The Adventures of Cosmic Yoruba
& Her Flying Machines too
In 1414 a Chinese fleet heralded by the Muslim Grand Eunuch of the Three Treasures, Zheng He (also known as Cheng Ho) sailed into the western Indian Ocean for the fourth time since his journey to the East began in 1405. In previously, that is between 1405 and 1414, Zheng He and his ships had…
This whole post is nothing but a shameless plug (or a series of shameless plugs)! I was recently invited by the authors of That African Girl to participate in their African Childhood series celebrating growing up in an African home and the quirks that come with it. I wrote a post on the childhood monsters…
In my previous post I mentioned that I had read somewhere that two slaves given as gifts to the a Chinese Emperor by an Arab delegation were the first Africans to enter ancient China. This may have been wrong really because dark-skinned people were talked in China as early as the 4th century. They were…
Last year while I was researching for my dissertation, I came across a footnote that mentioned that the first Africans who reached ancient China (the particular period was not specified) were two slaves given as gifts to the Emperor by an envoy of Arab traders. I found myself wondering what happened to them, were the…
Osun is the Yoruba goddess of love, lust, fertility, fresh waters, women’s health, witches and wealth. Osun has been compared to and is sometimes thought of as the Yoruba representation or reincarnations of goddesses from other cultures such as Nekhbet, Sekhmet, the Chinese goddess Kuan Yin and Hindu goddess Laskhmi. Each year a large festival…
Below are some images Sugabelly put up on FB a while ago that I’m reposting here with her graceful permission. While writing about Nigerian historical dramas, I thought the point I was trying to make there would go down better if everyone saw actual images of African women from the precolonial days. Not everyone (Africans…
It is no secret that I am a huge fan of movies and series set in the fictional past. I’d rather watch historical dramas than those set in the modern times. I love all sorts of dramas set in different periods and I tend not to discriminate as I enjoy European historical movies alongside wuxia…
The Last Airbender will soon be released in America soon and it seems my prayers have already been answered. I am extremely glad that the people who have seen this movie seem not to be impressed. I also hope the movie doesn’t do well at the box office (though one of my primary concerns is…
Recently I got into another conversation on how characters in Japanese comics look just like white people. I’ve had several conversations and arguments about this and I personally do not agree that all characters in manga look like Europeans because they have big eyes and hair that is not black. Today I remembered an episode…
I know I should not be taking Nigerian movies seriously. However last week I had the pleasure of watching a movie that I felt I should blog about. This movie is called White Hunters and when I first saw the DVD cover I was a bit confused about the film’s title but all confusion vanished…