Kicking and screaming (more than likely) I was brought into this world July 30th, 1967, in a small Tanzanian town called Tabora, where my parents were teachers. They'd come to Tanzania, pioneers of a kind in 1966. Can't imagine the life then, but my memories are of a peaceful and exciting childhood. Which likely means I have blocked out reality.

Anyway, I moved on, with my pater and mater, to Zambia, a small central African nation, whose times of prosperity were at a peak. 1973. Idi Amin had been taking out his frustrations on the Indian population and the entire region was a bit unstable, at least for Indians. You got to remember India was being potrayed as a famine- stricken, poverty-bound and hopeless country. (For those of you who were too young to remember, India was potrayed as a famine-stricken, poverty bound-and hopeless country). So as a whole we were despised as a bunch of leeches escaping from sure death in our homelands.

Well, there was some truth to the leeches part. There was/is a very powerful and rich Indian business community, whose racial bias were, shall we say,not helping our image.

So not being quite so rich, and having the label "Indian" got us the licking of both worlds. Fortunately, Zambia had a benevolent dictator, President Kenneth Kaunda, Commanding Officer of the Armed Forces, and all around good guy, who liked Indians. Why he liked Indians is question that I'd rather not try to answer.

It was a humdrum lifestyle. Lazy, introverted and an avid reader, I let the teenage years pass by in a blur of imagined adventures and fantasy universes. I started writing to expand my worlds, and escaped into them, voluntarily coming out only for food and drink.

World of worlds,which was constantly interrupted by nasty things like exams and chores. And parents who seemed to know when those interruptions should interrupt.

Age sixteen, I got in touch with Someone from out of any world I had experienced. I accepted Lord Jesus as God, got saved, became born again, and the rest of the deal. I was saved and bound for heaven, according to the Word. Hmmm. Except I had a bit to go before I was a true disciple.

University of Zambia, 1985.

Man, what that place did to me!

Chubby, (let's be kind), bespectacled and wearing clothes that should have been burnt at the stake a long time back, I burst into UNZA, as we called the University. And I was supposedly this religious guy. Geek was my middle name. Okay, so maybe it still is.

My spiritual life was quickly exposed for what it was. Fake, hypocritical and of no substance. With that I went with the winds and did stuff I really needed to get saved from.

Having experienced the other life, I decided the confusion and the frustration of living a life that was debauched was okay for others but not for me, I rededicated myself to the Lord, and did what I should have done before. Read the Bible daily and spent time in mediatation and other spiritual exercises. My exploration into other religions took me into Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism. And I dealt with groups like the Jehovah's witnesses. And I began to understand why I believed what I did. As I developed my politics, I had to deal with the Marxist/Leninist philosophies that were the bedrock of UNZA. The evolution hypothesis, presented as a theory, provided the scientific front against my own philosophy.

The great days. The days of tumult. The days I realized that my namby-pamby Christianity was giving way to a philosophy that could be challenged and proven. And I had a healthy respect for the world philosophies I had come in contact with.

Truth can only be one, and that is The Christ, Jesus. But the Christ decreed, demands that I love everyone, and not put down any belief.

Days of tumult, indeed. The late 1980s in Zambia were the days of "belt-tightening", a common Government statement. The Leader, President Kaunda had been president since 1964, and the country had been run to the ground. However, he was elected back into power every five years. Of course, there was only one political party, and only one leader of that party. But close to 90 percent of the country was registered to vote, and the president was always elected back in by a 99% majority vote.

Probably because one could only buy essentials (sugar, cooking oil, etc) if one had been registered to vote. And though the election ballots were secret, there were strange, unique numbers on each one. Hmmmm.

The newspapers, TV and radio were strictly controlled by the government. Every other person could be an informer. The government and the President could not be criticized. It was no reign of terror, but everyone practised self censorship. We were scared of what we said, and loose words could spell deportation for us. Prison or worse for Zambians. In the days of plenty, this was fine. Why complain, if one's belly is full.

But those days had ended. And I was at UNZA. The UNZA students were not scared and spoke out against the government. The freedom was heady stuff, and got me punch drunk, quickly. I shed any patriotism I had for any one country, and became a citizen of the world. And demanded those rights that I believed to be mine. I wanted to say what I wanted, and how I wanted to say it was going to be my choice. Did not the Bible talk of justice? And the LORD demanded that we fight oppression and injustice! And I plunged into a world that my parents did not realize they were paying for.

Four major riots and five University closures. I may have been in Engineering school, but I think I learnt more outside, breathing tear gas and getting whipped by the miltary guys. (The "whipping", only twice, was minor; two or three swats with a baton only whetted my anger - and heightened my desire for adrenalin).

How to reconcile my non violence beliefs with my desire for an ideal free society by any means was a major source of irritation, to me. I couldn't. Looking back now, I realize the desire for danger and action fuelled me more than any personal philosophy. That the end was noble, a free society, made the means even more enjoyable. But America, the country whose philosphy and politics was my ideal, even America had its birth in revolution. I took comfort in this, as I grappled with inconsistencies in my personal philosophy. Then came another American link.

Malcolm X, Malcolm Little, Malik El Shabazz. Alex Haley (it was the "Roots" connection that drew me to the book, initially) had a biography on this man, and I picked up the book, having no idea that it would impact me in the way it did. I was 21, and before I was 22 I had read the book over 3 times. Racism. Here was injustice and opression unparalled.

I was a rebel without a cause, and searching for any I could identify with. And I found one. The Black man's struggle in the US was something that hit me square between the eyes. Malcolm was my hero.

Here was someone who was a loser, a junkie and petty thief who turned his life around by sheer will power. If there was anything I wanted to emulate it was this; I wanted to have a life that was as meaningful. And there was something else; the man may have spoken violence, but there was not one riot he sparked. Not one. Dr. King and Mahathma Gandhi spoke non-violence but had more violence associated with them.

I believed that Dr. King and Mahathma Gandhi had the right angle: non-violence was the best answer. But they were effective because the alternative were men like Malcolm Shabazz.

A meaningful life began with the Truth as its foundation. And the courage to use that foundation for the rest of the building.

June 1990. My close brothers were Zambian friends who were strong christians and shared the love of Christ. And the love for freedom. And were committed to the end of the regime of the President, and we believed that free and fair elections would achieve that. But we were just students, and our beliefs would not stretch to violence.

Just students. Final year engineering. Projects. Final exams in a matter of weeks.

Then it happened. A number of Zairean students was killed mercilessly for opposing their dictator President Marshal MOBUTU Sese Seko Kuku Ngbendu wa Za Banga. As word of the massacre trickled through, the UNZA students, leaderless up to now, made an impromptu protest march to the Zambian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The leader of this rag tag group was someone with another axe to grind: his father had been "silenced" by the Kaunda regime. The protest against the Zairean massacre was met with patronising silence by the Zambian leadership, and that protest became a protest against the Zambian government.

Rooms belonging to people who were threats to the new movement on campus got burnt that night, and I watched, knowing that this was the beginning. As the flames leapt out of the windows, I knew my silence was not just the silence of a coward, but also the silence of a coward wanting to see the end of an oppressive regime - at someone else's cost.

Within two months, the whole country had been turned upside down, and I had my fill of revolution. Radicals led a peacful march that was met with violence, and the riot that ensued got the radicals arrested.

Three weeks from final exams, from being an Engineer, I was faced with the realization that all my closest friends were now cast as leaders of the most deadly riots Zambia ever had exprienced.

First time in my life, I was shot at, and was being sought for "questioning". True, I had personally not done anything but talk. And been in the center of every protest and riot. And all my friends were now fugitives. One week of continous gun shots, that culminated in a abortive coup.

The President talked of foreign meddlers, and with a jolt I realized he could well be speaking of me. Meddler? All I had wanted was free elections. Wasn't that a right?

The University was shut and I was now faced with myself. Children had died. Buildings destroyed. And I had put my family and myself into an unenviable position. No degree. And I would likely be deported - no longer a citizen of the world.

I was a coward who was now paying for my beliefs.

God is good. The President declared a time of peace and forgiveness, and declared an amnesty for all. Including me.

And within three months he had allowd for a free press, and a multi party system. True democracy dawned on Zambia in October 1991, with the defeat of Kaunda and the election of Frederick Chiluba.

Corruption still reigns in Zambia. The government is still a little inept.

But freedom also reigns. And there is a free press.

Was it worth it? Would I be more decisive and do more?

Yes.

But Daddy does not approve.

That chapter ended when I came to the US in 1992, a lot wiser, and eager to understand the country that had shapened most of my thinking and whose democratic processes has shapened my thinking. America, not just the land of opportunity, but a land of freedom. Would I be disillusioned? I was mature enough to accept that possibility. But this was the country that remade itself over and over again. One that I believed in.

Still chubby, still bespectacled and still wearing clothes that should have burnt at the stake, I came to the country that had beckoned through all the books and movies and philosophies I experienced.

A new chapter.