what will be said of me

I fell in love with Africa when I was a little girl. I'm not aware of the exact moment but can pinpoit distinct times that the love affair grew. One in particular, Out of Africa.


"If I know a song of Africa, of the giraffe and the African new moon lying on her back, of the plows in the fields and the sweaty faces of the coffee pickers, does Africa know a song of me? Will the air over the plain quiver with a color that I have had on, or the children invent a game in which my name is, or the full moon throw a shadow over the gravel of the drive that was like me, or will the eagles of the Ngong Hills look out for me?"

I recited this, the first night I arrived in Nigeria. It was about midnight and we all gathered up in a greyhound like bus to travle through the night. It was pitch black in the bus so that we could all sleep but most of us were wide awake. I was so hot that I struggled to open a window. When I finally did...aw...beauty...I couldn't speak. I just cried. Slow heavy big droplet tears. First out of my right eye. Then out of my left. They droplets were so thick that they first collected in my eye causing everything I see to blur. Know the kind I'm talking about? That night, Africa gave me a present, in the shape of a full moon. Really a heavenly spotlight. I could see the bush and all it's magnificent trees for such a long distance. Bright. Almost as the day. And I didn't sleep a wink that night. I just stared. Breathed. Rested in the divine. Wept. Blue, African Blue is a distinct color. Can't be duplicated or found anywhere else. The yellow moon on the green jungle caused the most beautiful blue ever. Suddenly I knew that I wasn't only a resident of Nigeria by physical state, but that my heart had found a surrogate home too.