wewe uko na kasoro? watoto wako wako na kasoro? ama ni waafrika wagani hao mnasema wako na kasoro? wewe huna kasoro BUT KUNA KASORO KWA CULTURE YETU!!

the perception of work... tempo of work... what you do with money... how you treat your workers.. how you handle groups...leadership.. personal property... fatalism...blaming others <-- HAPO NDIO KASORO IKO!!

@Masukuma, There was a documentary on Al Jazeera,on The Comoros islands. ISLAND OF DEATH. Of the four islands, after a referendum three declared themselves independent. One of them Mayotte island remained colonized by France.

Decades later, Mayotte island (the one still colonized) has 'developed '. The citizens of the 3 independent islands are fighting to have equal rights with the Mayottes,claiming Mayotte island is part of their country hence demanding economic opportunities.

The 3 islands have and are still fighting for Mayotte island to be independent like them. The Mayotte people don't want the damn independence and don't want the other 3 islanders coming to their island.

The other 3 islands are languishing in poverty with their independence, Mayotte island is better of, okay with being a colony of France.

@Masukuma, Why do the 3 islands want a piece of the good in stuff in Mayotte? They wanted independence ,got it, screwed things up but as we did, but now they don't want to see Mayotte do well. Wouldn't that qualify for a curse?

Iko shida kubwa sana nag si Ya nguo.

Scarcity mentality is our biggest problem. Look at how S.Sudanese are cannibalizing themselves. They have all the resources unimaginable but look....kasoro iko

Culture is a way of life, which is inturn shaped by the environment we grow up in. I would like to know how we lived b4 the colonialists my assumption is we still fought each other to survive. Those who go to kiash land are exposed to a whole different environment that makes them question our own. I respect those who go to Kiash land and make it, its not easy, those who've been there can tell you that. So if someone is washing wamama wazee and earning $40 an hr, power to them, kazi ni kazi, there's another man in Nairobi diving in the Ruai sewer lines to make the system work and getting that $40 a month. I hope we'll get an answer as to why the men would like to bring others down to their level or lower, and when that fails, they start badmouthing.

Culture can not be changed by one person? Partly true partly not. I will give examples, In the 80s coffee was a locally poor mans drink "kahawa tungu" that was barely given any attention tea rooms and milk bars which were the in thing, a culture we learnt from the mzungu ofcourse. Then come Kevin Ashley (java) who made it cool to sip coffee in a coffee house and in no time, coffee became cool. Right now our youth want to be spotted in KFC and any other junk place in Nrb. All learnt.

Culture is learnt by association. We learnt to pray and worship the Christian and Muslim way. We learnt to dress up like the white man and cleanup like him. Yet we've refused to work ethically like the other cultures. When Kiashes vuka border, some get on easy, and others the hard way. I dont think its our place to judge if they "refuse" to give to their less privileged family but, they also have a right to ask why a city like Nairobi is regressing instead of progressing. Why maintaining the state of a colonial school should be hard when no new schools have been built. If we sit without questioning why the best public school in Nairobi was built over 50 years ago and none has come up with all the taxes paid then we have something really wrong in our way of life. Do they call it complacency? We call it our way.

Because of people like you @masukuma! You said you are a natural coward, and you will always mind your own business, you said you will never defend anyone or yourself, because you do not want to be a hero for someone else to write your story.

So this is why the society has reached where it has reached: nobody cares anymore coz of their own interest!

@Masukuma, We Africans are full of shits. Excuses all round.

If being a colony is such a good thing, then why did we fight for independence?

The Comoros case is one of the "free people" of the 3 islands, fighting and dying at high seas , just to get to Mayotte, a colonized island with working systems.

Asia was colonized as well,India got independence in 1947. S.Korea around the same time. Singapore, Malaysia a decade or so later. How do they compare with our sweet Africa?

Closer home,there was The Sugarcane feature on NTV. Guys crying that MSC field officers are not strict enough, as they used to be, to ensure farmers do proper sugarcane husbandry? Why can't the farmer do the right thing? Whose money is at stake?

Its your sugarcane, meant to make you money, why must someone be around with a long whip just for a farmer to do the right thing?

At the time mzungu was leaving, we had functioning farms and ranches. What happened when the blacks took over?

Railway was working, what happened afterwards?

Nairobi city was working,now?

Most of the colonial estates had social amenities, social halls for public, play fields, markets etc, is that happening with our black thinking?

Virtually everywhere in the world where blacks are in power, it's a mess.

From Haiti to Solomon Island. Everywhere!

Why can't we do the right thing? We need to look deeper into ourselves if we are ever to make it right.

Why is @Masukuma a selfish coward?

There was a time in history during the Roman civilization when europeans were called barbarians. The barbarians couldn't cope with roman civilization and they eventually conquered it and Europe went into the dark ages. Hundreds of years later the west started on their own path and came up with the western civilization. What we have now is western civilization thinking and systems. The history of mankind is still being written. In all the centuries of 'civilization' africans were mostly cut out with our human cousins especially by the advance of the sahara desert. Africans were not able to share ideas.

That did not mean there was not black thinking. By the time europeans came most african societies had some of government control. African were innovative working and smelting iron, gold and processing hides and skins, farming, livestock breeding building canoes and ships. What is not working for blacks is the western system and thought. It is not an african system. With time african will come up with their own systems through adopting some things, discarding others just like the west did with the roman civilization. There will be a time for an african civilization when africans come up with their original thoughts and innovation instead of constantly thinking the western systems are all there is.

Let's not forget in the 1950's Africans were only 9% of the world population but the future of humanity is african. In another 80 years Africans will be around 40% of the world population. If those africans of the future will keep thinking that all the solutions for humanity's problems come from the west then humanity is doomed. Let us teach our kids how to think originally and how to innovate.

From your diagram above, there's nothing below the iceberg that is strange or foreign. In our tribes, there's one clan that is deemed "slower than the rest" I think in the larger human race the African could be it. My argument remains, the environment has shaped us. Drought, famine, and the devastation of weather could have made us believe that when we receive something we need to hoard it. We always blame someone for our challenges, from the white man to the gods.

I do it by design... having traveled to 20 or so countries I think i can distill what is in my interest or not. I know the battles I need to pick and those which I want. I am very self reflective my positions are not informed by culture (not most of them anyway) but by critical self reflection unlike most people I don't feel the need to prove myself to others who i consider my intelectual juniors in order to be seen as "human" by them. Sina mzigo... I have accepted some things.
that is why I am a proud and self identifying coward coz my life is irrepetable...I am me. There will only be one me EVER. For better or for worse.