Onyi, sit with me for a second… Why have you lost sight of your own reflection? Mmmhh…? You ever look into a mirror and wonder who that person is? Because the hair is yours, yes, the face is yours, of course… but the attitude? The attitude looks imported from Europe with express shipping.
That!… my friend, is Africa sometimes, staring into borrowed mirrors and wondering why the reflection looks like someone who says, “Could I get a latte?” with a British accent.
See, once upon a colonial time, someone came and handed us a mirror and said:
“Here. This is how progress looks.”
And because we are polite Africans, raised to accept tea whether we drank milk or not, we nodded.
And somehow, this mirror convinced us that everything local needed an upgrade, a filter, and a translation.
Suddenly, our mother tongues became “vernacular,” our storytelling became “folklore,” and our intelligence had to be stamped by foreign universities like a visa application.
For instance, think about fashion.
Wear kitenge and you’re “colourful” or worse “kienyeji”
Wear a suit and suddenly you’re “professional” and “chic”
Please!
If creativity was clothes, then Africa invented the runway before Paris knew what a hemline was.
Same story in education. Tell someone you read Okot p’Bitek, and they stare like you said you study witchcraft. Quote Shakespeare and suddenly you’re “well-read.”
As if our ancestors weren’t dropping bars in proverbs so deep, they could diagnose your life choices in one sentence.
But the real African mirrors are still here, just a little dusty from neglect.
You’ll find them:
- in the stories slipped between sips of uji under the baobab tree,
- in kids turning broken flip-flops into world-class football boots,
- in the way elders settle arguments with one proverb and a side-eye,
- in the laughter of a community that can create joy from absolutely nothing.
These are the mirrors that show who we truly are; loud, brilliant, hilarious, innovative, and stubbornly human.
Ask yourself:
- Is success only valid when the West claps?
- Are we waiting for foreign approval to celebrate our own scholarship?
- Are we letting documentaries made in cold countries narrate Africa for us… again?
Or are we finally ready to put down the borrowed mirror and look into our own, the one that knows our light, our flaws, our creativity, and our chaotic humour?
Because truth is: the African reflection isn’t lost.
It’s just been standing there like,
“Hello? Can you people see me, or should I fetch a ring light?”
