#meleninmagic

Happy Africa Day to my fellow brothers and sisters all over the continent.

I thought today would be an appropriate day to launch this particular blog, on a day associated with celebration, and joy for many, as it marks the remembrance of the development of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), back in 1963; for which 32 independent African countries came together to celebrate Africa Freedom Day. The first meeting was held in Addis Ababa in Ethiopia, hosted by the then emperor of Ethiopia Haile Selassie who went on to become the first president of the OAU.

Fast forward to 2018 and the OAU is now known as the African Union (AU). They officially changed their name in 2002, for which Africa Freedom Day then came to be known as Africa Liberation Day - now Africa Day, celebrating Africa as a continent and all its beauty and it's successes.

However this day for me also came with the realisation that it is shocking how little I actually know about the history of Africa. Having been alive for almost 25 years only first hearing and internalising what Africa day is, and what it's about today for the first time alerted me to the fact that there has been a fundamental flaw in what I have been learning and in the way in which I have been thinking about Africa.

You see for me I started this blog with hopes and intention to emphasise as many positives as I could about my own country. For me this was to be a process in which I could learn about myself, my history, and in the process teach others and learn from others as well. But as some people if not most people tend to do, I started to second guess myself and over think the process as to how and when I would release all of these things I wished to share.

But then yesterday I read a blog which held some slightly controversial views and I realised that if I was doing this for all the right reasons I would just get started and let things fall into place. I wouldn't let the fear of being controversial or of not being perfect hold me back from not only expressing myself but also doing what I set out to do for myself which is challenge myself to learn new things.

With that being said, if you do read this then welcome to my blog, hope you do stick around and we get to learn and teach each other new things.

P.S check out the instagram page that goes along with this blog. I hope to keep the content slightly varied on different platforms but for now I'm just gonna go with what I feel comfortable with then develop it from there.

P.P.S check out my blog on WordPress (which was originally intended for this exact purpose, but I got freaked out by writing).

https://onlyeverydaysa.wordpress.com

Links to information about Africa Day and it's context in recent years:

http://www.blackpast.org/1963-haile-selassie-towards-african-unity

 https://www.iol.co.za/news/africa/africaday-10-things-you-might-not-know-about-africa-15155811

 http://kdaniellesmedia.com/2017/05/25/road-celebrating-africa-day/

 http://www.vaalnest.co.za/blog/post/africa-day-celebrations-continue-vaalnest-shares-i/

 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa_Day