-
For the love of sex
I have been on mother earth long enough to learn to be more comfortable in talking about everything sex. A complex topic. Learning and unlearning what sex is and what sex isn’t. Most importantly I have unlearned that sex isn’t bad manners. Sex isn’t sin. I wonder how many people refer to this act as “tabia mbaya” bad manners. I picked that up as a child as sex always went by that description. For me, having been brought up in a household most of you would be familiar with, sex wasn’t and unfortunately still isn’t an easy topic to dive in with the folks and even siblings. Mention the word…
-
Minding “my own”
A few weeks ago on a beautiful evening, I was just about to get to my apartment when I passed this lady in the hallway. Like the well-mannered girl I am, I said hello looking straight at her. I value greetings so much that I blame it on how I was raised. I will feel offended if I greet you and you don’t greet me back. I don’t get it when people disregard greetings. If you ignore me I’ll wonder who hurt you or what I did to not deserve a hello from you. I don’t like to harbor these kinds of feelings. It’s unsettling that living in Vienna and…
-
We lived and to more years
Sometimes I am a bit naive not to believe that there is evil in this world. That some people can be so hard-hearted and jealous in a situation they wouldn’t even gain from. Honestly, I don’t understand how someone can be so evil and negative minded to actually sit and plot someone else’s downfall. How they can wish for the worst to happen to another human being. How they utter hurtful and painful remarks on someone’s life. At what cost? At whose gain? I have been celebrating the birthdays of my two amazing younger brothers. Born back to back but different years. My mind took me back to when they…
-
Unappreciated efforts
You do try. You use everything in your reach to make your life livable. You often juggle to make the lives of those you care about „easier“. You make a lot of sacrifices for others. You give back to people you don’t know and have never even met. You extend your resources over and over again to those who feel entitled. You want to be accorded respect for that. You want your name in everyone’s breath. At times you feel unappreciated, taken for granted but you still do it again. Think of all the good you have done. Oh, you can’t stop. Think of all the times anyone appreciated…
-
Lovestruck in hopeless hopeful places.
We have all probably seen a movie where people meet in a hospital, fall in love, become a couple and the rest is history. The most fascinating of these stories is when 2 people, both likely suffering from terminal illnesses meet at the hospital wards or hallways and connect so deeply that all there is to see is love and not what they are suffering from. I love beautiful love stories. (Wait, I say that as if there are ugly love stories. I guess for me ugly and love shouldn’t be in one sentence) Well, let me not get into those who are trapped or stuck in toxic relationships in…
-
Cruelty or Love?
I have wanted to write about this particular topic for the longest now and finally, here I am sitting by the riverbank, taking in the much needed fresh air as I watch these beautiful unbothered swans swim. Near the water are these two doves hungrily feeding on the leftover crumbs as if they haven’t had food for days. It is calming to watch the little waves on the water and feel the wind on my brown skin. “We turned out alright” they say. But did they really? I ask myself. A question only a victim of physical abuse could answer by being completely honest with themselves. Digging deeper into my…
-
Resetting and finding perspective amidst the COVID-19 crisis.
Am I even a blogger if I don’t post a lockdown related article? It has been a roller coaster the past weeks. Most of us if not all of us are already going crazy. It is one thing to choose to stay home and it is another thing to be asked to stay home. And because it seems like the hottest topic in town that almost everyone wants to talk about is this damned COVID-19 crisis, here we go. Allow me to share a bit of what I’m on to and my take during this whole mess. I’ve witnessed how rebellious some of us can be and I wonder…
-
You are in a new country and you don’t relate.
Coming to a point where most of your senses align to each other and you find yourself calling a place home is such a defining moment. A blessing on its own. It isn’t easy peasy to settle in a new habitat, learn to maneuver and somehow adapt to it and finally be able to call it home. It is a battle with all your senses. Best believe it. Beautiful thing is we all have the human capability to be able to do so against so many odds. A lot of people ask me if I feel at home in my current host city, or if I will ever go back…
-
When loneliness kicks in and you miss home.
Things are completely different to what you were accustomed to. The air smells different too. When it rains, you miss that earthy smell in the air. It seems like forever since you last smelled it. This is something you never paid much attention to. And you dread to forget that smell. The streets are lonely. There are people yes, but everyone seems too absorbed in their own thoughts. You can’t tell really if people are too slow or too fast. But somehow there is that liveliness that’s missing. That liveliness that ascertains you of home. One of the little things you like to do is watching people and trying to…
-
“Go where you belong!” Where?
Thinking back, I never thought about racism the way I do now. I wasn’t exposed to that before moving to Europe and so I didn’t fully understand what it exactly was. I was very naive, contrary to all the praises I got from people I interacted with when I moved to Europe. Countless times I was told how brave I was to just board a plane all by myself and move to a whole new country, a whole new culture, a whole different language and to top that with no family at all. I always dismissed that because to myself, it didn’t seem much of a big deal (the way…
true storytelling from personal experiences and inspiring stories from my perspective