Kola Boof

To the extent that Army uniforms are necessary.... That United airlines must mark its airplanes with a United airlines logo... To that extent that AALBC.COM has a logo making it possible to tell this site from BLackBooks.Com.... ....I have come to understand via traveling and living all over the world exactly why Human beings LABEL things and why they need to be able to identify their own. It has to do with trust and survival. Americans are not part of Tribes or Clans. I am. So I understand the benefits and negatives of having that cushion along with a family cushion. I understand how it protects us from invasion and outsiders. I especially notice that Black Americans don't stand for anything. Anyone can waltz right into your communities and open a liquor store; claim to be you; set up restaurants and sell you hair. No other group of people is like that and they ALL have "standard requirements" of identification and unity. EMOTIONAL mantras like "One Love" won't cause Thai people to call your half-Asian baby Thai----as Tiger Woods found out--no matter what you accomplish. Africans, Whites, Asians, Latinos will smile politely...but close ranks...on outsiders at a given point. This is not because they're evil or racist. It's because they understand the law of Physics and they understand that Lions and Cheetahs and Panthers don't hunt together and share food together and mate....just because they're cats. Because Black Americans saved my life... Because Black Americans are beautiful & special to me... Because Black Americans are VALUABLE to me.... I would like to see them be more discriminating and self-possessed and make outsiders EARN entry into the Black community more often. And before someone gets smart....I was BROUGHT HERE by Black Americans; I did not come on my own. I was brought here & indoctrinated into your tribe BY YOU. My criticism of Black America is because I hate watching African-Americans constantly DEFER to anything that is white, light or Non-Africoid...wrongly believing that you have a Stake in the establishment when you clearly do not and aren't even properly respected as human beings. No other people in this nation are asked to "transcend race" but Black Americans. No one else. Not even African immigrants! And you shouldn't stand for it. You NEED a uniform; you NEED to embrace your blackness and close ranks on outsiders and build up with an inter-connected Clan system that benefits YOU and YOUR PEOPLE. That's what you need. And cut out all this emotional Mr. Rogers Camel Shit about HUMANITY. Humanity doesn't give a shit about human beings and never has. If you haven't learned from Jews baking in ovens; Indians massacred on their own land or Africans chained & dehumanized like dogs for thousands of years...then you'll never learn. Black America is dying...because you refuse to have Standards & Cohesiveness that correlate around your Blackness.

Well Cynique, I was rooting for Bernice McFadden to win the fiction award. She is VERY light skinned. Haha. We're on the same publisher and we chat from time to time. I really love her to death and Terry McMillan, whose writing I also admire, is not friendly to me, so I wanted Bernice to win. She deserved it (Read "GLORIOUS" folks!). But you do make a point that always irks me about America's "Black" community in general. Which is why I've now removed myself and only consort with "MY" Black American relatives. That way, I can be the "immigrant" and not feel that the IMAGE Awards is a reflection on me or mis-representing me. I used to take these images so personal and feel that I was part of a "traitor" class. But now I have come to accept that I will never really be Black American. It's what my family is and they love me and understand me.

Oh definitely not. HUMANS base their trust upon Like-ness. It's a natural human instinct. We herd, gather with & trust those who look like us. So this is of major importance even if it's not spoken aloud. The Homer Plessy case is extreme. That, to me, was ridiculous, because he actually LOOKED white. But in Africa, we don't call our mixed off spring "Black"--we call them "Half Caste" and we have all kinds of Standards & Practices to protect our bloodlines; matrilineal harmony and tribal-clan identities. Africans deeply love their mixed children; they love mixed people for that matter. But they will not recognize them as the 'ancestral' marker out of self-respect. I remember feeling so angry and offended when Black Americans used to call Mariah Carey a "Black" woman. To me, it was proof that they hated Africa and hated blackness. A lack of respect for Black people's Phenotype. In North Sudan, I am considered Black. But in South Sudan, I am a Half-Caste person. Then, too, the word "Black" isn't used in many parts of Africa because everyone in that particular place is Charcoal black, so they don't speak about color...but tribe. When outsiders arrive, THEN we use "black" because now we have a visible contrast. Halle Berry said that she was very hurt that the people in Tanzania kept insisting that she was "White" and called her "White Lady" everywhere she went. But to Black Africans, the European in her face is loud; she has no African hair; so she is White. It's not just America. It's a human condition. But the more I've lived & seen the world, the more I understand and respect why it's necessary. And on some level, it is.

Troy, I'm not surprised that they are---are YOU? That doesn't mean shit. I changed my passwords on here and on Facebook where my page was also broken into as you suggested in our email exchange. I don't understand WHY I would make a post calling myself a hermaphrodite. Do you or anyone else??

SIGH. Here we go again with this mess. I didn't write that last post!! Who used my account to write that??? Troy is this the Skinheads again??? Please leave it up. Don't take it down. CHANGING MY PASSWORD NOW

Bookfan, When you stop being interested in Transsexuals and get a thing for Hermaphrodites...call me, ok. You're so lame and defeated.

HELP!!! Well from Carey to ChrisHayden to Cynique...I think just about everyone here is a WRITER to my mind. I've recently taken on a task that's quite challenging---writing a Murder Mystery novel and creating the Woman Detective lead character. The imprint I'm on specializes in murder mysteries; it's their main genre though they signed me as a literary author. Big HAM that I am...I insisted on penning them a murder mystery. The thing is....I hardly ever read murder mysteries and I've never dared try to PLOT and write one before, and no matter how good a writer you are, there's a special ambiance that pervades the best mystery stories, IMO. Now that I'm into writing my book, I worry that my lady detective might not be convincing. I'm supposed to be calling LAMBD on the telephone to get his advice on this, but we keep missing each other...so hopefully Carey, Chris, Cynique, BookFan and others can give advice on what not to do and how to make my character seem convincing as a detective. On the outside Cricket is a very beautiful black police officer newly switched to the detective's division (Wash. D.C.)...but in her private life is an amazing array of childhood secrets she's trying to escape. She's smart, but also vulnerable.

Haha!!! Troi (pronounced Troy) is that certain lion cub out of a litter who wants TO EAT FREE and not be out in the cold. LOL! The name is also used to mean "teacher's pet" in school. The smart kid who always wants to sit up front and raise their hand gets called "Troi." Of course girls aren't allowed to do that.

Haha!!! BTW...I don't like my children's names. Their father (a pure blooded Garifuna from Belize, Central America)named them popular Black Central American names--Arnofo and Wombe. I would have named them Cedric and Troy (which has nothing to do with Troy Johnson; I have always liked that name since I was a child because Troi in my birth mother's "Oromo" language means the lazy lion cub who chose to be our house pet). But they are extremely successful boys. Much like their father and me.

Names like Bob, Meredith, Constance, Clifford, Alice and James only sound "normal" because you speak English. You live in...and are informed from the day of birth by a combination of White tribal affiliations be they Germanic, Greek, Victorian or Polish and Italian. This is the dominant White culture and all of us living here bask in "their acculturation." Though Shaniqua and ShaQuonda are not African names--they would sound far more organic and fitting to an African immigrant than "Jennifer." That's because the African (the natural Black person) speaks African languages. In Africa today, it's exotic to have Western names (Good Luck Jonathan, Jerry, Facebook and Exxon). But since the late 1950's, there has been a virulent continental revolution to depose all "Colonial" names and return to African tribal/clan names. In my case---as with many BLACK North Africans---I refuse to publicly use my Arabic birth name (Naima Bint Harith); though it's considered much prettier to many people than my more West African-sounding pen name. Many years ago, I wrote a 2 word poem "Kola Boof" and decided to take that poem as my professional name. The poem represented being "been-to" (an African who has lived outside Africa long enough to be acculturated by foreigners and returned home). Kola = (a)the most beloved snack by African children ( the supreme good-will Boof = The specific sound of drums made with elephant ear tops--BOOF! Comes the drums/Or in Nigeria the highest 'medallion' presented to warriors after war is the 'Boof.' Kola Boof = The poem is reminiscent of my childhood silent movie idols Clara Bow and Betty Boop; as silent movies became my only friends upon first arriving in America, because I couldn't speak English. NOTICE---if you take the words separately they are AFRICAN; but if you join the two words together (Kola Boof); they become WESTERN (in my mind like Betty Boop is Western). I have what is called a "Been-to" name and I write "Been-to" poetry as opposed to Haiku. But few African-American writer/scholars are able to appreciate or even notice these small but profound intricacies. ___________________________ (NOTE: There is a pediatrician at Cedar Sinai Hospital named Dr. Shaniqua and there's also a Dr. Kianna and a Nurse Tameko. All have tended my sons.) ___________________________ MY POINT: When we Blacks find ourselves disgusted by the name "Shaniqa" but not the Japanese name "Yoko Shimada" ---it is because #1--we compulsively reject 'perceived' overt blackness and #2--our dominant language is English. Our reaction is indeed (95% of the time), like Troy said, a form of self-hatred.

LOL!!! What saddens me about reading your responses to these poor souls (and I seriously sympathize with their desires to succeed as published authors)....but what saddens me Cynique is that you are not an Editor in New York. We might actually get some originality, passion and some HIT BOOKS if they returned to having eagle-eyed people like yourself sniffing through the pages and critiquing so effortlessly. Believe it or not, whenever you go on these grammar checks, I hear the voice of Julia Child doling out the corrections. It's hysterical for me. I myself am untrained with grammar/punctuation and basically learned what I know devouring at least 6 literary novels per month and reading several newspapers daily. And that's after I learned English itself! I'm not dyslexic, mind you, I just write like I'm dyslexic at times. (I don't know the grammatical language laws; I write from sheer memory of how books & news print is laid out. I just 'feel' the structure; the difference between nouns and verbs is all I know.) They don't have many people like you in publishing anymore. I sincerely believe it's a significant reason for the breakdown. It's overrun with business people--few arts and crafts men. Something truly unconventional and experimental like Jamaica Kincaid's "At the Bottom of the River" could never get published today. Not by an African/African-American female author anyway.

BOOKFAN, Allow me to speak for myself and no one else for a moment. Let me tell you HOW YOU HELPED ME GET A BOOK DEAL. You made a major vicious (and I mean vicious) attack on me on this board claiming that there was no ancient song entitled "The Beautiful One Are Not Yet Born." You claimed that I had blithely stolen this from a 1990's West African author's book title (not that titles can be copy-written or used in only way). One of my editors, an expert on African musical instruments in the middle East (not Black) saw our exchange and saw you for what you actually are. You had called me a "liar" and demeaned me without any fair consideration or genial respect. You went on to list endless claims of me being "fraudulent" and a "liar"---assignations that neither you, Cynique or anyone here has ever proven in the light of day with me present. NOW...after said Editor contacted me to congratulate me on the video & my singing, he went on to tell me how he had been raised party in KENYA in 1950's and was sung that song every night as a lullaby by his Bantu Kenyan Nanny. He is also Arab and knew much of the historical dogma that I sing throughout the song. AFTER THAT..... A few months later, you did it again!! This time you claimed that I was not in contact with Angela Davis and that I had stolen portions of Gloria Naylor's book "1996" and that I was not on a list of Immigrant Authors being targeted by an F.B.I. sting. Well it was lucky for MY CREDIBILITY that you did that. Because all the parties involved were able to see what I go through with people like you and tell others within the industry that ---"Kola is not lying about this. She is the one whose phone number came up in France, Germany & Bahrain as the other authors had been chatting with her." For the record...my COMPLETE complaints about the F.B.I. were posted BY ME on this board YEARS BEFORE Gloria's book came out. I was always teased by Cynique, Thumper, Mzuri and others here who claimed I was crazy or whatever--when in fact, that was my real life. Group Attorney Cheryl Welch, a close friend of both Gloria Naylor and myself, was especially stunned by the level of hostility you employed in trying to mow me down. THING IS...the more you tried to discredit me...the more people like Derrick Bell, Angela, Gloria and so many others got to see how outrageous and mean-spirited you and your kind are when Black people attempt to tell THEIR STORY-THEIR TRUTH. My advice to people like you is to always be fair and somewhat humble in stating your positions. And to present Concrete Evidence in your claims about people. Because that's why I'm still here....I present EVIDENCE showing how I'm lied on and mis-portrayed by erroneous critics who apparently hate & degrade me for their own personal prejudices. THINK whatever you want to think, but that doesn't change the truth. You can't discredit what's real.

Haha, Cynique! You know I dated Vick's cousin Quentin last year. Was fun. As for OPRAH...she stated at the beginning of this season that she would use her FINAL SHOWS to squash & resolve some long-standing hard feelings. I think she is doing that more than going for ratings. The situation with her sister was aired relatively FAST considering Oprah just found out at Thanksgiving!!

POEMS from the last two days by Kola Boof: *Kola The Snow Man You looked at me and laughed..... I got up from the snow (melting). You made me. _________________ *Laughing In Window Doing Dishes I recently hugged you.....thoughts.... like I gave birth to you..... feeling U my son/U my daughter/U my love. I feel good. ________________________ *Fingering Pearls Laughing with champagne toe to toes on an empty bank account. We got it like that. _____________________ "Rod" I don't love the Husk. But the more I caress it; the gentler his heave beneath. _____________________ *Untitled Hold me a while....and take me....when it's lavender and too weak to think straight. ______________________ *Humbly Owned I want to be somebody else while the lights are out. _________________________ *Owned He comes from a Red Clay village. He comes from a Red Clay woman. He comes...wrestling God....inside me. _____________________________ *Memory & Aging: Drying Clothes A Black Man plucked me out of thin air. A Black man followed me into the Sea. A Black man caught my falling star. A Black man set me on his knee. _____________________________ *Snow Brown Nipples Beautiful, beautiful clear sky....fresh & clean deeply breathing. I had to smile and then my nose was cold. It hurt to laugh! It made smoke and white slush sweetness _________________________________ *Luck This is nervous.....it's laid out long...... it's a breezy kiss; not even ours anymore.... everywhere's kiss _____________________________________ *Mortal My everything just can't end with this life. Love should be unkillable. And sometimes, the heart strains to know. It's not Greed; it's the heart! ---------------------------- Happy belated valentine's day.

Cynique, Thanks for the tip about Cumin. I just noticed that. My problem isn't with people not liking Oprah. Everyone has the right to admire whomever they admire. My problem is with people (particularly Black people) rushing to say that Oprah is "ugly" (which she is not). I am speaking to a Mass Condition I notice (whether you agree or not) in the majority of Black people where anyone who is noticeably Black is viewed through a "Flatness" of eye dismissal...meaning, facial features are not really observed; healthiness of skin tone; teeth; smile; eyes; the whole face of that person is just routinely dismissed because they are Black. The fact that the same idiots saying Oprah is ugly will commonly turn around and say that Ricki Lake or Mama Cass "had a pretty face" is proof of this phenomenon. I am tired of reasonably attractive/healthy looking Black people---such as Oprah, Gayle King, Michelle Obama, Dionne Warwick--being referred to as "Ugly." Let us not forget that PRESENCE and the ability to command a space is one of the greatest attributes of those who are beautiful. I feel very strongly that American Blacks immediately OVERLY-judge Black people's looks and have inhuman expectations about what THEY are supposed to look like. There is nothing "ugly" about Oprah Winfrey. I saw enormous beauty in her appearance the first time I ever saw her. I don't know how in the hell Barbara Walters is stately and good looking...but Oprah is a shrew? Just stop. Lastly. Black People...are SUPPOSED to look like....Black People. And often times the put downs & hatefulness towards a Black person's looks is based on something that has to do with their Phenotypical beauty composite. For instance, Gladys Knight, who was really a raving beauty when she was young---is disqualified for having big cushy lips, which to my eyes, RAISES HER above the other women in the looks department.

Let me preface this by stating how much I love Halle Berry. I'm a huge Halle fan from when she first started on "Knots Landing" and no one knew she was biracial. (1) I think Halle wanted a sperm donor. I think she wanted her offspring to look a certain way and deliberately sought a MALE MODEL who is not Black to procreate with. If she wanted a black baby, she would have just gotten pregnant by one of her black husbands. (2) Halle doesn't want to pay "Child Support" for 6 months out of the year to Gabriel Aubry. That is what I believe this is all about. I don't buy for one second that Gabriel is "racist." If he did call her the "n" word, then that's just part of being a couple. God knows I've called my White friends "peckerwood dog-smell'n mofo" and yet I love them dearly. I understand what Halle is doing and I still like her. But I don't buy this scenario.

I LOVE THIS Oprah Winfrey (at age 17) singing in Spanish!!!

Troy and XEON, WHAT I THINK: One thing I notice in this country (and we see this ALL THE TIME)....Black Men telling Barbara Walters, Diane Sawyer, Fergie, Jane Pauley, Teena Marie....the most average looking White women HOW LOVELY they are. Yet Oprah is supposedly Fat & Ugly. I say Camel Shit! Oprah looks better than ALL those ugly White hags. But there is some germ of mental illness that afflicts Black Men. I don't know if they got it from birds or cats...but it's like a fucking VIRUS that Black Males just can't shake. Anyone with WHITE skin is immediately credited with good looks simply on the basis of having a lighter complexion--and in MOST cases---such as comparing Ricki Lake to Jennifer Hudson; the Lighter/Whiter person is NOT the cute one! I had this argument with Posar (my guy)....and though he's Black American and quite different and I love him to death, I had to admit to him that I secretly LOATHE most Black American men for this very reason and put them right on the REMEMBER TO BURN AT STAKE pile right along with Sudan's Mullahs and the KKK. It just pisses me the fuck off when an "African-American" gets done talking about how ugly Oprah is and then turns around and says Teena Marie was pretty. Man, CAMEL SHIT!!! Miss Black Tennessee Oprah Winfrey Oprah Winfrey won the Miss Black Tennessee Beauty Pageant and she is prettier than all those women and always was. And it really irks me that your people can never see anything pretty about each other. POSAR gets pissed at me for saying this, but it's like you don't know what Black People are SUPPOSED to look like or some shit. It's always a frigg'n "AA" talking about 50 Cent is ugly or Fantasia "isn't cute enough to be on the radio"---but then you pumping up White HAGS like Fergie and Teena Marie. Please. Like I said, Oprah is a very attractive Black Queen. Period.

Yes Xeon, I think Oprah is very beautiful. Of course in a western society she would not get credit for her beauty, especially from Black Americans, because you all (for the most part) can't recognize BLACK beauty unless it's white-looking. She is a stately, queenly, beautiful Black woman. She looks like a 100% Zulu.

Xeon, At the beginning of December 2010, our entire family returned to Falls Church, Va. because my adoptive father was given 1 week to live. Posar couldn't go, but I took my sons and we lived there with my parents awaiting my father's death. All 8 children came home (well the official legal 8) and we held up our mother who of course was devastated after 50 years of marriage. My dad had been very ill for the last four years. He had been operated on several times beginning with cancer. In summer 2010 he developed diabetes. By November they informed him that they needed to cut off his arms and legs. ALL FOUR LIMBS. He also began losing his eye sight! He response: "...just let me die." By early January, my father died at age 70. One week later....(which is just last month)....I began having intense visual problems and blood sugar swings. I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes. EXACTLY LIKE MY FATHER. Since starting treatment ((I drink 2 cups of Guava tea per day instead of pills or insulin)) my sight has improved and my blood sugar seems to be regulated. Posar, who put me on the tea, brilliantly instructed that I should also take Quill's Oil for my eyes. The DHA strengthens the retinas. Posar, by the way, is a Health Nut and a Raw Foodist. His instruction that I treat myself with all natural things (Guava tea, Quill's oil) has brought me INSTANT control and relief and has been much better than what the doctor's mapped out for me. As long as I get exercise and drink the Guava tea & Quill oil pill, I seem to be OK. But I was treated for brain cancer in 2008 (very successfully) and since then, I'm always paranoid about my health and feel very unsure about how long I will live. I've had a very awful life to be honest.

Oh wow. Coming from Cynique, the Grand Dame in my eyes, that's going to make me cry. Thank you so much. I appreciate your words so much. Well now, I really am crying. ICK! Kola

Kola's ass is being whipped by Diabetes right now (at 41!)...struggling to retain my eye sight....and trying to keep my weight down to calm my arthritis. PLUS trying to stay cute for my virile lion boyfriend. Honestly. I'm a bit tired of fighting to be honest. I might have to undergo a breast reduction. Which I really just...can't accept. I love my titties and I don't want to be THAT skinny-minnie. But the fatty-tissue holds too much estrogen & feeds my diabetes. OH...aging. I'm hating it so much. This is why I secretly love & admire Cynique so much. She makes it look so easy and she's sharp as a whip. I want to be like her. But I'm too wild and not disciplined, I suspect. Another thing. Just because I cuss at people doesn't mean I don't really adore them. If I take a lot of time to fight with you, that means I probably care about you deep down. A good example is ZANE. I've ripped her to shreds (because she made me) but I really love her deep down. I felt I had to attack back and when I attack, it's rarely medium force. I actually like most people. I just have a lot of unpopular views. People think I'm "weird", which hurts my feelings and then I attack them for disrespecting me. What's hilarious is that Posar and I have yet to have a single argument and he has THREE PROBLEMS with me: (a) he didn't know I was a comedian; I make him laugh too much. ( I feed him too much. © I spend too much money according to him. But I don't. Not at all.

I can't wait to see the new movie that Oprah is starring in with Meryl Streep and Sandra Bullock. Those three in one film has got to be a powerful combination. I hear Oprah gets the guy at the end. I love Oprah. I think she's gorgeous for her age and I think she's been randomly "lucky" just as Cynique described. But she's still a helluva person IMO.

Thank you so much, BOOK FAN. I wish you a Happy Valentine's Day and hope you keep posting about other "book" stuff King. Kola

Hi Carey Thanks King. I've missed you and everyone.