DEADLY MIXTURES:
1. FISH TRADE--POVERTY--AIDS--APATHY--MALICE
2. CULTURE--AIDS--IGNORANCE--MISINFORMATION
Here are some old UN-sponsored Videos on AIDS. Pass it along as a service to your community.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBpCKuRvUQg&eurl=http://www.mashada.com/forums/kenya-2008/84390-nyanza-province-tops-hiv-aids-prevalence-kenya.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWw1O9Fqf04
JR Alila (Author: SUNET ON POLYGAMY)
AMEPEDIA ARTICLE:
I am author Joseph R Alila, author of the Poetry soft cover RATENG AND BRIDE (A POEM). My past works include such novels as WHISPER TO MY ACHING HEART and SUNSET ON POLYGAMY.
In RATENG AND BRIDE I have revisited political humor and satire, and used imagery in challenging the reader, through the hero (Rateng') to abandon a lifelong ambition of reigning in a killer, illusive Bride, because attempts to redeem our pride and personal honor often blind us of our more important contributions to society. In the long poem RATENG' AND BRIDE, in which certain tragic political events in Kenya's short post-independence political history are recalled and mourned over, I remind my audience through the hero RATENG' of the corrupting, material allure and deadly charms of unregulated power (here, Rateng's illusive Bride—call her Power or The Presidency). The message here is that power is dirty, is often over-glorified, and like a genie, its gains to the holder are brief and blissful. The reader is reminded that Power otherwise brings personal anguish and sacrifice, and has the universal tendency to corrupt those with it and their cronies. Through Rateng' the reader is warned that like a gem, unregulated Power (the Presidency) corrupts everybody it touches, and its corrupting effects linger like the nauseating smell of a scared skunk. Employing the rich Luo Oral tradition, and generous with its literary vehicles such as song, self-praise, satire, imagery and proverbs, and never shy to go Luo vernacular with proverbs specifically, I have tried to uplift the role of poetry and song in Kenya's post-independence political discourse. I have tried to walk delicately with the reader into, and out of, a more recent, and more deadly, political match between two powerful suitors (Rateng' and Milo) over one Bride, with one biased Referee in the ring, and their adversarial supporters fighting ringside.
NOT ON MY SKIN (A Novel By Joseph R. Alila) ISBN 143-825527-6; EAN 13: 978-1438255279.
Published by http://www.createspace.com/, An Amazon.com Company www.amazon.com/books.
Fans,
My next literary voyage has landed me on the shores of the Americas. It is from here that I bring to you a work of fiction I have struggled with for a couple of years--long before I received any inspiration to write, THE MILAYI CURSE, SINS OF OUR HEARTS, RATENG' AND BRIDE, or WHISPER TO MY ACHING HEART--all of which have seen the light of day.
Here comes NOT ON MY SKIN, a novel in honor our many Safaris and awakenings in the wider diaspora.
SYNOPSIS
In Alila's "NOT ON MY SKIN," the all-American City of Harmony is not exactly harmonious. That is the conclusion of Ochome, a poet and suburbanite, who has staked out his evenings compositing verses in the city's Oak Street Café from where the American life plays itself out before his analytical eyes. Ochome discovers that Harmony City's peace is only skin deep; wherever he turns, he sees, hears, and constantly feels souls cursing in various nuances of "not on my skin"-- a protest mantra against nuances of prejudice he sees, hears and feels in the city café and beyond. The Café crowd has a few regulars, notably the verbally-disengaged Quartet of Sam, Pierre the snoop, Ochome , and Frank. But the hero is the diabolical Alex, a man considered a mad nuisance by all, but who, in reality, is the only mirror and gong off which Harmony City perhaps can see and hear itself--the same way a child's innocent words are the real measure of the moral quality of life in a home.
I am author Joseph R. Alila. In a number of my novels, there are moments and periods of tension: between husbands and their wives; between widows and their in-laws; between religious beliefs; between children and their parents; between changing cultures. Those heroes and heroins in these novels, who live to see a better tomorrow, are those who manage to live above tension by realising that tension is caused by, and is between, two or more parties; that the very act of one party refusing to negatively promote the tension, by reaching across and promoting positive dialogue instead, is enough to diffuse the tension. These individuals, also realized that tension denies them the energy and emotional health to function as normal human beings.
Why don't we resolve to turn our backs on situations that can promote tension. For those in polygamous relationships, this will be adaily effort. But those of us in monogomous marriages are not safe from the constant wind of negative emotions: we still have to contend with that mother-in-law whose dinners are compulsory weekly affairs; there is that woman in Church whom you imagine to be dressing for you or your husband, and whose every word must be analyzed with the help of a thesaurus; there is your neighbor, who in innocence, packs his Next-Year Lexus infront of your old GM Blazer during these trying economic times, and whom you believe to be doing that so as to fuel the tension between you and your wife.
I could cite more situations in our lives that do promote tension, and which we have a choice as human beings to recoil from.
Can we make "tension diffusion" our daily goals in life, can't we? Don't we have our Holy Scriptures, Consellors, and Devotional Authors.
JR Alila
You Mr/Ms Prejudized Out There:
Are you struggling with the soul-snapping-and-draining Sin of Prejudice? Are hate and prejudice lowering your productivity at work?
Is your mental, spiritual and physical health going down the drain because of private guilt against spouse, child, friend, anybody, or self?
If your answer is yes, know that You are Not Alone. You need help. Reading "essential literature" (Like the Bible for me as a Christian) and face-to-face counsel can help.
Writing letters, stories, . . . too can help.
I have found myself healthier, emotionally, spiritually and socially by writing books that examine the inner lives and private journeys of individuals within societies, both modern and historical.
Since embarking on my current literary journey, I have found it easier to empathize with other people's situations without appearing to demean them.
JR Alila
Author:
-"SUNSET ON POLYGAMY,"
-"WHISPER TO MY ACHING HEART,"
-"SINS OF OUR HEARTS"
-"THE MILAYI CURSE"
July 5th is the late TJ Mboya's 39th anniversary. That is the day he died (in 1969) at the hands of a gunman known as Nashon Isaac Njenga Njoroge. Students of history, and the recent upsurge in new revelations about his death are attached below for any of you, who occossionaly stray into my e-hut.
http://www.eastandard.net/news/?id=1143989571&cid=4
http://www.eastandard.net/news/?id=1143989575&cid=4
You may also sample these verses from "RATENG' AND BRIDE.* TJ was popularly called, Rateng', by his contemporaries, but he is not the RATENG' in my epic poem. For the young among us, you want to know that this native son of Rusinga Island---a seed of Ramogi Ajwang' (Ramogi ka Podho son of the great Ramogi)---was a GO-GETTER.
In this regard, TJ is remembered for the great Mboya Airlifts (educational) that saw the arrival of many sons of Kenya at the shores of the Americas, as the late Jaramogi Oginga Odinga was doing the same in the Soviet Block. Two sons of Ramogi, polarized by an ideaologically polarized world of the 1950s and 1960s, yet able to bring the kill home for their nation, Kenya! The Shield, the Spear, the Cock and the Axe (all four are requisite in starting a Luo home) in "Kenya's Court of Arms" are a testimony to Ramogi's footprints and Wisdom in Kenya's political journey.
Rateng TJ is my inspiration---only I can't do even a millionth of what he did!
Rateng',
This genie-of-a-woman
Has wooed and killed
Each and every one
of our brothers
She ever danced with:
AK Joremo—
the best legal mind
Of his generation—
Fell on her chest after a brief
but romantic affair—
AK fell to an irate, rival’s barb.
TJ JaRusinga,
Was then the best dancer
On the floor—a dancer
with a golden tongue,
A fast pair of feet
And a sharp mind;
TJ was a dancer with
An unmatchable speed
On his feet
On any dance floor—
TJ Fell to a jealous rival’s
Arrow of passion.
Rateng’,
TJ fell to a jealous rival’s
arrow of passion,
As he flirted, chatted
and danced to a slow Rumba
with the woman.
Rateng’,
TJ fell in broad daylight—
Like a common-street thief—
He fell, the bride’s
freshly-minted ring
Still in his pocket.
* Source: RATENG' AND BRIDE (a poem) pp 19&20)----NEW
Author: Joseph R. Alila
Published by CreateSpace
www.createspace.com/3346481
BOOK RELEASE
RATENG" AND BRIDE (A Poem)
ISBN: 143-825109-2 ; EAN-13: 978-143-825109-7
Author: Joseph R. Alila
Published by CreateSpace An Amozon.com Company
(http://www.createspace.com/)
Within the next month, and in remeberance of the events that have redefined Kenya in recent times, and remeberance our heroes (dead or alive) who have shaped Kenya's democratic space, I intend to bring to my readership the epic poem "RATENG' AND BRIDE published by CreateSpace an amazon.com company (http://www.createspace.com/ ). Here is the synopsis.
SYNOPSIS:
In the epic poem, "RATENG’ AND BRIDE," (ISBN: 143-825109-2 ; EAN-13: 978-143-825109-7,) poet Joseph R Alila (Author of such novels as "Whisper to My Aching Heart" and Sunset on Polygamy") pleads with his hero (Rateng’) to abandon a lifelong ambition of reigning in a killer, illusive Bride, and redeeming his honor and his people’s collective pride.
Of Rateng’s illusive Bride—call her Power, Leadership or The Presidency—Alila reminds his hero of her corrupting, material allure and deadly charms. Like a gem, a Powerful Presidency corrupts everybody it touches, and its corrupting effects linger like the nauseating smell of a scared skunk.
Employing rich imagery and proverbs, and never shy to go Luo vernacular with proverbs, in "RATENG’ AND BRIDE," Alila has played his satirical hand, again, and demonstrated his knowledge of the political landscape of Kenya—only here, he walks with the reader into, and out of, a more recent, and more deadly, political match between two powerful suitors (Rateng’ and Milo) over one Bride, with one biased Referee in the ring, and their adversarial supporters fighting ringside.
In the second poem, "Fellow Kenyan," Alila talks to Kenya’s most-recent electoral crisis and warns every Kenyan of the dangers of losing their country to ethnic rivalries and hatred; and being exploited by a powerful cabal of elites to fight the latter’s wars over power. In a final mournful appeal, Alila sings of the need for Kenyans to reconcile their differences because there is only one Mother Kenya, and she must not be allowed to go to the manipulative crows of Nairobi.
