My African Cliches (English‪)‬ Dr Teju Baba

My African cliche of the day is a book! the first bilingual book that lists African pioneers. I didn't say heroes, and I didn't say black, I said pioneers and Africans. The combination of these 2 words suffers to appear in Google and other search engines. Why ? for many reasons, but mostly because we are failing to document our own pioneers, and expecting someone else to do it for us, just as we do for anything else!
50 little-known figures from recent African history in an illustrated book to inspire children and adults that is the promise. And for you, I will be to support an Africa that writes its own beautiful history. Will you be a pioneer? will you be part of that?

My African cliché of the day is that of certain Ethiopian friends, who do not hesitate to brag to other Africans, that they have never been colonized. This is obviously not true, since Mussolini's Italy well settled in Ethiopia from 1936 to 1941, avenging in the humiliating defeat40 years earlier. Of course, it was a very short colonization period compared to other African countries but it’s not the right account of history.
 
Anyway, I wonder, if these Ethiopians would be less proud, if they knew that this whole bragging, they owe it …… .. to a sheep, and a cow, these blessed ones without whom, they would be bragging in Russian cause that would be their official language, the same way their national dishes, served on Ethiopian Airlines flights, perhaps would be the grechka, the pirozhki, the borscht soup (made from beetroot); and, of course, the pelmeni, those Russian meat dumplings,

My African cliché of the day is a date. November 30, 2016. On that day that, UNESCO acknowledged Cuban rumba to the list of the intangible cultural heritage of humanity. And that same day, on the same list, the same honor was given to another historical monument called hahaha, Belgian beers! Don’t laugh, both of them can make you dizzy so why not! Well, Congo and Belgium's destinies are really tied forever to each other.

It’s a country whose recent history was overshadowed by a brutal civil war, but with a rich history, with one of the largest natural deep-water harbor in the world; it’s the first country to appoint a woman as a cabinet minister within Sub-Saharan Africa, in 1962, the first country in the world to invent a self-adhesive stamp, , and even more important, a country where women have started voting in 1792, 120 years before those in Britain, and almost 200 years before Switzerland.

If you too are SL, then tell me about the cotton tree, Bunce island, Dublin in Banana island, York, St John’s Maroon Church, Old Fourah Bay College, the Martello tower, the 3 old city boundaries guns, the Wharf steps, and old guardhouse, yes do justice to your amazing country, probably the most pan-African in Africa, if we judge by the origins of all its people!

As you know, we have been working hard on compiling in a nicely illustrated book, the lives and stories of 25 women and 25 men, who were the first to achieve feats hitherto unattainable in the African continent. 
Read more about this book at
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/821165653/50-pionnieres-africaines-50-african-pioneers