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The return of Miriam Makeba | page 1, 2, 3
"But the resources, the natural resources," she says, "they all belong to that very troubled continent of Africa. And I believe that it becomes a troubled continent because there are those who must always cause confusion so that we do not keep these natural resources. For instance, we're always fighting amongst each other. Who gives us the arms? And then we become indebted to wherever we are buying them from -- with what? The very resources we need to keep there." It's time, she says, for the people of Africa to "stop fighting and just be soldiers, beautiful soldiers, who should fight, not against each other or other nations, but fight disease, fight hunger, fight all the ills of the world and bring our people up to a much better way of living. I just wish that that should happen, and it must happen someday. Otherwise, I will look up to the Superior Being and say, 'What is it that we have done?' I mean, it cannot go on forever; it should not go on forever." She notes the West's late response to the March floods in Mozambique. "Flood, flood, flood all over; I was never so sad," she says. "And I cried when I saw that woman have a baby on a tree. I mean, really. And it was so strange that there is little South Africa can do; we were hit in [northern South Africa] by the flood. And our country was struggling there and then also had to go and help in Mozambique with the limited means we have. And the world did not come through until 10, 12 days later. That was the strangest thing, too, and it hurt. It hurt those of us who do love our troubled continent. And you ask yourself the question, why?" Of the prospect for racial harmony in her own country, Makeba remains cautiously optimistic, though she concedes that legal change alone will not do the trick. "When you have the laws that people can go to and say, 'You can't do this to me because the law says you cannot do it,' -- that was the difference between America and South Africa, even when I first came here." Racism, she explains, "was not institutionalized anymore" -- at least not in the northern states -- "but, you know, people practiced it. Which goes to show you, you can make all the laws you want, but you cannot change people's ways. If you must change them, you have to understand that it will take a long time. "We have a chance maybe now in that all those little ones are going to the same schools together, and maybe they will grow up not feeling [bad toward] each other, not suspecting one another, because they're growing up together. . . And so we have a chance, maybe 50 years from now, to be much better. I don't think it will be gone. Some people are just die-hards; they will not change, and there are quite a few of those on both sides." "Do you think you might write another book?" I ask. "I don't know," she says with a sigh. "Your last one came out in 1988, and a lot of things have happened to you since then." "It was not well distributed," she says of her autobiography, "Makeba: My Story." "Perhaps it was the wrong time, because there were still a lot of people who thought I was a terrorist or I am this, I am that." "Do you still get that?" "Well, there are so many things that have happened to me that make me feel that some people will never forgive." "Forgive what?" "I don't know, because I've never killed anybody. I've never said anything nasty about anybody, except my truth, which is things I've experienced in my country, or wherever ... I feel sorry for people who cannot forgive, because there are people who think I did something," she asserts. "But even if I did something, has it not been so long ago that they can't say, 'Oh yeah, you know, maybe she was crazy. Maybe she was this.' If they don't, it's them I feel sorry for, because I have forgiven everybody who tried to strangle me and couldn't -- I'm still here." There's a certain irony to Makeba's circumstance. Because she was categorized as an anti-apartheid activist, with apartheid now over, she herself is starting over as a singer. I mention this, and she laughs. "I always fall, then get up and -- " she suddenly claps her hands. "My life has been like a yo-yo. One minute I'm dining with presidents and emperors; the next I'm hitchhiking. I've accepted it. I say, 'Hey, maybe that's the way it was written, and it has to be.' And that maybe there's a reason why I'm still here." "I hope nobody puts me on a shelf again," she says plaintively. "I hope all those people can find it in the goodness of their hearts to just please leave me alone." "Who?" I ask. "Who do you mean?" "All the ones who've been suppressing and whatever, you know?" I don't. "Who don't give the music the airplay?" "Who don't forget." "Oh, those people," I reply, cluelessly. "Well, who do you mean when you say this?" "They know themselves," she says, stubbornly. "When they read this, they'll know who they are." We've moved into serious resentment territory. "There is a sad thing, too ...," she continues. "When I left [South Africa] and went to Europe ... the manager I had then had me sign so many things. And you would be surprised -- I have never had one cent from 'Pata Pata.' I should be a millionaire," she says. "But, you see, that is the sad story of Makeba. People keep beating me on the head with a hammer." Her voice tamps down to a whisper. "And I keep getting up."
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