Stoic, gobanimo@dadnimo.qalbi-xaadhni. I too was shocked because Xaaji never looked like that to me. I hope he is just doing a palaver. Apophis - i think i did not say much that is useful to most SOLers, but given your position on this issue, i think it is a different perspective. By the way, you don't have to stay the course and stick to bad ideas just because to say " aha, maybe I am wrong" looks like a death to you. I know our people equate yielding ground or admitting mistakes to a disgrace, but I am serious when I tell you your attitude - unless you are not playing the bad guy intentionally - is not right. Hadaa inaan iscayno rabtana, habeen danbe inooga dhig caawa waa habeenkaan dhashay - arbaco ayaa soo galaysa - markaa hooyaa tidhi wax xun ha ku hadline. :D

What I wanted to say to A-buufis- sorry I mean Apophis, Norf said it, laakin i want to tell Apo that the discussion is not what we would do ourselves, it is about how to deal with when these things happen. Also, i thought you are better than that? Ileen you are brainwashed. "Private space" kulahaa? Whose culture is that? Waryaa there are no such things among us. " xaaskii maxaa ku dhacay wali uur ma yeelane?" ayaa la iswaydiiyaa. And it is not like I am saying it is shame; it is just that it has different meaning when somalis ask this thing each other and when it is applied in a different setting. Somali- bashing is recently in vogue. It apparently attests to one's sophistication and civility. I hear it always and it is sickening! It is one thing to criticize ourselves on our backward cultural beliefs, our men's irresponsible poligamy, our oppression of women etc. That is necessary. But to bash Somalis for breaking western - and now internationalized- etiquettes is shameful. Especially when the people you are judging most likely did not have the opportunity to know what you know. Always prioritize respect and compassion over pride and ego. It is not a loss if you are made to look small if that helps one other person feel better. Let that person take you for a fool, that won't make you a fool. Have the inner self- belief and self-respect to take offences and abuses; you will not make yourself big by shouting back or by showing the other person that you are better. Markaa, take from your pleasure and give to the other person and if that means you feel uncomfortable and violated for a while, let it be! It is not like you are tolerating domestic violence. It is a fleeting discomfort. Chubaka is right. Yes, all are human beings, so give the respect a human being deserves to a somali who is also a human being. Hadaad wada dhalasho u soo dhawyn kartana ka sii fiican! Caawa, maxaan u jeedaa wacdi baa iga soo hadhaye...! Wait, Apophis, you are right. Forget about what I said here. Adigaa iga quman. Put them where they belong to diinta aabahood waxooyinka primitive'ka ah!!!

It is not about loving or hating talk. Nothing pleases me more than sitting in a corner somewhere obscure and wonder about this world and viccisstudes of life. Yet, if a guy appears ( of course not someone who scares you as a criminal) and says can i sit next to you, i offer and if he talks, i talk back; if i find the talk not very useful in any way, i quietly plan to wind it up and go. Of course, nearly always that is not the case. Not many foce themselves on you; and those who does often have some interesting to say. Anigu dadka xun ee la sheegayo maba arko, nearly all the human beings I see are honestly good to me. Of course my families and friends say I am naive and i trust everybody.

Juxa, it is important I make some sides of me known to you from time to time. Aftera, i am not entirely anonymous.

I know people may think I am feigning goodness, that is not my intention. I have many problems. I do many bad things but nothing pains me more than hurting or displeasing someone! And stories like that of Xaaji mak me sick. I notice Apophis also thinks what xaaji did is fine, but i think it is unacceptable behaviour. People you meet have different levels of education, exposure, intellect, etc. qof walba isku wax laga ma filo. Nin miyi ka tagay haduu kugu dhago adigoo yurub jooga waa arin ma duwan qof u eg someone who spent time in the west oo daf daf kula soo gala. Ka xitaa daf daf aadan jeclayn kula soo gala adigoon is xumayn baad is difaaci kartaa. Iga raali ahaw, i am in hurry, ee waa inoo xili kale nooli kulantee hadaad tidhaa adigoo faraxsan maxaad noqon?

Bakhaylimada Xaajiga ma taqaanaan; trainka inaga bixi in la yidhaa ayuu ka cabsanayey. Ilaahooow muu cadaan ahaado, xaajigu wuu la hadlilahaa with pleasure. I give -20 for Xaaji for this bad manners. Me, i have no problem talking to a somali. I study the person and if i feel i can talk to, i talk to the person. If he talks to me, i always go extra mile to make sure he feels valued. Not only with Somalis, with all human beings but Somalis get extra respect. In most cases you learn by talking to people. And if it is a long travel and I need to read, i tell the person and ask him if he can allow me to do that. I think it is when i show respect and compassion to a human being that i truely experience inner happiness. So, Xaaji arintaa waad gaftay walaal. Qofku afka qori kaama galinayo oo kaama hadlinayo, the least you can do is to listen and if he says things that you don't agree with, politely make your displeasure known. Also dadka lagama faano noocuu dooni ha noqdee. One of the biggest criticism i have endured in my life is dadka qof kasta waad la sheekaysataa! I say war de ma qof kula hadlay baa la odhan karaa ama loo muujin karaa in uuna hadalkiisu qiimo lahayn. Hadaan magaalo tago buushashka shaaha lagu cabo inaan dadka la fadhiisto ayaan ugu jeclahay walaahi.

Osman said nothing wrong here. Osman is as sane as he ever was, it is Xaaji who got dumber!

Nah! Carafaat, Tamirat is nowhere close...this is Tizita, not the Hakime nesh yelling of his that titilate the youth! Aster's fikrin cherishew ( I finished love!) is great. I was not back home when it was released last year to read the mood, but I know it was well received. Yet, if you just say Tizita, 10 out of 10 Ethiopians will most likely say Bezawork! Michael Belayneh did a fine job. I think the best from the male side.

Thanks Carafat, of course you can see the transformation. She is more urbane now and the music is upgraded to match the times. This version is for young Wire. The old men like me prefer the old version with less music and more voice. One of the most talked about enigma in Ethiopia is why all the great singers came second to Bezawork on Tizita, and why Bezawork's undispited talent failed to produce one other great song!! I think she has other nice songs, but her debut Tizita - the one with Ketema - got viral and so widely enjoyed over many, many years that people simply concluded she cannot possibly do better. Mind you, the voice and the music is a plus, it is the lyrics that is gripping. In this new version you posted, she is saying many philosophical things!

Excellent analysis and refreshing perspective. Where is juxa?? She should print this and read it once a day for six years to get why we do in the internet what we can't dare to do in real life! ... Ngonge, add this dimension. Like a girl who loves singing but with parents who forbid that, you have an urge to write fiction. More than urge... a consuming desire! Yet, you know you will never be able to do that. You have a mom who probably will get a heart attack if she hears what one of your characters said, you have an uncle who thinks the apostate in your story is you, you have a brother who thinks your are the personification of morality in this earth. You have kids who think you are the purest human being. Above all, you have a sanctimonious and irking society which can't or is unwilling to tell between a story and a story-teller. What does that man dying of an intense desire to be something do? He finds internet and the relative safety of a pseudonym. He threws himself in and starts to relieve some burden. ... and that overbearing society finds your real persona through hearsays and unnuanced truths. Alas! What you feared happens. You are pronounced mad! You are a wicked man. Even amoral. It is shackling, I tell you.

The 'Tizita' genre, which is about reminiscing about the past - usually in a longing and wistful recollections, is to Ethiopians what football is to Brazillians. It is a national treasure and pride and as such no single poet or singer can lay claim of exclusivity to it. Needless to say, there is no singer - old or young, modern or traditional, tall or short, man or woman, boy or girl, rebel or loyalists - who did not sing Tizita at one time or another. It is the world cup of Ethiopian singers - if you are great, you have to be there... But no one sang it better than Bezawork Assefa, whose name is synonymous with Tizita nowadays. Not the great Aster; not King Tilahun; not Mohamud Ahmed; not Minilik Wosenachew; not Teddy Afro. Not even Mikael Belayneh whose modern rendition really came close! Ultimately, doing the Tizita so superbly was to prove Bezawork's undoing in her later career. Nothing she produced in later years gripped the nation. Buna (coffee) with a rocking beat - far removed from the tranquil Tizita - was a modest success, but Bezawork did not shine ever after. Bezawork's heart-seizing melancholic voice, the pain of unfulfilled love her facial contortion betrays, and the ingenuity and simplicity of the lyrics she munches on so romantically, is what distinguished her Tizita rendition from those done before and after hers. Bezawork is assured of a legendary place in Ethiopian music and it is hard to imagine anyone who could ever rob her of her undisputed crown as the queen of all queens in Tizita! More than any other song, Tizita when sang by Bezawork, has the power of dragging you out of the drudgery of life and transferring you to a land full of bliss and beauty. If it does 't move you , then you must have the heart of a Maaddey, the mindest of Che, and the bitterness of Gabbal. Go and read Alkataa'ib! This world is not for the likes of you! ....Say again...What? ...Please stop the useless excuse you don't understand the language. Half of the CDs I bought over the years is Malian music and my name is not a Traore! Music is a universal language. That cliche is ace. But Bezawork would probably have languished in artistic solitude if the late Ketema Mekonnen was not alive in her time, and did not rattle hearts with his fading yet tantalizingly bucolic voice, which graciously intersperses romantic lyrics between sam-ina-warq (Wax and Gold) poetic lines. Sam-ina-Warq is a dualistic, paradoxical Amharic poetry, ubiquitous in Northern mountains, whose last lines are expected to send two messages from one single phrase or word. The wax is the supeficial message; the gold is the hidden one, which the wise ones ponder on for days to get it. This conflation of seemingly disparate messages is produced by either stressing or relaxing the incantations of few words, or playing with the sequence of words by conjoining them. When you get the meaning after several trails and tribulations, it is a eureka moment. The mystery is solved. Ketema rarely utters one direct word. His lyrics are Wax and Gold from start to finish and the song is filled with intrigue and suspense. Like a movie. It has chapters and its own history and transitions. One of his most memorable lines (not in the song I posted here) was when he decried social injustice by mocking society's behaviour when death takes one of its members. Genzeb yaalawuna,Ganzab ya loow, Sihed yaas taawiqal, ka wadha holaaw "You can tell the have from the have-not, By looking at their backs as they walk to the horizon" The beauty of the lyrics - which no doubt loses potency and context through my lousy translation- is that the Wax describes the physiological (asthetically) difference between the haves and have- nots when they are alive rather playfully and in amusing way, while the gold is a more macabre affair. Entertaining and educating at once! Listen to the Tizita duet of Bezawork - plenty of Gold in Amharic - and Ketema , and discover the nirvana of bliss and perfection. Unless you are that Tigre-worshipping Passerby who looks at art through political lenses! He can go and twist his shoulders and chest with Tertaraw Sibul's war chant against Eritreans... hufer tabagas!... Warriors of Shire and Adwa, children of Alula Aba Nafso, conqueror of Italians. Go take Barentu and Keren... the liver and heart of Eritrea....shame the moustached Wodi Sharmuta - Isayas! Pity. Even in war chants, the Amharas do better. Of course, they don't fight better than Tigres. But instead of hufar... They have the inciting and instigating Zeraf, which highlights own bravery in a more philosophical way. "Say Zaraf, zaraf!!" They Say, "Zaraf warms the mouth!" as they wield swords and sheilds! Bezawork, plenty of gold in her voice indeed. A gem.

Ngonge, ignore him *baas.tar*ka! Shaqo-la'aan baa haysa. Why does he call you adiguba lama hadashide?! Wyre, mahadansid walaal. Aad iyo aad. But never listen to Juxa like my alledged cousins did. According to her, even the protagonist in this story (see link) is me. http://www.somaliaonline.com/community/showthread.php/12155-THE-BENEVOLENT-PROSTITUTE

STOIC, sheekadan halkaa ku jooji. It is a prank that has gone too far. Cirkoow soo dun, Ciidaay dhaqaaq Cadha Alaay kaalay Waxba dhowran maynee Aloow dhagaxyo soo daadii ..... In truth, I have added enough twists in the tale for all characters (those which are real) and the chances of a coincidence with a real person was minimal and if it happens the chances they will identify with the storyline is slim. ..

Ngonge, I was actually admiring the design of the website until the Kennedian tag line flashed! I have to tell you I spew out the water I was drinking and rushed to the gents to restrain my laughter! Dadkii meesha fadhiyey baa isoo wada eegay.

looooooooool@Juxa. Been bay kuugu sheegeen waxba isuma nihin qoladaas ku tidhi waa wiilkayagii. Anyway, the excuse "waxbarashaa waashay" is common and has a long history. Back home, our folks usually get mad by overdose of knowledge when they are in grade 4. Midda kale, Abtigiis is not me. So, they cannot judge me [the person] by reading what an online invented persona talks about. I think sometimes you miss that distinction. Take Abtigiis as an actor. Actors do not live the life they play in movies nor do they tell their real stories when talking in movies. I think my cousins who are your dumaashi were not given this context and can rightfully declare me insane based on the stories they are told. Hadayse yihiin dad sidaad sheegi aanu is xigno oo dan iga leh may ila soo hadlaan aan u xog-waramee. A cousin of my wife also allegedly found out who Abtigiis is and told the wife. Well, I explained and she understood. This forum is a theatre and I will surely be surprised if the persona we wear here is that of ours. In that case, why not just form an email group and discuss... By the way, don't you know "wuu waalan yahay" depends on who is saying it?Two days ago, I told this guy the people in Gashamo are more closer and have a lot in common to people in Danot (the two places are in Somali region and neighbouring) than the people of Danot have with their geneological kins in Garissa. He could not believe it. He said I am mad! Well, you can imagine what I think of him! :D

Waxaasi inuu soo socday Juxa ka digtay oo boqol jeer tidhi war fiction iyo facts kala saar!! :D

Cara.;897579 wrote: Incredible. Cara, what is incredible?? Stoic - hadaba the one I am talking about is not your dumaashi. Taan anigu jeedo naaso waa weyn bay lahayd in real life : D : D istaaqfuruah!! P. S Stoic, bal send me the number or more details. Once we confirm, we can break the news to her. It will be a big surprise.

:D I know we are connected, more so in this age of internet. That explains why there is no Xaliimo girlfriend of mine in all my stories. Where they exist in real history, they assume the characters of Agnes or Sophie.

Ngonge, I will look for the book you suggested. These days I am totally immersed in a fascinating book by Richard Hall - it is an affront to just call it a book - Empires of the Monsoon. Stoic - i should have known the name Ismahan is rare. But no damage done, and she will confirm the narration if she reads.

Stoic, characters in this story are fictional. Any coincidence with real people is purely coincidental! :D :D Haday iyada noqoto ila soo xidhiidhi ama lambarkeeda ii soo ***. Waanu iswaynay. I am sure she will like to speak to me, and if this small indiscretion unites us again, she wouldn't mind.

19 years ago, one Tuesday noon, me and Fitsum traded vicious insults and vowed never to speak to each other again. Fitsum – a classmate and something else to me – had a fiery temperament, a trait she no doubt inherited from her half-Eritrean parents. I had the pride of a nomad. How can an Amahara whore look down on me – son of Mahdi Ciil-nuug, owner of over hundred camels?! What made the brawl stick to mind is the commotion it caused. The whole class witnessed it. Most did not know of our furtive courtship until that moment. For a whole semester, the vow was kept on both sides. The greeting of God – as the perfunctory hello is known in Ethiopia – was flouted. Until, one day, I left a note by her desk without speaking to her. It read “it seems there is a dearth of intermediaries to reconcile us, why can't we reconcile by ourselves?” She obliged. Two years later, Nigatu – my roomate in the University who is now a lecturer in Addis Ababa University –introduced me to an afternoon pastime. We would walk out through Afinjo ber –the smaller gate of the University, walk towards Piazza, teasing lonely girls on the way. Before we reach Arada, we would turn back and hit the main road that links Arat Kilo to sadist kilo and walk as far as Shiro meda. Just before we reach Shiro meda, there is a big church – Medhane-Alem (the holy saviour), on the right side of the road. Nigatu would ask me to wait for him as he pays the customary respect to the “Father, Son and Holy Spirit”, by kissing the wall of the church and kneeling down for around five minutes. I wait by the road. On Friday’s he would sip tea at a nearby café and wait for me as I perform Jum’a prayers for one hour in a Mosque at Takle-Haimanot safer. My tolerance of the beliefs of others was cemented in those days. And then Ismahan happened. Unlike me, she was from Addis Ababa and has not lived with Somalis although both her late father and mom were Somalis. We met at the college when one Amhara friend told her that there is a Somali boy in the campus. That Amhara friend was from Dire Dawa. He was Taye, who was later arrested for bad-mouthing Tigrean fighters in a Televised address when Mengistu Hailemariam visited the University in his last days. Taye used to upset me by calling me a “ fake Somali”. “Just look at him when he starts eating magna Injera. Just be honest. Does he really look like a Somali or a veteran from Dabre-Birhan?” he would tell my friends in my absence and they would tell me later. Ismahan and I developed such an intense platonic friendship that rumors abounded that we were not just friends given the time we spent with each other. Ismahan did not speak Somali. But I started teaching her to the extent she felt she can talk about others in Somali when she wants to tell me something urgent that she doesn’t want others to hear. “Wiilkii iyagii madaw weeyaan?” She said one day, trying to tell me that a boy standing next to us looked like an Afro-American. Like me, she must had instructions from her family. Be yourself. Know you are a Somali. A goat that spends time with sheep doesn’t become a sheep. My mom’s words –whenever she sees me after six months –were wakening. “Hooyo, don’t eat their meat. Don’t take their culture. We are better than them. We are Muslims. We are Somalis. We are clean. If God made you a Somali, you couldn’t possibly ask for anything more." Mom had underestimated the profound impact environment and interactions have in shaping attitudes and identity. Ismahan always, always mentions the day we spent revising calculus in empty classroom at night and I somehow noticed that her chest was almost like mine because nothing was protruding from the tiny T-shirt she was wearing. “Ismahan, you need to grow those things" I said. She laughed, and laughed and laughed, and in subsequent years, asked me why I came up with that joke. Of course, by the time I made the joke, there were no secretes I did not know about her, or she did not know about me. But I think she may have been startled by me noticing something she did not expect me to notice. Despite mom’s advice, I ate their meat, slept in their houses and adopted some of their etiquettes. But always, my outward integration masked an inward longing to be a Somali. So, Radio Mogdishu, news about Somalia, Somali music was to be obsessively tracked. There was no internet, no TVs to follow then. The only way of connecting with your roots was through audio cassettes you collect when you go on holidays to home once or twice in a year. Ketema Mekonen – the late quintessential Ethiopian Kirarist, sings this breathtaking lyric: Your tender heels are like a lemon, I am afraid you may rapture (them) if you walk bare-footed, Why can’t you wear me as your shoes? And then laments the self-centeredness of his lover who he alleges had taken his heart: Return my heart to me, yours is enough for you Where have you seen someone who became rich by collecting hearts ? And the lines invoke memories of people, places, and times. People I don’t want to be but I can’t help to identify with, places I don’t wish to live in, but I can’t take off my mind. Heck, I am a Somali. It is memories that make you or define who you are. But my defining memories are not Somali. Which means they are not correct. I delete them. I am not going to allow intrusive memories to dictate to me who I am or to stifle who I want to be. I am what my mom wants me to be. I am a Somali. 100%, most of the time; except the devilish moments when possessing recollections seep into my mind.

A marvelous put down and very informative review!! http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2012/dec/20/salman-rushdie-case/?pagination=false

Loooooool@ Malika!! good one walaahi. Dadku xaasid sanaa!! The first to be bombed ma ahayn the dhulos according to a new book published by a prominent Somaliland historian Abdillahi Cige Qawdhan. The first people bombed were Habar- lover pastoralists who just happened to be in Taleex when the bombing started. Sidaa miyaa sheekadu??

Xaaji, i also found that humorous but forgot to mention. Delusion and false clan grandeur has no limits in this somali earth. Alpha, don't worry. You will be taken a prisoner soon and converted to a Khatumoite. Iska yar sug!

This was really hilarious. On a week, we finally got a countervailing SAHAL to the HAG, we also learn of the fact that Khaatumo kids are unlike any and that there is special dishes that Khatumoites eat that we never heard of. Aaliyah and Abdikhadar should have told us this long time ago.