First of all: I am an complete outsider, I only have a very vague idea of what Rasta could stand for and therefore accept if anybody around here feels that my words are misplaced here. Maybe somebody has read my posting 'dreamin'' in the other, open discussion board. This is how I came here: Tobago is the key word, is my dream land, and you, - at least some of you posting here, are it's people.
I am so happy having found this site, and I am dumbfounded by what I've found. Are you people living there happy people? I was almost crushed by concepts like repatriation, slavery, is the white man cool or not, and there is no way I just shut up being confronted with so much engagement full of emotions.
I don't know nothing of many of these concepts floating around, but the word of 'mental slavery' somehow got stuck. To liberate ourselves from any ideas thrust upon us is important, more so from any we carry internalized within. How will it be, will I really arrive in T.T.? Will I be subject of a heavy set of projections thrown at me for the color of my skin? Do I have to proove too much and fight against bad odds? It seems as if I'd have to try to behave correctly in a set of concepts put forward by somebody who says he is correct because of his color of skin, and that my color of skin gives me very bad odds? A dear Mexican friend who is half Aztec in blood and full Aztec in heart says that the world got all of real value from the Aztec culture. Somehow I agree, but not in the absolute sense. I do fell the same here.
Repatriation: Is it about going back to Africa to live? How about your culture you've got right there, where you are living? Would you have the Rasta culture there, and could you do without? How is your socio - political situation? Is anybody depressed, even because of the color of his skin? To me it seems that working for the lifting of the mental, physical situation at the place you are at could be more meaningful than projecting the paradise to a life in an other continent, even though your forefather once were forcefully taken from there. Don't misunderstand me, if really somebody wants to go to Africa to live there, well, go ahead, but I can suppose that there might be much more people taking about it rather vaguely than actually doing it. I might have written something disturbing here, please excuse.
Still I am very curious: Do the people living in T.T have a feeling for a real person or does one have to comply to a set of fixed ideas first? ( This is something why I rather stay away from where I was born ).
Well, my words are very badly structured, but I hope some of you can get some poke for further thought. Hope I can learn so much here,
thanks
kuuan
