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Categories:  MotherhoodMarriageMadnessMusingsPhoto Essay FridayRHKOASay what??The South African SeriesUncategorizedGH2013
The South African Series

White Privilege Ran Into Our Car Today

10 comments

The weather in Plett has been absolutely gorgeous, and if you follow us on Instagram, no doubt you’ve been diverted by the pictures of brilliant blue skies, the ocean’s sapphire surf and the majestic mountains all around us. Today, however, the temperatures dropped dramatically and we were forced to stay inside. Marshall had to go […]

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The South African Series

Learning The Language of the Oppressor

2 comments

The kids were fighting in the back seats of the car, making an unholy ruckus, fighting about who had breathed the last of whose air and why it was so unfair. We were taking a day trip along the Garden Route, destination: I Can’t Recall. After 15 minutes I’d heard enough choruses of “Giiiiive-ugh!” and […]

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Motherhood

My Personal Choices From My Previous Life Lived in America Have Come to Haunt Me in South Africa

15 comments

*Note: This is not a lament, nor am I disparaging my host country. These are simply musings based on my observations. Today as I sat in the lobby of the local branch of Standard Bank and found my senses assaulted by the glare of LED lights that bounced off the newly waxed floors, I felt […]

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The South African Series

The Saga of my #Lost(GhanaMustGo)Bag

1 comments

*Please make this go viral. Tell Richard Branson and the SAA CEO that they can keep everything else. Just please return my First Lady hat unharmed. The white hat never hurt anybody and deserves better than this!* Travel is often difficult. It is made even more so when the carrier responsible for transporting you, your […]

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Marriage

Patriarchal African Men: Learn to Cook Your Own Food and Fulfill God’s Will for Your Life

8 comments

When my family moved to our long-term rental in Labone, the area provided all of the creature comforts that a girl of nine would need. There was a shady tree under which to shoot the breeze, a kiosk across the street that sold toffee and Malta when you could afford it and there were nice, […]

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The South African Series

Sabona! Greetings from the bottom of the World!

2 comments

One of the greatest thrills of international travel is observing customs and human quirks that are foreign to the observer. If you can’t travel internationally, however, people watching at the mall provides you with similar rewards. Recently, I’ve found myself absorbed with greeting rituals. From dap, to a simple handshake, the ubiquitous Black nod or […]

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Motherhood

Why I Let My Girls Jump In the Frigid Pool Waters at the Holiday Inn

11 comments

We were stinky. We were cranky. We were happy to have the cylindrical flying ship that had borne us from one hemisphere to another at our backs. Finally! We were in South Africa! After making small talk with the man at the reception desk at the Holiday Inn in Jo’burg and tipping our very happy […]

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The South African Series

SAA and the Franken Air Hostess

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“What do you mean that I cannot speak my language? If I want to speak my language, I will speak it!” Our flight had taken a scheduled detour to Ghana’s capital – Accra – where the cabin was being cleaned by the local ground crew and a new set of meals, blankets and headsets brought […]

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GH2013

Pictures of Muhammed Ali For You From My Dad

2 comments

The Greatest, the Prettiest, the Butterfly AND the Bee. There was no one – no one! – like Muhammed Ali. The world lost yet another icon this week. Muhammed Ali, born Cassius Clay, died at age 74 surrounded by family and friends in a circle of love. His daughter Leila said that his wouldn’t stop […]

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The South African Series

You're Moving to South Africa! Are you "Excited?"

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Ever since our family announced the decision to move to South Africa in order to work in ministry and pursue a change in scenery, everyone (not just a few people…literally everyone) who’s caught wind of the news has had one, singular question. “Are you excited?!!” Initially, the easy answer was to reply with a hearty […]

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The South African Series

MOM Update

3 comments

Did Malaka stop blogging? What happened to M.O.M??? Did the BNI actually succeed in silencing Malaka forever??? Nah, dude. It’s all good. A LOT has happened since My last blog nearly THREE WEEKS ago. (That’s like an eternity to go without writing. Hei!) In view of this, I just wanted to drop you all a […]

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Say what??

Thuggin’ It: Asians Want Diversity in Representation in Film Too

4 comments

The countdown to my departure from the ATL has officially begun with less than a fortnight until we leave the place I have called home for 17 years, possibly for good. There is SO much I have left undiscovered in Atlanta, so many experiences I promised myself I would “get to eventually”. Between mothering and […]

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Madness

The Idiocy of Declaring a Woman a Hoe Based on the Length of Her Hemline

9 comments

And the Bible says: “If a woman wears a short skirt and tight jeans a man shall look upon her lustfully and commit adultery in his heart.” – Jesus H. Christ, 2000+ years ago. No? That’s not what your Bible says in Matthew 5? Coulda fooled me! The way we police women’s sartorial choices “based […]

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Marriage

What I Learned About Marriage on the Morning of 11th Wedding Anniversary

4 comments

Before I went to bed last night I drank 32oz of blueberry cider, a treat I had scored while on sojourn to Southern Belle Farms in McDonough, GA. Liya and her kindergarten class were on a field study during which it was incumbent on all in attendance to pick strawberries and warble a country-fried rendition […]

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Uncategorized

Women in Tech – What's the Real Story?

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The good people at Toptal.com reached out to me and asked me to share this article with you about gender and technology…because a blog about marriage, motherhood and the conflict of the African female with her environment has everything to do with programming languages and dev/design. I can just hear the powerful Enyonam Kumahor and/or […]

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Madness

Why Picking Up the Mother’s Day Mother Load is the Best Decision You Will Make This Weekend.

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Okay. Fine. Fine! I admit that getting a set of 5 books for a cool GHC 100 might not constitute the “best decision” you will make this weekend. I mean, you could make a first ever decision to invest in mutual funds that could yield you thousands of dollars eventually…but if you’re looking for immediate […]

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Marriage

…And Tiwa Savage Chose Life, and Chose it More Abundantly

6 comments

As we come to the conclusion of this series, it’s my fervent hope that the narratives that these women have shared will motivate each of us to do some serious introspection and become more contemplative about our personal choices. Not just in the realm of romance and marriage, but in other areas of our lives […]

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Marriage

Moil and Matrimony: The Accountant and The Analyst

4 comments

The Accountant’s Tale I’ve always said that women who do not watch men before marriage are very stupid. Yes! I was very vocal about it. If you let a man get into your pants before marriage, you are a stupid woman. How can you let a man trick you into having sex? What if you […]

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Marriage

Moil and Matrimony: The Sunday School Teacher’s Tale

6 comments

I heard you took the Night Nurse out for dinner. That was very nice of you. She deserves it. She helps me out a lot, you know? Whenever I need to take time for myself, she takes my three kids without a question. We’ve only just recently become fairly good friends, even though we’ve been […]

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Marriage

Moil and Matrimony: The Night Nurse’s Tale

3 comments

When I was three months pregnant my husband locked me out of his house in Kennesaw because he was drunk and I was angry that he was drunk. I say “his house”, because his name was on the deed, not mine. I was a new immigrant and I was sure that if I called the […]

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Marriage

Moil and Matrimony

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https://twitter.com/MsAfropolitan/status/726400308197351428  Minna Salami brilliantly and succinctly captured the essence of the news dominating our discourse during the last week in April in that one tweet. It WAS draining. Between ‘Becky with the good hair’ and a phantom Nigerian husband-eater known as Edible Catering, the façade that marriage always ends in happily ever after if you’re […]

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