YO BLACKIE- YOU FREE?

My Co-TedxFreetown organizer and i sat to chat vision TEDxFREETOWN over a bottle of wine and the cool freetown evening breeze. Of course we swam across many seas, danced on mountain tops of dreams, played orchestra with the finest of instruments somewhere in Vienna, detoured to South Africa and ....you get the gist, before actually reaching the conversation about our up coming conference, we had many more things we wanted to talk about. The conversation came to a sad halt when we talked about freedom, and what that meant for young women, us, living here in freetown. What freedom meant in general for black women, for black men, for black communities living on this plain of existence, are we free? The question was haunting, dark and at the same time hopeful. TO CONTEXTUALIZE:

We asked one another why we continue to live in our home country, the CHOICE we make to stay here in Sierra-Leone, a land we love, a land that does not nourish nor cultivate our freedom most of the time. Why? Like my mother would flippantly respond, "Y has a long tail Fatou". What i have come to understand from that rhetoric now is, their are many reasons to the question why, one answer would not do it justice.

Why are we here ( decide to come to our home country).

 Ans: why (Y) has a long tail. an assortement of reasons would answer that question

Why do we stay?

  Ans: some say its a bug we catch, once we leave the country, we just want to come back because and despite it all. Others say, this is the only home/country they have, just like family you deal with the card God dealt you. Others, a profound love for the country, while for others, MONEY TO BE MADE/IS BEEN MADE/IS MADE. And for some of us, I included, i ride the hormonal tide of HOPE of the POSSIBLE, the infinite possibilities for creation and creativity.  It is possible, but the odds i promise are highly and finely stacked.

WHICH BRINGS ME TO...FREEDOM:

my cousin took the photography you see below. I like the shot, it finely capture's my emotion. I crave utter freedom to be all that i am every day, every where, any day any where. Totally Me: flighty, a hopeless romantic, a lover, sensitive, vulnerable, strong, manipulative, funny, weird....creative. EVERY DAY, EVERY WHERE. My country doesn't foster that in the here and now. To survive here, one must almost have to be: smart, careful, wary, family oriented, spiritual, un-trusting, and well fortified (mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically). Oh and you must act, wear, love, eat and speak in a specific way...those bounds are confining within a  social-cultural structure, and i assure you, just doing you is a luxury most black people, especially women cannot always afford, anywhere in the world to be quite honest.

Photography: Rose Lamin

so i ask again...what is freedom and HOW are you enacting your freedom everyday? As a self identified woman/man/person of color-based on your geographical, soci-economic, religious, political make up---how does freedom flourish within your being?

fambul dem this is how we do....