In Blood Diamond, Leonardo DiCaprio’s Zimbabwean ex-mercenary utters a line that became one of those oft-heard film quotes. As a means of explaining the way things work – or don’t work – on the continent, he tells co-star Jennifer Connelly, “TIA.” When she doesn’t get his homemade-acronym the first time around, he spells it out: “This. Is. Africa.” It may have taken over a decade, but you could say Black Panther is the cinematic blockbuster retort to that. A long-awaited clap-back in the form of a roar. This is Africa. Yes, it’s a heightened, idealized version of it — where vibranium, not diamonds — is the major resource. Yes, it’s…
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Trevor Noah’s Born A Crime
The moment I finished reading the last line of the final chapter in Trevor Noah’s book, Born a Crime, it felt like I was left sitting in a cinema after a really good film has played. You know those moments, when the credits are rolling, the lights are slowly coming back up, people are scurrying out to leave, but you can’t move just yet because you’re still thinking about everything you just saw. Only in this case, it’s what was just read. And instead of a cinema, I was in an Upper East Side coffee shop, Marvin Gaye’s Sexual Healing coming back into ear-shot over the speakers, a woman across from me looking at me with that mix…
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Voting for the RSA in the USA
I keep a R5 coin in my wallet. I have since I left South Africa 3 years ago to base myself here in New York City. It’s one of those special limited edition ones issued after the presidential election in 1994 – the 20th anniversary of which, our country recently celebrated. Last Wednesday, as I made my way to the South African Consulate General in Midtown, my fingers brushed past the coin, when I was looking for money to buy yet another umbrella to fight the rainy, blustery weather conditions New York likes to throw at its inhabitants. It was really one of those horrid weather days when you’d do…
