African Pride

Three weeks ago I visited a friend at the Hospital. I had not been to this Hospital in a very long time and being there brought back so many memories. My very first job in college was at this Hospital in the Medical Library.

I was Pre-med at the time (my first of four majors in my higher education career) and I shelved every medical journal on the planet. My first check at this job was about $250 and I was so pleased with myself and knew exactly what I was going to do with my big earnings.

My parents were visiting at the time. My mother would wake up in the apartment my siblings and I shared and fuss over making me breakfast. I tried to tell her every single morning that I was not hungry but she wouldn't hear any of it. Her job as an African mother was to feed us at every given turn. We had been on our own for almost 12 months and we must have looked skinny to her or maybe we had turned too "American" and she wanted to cure us of our newly developed fast food habit.

My parents had sent us; my brother, my sisters and I to the U.S. for a better chance at an education. My sister was a sophomore in college and the rest of us were a freshman, sophomore, and senior in High School. We were teenagers living on our own and although it was liberating at first, we missed our parents dearly. To say we led sheltered lives until this apartment is a true understatement. We had to grow up real quick from the fall of 1994 until the summer of 1995 when they came back to visit.

My father took pride in driving me to work at the Hospital and picking me up later on. The day my parents picked me up after my first pay day was such a special day. I asked Dad to take me to the bank and then I split the check in half and gave them the money. In my parents world of Concords, Caprices, and the finest Italian fashion, $125 was not a lot of money but they treated it like a million dollars!

That was one of the proudest moments of my life! What I gave them that day was not much but it was my way of saying thank you to them. My mother bought a sweater and some other things and I rememer my father picked a shirt.

When I answered his call today, he told me he was wearing "my" shirt and thinking of me and that day. My heart swelled all over again. My biggest fear, and in conversations with other African children, their fear too is disappointing our parents. I didn't become Dr. Kaira like they hoped and there have been several times when I went left when they veered me right but knowing that I have made them proud is all I need.