Happy Kwanzaa!

I had to investigate what the hell Kwanza was all about, this Swahili word that I identify with, and for which wrote a tongue-in-cheek greeting card last holiday season. I am not ashamed to say, I had no idea whence this holiday came.
It was like the realization of the celebration of Cinco de Mayo. There I was, 17, living in Puebla, Mexico, where the May 5th war had been bravely fought, and lost against the invading French colonizers. In a land with so many holidays, and excuses for a party, is was virtually ignored. Day of the Student was a bigger deal.
Being whitie, living in Orange County and then Sonoma County,
Whitie, whitie, whitie.
I hadn’t a clue what was being referred to in our efforts at PC holiday greetings that attempt to include all religious (Happy Chanakah!), cultural (Happy New Year!) and seasonal (Happy Winter Break!) holidays. Luckily for Capitalist Christian America, Eid al Fetir, (the Islamic holiday following Ramadan) is always a couple of weeks earlier than it was last year, (since ours is the Gregorian solar calendar rather than the Islamic lunar one, thanks Wikipedia!) and too complicated to recognize.
So, getting into the holiday spirit, and wanting to understand a little more about American culture (I will have to know how to answer Tino’s questions!! And he surely will be curious about a holiday whose daily greeting is Habari gani?! Swahili for What’s up?) I looked into it a little bit. Anyone can google Kwanzaa like I did and get the story, the point is, that although it is a holiday that was invented by a single man, a Long Beach State Professor in 1966, and celebrates African-American culture (thus the two A’s at the end of the word, instead of the correctly written one,) now that Tino and Elias are part of the family, I can see myself celebrating it. Actually, I feel thankful for it. Sure I subscribe to the basic tenents, which I’ve posted below. But I also appreciate the fact that we can continue a tradition together that acknowledges our diversity, and how, somehow, the Swahili culture is alive and appreciated as part of an alive and appreciated culture of being Black in America.
I sometimes do fear that I will be able to raise a boy that will feel at home in two worlds. The goal is not for him to feel at home in Tanzania and the United States. That, I think, would leave one with the isolation that a Chicano relates to, neither here nor there. Rather, it is to focus on being a citizen of the world, and unique and crucial part of the Universe. Neither better nor worse than those who grow from Kindergarten to High School with the same group of kids.
I always wanted something different for myself, which is part of why I loved going to live in Mexico for a year at age 16. But it is also a way of life that I have always hoped for, for myself and for my children. Never have the wise words of those who regard stability and fences shaken my differing desire.

So, let us light our candles, whatever the reason, ‘tis the season.
Copied directly from Wikipedia, because its an easy format with good translations of the tenents.
Kwanzaa celebrates what its founder called "The Seven Principles of Kwanzaa", or Nguzo Saba (originally Nguzu Saba - "The Seven Principles of Blackness"), which Karenga said "is a communitarian African philosophy" consisting of what Karenga called "the best of African thought and practice in constant exchange with the world." These seven principles comprise Kawaida, a Swahili term for tradition and reason. Each of the seven days of Kwanzaa is dedicated to one of the following principles, as follows:

* Umoja (Unity) To strive for and to maintain unity in the family, community, nation and race.
* Kujichagulia (Self-Determination) To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves and speak for ourselves.
* Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility) To build and maintain our community together and make our brothers' and sisters' problems our problems and to solve them together.
* Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics) To build and maintain our own stores, shops and other businesses and to profit from them together.
* Nia (Purpose) To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.
* Kuumba (Creativity) To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.
* Imani (Faith) To believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.

(Looking at Ujamaa, the term for the socialist villages that Tanz. Pres. Nyerere enforced when he came to power, it is a highly controversial concept, especially to a western mind. But I will say, that although I was a bit struck at the ‘our own stores’ bit, sounding like a Black community excluding itself, rather than empowering itself, it is just the concept of economy that I truly love and have lived for, forever. Dedicating many years to Community Supported Agriculture and finding a beautiful town, only that which offers its townspeople the diversity and character of shops and restaurants that aren’t AnyStripMall from Anytown, USA.)

Imani was an alternate Swahili name suggested to me for Elias. It is beautiful, who knows, after all this, maybe Tino and I will change our minds at the last minute.