For centuries, Africans have used patterns, discovering and manipulating geometric concepts to make them symbolic systems. So, mathematics wasn’t far from being a language. They transformed abstractions into knowledge. Ideas from their human minds were then communicated in a highly artistic manner. The significant geometric patterns are visible on decorations covering architectural styles: buildings, traditional monuments, and temples.

It’s 2016, and I’ve been swindled into a math competition. I’ve always been “good” at math. The monotony of it suited me; the rote memorization of formulae and obvious pattern recognition, while anxiety- inducing in others, came to me instantly. It also meant that, once I understood something, I also didn’t care to spend an hour and a half doing …

I wonder. What purpose would I serve if I had a different religion, and if I wasn’t forced to practice the one I do? Right about now, you’re wondering too: which religion is he talking about? Is it mine? Am I forced too?! Or maybe you’re not anxious, and you’re just going to keep on reading to find out. Go …

in the beginning: there is water; the world is without form, an empty void; a hen scatters sand poured from a snail’s shell as a god watches on; life is breathed into clay figurines; the sun emerges from a mound; order unravels from chaos; a great flood recedes from the land; matter coalesces from a big bang; there comes a …

September 29th, 1988 – En Route to New York City “Name, Miss?”  “Alice Carlisle.” It was a beautiful train, I had to journal every detail for Amare. My brother would be expecting a spectacular story. I glanced at the old couple across from me, and imagined she was a baker, running a fabulous patisserie in New York. He was her …

“Hey, James?” Kiyoko whispered.  “Ya?” He answered.  “There’s no holiday or anything happening today right?” Kiyoko asked with confusion.  “I don’t think so… Why?” He asked.  “All the places and parking lots I passed were empty,” Kiyoko said. James was even more confused than Kiyoko hence he just woke up. He threw on his shoes to see for himself. The …

Chapter 1 I was washing  up before morning prayer when I heard, “Thirza, your kha-ver is here!” I dashed down a sleek set of stairs to find Ethan holding the door open for Tabitha. Imma and Abba were out with our handmaid to help her with the groceries. Our parents told us that when they were kids, it was a …

Part 1 Kamau & Njoroge It’s the hottest day of the summer in the east African traveller’s town of Panaka and the recent high school teacher retirees Kamau and Amani are loafing outside Mugiri’s Convenience in the scorching sun with a withered red umbrella as their only protection from its piercing rays. After their retirement at the young age of …

Tug of War is a remarkable directorial return by Amil Shivji and the first Tanzanian feature to be screened at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF). Based on the award-winning Swahili book by Shafi Adam Shafi, Tug of War follows a communist revolutionary, Denge (Gudrun Columbus Mwanyika), and a woman escaping a forced marriage, Yasmin (Ikhlas Gafur Vora), in 1950’s …

Plot: ‘The Gravedigger’s wife’ is a film that revolves around Guled, a man who has been earning money as a gravedigger in order to provide for his son, Mahad, and sick wife, Nasra. As Nasra’s health declines, Guled is seen to go through many difficulties to earn money and ensure his wife’s Kidney surgery and treatment.  Review:  In his debut …

Plot: ‘The Gravedigger’s wife’ is a film that revolves around Guled, a man who has been earning money as a gravedigger in order to provide for his son, Mahad, and sick wife, Nasra. As Nasra’s health declines, Guled is seen to go through many difficulties to earn money and ensure his wife’s Kidney surgery and treatment.  Review:  In his debut …

Growing up, I often felt lost, endlessly searching for unfathomable answers and some kind of purpose. The question of “who am I?” would ring loudly in my head and sometimes, it still does. In my attempts to understand my own being, I would find myself stuck in cycles of denial and hesitancy, struggling to come to terms with my seemingly …

The pandemic exhausted me mentally, physically and emotionally. There were and, in many ways, continue to be no breaks from trauma on personal, societal and ecological levels. I’d never in my life looked for peace and comfort as much as I did and continue to. At a critical moment in life, when there was so much loss and unknown, all …

Tuesdays are for the Ocean. Sundays are for the universe. Mondays are for peace. Wednesdays are for the spider. Thursdays are for the earth. Fridays are for fertility. Saturdays are for God. When we look to Ghanaian naming traditions, a name marks a person’s place and signifies belonging to a spirit, to a history, to a circumstance. You may find …

Boycotts, protests, towns burned to the ground. Hundreds of deaths, and hundreds of thousands displaced. Separatists, militia, and journalists impinged by an authoritarian presidency. The struggle for power in Cameroon is one of majority and minority, French-speaking and English. President Biya’s 38th year in office is marked by another year of infighting prompted by the marginalization of the English-speaking population …

When Uncle Sunny asked Ogbonna to come home for Easter, it was not a request, and there was no talk about human sacrifice. Now he is kneeling here, in the middle of a forest, beside his family house, with a sharp cutlass piercing through his chest, a gallon of blood gushing through his veins, and he cannot help but know, this is exactly where he is supposed to be.