I have always hated the first day of school. The teacher goes down the list and reads the names of students to record attendance. Mine is always written somewhere at the beggining...
"Joy...Aw...Awo" The teacher struggles, So I help them out.
"Awoniyi" I say. I usually sound a little annoyed. Mostly because it is pronounced the same exact way it is spelled. Ah-Wo-Nee-Yee. If they would really try, Im sure they could figure it out.
"Interesting." He/She usually comments. "Where are you from?"
"Nigeria" Now, I know that I wasn't really born there, and that I have only visited twice. But, I have no problem claiming Nigeria as my country.
Everyone in the class usually stares at me, as if I somehow turned into some sort of barbarian. Throughout the year people ask if I've chased a lion, or a tiger. They ask if my family back home is starving or if I have seen any of them on the "feed the children" commercials. My answer is always no.
Eventually, when someone finds out that I have lived in America my entire life, they tell me "You are a true African-American." Usually, the person is black so I tell them "You are too."
The response I get is offending and very annoying. All of a sudden, they become defensive. "I'm not African. I'm just black."
Yes, I have heard this comment many times. I have been the subject of jokes by "blacks" because of my African parents. But the truth is, we are all African. So-called-"blacks" are always talking about the importance of knowing our history, but what good is it when you don't accept that the people who are still living on the continent are your brothers and sisters?
We know that originally, whites stripped us of our dignity, our hope, and our history. For many years we were told that we don't have a history. But Black history didn't start with Harriet Tubman or any of the first slaves. It started in Africa. We are all Africans. Maybe you are from the Carribean, maybe you can't trace your ancestors past the United States, maybe you are a black-hispanic....I dont really care. We are African.
Why be so ashamed of what you truly are? If we want to truly be free from the chains that bind us, we should at least embrace who we are....Africans. All of us. I think the ignorance should stop.
So blacks...Want to do something progressive? Lets stop ignoring and degrading our OWN people. Lets start treating them like the family that they are. Of course, its easier for me to say, a lot of my family is still living in Nigeria. But at some point, all blacks should come to grips that our home is in Africa.
**If all Africans came together to do one thing, there is nothing that anyone in the world could do to stop us***
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