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Published: March 8th 2007
Go past the alleyway filled with metalsmiths; their hand-tools clinking like a percussionist orchestra, wall-less bays of them sprawl out on either side. Follow deep into where the wooden shelters and workshops turn into mud huts and homes. Get into the dark part, where the ground is black from waste-water and the shadows of the taller buildings cover the street. You start to smell the aura of open-air latrines and unwashed drunks. I'm standing there, shouting about language with a drunken dwarf (we don't share one). The place is strange and textural and, as I look around, I think it's just the kind of place where I belong. Then Chelly's brother Ali finds his friends, I wave goodbye to the midget, and we're off back down the clanking-metal road.
3/7/2007 After sitting on the roof for awhile, talking to the guys under the hot sun in Mombasa's triple-degree weather, I start imagining things. You know, seeing things happen that didn't really, and hearing voices.
I leave to work on my webpage and I consider never speaking again, or at least not talking very often for a while (the whole Silent Bob thing). No, that's ridiculous. I have
to talk, that's maybe my whole key to life. I get jobs by talking, I got through school by talking, I talk myself into all the trouble and all the successes in my life. I must talk.
That over with, I start to think about all the strategies I've formed in order to avoid the sun in Mombasa. I pick only the closest destinations, and take a Matatu if the place is too far. I walk close to the buildings to stay under their shadows--unless the sun is too direct to cast a shadow. Nevertheless, I usually sunburn in about 10 minutes (despite my tan). I wonder to myself if this damn blazing sun is one of the reasons the economy here is so simple. No, that's silly, the people here don't burn the way I do, and they hardly even notice the sun.
I pick up some sticks of Mshakiki (Kenyan street BBQ) and some Indian Onion Bhajia. I savor the grub while the sweat pours in my mouth to flavor it. I duck around the corner, charged to enter the air-conditioned, unlit, Caribbean Cyber Cafe...
And I find the power out and none of the
machines working. I get outside and feel my skin near the danger-zone. I speed-walk off in the direction of another cyber cafe I know, but I can't find the place. I'm getting farther away from home: nobody knows me here and even fewer of them speak English.
I find the spot--it's closed--and I dash off across traffic like a lunatic. There are no traffic lights here, no lane-markings, and the clogs of speeding traffic never stop at the crosswalks. Getting across the other side feels scary, but there's a dumptruck backing into somewhere so the cars are stalled.
I try the next cyber cafe and I hear the same dismal news. The chubby young Arab guy in the plastic patio chair outside tells me to try taking a ride to one of the shops in town. I shake that idea off with a shudder at the sun--and then I notice the sign above his head.
It's laminated computer-printer paper and it says something about Islam not being terror and about women wearing socks. I take a quick picture and then hustle back to Caribbean.
The clerk gives me a strange look for coming back--I ask him
for a pen and a chair. I sit down and just start writing in my journal. I think about all this stuff as I'm writing about it, my mind wanders, and I somehow arrive at the conclusive thought that I need to be 'that guy' who is concerned about business and economics, but carries out all his ventures from a humanist-activist and environmentalist standpoint. I just want to help prove that advanced economic science and ethical business practice can be used to improve the world--not just from a financial standpoint, but in terms of community health , skill-building educational value, resource sustainability, and cultural preservation. I also think about using broad-based, in-depth inquiry coupled with life-experience and action, to better people's family lives, personal wellness, and religious being.
I guess that's the proggressive activist's or cultural leaders role: to speak-up loudly about ideas whose time have come, and to give people the inspiration they need to will things into being.
Plus, I also wanna learn more about grammar, punctuation, and tenses, while experimenting with different writing styles and doing a lot more research for the things I write.
The Perfect Writers' Setup My perfect writers'
setup would have a good dictionary, a thesaurus or two, a set of up-to-date encyclopedias, and a computer to search the internet and access a few online research database subscriptions.
I would also want four walls and a window, dimmable lighting, a snazzy typewriter, and some really good pens. I'm talking about smooth-flowing ballpoints with heavy, ergonomic handles. And I'd have to have a full stock of writing pads and papers, along with bookshelves full of eclectic research materials, with inspirational artwork and sayings up on the walls.
Yoga I was finishing my Yoga practice the other day, just sitting and meditating. My mind drifted to
this woman; this loose collection of atoms unwittingly infused with life and pushed, dragged, tossed aimlessly, alone, through the world, able only to
glimpse the full glory and beauty of God's creation past the suffocating madness and constructs of man. Somewhere, after years of wandering, she bumped up against another wind-blown human speck--and she chose me as her companion, to float and ride and try to steer through this wild life together, until the end. That is amazing really, and truly beautiful.
I should do Yoga more often.
On Small Biz, Again In order to understand my stance on supporting locally-owned and small businesses over big corporations, you need to know about two things:
1. Consumer activism in it's many forms (think about PETA, Made in America tags, the Green movement, Organic foods, FUBU, etc.)
2. Corporate ownership and governance issues. (Public corporations are owned by stock-market investors; usually majority holders are larger corporations, multi-nationals, rich individuals, and large funds with their own special interests. Boards of Directors are representatives of these major interests, not of the smaller, non-aligned investors or stock-owning employees.)
My reasoning is that choosing to support large corporations and multinationals is the same as choosing to send your money to other states and countries, or to people who already have way too much money. You are also choosing to give into some degree of control by the rich and the powerful and their institutions.
Choosing, instead, to spend your money on the small and local, is choosing to enrich your own community and to support independent, innovative ventures--and business-people whose values you agree with. This is economic activity that you can feel passionate about, rather than ashamed.
Chelly I love Chelly for more than just her beauty, humor, and intelligence. I love Chelly for her maturity and her worldview as well.
Chelly's maturity manifests itself in a kind of older-woman's wisdom. She recites folk proverbs and repeats old wives tales. She has the self-confidence to give sarcasm some sexiness, and to find mirth in making self-effacing jokes without a hint of insecurity. She is trusting and commited to integrity. She thinks about the future practically, developing skills and resources as building blocks for her dreams.
Her worldview is one that looks to a future of peace, understanding, and cooperation. She sees helping ourselves and helping others as interdependent things. She values responsibility, ethics, and hard-work as the keys to improving one's own world and the world of others. She knows life and life knows her. She sees our future together being dedicated to building a marriage, building a family, building a home, building businesses, building a better world, and eventually building some kind of independent wealth. We even agree on how to raise kids, build homes, and start companies.
Literally a match made in Heaven, as I mean "Heaven" the way I think Jesus was using the phrase, "Kingdom of Heaven", as a state of being on Earth that people can live through unconditional love, empowered hope, strong personal values, and total peace. That's Paradise on Earth, and this is how Chelly and I will strive to live.
On Religion In this day and age, religion often equals controversy--even strife and warfare. For most of the world, a relgion is the same thing as a lifestyle, but for many, religion has no place in thier lives but as nuisance or artifact.
The first group has used religion as the basis for their understanding and practice of diet, habits, physicality, relationships, decision-making, politics, art, music, dance, dress, science, history, storytelling, law, ethics, morals, cosmology, etc. The second group has replaced the role of the Church--or of their own Prophet/Rishi/Seer/Shaman Tradition--with the teachings of numerous scholars, masters, doctors, and other thought-leaders. The rest of us exist in some gray-shade between the two: drawing on a hodgepodge of religious mythology, local superstition, spiritual teaching, modern fads, practical experience, and socially-common beliefs to create our worldview.
At the least, we all continue to draw much of our identification with culture, language, ethnicity, and nationality from a religious basis. This all indicates that religions throughout history have functioned as attempts to create a holistic understanding of all existence and a holistic approach to life--intending to generate some over-arching shared worldview and identity. Organized religions have ceased this function in many pluralistic societies today because they have failed to keep up with the pace of change, or--arguably--because the world has changed so much as to make their aim for holistic understanding impossible and the goal of common-worldview obsolete.
Either way, in order to advance the evolution of this concept of "religion", some new system must arise. It is my feeling that this system must rely heavily on emphasizing the power and free will of the individual. In order to achieve holistic understanding and shared worldview in our multiplicitous and diverse world, I would reason that such a system must include the acceptance of an
open canon and the provision that
each man or woman is their own priest.
Of course, I'll write more about this later.
Choices Every action we take--every habit and recreation and instinct even--is changing us AND changing the world. Internally, it is mental, physical, emotional, psychological practice (the kind that "makes perfect"). Externally, it has a ripple effect, a role-model (example) effect, as well as an intended impact on the world.
Our environment, rearing, and circumstances strongly influence these actions, often teaching us good and harmful behavior-patterns at the same time. We're all, also, often unconscious of our actions, their intentions, or effects. The key is to understand your surroundings, your background, and the function of your actions. This way you can make positive choices.
By understanding all of our actions and the reasons behind them, we can equip ourselves to make the choices that create the world we want to see and the person we want to be.
'Til Next Time Okay, I hope you enjoyed this latest installment of my rants, thoughts, and journal entries. There will be many more later, of course... Once I'm done putting up all these pictures!
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Aaron Brown
non-member comment
agreed as usual on the business ideals.