Perhaps today, some woman will gather her children around the kitchen table and say, "I want to talk to you all about Nelson Mandela." If the children are very small, haven't lived long enough, they may ask, "But who is this Nelson Mandela, mama?" What will she tell them? It's all coming back to me now. I too was a child, but not very small. I lived in Festac at the time. Festac was a lovely town whilst I lived in it; I hope it still is. The video stories are coming back to me. I see the people running. I hear the guns firing. I see some people falling to their deaths, and others dying as well, while trying to bear the corpses along, or as soon as they stoop to mourn briefly. The people are the Blacks of South Africa, agitating for freedom. They are tired of oppression. They are tired of being treated like second-class citizens in their own country. They are tired of being tired. They are marching; they are singing. They want to fly; they want to soar.
Mandela is still in prison at this time. He is breaking rocks. He lifts the axe up, and he brings it down, hard. He lifts the axe up again, and again he brings it down, hard. The rocks are smashing, and they are singing. Mandela knows the song. It was the birds that taught him it. It is the song of his beating heart. It is the song Maya Angelou taught the caged bird when they discussed the sadness of confinement. She knows why the caged bird sings. One day, I will ask her. I will ask her to teach me the song, the one Mandela sang as he brought his axe down on the rocks. It was a song of freedom. He sang it to the sun, the one that shone on his glistening back; the one that caused the sweat to fall from his handsome face. He was in prison, still. He was paying for daring to ask his oppressor for more from life. Like Oliver Twist, he had made his oppressor afraid when he asked. The oppressor had turned pale, deathly white, and gasped, "More!" And he had clamped Mandela in jail.
As a child growing up in Festac, I and my buddies used to play in the sand after watching the videos. We would ask one another, "So what do you think will happen to Mandela - do you think the White man will let him go?" "Hardly. I'm sure they will kill him. Who knows what mischief is in the White man's heart?" "Indeed, who knows. They will kill him. How sad. They will definitely kill him." And we would shake our heads ruefully and begin to picture the White man killing him. We would picture the grave they would throw his corpse in. And after they had covered the grave up, we would picture them wiping their hands and smiling mischievously. Ah, the White man! Terrible, terrible man. We mourned our dear Mandela back then, seated in the sand, mere children we were, growing up in Festac and watching the videos of our siblings in South Africa.
And just before we got up from the sand and dusted our seats, one boy said something unique: "But maybe they will not kill him." How naïve! Elaigwu has always been naïve. He was my first best friend. Perhaps it was because he was so naïve that I loved him so. I put my hand on his shoulder, as we began to make our way from the sand to the houses nearby, where we lived with our parents and siblings. "Don't be so naïve, Elaigwu; of course they will kill him." "But maybe not. We need to have hope." I sighed. Maybe he was right. Hope was a good thing. Perhaps we needed hope: hope with which to watch the videos with less pain; hope to be optimistic when we sat in the sand and talked; hope when it seemed that the difficulties of life would undo us; hope when we made our way back to the house after contemplating the fate of Mandela. But we were mere children growing up in Festac back then when the world was younger. What did we know of hope? What did we understand about life, and the fate of the men in it? What could we know?
But Elaigwu was right. Time and tide proved him so. The White man did not kill Mandela. He let him go free. I knew then that I was wrong about the White man. I knew then that he was not as mischievous as the videos had led me to believe; was not as bad as I had thought. Elaigwu was right to have hope. He was not naïve; he was wise. The White man behaved just as Elaigwu said he would. He did not kill Mandela. He let him go free. Ah, the White man! Who can know him? And when we sat in the sand again, after the White man had let Mandela go free rather than kill him, I said to Elaigwu pensively, "You were right." Elaigwu was a humble lad. He did not gloat. He did not say, "I told you so," as prouder boys might have. He simply bowed his young head and said: "I thank God. My father was very happy." "I am happy too. Thank you for having hope." Elaigwu did not say anything. None of us did for awhile. We were thinking. We were contemplating what the future would be thenceforth. What would happen now that Mandela was free? The sand was comforting to sit on that day. It was not too hot, and it was not cold. Like the Little Bear's porridge, the one that Goldilocks ate, it was just right. All was right with the world. And we hoped again that things would get better, or at least stay the same. "Elaigwu!" It was his mother calling. He promptly stood up from the sand. He wiped his seat and said, "I am going."
Going. Back then, it sure seemed like we all were going someplace or another. But where? Where were our families, our communities, and our interconnected worlds going? Forward? With hope. With the same hope Elaigwu, my first best friend, inspired in us. We were going to the promised future. We were putting one foot in front of another. Perennially. Persistently. And we did progress. Mandela did subsequently become president of South Africa. I went to college. I traveled abroad. I grew up. And I kept hope alive. And as I sit at my computer typing this heartfelt post in honor of one of the greatest men that ever lived, Nelson Mandela, I recall the words of one of the songs we children used to sing back then in the sand: "We are going higher everyday; why not join us?"
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