WHAT IF THE DOOMSDAY PREPPERS ARE RIGHT?

It was Thursday, 20 December 2012. It was evening and a few hours before midnight. Doomsday, as allegedly predicted by the Mayans, was slowly approaching.  According to a Reuters global poll, one in 10 of us was feeling anxiety about 21 December.  Despite many assurances that the Mayans never predicted the end of the world but a new beginning, everyone was just waiting to see if anything will happen.

Among many scientifically proven possibilities in which the world would end, there were a super volcano, asteroid accident, comet collision and suicidal supernova.  If anything was to happen that day, no one had an idea what it was going to be.

The Russian Minister of Emergency was forced to issue a denial that the world will not end. In a Village in the south of France, authorities barred access to a mountain where some believed an Unidentified Flying Object (UFO) would come to rescue them.  Back home in my living room, the family was glued to the TV screen and our daughter was so scared she kept saying “My God” after every few minutes.  Her breathing was laboured.

However, some people just laughed it off. “It’s not going to happen because the bible says no one knows when the end will come.” Some websites were created specifically for Mayan Doomsday jokes. One website wrote, “with the Apocalypse upon us, everyone is making end-of-the-world jokes like there is no tomorrow. You might as well die laughing with our round of the funniest Mayan Doomsday memes, cartoons and Tweets”.

Social networks were abuzz with updates and comments. Most of these were on a lighter note. 

One thing that caught many people’s attention during this period was the National Geographic TV series, Doomsday Preppers.  Although these Preppers prepare themselves for urban jungle survival skills, food production skills,   an electrical grid failure, financial collapse, earthquakes, economic collapse, and maybe even a Zombie attack,  most of them even prepare for larger events like the earth colliding with an object from out of space or the shifting of the earth’s polarity. 

Watching these programmes made most of us start asking questions.  

“What if these guys are right?”

“Do they know something we don’t?”

“Is it possible to prepare for an unknown catastrophe?”

Well, 21 December came and passed without any event. The world as we know it was still there. There was no doomsday. It was not a surprise to many people but there may have been others who were disappointed that it never happened. There were some people who seriously believed that the world would end on that day and they left their jobs and families to spread the word. These surely must have been disappointed.

December 21, 2013 is not the only date that has gone into history as a day when Doomsday failed to happen. There have been other dates in history when earth was under the same “threat”.  In 1910 astronomers discovered that earth would pass through the tail of a comet. This created hysteria because some people believed a poisonous gas would penetrate the atmosphere and end life on earth.  This comet was Halley’s Comet.

In 1954, there was a woman named Dorothy Martin who started telling people that there was going to be an apocalyptic flooding on 21 December. Ironically, the date and month is the same as that of the 2013 doomsday prediction. This lady said she was receiving messages from aliens and that these same aliens were going to send a space craft to rescue believers from her cult.

In July 1999, the world was also supposed to end. This was according to Nostradamus’ prediction that a King of terror would come from the sky and destroy earth. Then there came the all too familiar Y2K.  It was believed that computers programmed with two-digit years rather than four would revert to 1900 rather than rolling to 2000 and that this programming error would trigger a nuclear war.  

We may have pulled through all these events with a laugh but does this mean nothing can ever happen to our planet? The way I see it, next time someone warns us of a pending doom, we shall not take it seriously and refer it to 21^st December, 2012. Doomsday Preppers believe something is coming.  They believe we have to prepare how to survive on a changed world.  What if they are right?

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MAN VERSUS HIS PENIS

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IS BLACK ALWAYS BEAUTIFUL?

The phrase “Black is beautiful” is said to have been coined by John Sweat Rock during a speech in 1858. This was probably to dispel the notion that black people’s features such as skin colour, facial features and hair are inherently ugly.

But is black really beautiful? If it is, why do we have many black women trying to make their skins lighter by using various types of skin lightening creams? I honestly do believe black is beautiful but I just can’t comprehend why some of our sisters fail to see that in themselves. I have seen many African women with blonde hair on their heads despite the fact that there are  no natural born blonde African woman.

There is nothing wrong for anyone to enhance their beauty but sometimes this is overdone and it reaches an extent where it seems like the person is ignorant or has a serious case of inferiority complex. Take for example women who bleach their skin with hazardous results. Many women have black hard skin under their eyes because at one time they used a complexion cream which destroyed their skin. Despite many examples of how the wrong application of these creams can harm the skin, many women still continue using these creams and joining the long list of disfigured women.

It is indisputable that women with lighter skin will be considered by men because they get noticed compared to those with a much darker shade and this could be one of the reason why black women are among the highest consumers of skin lightening products. This could also be the reason why most black women tend to risk their health by using creams which have adverse side effects.

Skin lightening may be considered a choice like lipstick, weaves, mascara etc, to make you presentable to the world. The only problem is most of these products are completely unsafe and some women do not use them properly. In desperation to look lighter, many African women have bought harmful creams with instructions written in a language that they can’t read.

Although there is not enough evidence, laboratory tests on rats have shown increased development of potentially cancerous tumors in rats exposed to hydroquinone, which is used in most of these creams. The potential of this chemical to cause cancer in humans has not yet been determined but it is safer to be wary. Hydroquinone also causes skin irritation, inflammation or a mild burning sensation. This may be the reason why some women that I have seen using these products have red spots under their eyes, which could be a result of scratching the itching skin.

In Zambia, some women who use these creams have very light skin which just ends at the neck. The rest of the body is a different colour. These women are called Coca Cola Fanta. They only bleach their faces because they probably find it more expensive to use the cream on every part of their body. Maybe it could be out of  ignorance? Some women also have blue veins showing through their skin which I think is uglier than a naturally black African woman skin.

Maybe society has played a major part in this because us men tend to like light skinned women more than dark skinned women. Ironically, even men do bleach their skins. It is not strange to see an African man with very light skin and a dark hairline. 

What if there are no side effects associated with using these creams? How would you see the people who use them? Are they not proud of who they are or their origins? We see white people tanning their bodies from the sun but that does not mean they are not proud of their skin colour. The same applies even to black women who bleach their skin to look lighter. I doubt very much if they do this because they are not proud of being black. They do it for the same reasons why a white woman tans her skin. It is for this that all black women must take a lot of care for their skins by using the right products and knowing how to use them. The only reason society condemns skin lightening creams is because of the harm that it causes to skin and not because it makes you lighter. After all we have Africans who are born naturally with a light skin.

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COCKROACHES IN THE NIGHT CLUB

About 4 years ago, I came out of a Night Club just after midnight to get a taxi to take me home.  For a minute I stood there just surveying the taxis that were packed outside, trying to pick one which seemed suitable. Most of the taxis that operate in this part of town are not marked and we call them “private taxis”.  This makes it very difficult for one to tell which one is a “real” taxi and which one is not or just belongs to a patron.  Usually, you just have to stand there and someone will come to you and ask “Taxi?” but on this particular night, no one came to where I was standing.

As I was standing there, I notice a woman standing leaning against the wall just near the entrance talking to one of the door bouncers.  From the way she was dressed, I could tell that she was not here to party. She was dressed in a wrap around called chitenge and a head scarf. No one dresses like that after midnight.  The woman was explaining to the man  that her husband has not been home for the past 3 days and she suspected he was inside the club with another woman.

The door bouncer asked her if she was sure the husband was inside.  She replied that someone told her that he has been spotted here on two occasions.  The man then gave her permission to go inside and check for him. The woman refused and said she was going to wait for him until he comes out.

“But what if he is not there?” the man asked.  “You may be waiting here when your man is home waiting for you”.

She replied that she cannot go inside the Night Club because “only cockroaches enter Night Clubs”

That was a bombshell and people heard what she said. From the way she stressed the word “cockroaches”, it was like she wanted all of us to feel it.  She was almost harassed by some people and was only saved by the two bouncers, who also were obviously not happy with what she had said.  

“If your husband has let you down because of his infidelity, it doesn’t  mean we are all the like him. If he has been having sex with another woman, has he been having it here in the Club?” Someone shouted at her.

“Madam, from what you have just said, maybe that is why your husband runs away from you. You talk too much and have no respect for other people’s choices,” added another.

She was visibly scared because she knew that anything could happen to her. Night Clubs have all sorts of characters and some of them are uncontrollable freaks operating like zombies, especially the ones that like hanging around outside.

Though I understood the woman’s frustration and did not take her statement of us being cockroaches seriously, I wondered whether that is how many other people who do not go out Clubbing think of us.  Maybe they have other names that they call us too. We could be mosquitoes, house flies, centipedes, snakes or anything that they thought disgusted them.

But is night life or clubbing seriously that disgusting?  I remember the first time I went for a disco, I was about 16 and it was called Teen Time Disco. It was always between 13:00 hrs and 17:30 hrs and never in the night.  We just went there for dancing and listening to new music and we drank no alcohol.  It was so much fun and it made most of us admire the job of the DJ.

But why do people go to the disco or night club? Is it for bad reasons or just to have fun? Has the disco evolved from an innocent stint to something evil? Every time I step into a night club, I see a lot of different characters. I see men and women dancing. I see couples sitting at the table sharing drinks. I see prostitutes sitting at the counter smiling at every man that passes near them. I see men standing doing nothing but just watching. I am pretty sure there are other things that I don’t see which other people may see.

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IS THIS WHY SOME MEN LIKE PROSTITUTES?

Last night I was listening to the radio and there was a news item that captivated my mind. A man is struggling for his life in hospital after having his genitals almost ripped off by his irate wife. This was after the man tried to have sex with her and she refused. No details were given why the woman did not want to have sex with his husband but it is alleged that when the man forcefully tried to pull off her panties, she lost it and grabbed his genitals, pulling them hard. If you are a man, I am sure you can imagine how painful that must have felt.

We all know that sharing some quality time with the one you love is a wonderful experience so what would make someone refuse sex in a marriage? There are so many factors but the first one that comes to mind is that maybe that person is having it somewhere and is in no need for it now. It may also be that the other partner has been cheating and having sex with him feels dirty, especially if you suspect them to have been having it with prostitutes. One reasonable excuse could be that he or she is not feeling too well, which is more acceptable.

The above story is not just a one off incident; the same scenario is being played out in many bedrooms though not to the extent of pulling each others fruits. Most men are dissatisfied with the amount of sex they are getting from their wives.  But what does a guy do when he feels he is not getting a fair share of sex? What is the main reason why many women seem not to like sex?

With the introduction of spousal rape, which is now repudiated by international conventions and increasingly criminalised, it is illegal for a man to have sex with his wife using force and he could be prosecuted.  But what can be termed as force? How far can one go to be classified a rapist husband? Rape is more often associated with physical violence so it is obvious that when you use violence to have sex with your wife, you are a rapist. But what if a man has not been having sex with his wife for a long time because she keeps refusing  and he is aware that forcing her will be a crime, is there any legal means which he can use to have sex with her?

In many developing countries it is believed by both men and women that a husband is entitled to sex any time he demands it and this has led to many people disputing that a husband can rape his wife. For instance, one survey found that 74% of women in Mali said that a husband is justified to beat his wife if she refuses to have sex with him. This is one reason why some African cultures teach that both man and woman must not wear any clothes including underwear when going to sleep.

The truth is that with or without the law, it is never right to force someone to do something that he or she does not want to do. Any man that’s not a psychopath would not force sex on his wife no matter how bad he wanted it. Instead, he’ll feel extremely unhappy and unloved and maybe seek solace elsewhere, which may be the beginning of the marriage breaking up. A woman who attends to her man’s sexual needs can be compared to a man who attends to his woman’s emotional needs. If a woman neglects her man’s sexual needs, she is like a man who neglects his woman’s emotional needs.

If we had to turn the tables and in this case the man is the one that does not want to have sex with the wife, she will feel the same way too. She will feel unloved and the first thing that will come to her mind is “He is having an affair” She won’t accept his excuse of being tired because a man is supposed to be tough. She will not accept his excuse that he does not have enough time because when having sex, a man can probably be finished in 15 minutes, so that is also a poor excuse.

Sometimes people wonder why men leave an attractive wife and go to look for prostitutes. It does seem a bit peculiar doesn’t it? There are many reasons why and their wives lack of interest in sex could be  one of them. 

When you deny your wife or husband sex, just remember that you may just be handing Satan the password to your marriage

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