"When I pause to think about it, I have to admit to myself and lament that we Black folk here in Amerika have a special burden all our own. At least once a week, on the job, in commerce, in the media, somewhere we have to deal with that special sense of non-personhood. We have to deal with simply being ignored, or rebuffed, or looked down upon only and because of our abundance of melanin. The darker you are, the closer to what some brothers and sisters call "blue-black" you are, the worse it gets. It is a form of injury, indeed of violence, that most other people -- perhaps with the exception of Native Americans and the Irish -- are never made to endure.

Because these folks don't have to deal with this, almost every day of their lives, as we do, they tend to discount its effects or complain when the subject is even broached. They say that we are complaining, even whining, and that we are too sensitive to slights that might not even exist.

But these slights and this injury does exist and this country and the world will never be healed until it acknowledges and confronts this great wrong against too many of God's children. ..." READ MORE

---

Media Editor BRAD BALFOUR with Alejandro Amenábar:

"Though Alejandro Amenábar has established himself as a director of thrillers -- he recently did "The Others" (starring Nicole Kidman) and "Open Your Eyes/Abre los ojos" ("Vanilla Sky" was an English remake of that film) -- his latest, "The Sea Inside/Mar adentro" has become a career benchmark for him. Based on the life of Ramón Sampedro, a quadriplegic who fought for assisted suicide several years ago in Spain, the film details a celebration of life as well a relapse experienced through death. Of course, with the help of a remarkably nuanced performance by lead Javier Bardem as Sampedro, Amenábar has made an important and touching film, worthy of the accolades it's been getting.

G21: This film is a big change from your previous films; did you intend to do this to show how you've changed or did you just say, "I found a good story and I'm making this movie?"

Amenábar: This time I didn't pick up [the] story; I believe that the story picked me up. I just thought of the proper approach. It wasn't a thriller or horror [story]; the suspense in this story had to do with these people dealing with their lives and life itself, and I always thought that [combining the] drama and comedy was the proper approach because Ramón had a great sense of humor so in a way I knew it was going to be different from my other films. On the other hand I think that the way I try to communicate with the audience is always as intense as the others. ... " READ MORE


OUR AFRICA COVERAGE HAS ALWAYS BEEN WORLD-CLASS BECAUSE OF GREAT WRITERS LIKE MPUTHUMI NTABENI:

"We decided, with two white American friends of mine, to spend our summer holidays in Zambia and Zimbabwe -- via Botswana. The most border-post pain we encountered was [at] the Botswanean border at Martinsdrift. Perhaps it was because we crossed on the 23rd of December when everybody was going home. Still three and half hours on the border-post is extreme.

The first day we slept in Francistown (Botswana) and proceeded towards Livingstone (Zambia) the following day. We crossed the Kazangula border (Botswana-Zambia) the same day. Kazangula was more congested and involved crossing the Zambezi River in a ferry but it was less hassle. We spent three days in Zambia and crossed the border, on foot, to Victoriatown (Zimbabwe) on the 27th [December] on pretence of seeing Vic[toria] Falls from the Zimbabwe side. This was the easiest border to cross for all three of us.

We were not in Zimbabwe to sentimentalise over sunsets and falling water, but to investigate [the] social, political and economic situation first hand.

What one notices most, when he arrives in Zimbabwe, is [a] shortage of freedom, which begets the shortage of choice.

You hardly see any commercials on national TV, and hear lot of worn out freedom songs about Mugabe's liberating the country from the British colonials. ... READ MORE