Shiny, Bright and New

Current events in the good ole U.S. of A. are causing me to turn my sights abroad for inspiration. Thus today's perspective focuses on the recent work of Nana Awere Damoah, an emerging writer in Ghana whose work is simultaneously intellectual and inspirational.

Damoah has published two books, including Through the Gates of Thought, as well as many short stories, including a morality tale entitled "Truth Floats" which appears in the anthology African Roar, edited by Emmanuel Sigauke and Ivor W. Hartmann. About a year ago I wrote a review for African Roar, but today I will examine Damoah's work exclusively.

Based on a line written by Ralph Waldo Emerson, Through the Gates of Thought acts as a vehicle of advice by way of anecdotes, vignettes and action exercises, which serve as calls to action. Each chapter is numbered as a "gate" through which the reader passes, after first presenting a series of Akan proverbs along with Emerson's passage: "The gates of thought - how slow and late they discover themselves! Yet when they appear, we see that they were always there, always open." One encounters the book's title as a reflection of Damoah's desire to have the reader's mind expanded. And it works!

This easy didacticism is reinforced when Damoah tells the reader that his intent is to bless, teach and encourage by "instigat[ing] thought, provok[ing] reflections and educ[ing] action." Thus the reader begins a journey of the mind through the gates of thought.

Gate 1, entitled "Bringing Up Someone Else's Kid", is about showing kindness to others, particularly strangers. Damoah introduces this by explaining his mother's behavior toward strangers, when he says "if she extended kindness to someone's child who was living in an alien land, the same courtesy would be extended to her child when the situation was reversed. By her example, Mama taught us to be kind to others." If this sounds a bit like the concept of karma in the Hindu tradition, or the idea of the Good Samaritan in Christianity, it may be because kindness and its benefits are universal. Oh, that we need more kindness is the world today!

This notion of the Good Samaritan is presented again in Gate 16, which is entitled "The Challenges of a Twenty-first-century Good Samaritan." Here Damoah uses an anecdotal event from his life to make the point that kind people "face a big challenge as [they] strive to be . . . Good Samaritan[s] in the twenty-first century." The problem: unscrupulous people view kindness as a weakness to be preyed upon. The consequence, according to Damoah: "[the] fear of being a victim in our attempt at being a Good Samaritan is that we have created a society where one is reluctant to do good, to lend a helping hand." Of course, this inclination for self preservation must be rejected and the higher calling of caring for others must be embraced. Damoah offers an action exercise in Gate 16 which encourages the reader to "not lose that desire and eagerness to do good to your fellow man or woman" because, according to a Hindu proverb, if you "help thy brother's boat across, and lo! Thine own has reached the shore."

This is just the kind of optimism I am in need of in the wake of the debt ceiling debacle in Washington, D.C. However, it's not clear that the Tea Party got the memo about helping others as a way of helping self. Their rhetoric seems to be very self-centered. Are any of my dear readers up for telling them?

But I digress, so it's back to the book! The last gate through which Damoah takes the reader is 24. This one, entitled "Pro Patria, for the Sake of Africa!" deviates from the others both in content and in form. After introducing the reader to Damoah's school -- Ghana National College --, he then explains the school's interesting history. Apparently it was established in 1948 by Kwame Nkrumah, who went on to become the first President of Ghana after the country gained its independence from Britain in 1957.  The school was built and named before Independence as a prophecy of "the nation he [was to lead] out of colonialism." As a result, the school's motto -- Pro Patria -- means "for the sake of the fatherland." This kind of patriotism was foundational in Damoah's education, and in many ways explains his upbeat attitude toward life and the world in which he lives. The patriotism was further reinforced by the school's emblem, which "consist[ed] of the map of Africa, with the map or outline of Ghana highlighted in gold." Ghana under the British was known as the Gold Coast, thus making this highly symbolic. Students of the school were to be "the beacon of hope for [their] nation and [their] continent, to bring the needed development and advancement to Africa." This kind of patriotic hopefulness is inspiring, and almost unheard of in the U.S. today.

All told, as a reader from the developed world, Through the Gates of Thought challenges me to confront my own cynicism. For Damoah much about the future is shiny, bright and new. Better yet, much is possible in a Ghana that is only five decades old. His country is rising and he can see a future full of potential. I, on the other hand, come from a country that is in decline financially, morally, and politically. His optimism and my cynicism both flow from our views of the future. And, as Damoah so aptly claims "The time to build the future for our children is now, to give them a head start." If Ghana is composed of others who are seeking kindness, goodness and the well-being of the country, then Damoah is a fortunate man. For now, at least, I am stuck with a Tea Party who shrilly worships at the altar of Ayn Rand selfishness, thus making me . . . in need of entrance through more gates of optimism.