, and from it was created the Yoruba kingdom of Ile-Ife.

Obatala was furious when he found out that Oduduwa took his plan and acted on it. Obatala's heart beat so hard the sacred egg cracked. From the egg flew a sacred bird that dipped and whirled till it created hills and lowlands. Obatala walked around, scattering maize seeds that grew quickly in the new land. Seeing these changes made him even more irritated with Oduduwa, so he sought Oludamare's help.

“Oludamare,” Obatala asked, “Do you think it is fair that Oduduwa gets the credit for my idea?”

“Surely you haven't forgotten why....?” Oludamare asked.

“I just took a little sip of the palm wine to celebrate," Obatala said. "It won’t happen again.”

“There is still work for you to do. If you are up to it.”

“I have learned my lesson. I won’t fail this time.”

“You can use your powers to create men and women,” Oludamare said.

“How do I do that?” asked Obatala.

“Use clay to create forms that look like the gods and the orishas,” Oludamare said, “and I will do the rest.”

Obatala molded clay into different shapes and left them to bake in the sun. He made lots of these bodies and got so thirsty that he took a break. He checked out the newly-grown palm trees and tested some juice to see if it had fermented as yet. He took one sip and then another, and then many more.

When he returned to molding the clay, his eyes and hands were unsteady, but he still thought all the bodies were beautiful. As a result, when Oludamare breathed fireballs of life into these forms, some could not see or hear, walk or even stand.

When Obatala realized what he had done, he promised himself that he would never again touch strong drink. He also pledged to protect those who suffered because of his carelessness.

Until today, Obatala is the protector of persons with disabilities. His followers may eat palm oil, but they must never ever touch palm wine.

Madame CJ Walker, from Cook to Cosmetic Queen

Women's History Month
Queen rule beehive, not king. (Guyana)

Madame CJ Walker (December 23, 1867 – May 25, 1919)


















As a child, the smell of fried hair was a constant. My mother was a hairdresser running her salon from home, and women came to her to create the fantasy that made Madame CJ the first American Black (or white) woman to be a self-made millionaire. Like Madame Walker, my mother used the hot comb to straighten hair.

Black women today seem to have wide choices - heat or chemical, straight or jherri curl, braids or twists, short or long, red or blond, sisterlocks or dreadlocks. Still, Black women need to go the way of Madame CJ Walker if they want to rise in the corporate world, or if their spouses are to create the "right" family portrait as they rise to the top.

Madame CJ Walker was born as Sarah Breedlove. Her parents, who had been slaves, died when she was seven years old. She and her sister later worked as maids, and she married at age 14 - apparently to escape an abusive brother-in-law. She was widowed at age 20, with a daughter to support. She became a laundress, and by 1905 she was a sales agent for a Black woman, Ann Malone who made hair care products.



Of her rise to riches, she stated, “ I am a woman who came from the cotton fields of the South. From there I was promoted to the washtub. From there I was promoted to the cook kitchen. And from there I promoted myself into the business of manufacturing hair goods and preparations...I have built my own factory on my own ground.”

In 1906, she married Charles Joseph Walker, and changed her name to Madame CJ Walker. She then founded her Madame CJ Walker Manufacturing Comany to sell hair care products and cosmetics.

Reports do not say how Madame Walker found the means to rise from a white person's kitchen to her own manufacturing plant. One hint is that the way in which she acquired the formula for her hair grower. She said the ingredients came to her in a dream in which a Black man told her how to cure baldness. She also seems to have "borrowed" Ann Malone's formula, and I did not come across a record of royalty payments.

Charles Joseph Walker, a newspaperman, contributed to the management of the business, but it is not clear whether he brought equity as well. Madame Walker divorced him by 1910, and by 1917 she had the biggest Black-owned business in the US.



To Madame Walker's credit, she never forgot her early struggles, and she tried to use her wealth to create opportunities for others. Thousands of Black women working as her agents earned almost as much in a day as they might have done in a week working as a maid. She helped to raise funds for anti-lynching campaigns, and personally donated $5,000 to the NAACP for this cause. This was the largest gift the NAACP had received up to this time. She also made the largest contribution to saving abolitionist Frederick Douglass' home. In her will, she left money to support Black schools, organizations, and institutions.

When Madame Walker died at age 51, her daughter Lelia succeeded her. Madame Walker was inducted into the Junior Achievement U.S. Business Hall of Fame in 1992. In January 1998 the USPS issued the Madam C.J. Walker Commemorative stamp.

The discussion of Black women's hair remains relevant enough to have been the subject of Chris Rock's recent movie "Good Hair". From the fifties hot comb straight look, the sixties Afro and the seventies dreadlocks, we now seem to be in the era of the Korean hair weave. What next?

The fire Hattie McDaniel started

Women's History Month
Splinters of wood are the ones that start a fire. (Kenya)

Hattie McDaniel














I grew up understanding Hollywood to be racist and sexist (not to mention age-ist). A plus-sized Black woman like Hattie McDaniel was therefore exceptional in getting screen credits as an actress, no matter how limited the roles she was offered. Two plus-sized Black women featured in this year's Oscar awards. Like Hattie in 1939, Mo'Nique took the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. Time will tell how wide a choice of roles will now be offered to Mo'Nique and Gabourey Sidibe (stars of the movie Precious).

According to a Jamaican proverb, "Donkey say the world not level." Lena Horne, even in the Jim Crow era, negotiated contracts restricting the parts she would accept - no maid roles. But Lena (slim, light-skinned) didn't fit the racist Aunt Jemima stereotype any more than Halle Berry or Vanessa Williams today. Plus-sized Black women still face challenges in finding an acceptable range of roles.

Hattie has had her critics for playing roles that stereotyped Blacks. She was a professional singer-songwriter, comedienne, and performer on radio and television. Indeed she was the first Black woman to sing on the radio in America. However, she rarely played any roles, large or small, other than as someone's maid. Hattie won her part in Gone With the Wind by appearing at the audition in an authentic maid's uniform. One film, The Little Colonel, was particularly offensive to the Black community. It showed Black servants yearning for the days in the South when massa was in charge.

When she first went to Hollywood, she worked as a maid or a cook because she could not get acting roles of any kind. When finally she appeared in a radio show, she was a maid. Her salary was so low that she had to continue her job as a maid in order to pay the bills. When the NAACP criticized her for taking roles that demeaned her race, she said, "I'd rather play a maid and make $700 a week than be one for $7."

Racism was a constant for all of Hattie's career. For example, she could not attend the Atlanta premiere of Gone With the Wind unless she were willing to book into a "blacks only" hotel and sit in the Black section of the theatre. In addition, her photo could not appear in any souvenir program for the South. Her friend Clark Gable objected on her behalf and threatened to boycott the Atlanta premiere. Hattie persuaded him to attend.



Hattie pushed back where she could. Southern audiences objected to some of her roles because she played maids who were independent, sharp-tongued and by no means subservient. She organized her Black neighbours to stand up against whites who cited a covenant that would have prevented Blacks from owning property in the wealthy area where she bought her home.



Even in her death she encountered race prejudice. She expressed the wish to be buried alongside other film stars. However, the owner of the cemetry refused to allow any Blacks to be interred there. More than forty years later, the current owners relented, but Hattie's family decided not to disturb her remains.

Respect is due to Hattie for her achievements in a time hostile to upward mobility of Blacks. She was the first Black actress to win an Academy award - for Best Supporting Role in Gone with The Wind.



Mo'Nique, the latest on a short list of Black actresses to win Oscars, thanked Hattie “for enduring all that she had to so that I would not have to.” Mo'Nique has pledged to present Hattie's story on film.

Hattie also has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Hollywood, and in 2006 became the first black Oscar winner to be honored with a US postage stamp.

Let us watch the career movement of Mo'Nique and Gabourey Sidibe to see how far we have come since Hattie's day.

Euzhan Palcy shines the sun on dark spaces

Women's History Month
If the sun shone at night many thieves would be discovered. (Africa)

Euzhan Palcy ((1958 - )






Euzhan Palcy's "Sugar Cane Alley" grabbed my heart when I first saw it, and each of the two or three other times I have watched it. I feel as if I know the children, the grandmother, the sugar cane plantation, the boy who leaves the plantation to go to town to get an education. Besides, Palcy is able to draw extraordinary performances from previously unknown actors. This is one film that I prefer to the book.



Euzhan Palcy is rare in her field. She is a Black female director, a Caribbean woman who was born in Martinique. "Sugar Cane Alley" was her first film. It cost less than US$1million to shoot, and it was an immediate hit in the early 1980s when it was made. This film won more than seventeen international awards, including one for Best Lead Actress for the 76-year-old who played the role of the grandmother. It also won the French equivalent of an Academy Award for best feature film.

More people may have seen or heard of Palcy's "Dry White Season", a 1989 movie starring Marlon Brando, Donald Sutherland, and Susan Sarandon. With this movie, Palcy became the first Black female film director produced by a major Hollywood studio.The story is about South Africa and the Soweto uprising, and Palcy researched her material by going to Soweto undercover.

Brando was so impressed with Palcy's sincerity and her social conscience, that he agreed to act in the movie without charging a fee. He received an Academy Award nomination for his performance. Not long after "Dry White Season" was released, Nelson Mandela personally welcomed Palcy to South Africa. The late Senator Ted Kennedy also thanked Palcy for making this film that was so successful in giving a face to the injustice of apartheid.



Brando’s performance in the movie earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor and he received the Best Actor Award at the Tokyo Film Festival. Palcy received the “Orson Welles Award” in Los Angeles, and a few months after the release of the film, Nelson Mandela welcomed her South Africa.

"Ruby Bridges" (1998) is a Palcy film that tells the story of a New Orleans girl who was the first to integrate public schools in her city. President Bill Clinton introduced that film to US television audiences.

Palcy's most recent film, "Veterans' Journey" unearthed the story of teenage boys and girls who left their French Caribbean homes to join in defending France in World War II. Because of Palcy's efforts, the French government finally recognised the bravery and sacrifice of these young people. In 2009, President Sarkozy honored them with an award of the French Legion of Honor. He also made Palcy an "Officer in the National Order of Merit", a signal honor. Before that, she had been honored by French Presidents Francois Mitterrand and Jacques Chirac.

If you want to check out one film maker's passion for social justice and compassion for humanity, have a look at a Palcy film. You can start with "Sugar Cane Alley" if you haven't yet seen it. Let me know what you think.

Forward with Yaa Asantewaa

Women's History Month
The warrior wins a battle by pressing forward. (Ghana)

Nana Yaa Asantewaa (around 1840 - 1921)















If I need to top my my courage, I think about Nana Yaa Asantewaa. Like the time a judge closed down her court to try to find a way to lock me up or at least prevent me from returning to her court. She objected to my divulging to the public what was happening in a court to which the public has right of access. Well, I can’t say for certain if Nana Yaa Asantewaaintervened, but the day came and went, and many months of the court hearing came and went, and I remained seated inside that judge's court room.

If I am tempted to do what is easy and expedient rather than what is risky and principled, I think about Nana Yaa Asantewaa. Like staying in the corporate job that was draining away my spirit, but gave me a regular income with benefits (like health insurance), and promised me a pension. But when the security felt like a shackle, Yaa's spirit moved me on.

Nana Yaa Asantewaa did not scare easily. She didn't back down even when Ashanti soldiers, experienced fighters, thought it was wisest to yield when faced with the military might of the British.

This was the early twentieth century. The British Empire was such that the sun could never set on it. Powerful. Strongest in the world at the time and only getting stronger. Boosted by the profits from slavery, the empire was now colonizing as much of Africa as it could.

This British governor Frederick Hodgson thought he show the Ashantis how low they had fallen. One the Ashantis were empire-builders in West Africa, but now the British had sent the Asantehene (Ashanti king) Prempeh into exile. The governor believed the Ashanti were subdued, and he wanted to make sure they understood the extent of their defeat. He insisted on sitting on the Golden Stool.



The Golden Stool. According to tradition, the Golden Stool had floated from the sky and landed on the lap of Osei Tutu, the first Asantehene (Ashanti king). It was made of pure gold. Akomfo Anokye, Osei Tutu's chief priest, said the soul or sumsum of the Ashanti people lived in this Stool, and therefore the Stool was central to Ashanti unity.



Replicas of the Golden Stool existed, but few people ever saw the real Golden Stool, and no one ever sat on it. When an Asantehene was being enstooled, he was raised and lowered over the Golden Stool, but even he could never sit on it. If the Stool were in a room, it was always placed higher than the head of any person in that room. Even today, only the Asantehene and a few trusted advisors ever know where the Stool is stored.



But the British governor Frederick Hodgson was demanding to sit on the Golden Stool. As of right.

Nana Yaa Asantewaa was a part of the secret meeting to decide what message to sent back to Hodgson. She was Queen Mother of Ejisu, an Ashanti state. Her grandson was the King of Ejisu (Ejisuhene) who was exiled in the Seychelles with Asantehene Prempeh. In her grandson's absence, Nana Yaa Asantewaa was the regent of Ejisu.

The Ashanti warriors in the secret meeting found reason not to resist the governor's demand. Some wanted to negotiate with the British for the return of the Asantehene and his advisors, so they thought allowing the governor to sit on the Stool might placate the British. Others thought the Ashantis would be further defeated if they went to war over the Stool,and then they would be treated worse than before.

Nana Yaa Asantewaa disagreed. When she addressed the gathering, she said,

“Now I see that some of you fear to go forward to fight for our king. If it [was] in the brave days of Osei Tutu, Okomfo Anokye, and Opoku Ware, chiefs would not sit down to see their king to be taken away without firing a shot. No European could have dared speak to chiefs of Asante in the way the governor spoke to you this morning. Is it true that the bravery of Asante is no more? I cannot believe it. It cannot be! I must say this: if you, the men of Asante, will not go forward, then we will. We, the women, will. I shall call upon my fellow women. We will fight the white men. We will fight till the last of us falls in the battlefields."

With that, Nana Yaa Asantewaa took charge of the war against the British. She may not have been in the battlefield, but she was chief strategist.

When the British realised the Ashantis were resisting the governor-general's demand, they took refuge in a fort in Kumasi. Ashanti soldiers kept the British hostage for about four months, beating back all efforts to free the governor general and those who accompanied him. Finally the British were able to send enough troops to push back the Ashanti soldiers.

Nana Yaa Asantewaa was captured, and according to oral tradition, she spat in the face of her the British commanding officer. She and her closest advisors joined Asantehene Prempeh in exile in the Seychelles. However, the British never again tested the mettle of the Ashanti soldiers. In addition, British governors kept at a respectful distance from Ashanti traditions and governance.

Nana Yaa Asantewaa died in exile, and Asantehene Prempeh returned to his kingdom three years later. He made sure that Yaa's remains were returned to the land of her birth for royal burial.

Just over thirty years after Nana Yaa Asantewaa's death, her dream was accomplished. British rule ended and the Gold Coast became independent Ghana.

Queen Nanny conquers mountains

March 20, 2010

Women's History Month

While there is a mountain in your path, do not sit down at its foot and cry, get up and climb it. (Africa)


Nanny, Queen of the Maroons









When we talk bout Grandy Nanny it might sound like fairy tale, but is true. You will know is not a fairy tale because it is not about no blue-eyed blond girl who sleeping till a prince come and wake her. This story is bout a black woman who strong enough to wake up princes and the King of England himself. Even after she dead she still the power to wake up people.

Most of what we know come to us through what the elders tell us. It don’t generally write in book, so if you are one of those who think only what write in book is true, then you can stop listen. Those who know better will tell you that plenty things that write in book not true and some is outright malicious lie. But who want to know the truth will know it when them hear it.

Nanny born a free woman, and she decide to live and die same way. She never ever forget she is Ashanti and royal, not when them grab her and walk her down to the coast. Not when she waiting in the dungeon with some much mess that even rat and roach run away from it. Not when sailors throw Black men over board like them is garbage and try push seed into Black women like them is dirt in planting season.

So when Nanny reach Kingston harbor and the boat dock, she just walk to the mountains and never look back. The spirits call her to freedom and she answer and make the spirits show her the way. Is only fear stop everybody else from doing the same thing, but Nanny never know what fear was. She probably reach to Jamaica round 1700 or so, when the Maroons was already battering the British.

If the Maroon war was simmering before, Nanny take it to boiling point. In them times, Maroon women don’t just live to serve them men. Them help raid the white man plantation and fight right next to Maroon men. Them was warrior-queens. One white man say he see Nanny wearing anklet and bracelet made of teeth of white men she kill in battle.

So Nanny lead the men and women. She show them how to cover themselves with branch so them look like tree. When the white men come up, what them think is trees stand still until the Maroons surround the soldiers and in a short time the battle done. Plenty British troops come into the mountains and don’t leave there alive, or else have to leave behind them gun and bullet or them blood and bones. Along with them pride. For how could these few Black men (them wouldn't want to count the women) make thousands of white soldiers of the British empire beg for mercy?

It was strategy that beat the British, but them never think Black men and women could out-think white people. So them start to say Nanny is a witch. Them say is not a fair fight when Nanny can catch bullet in her arse and fart the bullets back at them. Them say Nanny have a magic pot that boil without fire, and if any white man look into the pot them will dead. Them say she feeding her people with magic pumpkin seed that grow big pumpkins in one week. Them say she have magic herbs that close up cuts and heal every sickness.

The British do them best to find Nanny. She live way up in the mountains in a spot where a lot of people cannot reach to this day. A place so high up that lookouts could see the British coming and blow the abeng as warning. A place where the Maroons could easily trap the British since the white men have to pick them way between rocks in passes holding only one or two man at a time. A place that Nanny help hundreds of slaves to reach if they wanted to be free. A place that the British reach one time but couldn’t manage to hold.

After eighty years of war, the British ask the Maroons to sign a peace treaty. Before Toussaint free Haiti from France, warrior-queen Nanny with her brothers force the British to free the Maroons.



For all those who think Nanny is Anancy story, check this out. Read all the book and newspapers you want, because this is what write down in black and white, Around the 1970s, some white soldiers decide to find Nanny Town. Well, when them get to a certain point, them hear like thunder, and part of a mountain fall down. The soldiers say at night time them hear voices and sometimes see faces. What seem to make the soldiers decide to turn back was one morning when a soldier couldn’t find him watch. Him know him have on him watch when him go to sleep zip up in him sleeping bag. But next morning him don’t see no watch. The soldiers search and search, and up to this day the watch don’t turn up.

Still, today if you want to go to Nanny Town, a Maroon will take you there. But you might want to ask Nanny first.

Women's History Month
When an elder shares, there is peace.(Ghana)

Dame Nita Barrow











Compassion is what marks Nita Barrow for me. Picture a nine-year-old girl coming from the country to live in town. One day she had two brothers (one a baby, really) and freedom to roam to neighbors where she could find children to play with and a game to join in. Later that same day she is sent to live with her aunt, a posh lady who lives in a rich neighborhood, so the neighbors here are mostly white or very light skinned.

The little girl sees the mostly white or very light skinned children, but they don’t see her. Only one other black girl lives on the road, and she becomes the little girl’s only friend apart from classmates who talk to her and sometimes invite her to play ring games at break times. A long time passes before her classmates invite her to their homes for birthday parties.

The little girl is afraid her aunt is going to forget her birthday, and she doesn’t want to seem pushy and ask what the plan is. If she were with her mom and dad she would at least have home made ice cream on the Sunday afternoon closest to her birthday.

When her birthday comes, the little girl gets a cake baked all for her. A whole cake just for her. She can’t remember getting a birthday cake before, with icing. Her mother made Christmas puddings and steamed them in a pot. But this is a regular cake baked in a regular oven and not in a pot with coal to the top and coal to the bottom. This is a magic cake with the brown and yellow swirls.

Nita Barrow made marble cakes for me for all the birthdays from I was nine till I left my aunt-mother’s home to get married. She is the reason my sons always had marble cakes on their birthdays.

Since I had only one neighbor to play with, I read a lot. I was reading the newspapers since I was about four years old, and that got my dad so excited that he bought me Tale of Two Cities. As a result, I resisted even looking at a Charles Dickens book till I was forced to read him in high school. But at my aunt-mother’s house, reading was a way to make believe I was not alone. It also turned out to be a great way to avoid doing chores.

Nita Barrow introduced me to the Little Prince by Saint Exupery, and until today I am never without a copy of that book. I re-read it the whole book two or three times every decade. And I open it a lot more often to re-read my favorite passages.

I considered myself grown up by the time I did university entrance exams, but I still felt like Nita Barrow’s favored little girl when she invited me to have lunch with her between exam papers. She was then the matron of the university hospital, and that was no mean feat for a Black woman at the time. Predictably, the head of the university - a college of London University in colonial times - was white, as were most of the lecturers.

By the time I was on summer holidays at the end of my first year at university, Nita Barrow organized a holiday job for me in the matron’s office. By that time she had moved on from being matron, and the new person was white and British (what else?).

Nita Barrow always treated me as if I were grown up when I was a child, and as if I were her equal when I was grown and she was a high flying international advisor meeting with world leaders. She remained caring and plain-speaking when her brother was the Prime Minister of Barbados and later when she was knighted by the Queen of England and became the first female Governor General of Barbados. . Her conversations with me were always catching up with all I had done since we last met. She never made herself the focus of the conversation, never dropped names, and she had plenty to drop if she chose. She was still baking cakes in her kitchen even when she was Barbados’ head of state.

As soon as we heard Dame Nita had passed on, my aunt-mother and I booked our tickets for Barbados. I don’t feel obliged to attend funerals unless the person is my close relative or a close relative of a close friend. Nita Barrow felt closer than a close relative.



I felt the reach of her love beyond her death when her family embraced my aunt-mother and me as if we also shared their bloodline. We shared all the family’s privileges at the official funeral for Nita Barrow.

Barbadians mourned their loss as if Nita Barrow were everyone’s mother, sister, aunt, grandmother, or best friend. I learned that any child was welcome to visit her in Government House. I heard about a coconut vendor who had his shack near government House. When the police wanted to move him, Dame Nita instructed them to leave him alone and instead to help him improve his location. People who cried real tears for her. The tributes spoke to her dedication to health care, her passion for social justice, her advocacy of women’s rights, and her reputation as a diplomat.

But for me, she remained most of all the person who always treated me as special, moat of all when I was an emotionally fragile nine-year-old.