I always chuckle with I see this photo of me and Nelson Mandela. The photo was taken as a souvenir for tourists when they get off the cable car at Table Mountain in Cape Town, South Africa. The photo is fake but my deep admiration for Mandela is real. The passing of this great leader pushed me to visit my photo album of my 2001 South Africa visit and the memories always come rushing back–the visit to Mandela’s cell at Robbin Island, the warmth of the South African people, talking with children on the schoolyard, the political discussions in the coffee houses, the hustle of Johannesburg, the dance of the Zula warriors…I reflected on all the work I was a part of during the anti-apartheid movement and felt like a citizen in this new country. I had done my small part of bring the racist regime down but as my eyes confirmed, the dreams of the black masses remain unfulfilled. Amandla awetu! The power shall be ours!
The MAGA Virus has Infected St. Louis. Who’s Next?
Most people forget that Missouri was a slave state. The state would like to forget that part of its history and pretend that because it’s in the middle of the country, that makes it Midwest. It’s ugly history which includes the infamous Dred Scott case in St. Louis, which makes the state more Southern than Midwestern. It was ripe for the MAGA virus to make St. Louis white again.
