Expensive shit part 1

Now that the furore about the President of the United Shit-holes of America has died down a bit let's try to analyze what it is that he said.

Sometimes a negative experience spurs you on to create something positive. I mean I wanted to start this blog like 4 years ago and nothing happened. I just could not commit myself to it.

I think I know why. You see in order for someone to be creative in any field not just the arts he or she needs to be at ease. Or better yet at peace.

I was not at ease then and at that particular moment I was in Africa, in Senegal. I love Senegal, mind. I love the people I love the women, I love their joie de vivre even though their elites make their live a living hell on Earth. There are also many things I don't like about Senegal and it's not just the leaders, be they politicians, spiritual leaders (marabouts) or business men/woman.

The main thing I hate about Senegal or Africa from Cairo to Cape Town is the idea that when you can do something without facing the consequences (impunity): you might as well do it or someone else will do it for/to you.

This idea is ingrained into most people’s heads on this continent.

An example from Senegal:

Why is it that you complain about the low wages you get paid (between $35 and $150) a month which is low compared to any standard… only to do the same to someone else when you can actually put your money where your mouth is.

A friend of mine worked for his uncle who was then at the head (and owner) of one the biggest construction companies in West Africa (A real black owned business) Not Lebanese or Syrians no real Africans.
This friend had to work every day of the week if he wanted to get about $120 a month. Any day off would result in deductions.

He decided to start a chicken farm it actually worked and well yes black people loooove chicken and we loooove watermelon too but that's a different story altogether. Anyway Senegal is like Joe Tex once sang Chicken Crazy so money was rolling in.  Alas my friend became a victim of the many power cuts that plagued and plague Senegal but back then I talk about 2008 or around that year it was baaaaad. 

What was also bad was that he had to store the chicken in freezers that were no longer working so his chicken were rotting away but it didn't have to end that way if he had a motivated employee who cared about the chicken and got them out of the water before they went off.

And that is the point I want to make here. His sole employee was not interested in saving the chicken. The last good ones were also no longer live and thus frozen… because demand was high. He was paid to make sure they stayed in the fridge once processed and make sure the live ones were not running away and that's ALL that he did.

Here is why.... My friend who felt so offended by his boss-uncle did the same to his employee. He literally paid him chicken-feed. I just asked him why he thought the employee should have warned him or done something about the problem. Explained him why I wouldn't: That employee was the field Negro and my friend though black was the evil masta who needed to see his house burning. And burn it did, well it stank but you get the point I hope.

In 2010 I worked almost a year in Ethiopia. The elite there have an idea how they are going to catapult Ethiopia into the 21st century but it would be mean to say it's just the elite because like in Senegal everybody thinks impunity is OK as long as you are on the good side of impunity...

I love Ethiopia. Here we have a country with black people and most of them (I say most of them) know they are black AND African, with its own alphabet and therefore according to white men's definition a history that goes way past anything people in Holland or England or the US can boast of. Because of this history they are not easily indoctrinated by foreigners (ferengis). I am proud of these people who are not easily pushed into accepting white men's (economic) dogmas. It also means they have NO excuse for their actions.

One day I was reading either Capital or Fortune one of the two leading English medium Ethiopian newspaper. Their news coverage gave me an insight however limited of what went on. One day I was less happy because already I was struggling to keep my Pan-African feel-good bubble floating and now I had to read the following:

Some Ethiopian men who worked for a transport company and a retail company got 25 years of hard labour because they had stolen the content of some truck. Twenty five years of hard labour for stealing a truck with stuff in it? Yes you read that right. According to the judge or the prosecutor this punishment had to be meted out because… these criminals were sabotaging the development of our beloved Ethiopia.

However… whatever was in the truck was Chinese and whatever comes into Africa from China is junk in every sense of the word. So I don’t understand how stealing a truckload of Chinese trinkets equals an insidious act of heinous destabilization of our beloved Ethiopia. In fact had they burnt the truck on the border with Eritrea or wherever this truck came from it would have been an act of national liberation.

I for one almost quit smoking because of the “quality” of Chinese lighters anywhere in Africa. Ok just Senegal, Mali, Ethiopia, and Sudan. These are the countries I lived in long enough to “get” Chinese-African development so I know Africa is NOT developing in the way/direction it should/could.

Hold on… I am not blaming the Chinese for the men getting 25 years for stealing a truck. I just can’t get my head around the fact that someone could sentence his fellow human being to 25 years for stealing a truck, a damn truck! Probably Chinese as well… That’s nasty on many levels.

But for me only one level counts: If you get 25 years for stealing a (Chinese) truck brimming with Chinese junk what does it take to take a government bullet in the head?

So this is Project Fear the Habesha way (Amharic for brown face) and this is why people get the same kind of silly wages working as a teacher.

I worked as a teacher in Ethiopia and got $500 that got less and less worth because we got actually paid in Birr which was losing value as you watched the seconds ticking by. But the locals got paid in Birr as well and got $150 at most. Now this was a real school from hell. The teachers were nice, most students were really nice, the rest of the staff was nice but the owner (an ethnic Somali) and his white American wife were true scum off the earth. I am not going to discuss my personal business with them even though as a Muslim I prayed for their downfall (on very hard times) and had to be told by some shifty non-believing lady that that was not really what faith was about…

I digress. This owner and his wife had the temerity to do a James Brown routine on their staff: If you made a mistake - and they decided what that mistake was, they would just cut into a part of your salary. I saw a cleaning lady cry because he withheld her “transport money” for being late. He found out what I said about him and told me it was his God-given right because he, out of the goodness of his heart (I quote) gave her 350 Birr travel expenses PER MONTH (that was about $17). It was also half her “salary”… Maybe I am wrong and it was less (Iike 150 Birr) for travel expenses but definitely not more. They did not get more than $35 PER MONTH for their work.

The cleaning ladies, some of them walked THREE hours to get to school and THREE hours back because that was food for them and their families. Not money for some crappy minibus.

Because of the JB (“I have got a bag of my own”) routine the cleaning ladies were never allowed to sit (neither were the teachers during lessons) from 7 am to 5 pm they were cleaning except during their 45 minute break. I swear in the name of Allah never anywhere in Africa have I seen such clean public toilets! They were clean and smelled nice. I have no shame to admit that if I had no time to finish my lunch in the teacher room which was also the lunchroom, even though there was NO room, I would continue to eat there and have some quiet time. Yes they were that clean that I could see the reflections of my face on those tiles. In Africa! In a public toilet, yes sir/ma’am!

I have seen quite a few African public toilets: I can honestly say that you would not even wish your worst enemy to visit them without the devil showing up pleading on their behalf, I shit you not.

So this was Project Fear on a personal level, no government involvement whatsoever in fact it is the absence of government that allows private citizens to behave in such an egregious way with their fellow human beings.

In Ethiopia I met a very nice police inspector who invited me to his house. We walked to save money as most people do in Ethiopia and on the way to his home he showed me his previous home. When he entered that place I asked him why we were entering this contraption and he said this is where he lived before he became an inspector. I could not believe my eyes I doubt if it even had an outhouse somewhere in the backyard. There was not even a proper door to enter the “house”.

This is the reality of many but not ALL Africans. Now if a police officer in Ethiopia lives like that you can imagine why a lot of Africans anywhere in Africa want to leave Africa. It’s not because they are lazy opportunists. In general these people believe that hard work is what you need to succeed but if there is no work or hard work gets you nowhere while a happy few is living the life you know it’s time to leave that shithole country.

Yes there you have it. I wrote it I am not happy but it has to be said. I don’t know if Trump meant to say black and brown people are shit and coming out of a hole. I am black and I am not shit. if one thing I am THE shit. It may hurt because Donnie Trump is a fat fomented turd who said it but there’s a reason why Africans are dying from thirst in the Sahara or drowning in the Atlantic Ocean or the Mediterranean Sea.

Any African citizen and especially our so-called political, business and spiritual leaders should just reflect about that cold hard truth.