To kick off my birthday month I decided on a little bit of indulgence. I last got a manicure/pedicure in 2004 as a gift to myself for graduating medical school. It was at a standalone spa. It was a teeny bit painful and I didn’t see the point of maintaining such a practice. So I […]
Taxicab Discussions
I’m spending the weekend in Washington D.C and I’m again struck by the level of enjoyable discussion one can have at the back of a taxi. In fact it is a world of difference from the country music blasting, older gruff white man driving experience I had on my way to the airport to catch […]
Child of God: A Novel by Lolita Files
Click for excerpts at Google Books Hmmm. Where do I begin? I read this book over the holidays. It was sitting on my shelf and I just grabbed it thinking this should be a nice read on the plane. Now, I wonder how it made it onto my shelf. It came via PaperBackSwap for sure […]
Nzema Clans and their Akan counterparts
I grew up knowing that I was Nzema, but it wasn’t until I came across a book “The Python Killer: Stories of Nzema Life” (1988) while sightseeing and browsing hole-in-the-wall stores in London in 2003 did I become aware of my clan. In fact, I ordered 3 copies of that book, one for myself, one […]
Oil and Gas Drilling in Bonyere (Nzema)
Though the Nzema are a matrilineal society, they are also a patrilocal one which means I am from my father’s village of Bonyere while belonging to my mother’s family/clan (Ezohile). Confusing, no? The first time I remember going to Bonyere, I was 11 and we were going to spend Christmas with the family after having […]
Little Bee: A Novel by Chris Cleave
Barnes & Noble link I requested this book from PaperBackSwap at the suggestion of a friend who had begun to read it this summer. Nothing else. I’m one of those who likes to read the back of a book to prepare myself for what is in store or to decide if a book is worth […]
Love, Anger, Madness: A Haitian Triptych by Marie Vieux-Chauvet
Amazon link This book grabbed my emotions so deeply that I could not stop thinking about it when I was doing other things. It was recommended to me by a Haitian-American friend who had studied it as part of her English/French PhD studies. It was read by the African Women’s Book Club (at her recommendation) […]
“People are afraid to pursue their most important dreams, because they feel that they don’t deserve them, or that they’ll be unable to achieve them. We, their hearts, become fearful just thinking of loved ones who go away forever, or of moments that could have been good but weren’t, or of treasures that might have […]
http://www.heliotropicmango.com/people-are-afraid-to-pursue-their-mos/
Powder Necklace: A Novel by Nana Ekua Brew-Hammond
This is a coming of age story that the African Women’s Book Club read a couple months ago. It would probably make a good young-adult fiction. The author is a friend of one of the members and we invited her for a book reading of this, her first novel. The book reading was held at […]
Rundown of books of yesteryear
Half of a Yellow Sun – Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie This was the first book I read in my mission to become a book-reader again. The African Women’s Book Club had read it earlier in the year and I had participated in its discussion blindly. Shhhh, don’t tell. I picked it up from my local library […]
A lover of mangoes. A woman - smart, without pretense, lefthanded, Afropolitan - navigating this thing called life. An unapologetic believer in social justice and karma. Choosing to radiate positive energy and be true to myself. Here, my musings.