"Love is so powerful, it's like unseen flowers under your feet as you walk" ----Bessie Head
It is my desire that this blog will never become stale in its' subject matter, and even though my blog has a theme, there is a world of Romance out there both past and present to be written about.
Ardent's latest blog entry got me to thinking about my very first international sojourn, as a Peace Corps volunteer in the African nation of Botswana. African nations south of the Sahara get such bad press. It is always about disease, war, poverty, or genocide. There is little mention of the good of the extraordinary. The most recent case of bad news are the elections in Kenya. It has hit home with one of my neighbors, because presently he is hosting a student in his home who is Kenyan.
Botswana is one of the richest countries in Africa because of its' diamond resources. It does not get much attention because the people are quiet and peaceful with their neighbors. Also there are not a conglomeration of tribes there, so no tribal problems. The Batswana are very tolerant. I used to silently laugh when some Batswana would tell me, "Botswana is not true Africa. You have to got to West Africa, to see true Africa."
I was in Botswana when apartheid was running its' course in neighboring South Africa. In fact, depending on where I was, I sometimes lived as close as 15 miles from the South African border. As a non-white person I went to South Africa only once, because the climate there was very tense and even some British friends of mine who went were harassed by white South African soldiers.
There were a number of people both black and white whom the Batswana like to talk about when I was there. One of them was a person they held in high regard, the writer, Bessie Head. Bessie Head is one of Africa's greatest authors, dying at age 49 just when she was about to come into her own and get the recognition she deserved. Her life was short, difficult, lonely, and tragic. Nevertheless, out of her hardship, she birthed writing of get power and sometimes disturbing beauty.
Bessie Head was the daughter of a white South mother of patrician background and a black South African father who was a stable hand to her mother's family. The relationship was totally illicit because it broke apartheid laws which applied more to white women and black men than to white men and black women. According to my Batswana students and friends who related Head's story to me, when Bessie Head's white grandparents learned that their daughter was pregnant by their black stable hand, they had her committed to an insane asylum. There Bessie Head was born in 1937. Life was tough from the beginning. Of course, her mother's family did not want her, and neither did her father's family. Therefore, Bessie was placed in an orphanage where she grew up.
Having showed strong intelligence, Bessie went to school to become a teacher. Later she married a journalist and had a son, but she eventually became a divorcee.
Unable to tolerate life under apartheid, Bessie Head went to neighboring Botswana where she became a refugee. Even in Botswana life was hard, and Head lived in extreme poverty. She ended up in the village of Serowe, one of Botswana's most famous villages one reason of which is because it is the home of Botswana's first president, Sir Seretse Khama, another person common on the lips of many Batswana. In Botswana, Head found her calling and began writing. Also in the process she became an alcoholic and died of hepatitis in 1986.
Bessie Head's work is hard to classify under one genre. Unlike many African writer's her work is not very political. Her novels tend to be semi-autobiographical, with Biblical and classical imagery. She was also influenced by D. H. Lawrence.
Here can be seen an online project by students at the University of Botswana (which was spic and span and new when I visited it) concerning Bessie Head.
5 comments:
What a lovely story.
Africa is a diamond but nobody wants to notice. And how many people like Bessie Head can be forgotten because only winners write History.
Indeed Emma.
Like some have said who have worked closely in aiding Africans, all they need is a chance because they are resourceful and industrious people. Africa has untold untapped natural resources. The people are the other great resource.
In Botswana I saw people making the most out of so little, with little kids making their own toy cars and trucks out of wire, which were really works of art. The people keep not only the insides of their homes clean, but they did not litter outside either. I have lived in Turkey where there is so much litter in many places. I did not see this in Botswana.
When apartheid ended, the black South Africans showed the world that the way to go was not violence and oppression against their former tormentors. A lot of people felt, "Uh, that's Africa, so get ready for a bloodbath." Thank goodness that Nelson Mandela and the others proved them wrong. The day he was freed and walked with his ex-wife Winnie was a day of great pride for me.
Reconciliation was what the people in the region decided to pursue. They are a proud people, but though they were humiliated, oppressed, sometimes killed or left out, I never heard any Africans express any hatred or bitterness towards whites even then. South Africa and some other parts of the region have done rather well since then except for the scourage of AIDS.
I wish there other troubled regions in world would take these people as their role model. The black South Africans could have become bitter. They could have choose to hate and resort to violence, but they did not, and they have gained ground for it.
Also for anyone who read this post earlier, I've to changed one thing. I was in Peace Corps in 1991-1992, so Bessie Head had already died. Previously, I wrote that she was still alive:( If you note the time posted last night when I posted my entry, I was not fully alert.
Bessie Head was truly an inspirational woman. She made the best of her circumstances. How cruel the world can be.
The black nations are not confrontational but the west keeps them poor and in conflict so they can extract their countries natural resources, just like Iraq.
Thanks for doing an article on Bessie.
Ardent,
If only she could have pulled herself together, she would have seen better days perhaps. Bessie Head was truly an amazing person, activist, and artist. After all the traumna it is kind of amazing that she reached 49 and was able to reach such heights in her work.
There is an optimism and drive I have seen in Africans who come from some very bad circumstances that I have not in different groups I have been around.
Also when Bessie "lost it" and made terrible allegations against the president of Botswana, she was not persecuted or killed like she might have been in some countries. He and the public understood that it was anguish that was speaking not any real maliciousness from her and showed her love and compassion and just sent her to a mental hospital for awhile. She wouldn't have gotten off as lightly here even in the US because the media would have attacked her and her reputation would have been destroyed for at least awhile. Look at the case of Britney Spears. How the media is treating her is atrocious. They laugh at her "antics." But here is a very mentally disturbed and hurting young woman. It is so sad the lack of compassion some people have. They need to show love. Bessie Head understood that:)
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