First off, don't make any plans to travel to Africa until you have made a conscious effort to study the history of Africa from the perspective of the masses of people of Africa. What that means is take time to understand the legacy of traditional African societies, the Judeo-Christian and Islamic entrance into the continent, and the impact those realities have had on Africa. If you don't understand any of that, and are not willing to learn about it, you will only add more confusion to the mix by traveling to Africa, so if you aren't willing to gain some understanding, its probably better if you don't go. In fact, its even better if you don't read any farther. I don't wish to convince you of the need to study. That's not my job. Now, for those of you who seriously want to understand why traveling to Africa is important, I'll continue. Here is a fact most of you probably don't think much about. Your sole or primary frame of reference for us as a people is based on our time living here in the Western Hemisphere. Unfortunately, this is becoming true even for most Africans who were born in Africa, or have parents born in Africa, but have spent the bulk of your time over here. The problem with having the Western Hemisphere reference is that we have only been in this Hemisphere on any mass scale for little over 500 years (I'm not talking about limited numbers of us who came before colonialism. And in case you are confused about that, if your surname is European and you live over here, it's a safe bet your family was somebody's property so stop pretending like you belong to a legacy of people who came before Columbus). We were in Africa for hundreds of thousands of years. So whether we know it or not, whether we like it or not, most of what makes us up is directly connected to Africa. I'm talking about the foods we like, the way we communicate, the philosophies we believe in, our taste in music, our spirituality, our vision of the world. Unfortunately, most of what we are as African people contradicts directly with the European values and ways of doing things that are practiced as acceptable behavior and norms in European dominated societies. Consequently, we grow up here being told daily that our way is unacceptable and we internalize believing that to be true. One clear way to diminish that oppression is to return home to Africa. Doing so opens your eyes in little ways to who we actually are as a people. Instead of being viewed with suspicion or disdain for being who you are, being in Africa exposes you to the reasons why doing what you do makes perfect sense. For example, after Sekou Ture and the Democratic Party of Guinea invited a delegation from the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) to Guinea in 1964, Ms. Fannie Lou Hamer came back from the trip and told SNCC members that "they be jus like us over there! They stand like us! They even be holdin they babies like us!" These discoveries are validating for a people who have been taught to believe we don't belong anywhere and therefore have no value. These discoveries are so many that you spend much of your time in Africa learning about them, reaffirming that not nearly as much of our cultural connection to Africa has been lost as we have been led to believe.
I am very much looking forward to traveling to Africa within the next 30 days. It won't be my first time. In fact, I've traveled there multiple times. Actually, at this stage in my life, I'm seriously planning an eventual transition to Africa to live out my twilight years. That's maybe farther along than most people who will be reading this, but the one thing that's universal is the need to make that physical trip in order to cement that spiritual and psychological connection. Admittedly, doing that isn't going to be easy. Africa is a very complex place. A place that has been impacted with so much struggle and suffering. All of these things make understanding life there a process. Kwame Ture put it nicely when he talked about the conversation he had with a Chinese diplomat once who made an effort to compare the Chinese and African struggles. The diplomat was complaining about how difficult the Chinese had it in waging their struggle against the Japanese colonialists and the Komintang (Chinese bourgeois class). Kwame's response was "at least you only had two enemies. We have to fight the British, French, Portuguese, Dutch, Germans, Israeli zionists, the Americans and our own bourgeois classes in dozens of countries!" Still, the answers and solutions in Africa far outweigh the problems and certainly outdistance any effort to try and find solutions outside of Africa. The key there is understanding those contradictions. Doing this has never posed a problem for me because I have the work study process of the All African People's Revolutionary Party that has provided a strong foundation to process through the complications in Africa and make sense of them. Doing so makes it much easier to navigate on the continent.
So, the message here is if you are struggling to find direction in the movement and/or purpose and space for your personal life consider making an effort to embark upon a process of understanding mother Africa. Start by taking one geographical area and reading what's going there. Try Ghana. Read at least one article a week about Ghana. As you continue to do that you will learn quickly that African politics are rarely in isolation. Learning about Ghana will expose you to what's happening in neighboring Corte Ivore, Togo, etc. Soon, you will find you have a working knowledge of what's going on. Pick your sources wisely. Try to stick to primary sources. Read what the African Party for the Independence of Guinea Bissau or the Pan-African Congress of Azania, South Africa, have to say about what's going on in those countries. If you want guidance, Google the All African People's Revolutionary Party's Ideological Training Guidelines. On page eight (8) there is a guide for primary source organizations. Stick to that list to get your information and in no time you will know enough healthy information about Africa to probably motivate you to plan a trip there. Decide where you want to go and make an effort to at least learn some words of the local language for that area. Doing so in Ibo, Wolof, Twi, Fulani, Mandinka, will not take you long and will go a long way. Plan your trip with people living in the country you plan to visit. Avoid going over on a commercial tour. Sorry tour guides, but just think of that in terms of how you view people on tour buses driving through your neighborhoods. Right. Connect with real people on the ground and experience the real life there.
There's much more that could be said, but the important thing is we have to start getting our people to think in terms of Africa. Our enemies are fooling us with this talk and developing consciousness of us being a race of people. Being Black people. All this is designed to do is disconnect us from our land - Africa. They want to disconnect us because doing so disconnects us from the resources which produces the power we need to liberate ourselves and our people. That's why connecting with Africa is so important. According to the U.S. Passport Agency, only about 30% of U.S. citizens even possess a passport which probably means only about 10 to 15% of Africans have one. The sad thing is many people will openly brag about not wanting to travel outside the U.S. This is the height of ignorance and exactly the type of stupidity the enemies of Africa wish upon us. There are many areas of Africa that are rolling out the carpet for Africans in the U.S. to travel to Africa. Granted, this is a bourgeois level invitation, but we should use it to make grassroots connections to our mother. The Western Hemisphere is such a small part of who we are and what we can accomplish, but we will never understand that if we don't grow beyond the parameters provided to us by our enemies. So, think about it. I'm tired of people only wanting to talk about traveling to Europe as if that's the pinnacle of cultural development. I'm also sickened to see the connection and consciousness other people have to their homelands only to see Africans having only the context of surviving oppression on the plantation. Edward Blyden, Paul Cuffee, Marcus Garvey, and others sought to awaken us about our motherland, our homeland, over 100 years ago and many have come and gone with the same message. The U.S. is nothing without the exploitation of Africa propping it up so don't think that connecting to the U.S. makes you connect with the winner. That tide is turning and it's turning fast. Take steps to prepare yourself and your family for the next phase. Africa is getting stronger and no force on Earth will stop her! Take the opportunity to introduce yourself to your mother, the sleeping giant of the world. In doing so, you may find that you learn many important elements about yourself that you have been trying to understand for quite some time.
I am very much looking forward to traveling to Africa within the next 30 days. It won't be my first time. In fact, I've traveled there multiple times. Actually, at this stage in my life, I'm seriously planning an eventual transition to Africa to live out my twilight years. That's maybe farther along than most people who will be reading this, but the one thing that's universal is the need to make that physical trip in order to cement that spiritual and psychological connection. Admittedly, doing that isn't going to be easy. Africa is a very complex place. A place that has been impacted with so much struggle and suffering. All of these things make understanding life there a process. Kwame Ture put it nicely when he talked about the conversation he had with a Chinese diplomat once who made an effort to compare the Chinese and African struggles. The diplomat was complaining about how difficult the Chinese had it in waging their struggle against the Japanese colonialists and the Komintang (Chinese bourgeois class). Kwame's response was "at least you only had two enemies. We have to fight the British, French, Portuguese, Dutch, Germans, Israeli zionists, the Americans and our own bourgeois classes in dozens of countries!" Still, the answers and solutions in Africa far outweigh the problems and certainly outdistance any effort to try and find solutions outside of Africa. The key there is understanding those contradictions. Doing this has never posed a problem for me because I have the work study process of the All African People's Revolutionary Party that has provided a strong foundation to process through the complications in Africa and make sense of them. Doing so makes it much easier to navigate on the continent.
So, the message here is if you are struggling to find direction in the movement and/or purpose and space for your personal life consider making an effort to embark upon a process of understanding mother Africa. Start by taking one geographical area and reading what's going there. Try Ghana. Read at least one article a week about Ghana. As you continue to do that you will learn quickly that African politics are rarely in isolation. Learning about Ghana will expose you to what's happening in neighboring Corte Ivore, Togo, etc. Soon, you will find you have a working knowledge of what's going on. Pick your sources wisely. Try to stick to primary sources. Read what the African Party for the Independence of Guinea Bissau or the Pan-African Congress of Azania, South Africa, have to say about what's going on in those countries. If you want guidance, Google the All African People's Revolutionary Party's Ideological Training Guidelines. On page eight (8) there is a guide for primary source organizations. Stick to that list to get your information and in no time you will know enough healthy information about Africa to probably motivate you to plan a trip there. Decide where you want to go and make an effort to at least learn some words of the local language for that area. Doing so in Ibo, Wolof, Twi, Fulani, Mandinka, will not take you long and will go a long way. Plan your trip with people living in the country you plan to visit. Avoid going over on a commercial tour. Sorry tour guides, but just think of that in terms of how you view people on tour buses driving through your neighborhoods. Right. Connect with real people on the ground and experience the real life there.
There's much more that could be said, but the important thing is we have to start getting our people to think in terms of Africa. Our enemies are fooling us with this talk and developing consciousness of us being a race of people. Being Black people. All this is designed to do is disconnect us from our land - Africa. They want to disconnect us because doing so disconnects us from the resources which produces the power we need to liberate ourselves and our people. That's why connecting with Africa is so important. According to the U.S. Passport Agency, only about 30% of U.S. citizens even possess a passport which probably means only about 10 to 15% of Africans have one. The sad thing is many people will openly brag about not wanting to travel outside the U.S. This is the height of ignorance and exactly the type of stupidity the enemies of Africa wish upon us. There are many areas of Africa that are rolling out the carpet for Africans in the U.S. to travel to Africa. Granted, this is a bourgeois level invitation, but we should use it to make grassroots connections to our mother. The Western Hemisphere is such a small part of who we are and what we can accomplish, but we will never understand that if we don't grow beyond the parameters provided to us by our enemies. So, think about it. I'm tired of people only wanting to talk about traveling to Europe as if that's the pinnacle of cultural development. I'm also sickened to see the connection and consciousness other people have to their homelands only to see Africans having only the context of surviving oppression on the plantation. Edward Blyden, Paul Cuffee, Marcus Garvey, and others sought to awaken us about our motherland, our homeland, over 100 years ago and many have come and gone with the same message. The U.S. is nothing without the exploitation of Africa propping it up so don't think that connecting to the U.S. makes you connect with the winner. That tide is turning and it's turning fast. Take steps to prepare yourself and your family for the next phase. Africa is getting stronger and no force on Earth will stop her! Take the opportunity to introduce yourself to your mother, the sleeping giant of the world. In doing so, you may find that you learn many important elements about yourself that you have been trying to understand for quite some time.
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