The Coconut

Today as i was reminding my 14 yeart old cousin that Africa is a continent and not a country, she started shouting that I was a coconut, I didn't know anything about Africa, and all I could do was to come here as a tourist and criticise.

It always pissed me off to hear " go back to your country Africa". If you've been to school you should know it's a continent compsed of many countries.

What upset me wasn' t so much the bit about Africa being a country, not even the bit about me being a "fake african", something i've heard many time. Going to the white man's school and land robbed me of Africanness. Being in favour of democracy, questionning the fact that "a black child is stubborn and the only way he can learn is by being beaten", also disqualify me as a real African.

What upset me was being rejected for telling the truth. Africa IS a continent. That much I know about Africa.

People who stayed know the guilt those who left for different not necessarily better shore, feel. Denying the returnees the feeling of belonging is I suppose due to resentment, a feeling of having been left out, a way for those who never left to reassert their own status face to some hypothetical threat posed by the newcomers? I don't know I'm no psychologist.

I am expected to go along and pretend all is fine here, and things are so drastically different in Africa, I need a different set of morals to appreciate things. It is normal there are no roads because it's Africa. It's ok not to have electricity for 16 hours a day because it's Togo. I'm shocked by the hypocrisy of it all. And shocked that only if i stop pointing at discrepancies than I'll be reinstated as an African. Because it seems the real African does not do self-criticism, doesn't try to assess what needs to be improved, doesn't do anything to change the status quo. In that light, our neighbours in Ghana and Benin are not real Africans either.

If I wanted holidays I would not have bothered coming back to Togo I wanted to tell my cousin, there are much nicer places to go to. I criticise because I want things to change and I cannot live in denial of the obvious. I'm not pretending to be more than I am: someone who have a lot to learn on all things Togolese, and willing to give a helping hand wherever I can. But if things are so good here that none of the contribution the million of Togolese abroad can offer is needed at all, then maybe I shouldn't have bothered coming back after all and neither should they.