The modern Afro-woman

I was thinking the other day, or maybe it was today its hard to keep up with time nowadays. What makes us modern women? and why are we reffered to that way anyway? is it because we are mostly born in this century or the recent last? is it because we relax and curl or straighten our hair, has it got to do with the fact that we cant hold a hoe and plough the sweet soil like our great grand mothers did? or the level of education some of us strive for?

I figured only the so called 'modern afro-woman' could answer that. So I started a conversation with some of my other 'modern afro women' and the answers were interesting.

A bunch of us, hardly call our parental homes our homes, I mean I am almost entitled to a 'honorary' diplomatic passport, I cant go as far as demanding one similar to Ban ki Moon's (he is the Sec General of the Uinted Nations) but i have had my share of border crossings. I  am not entirely to carry the blame, my parents played a good part!! I was almost born in Uganda, grew up in Kenya, Zambia, Swaziland, South Africa and a handful of other African countires. I went on to travel to a lot more than that, and work everwhere as well. I speak a couple of languages and can cook dishes from most of those places, I can sing, dance in my traditional mother tongue, as well as any one else.

So I cant careless the gound as well as my great grand mother, but if I was offered the chance, and did not have to strive for the almost three degrees  I have, I might have been inclined to learn. I cannot for the life in me carry water from the river, but I have other qualities that are great.

I have almost done all things I was taught, and a couple I wasnt, and excelled brilliantly, I can cook, and very well I might add, I spend my days reading law books!! running from one court room to the next, attending to passengers on one flight to the next, nursing patients, teaching school children, and in a lot of instances at building sites overseeing constructions and large projects. I am an engineer, a doctor, a lawyer, a teacher, an accountant, a designer. I am a modern woman, black, and yes my hair is straightened, but my cousins, and best friend have beautiful curly afros. I dress every day in new designs and carry a designer handbag, because I can afford it and it looks good on me.

I leave work late  in the evening like all my colleagues of all other species, get into my little cute car, and head home, where I prepare a delicious meal, for myself and whoever has chosen to share my life and the little ones, I prepare a bath for him and them, clean up our home, and wait to wake up in the morning the next day as early as possible and prepare  breakfast, arrange for the day's routine for the little ones, drop them off at school before I get on with the day.

I perform well at work, I have been recently promoted, even though I had to work the last four months with a five months pregnancy, I did not complain, I loved the challenge!! I cannot plough a farm, I do not carry water from the river, I have not yet had ten children, but I am finalising my PHd, and I stand on flights from singapore to New York serving people, I pay bills for my mother after my dad passed, I send my siblings to school and  I astill manage to do my hair, and look beautiful with a large smile.

I AM THE MODERN AFRO-WOMAN AND  I AM NO LESS THAN MY GREAT GRAND MOTHER