By Teddy Fikre
I love this word. However, as an Ethiopian who lived the overwhelming majority of my life in America, I did not understand that this word has been tainted due to the origins of a propaganda campaign back in Ethiopia. Ironically, this word represents the very essence of a regime that forced my family to immigrate to America back in 1983 at the age of seven. This very word—Hebret—is a word that represented the suffering of countless many and the reason why Ethiopians are the second largest community of immigrants from Africa. But still….
Hebret.
The word, irrespective of history, is one that I love. To me, Hebret means unity; it means a collective effort for a collective success. The Chinese have a saying that goes “you can break on straw easily, you can’t break a hundred straws bonded together”. One man alone can accomplish little, a hundred men working together for one goal can profoundly change the world. That is the very meaning of a community, thus the saying “it takes a village to raise a child”. Let me put it another way, “50 Lomi Le 1 Sew Sekimu, Le 50 Sew Getu New”. It basically means that 50 lemons when one person is carrying is it heavy, but when carried by 50 people is enjoyable.
So is this the missing link in Ethiopia, is this the missing link in Africa, and is the missing link within the African Diaspora and African-American community at large. When I was a child in Ethiopia, I used to notice a certain inferiority complex in the community. Shocked? You should not be, I remember that certain doctors that were not from Ethiopia would be flocked to, meanwhile, doctors Ethiopian doctors would have a certain connotation—a certain stigma as if though you only go to them if your literally in dire straits. It makes me wonder why I romanticized the fact that I attended Lycee in Ethiopia. Or why, as a child, I deferred to non-Ethiopian instructors a thousand times more than my Ethiopian instructors.
Thus I came to America, and what I have noticed the utter dearth of Hebret not only in the Ethiopian community but in the African Diaspora overall. I took note of the many instances of an African-American that would try to start a business and would struggle to get support from his/her own community. How else can you explain when a black man starts a business and he goes to service his own for support and he literally gets almost no support. Oh how many times I have you witnessed a black plumber who would visit an African-American to fix his leaking toilet. Upon entrance to the house, the first question he would often get asked is “Bruh can I get a discount”? Yet these very people would NEVER ask a non-minority for a discount. Or how about an African-American mechanic who has to put up with the menace of “dude seriously I can only pay $25 for the oil change”. Yet these very obstinate consumers would gladly fork over $60 for an oil change at Jiffy Lube.
Is it no wonder that successful Ethiopians specifically or those from the African Diaspora generally often get frustrated and feel alienated from the community. And then they get blamed for being “sell-outs” when they choose to move to the suburbs and no longer feel a bond to their community. When you call them sell-outs because they made it big, did you support them when they were struggling? Thus, who is the sell-out, the person that tried to provide you a service that you neglected when he was struggling or that very same person who—out of frustration, anger, or experience—finally says good riddance when he makes it big.
This happens time and again. Through my work last during last year’s presidential campaign, what I encountered over and over again were whisper campaigns about this person or that person. “Oh you can’t trust him, he is a leba (thief)”. “Esu ma, lerasu becha new emiseraw.” “He is only using Ethiopia for his own good”. I shake my head, here is a man who is offering something profound for his community, a visionary that can advance the cause for everyone. Yet, he is a leba aydel? I am forever grateful for the many people I met during last year’s presidential campaign who worked endlessly to organize the Ethiopian community. And I know that there were countless others who did the same without me knowing about them. However, as much as we broke out back to offer our community a voice, the vast majority of our own did not support. Yet, when Obama got elected on November 4th, I could not count how many Ethiopians I saw dancing in the streets of DC.
And yet, as I point a finger, there are three pointing back at me. I recall many times of my own personal failings. There was a particular moment when it crystallized in me how my own judgments are infected with the germ of self-hate. When was this? Well, I never had a problem giving a dollar to none minority kids who were selling donuts for a basketball camp or a weekend getaway. However, one particular day, after buying groceries from Safeway, a couple of African-Americans kids asked me to give them money so they could go to football camp. My first though, to my own shame—“yeah right, I wonder what you will really do with this dollar?” I got in my car, and I ran smack dab into a cognitive dissonance. Did I ever have this question for those kids that were not minorities? Did I have this question to those children who were selling Girl Scout cookies? Most have these types of thoughts, but bury them behind facades of enlightenment and smiles of indifference.
Yes, this is uncomfortable to discuss, but truth is needed. How many of us have these types of judgment, and it’s not a one way street where Ethiopians have stereotypes about African-Americans. When I came to America in the 1980s, growing up I was called jungle monkey, antelope chaser, vine swinger, by whom you say, by my African-American classmates. The first friend I had was a white girl who asked me about Ethiopia and wanted to know my name. So lest you think that the biases and judgments are only one way, think again, it is a strain that strains the whole lot.
This is the plight of our community. We don’t trust, we don’t support. I cannot paint everyone with the same brush of mistrust, but my own experiences have taught me that this is not an isolated incident. When someone comes around tying to make a change, she is instantly questioned—her motives judged not for the facts but by the opinions of poisoned minds. I wonder if we really knew how much inherent power we have in our own community. Although we have no quantitative idea of how many Ethiopians live in America, we know that there are enough of us to make a profound change and improve the lives of many if we worked together. However, we choose to sip buna and talk about what if and what is not right. Inertia is a rule of thumb, action is always given the thumbs down.
We question and procrastinate before we support. We suspect before we accept. Guilty until proven innocent, and even then guilty regardless. Any Ethiopian who sets out to try something new is instantly branded with the scarlet letter of either greed or a some overseas political affiliation. So I circle back to the original premise. What exactly is wrong with using Ethiopia for our own benefit. After all, it’s all semantics; what one would call using others would say unity. What one would label as “using”, others would say it’s Hebret—a collective success based on a collective work.
“One man may hit the mark, another blunder; but heed not these distinctions. Only from the alliance of the one, working with and through the other, are great things born.” (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
So how much longer shall we continue to question every man or woman who espouses to do something different—to make a change. Do we continue to brand a visionary who dares to have the audacity to believe in making an impact that will help his own people—and so what if he benefits financially while doing so? Sure there are times I can recount when my very people were selling bottles of water for four dollars while we were marching for freedom in 1996, and do I put these people (hustlers) in league with the someone who dares to dream the dream that he can make a profound impact on humanity—to achieve the impossible and to think he can make a difference in even one person’s life?
So next time you see a man or woman—Ethiopian, Nigerian, Kenyan, Jamaican or other—who starts his own business. The next time you encounter kids at Safeway who are selling cookies to go to football camp. The next time you see a visionary who just might make your life better. Pause. And ask, is what he is doing going to make my life better, or will you ask “bruh can I get a discount?” or “What do you get out of it”. Will you ask, “Is he using Ethiopia”, or will you ask, “Is he going to make a difference for Ethiopia?” Maybe, just maybe, his idea can unload some of the lemons off your back.
(Teddy Fikre isw an organizer with Ethiopian-Americans for Change, www.EA4C.org)