I don’t know where to begin. There are so many little writers’ epiphanies floating around in my head and the past few days have been a whirlwind of trying to put my pencil to paper and being momentarily, then extendedly distracted.
I attended two funerals today and succeeded in taking my first step towards a secondary project: a conversation. All this time I’ve been fretting over having my initial conversation with the right person. Now I realize that the right person is the one who is available. After that, it’s all checks and balances. As long as the right people are involved, even if that includes enemies… especially if that includes enemies, rather, then those involved can only contribute in a positive manner.
It is tricky… trying to head off a seemingly small, yet possibly large project in a town where most people don’t speak English and their first language barely shows results in a Google search…
But it is also exciting, and hopefully worth it.
Anyhow… back to the other tid bits floating around in my head: I’ve been reading a book called “A Language Older Than Words,” by Derrick Jensen, and it’s got my tree hugger spirit soaring. So you’ll have to bear wit me as I rant about the birds and the bees.
Well, there is not much to say about the birds, except that I think it must be guinea fowl season, as I passed a flock of them on my way to school the other morning.
Q: Why did the guinea fowl cross the road?
A: He preferred death by moto to death by cutlass.
But bees!… Yeah let’s talk about bees.
Have you ever heard of an Africanized honeybee? If you live in the USA or Europe, and you know anything about honeybees, I’m sure you’ve got a stigma against them.
Why?
Well, “Africanized honey bees (also spelled Africanised honey bees), known colloquially as ‘killer bees’, are a hybrid of the Western honey bee species, (Apis mellifera), produced originally by cross-breeding of the African honey bee A. m. scutellata, with various European honey bees such as the Italian bee A. m. ligustica and the Iberian bee A. m. iberiensis.”
Killer bees…
The European honeybees, however, have undergone genetic modification through artificial insemination. We’ve bred bees to produce a maximum amount of honey and behave in a docile manner. Sounds great, right? More nectar of the gods and less painful stings!
But have we examined the true implications of what we’ve done, or just brushed the dirt under the rug, ignoring its inability to dematerialize?
Let’s put our actions into a less conscience-friendly sequence of words: We’ve bred bees to export an excessive load of their food stores to humans, and react compliantly in the process.
Now it doesn’t sound like the rainbow we’ve created will lead to so much gold. In fact, it may lead to a mosquito-infested, pesticide-laden sewer.
But why the negativity from me: a person devoted to the global spread of positivity? It is not to despair. Unlike my current impression of Jensen, I’m choosing to see the positives. But that doesn’t mean we can ignore the seeds we’ve sown altogether. Rather, we must harvest the faulty crop and re-evaluate our planning.
Coming outside one 65°F harmattan morning this week, I discovered that the swarm of bees I had heard the night before had left some stragglers. A few cold and weary worker bees congregated around my house light, fighting for warmth.
I’ll gladly share my light and my borehole with these little guys. Wouldn’t you extend at least these courtesies to someone who’s meal you wish to share?
I took this picture with my hand less than an inch away from this bee.
Now this is not merely an “Africanized” honeybee, but a native “African” honeybee: perceived to be aggressive and undesirable for beekeeping. And I can tell you: this bee didn’t flinch. Does this bee seem like a threat? Is there a need to breed docile bees?
On another occasion, bees congregated at my borehole to drink from the surrounding puddles. As I watched, I saw one drowning. I picked up a stick and put it close to the bee. It climbed on and as I set the stick on a nearby rock, I swear I almost heard it muttering a soggy “Thank you.” I had no fear of being stung by the other buzzers.
So why, I must ask, do we criminalize the African honeybee?
The only answer I can fathom holding any truth has nothing to do with the need for more docile bees, but everything to do with industrial consumerism. Even the noble act of “beekeeping” has fallen prey to the shipping container and the price tag.
But the world is dynamic, not doomed. There is still a natural population of honeybees here in Africa. Let’s each do our part and consider personal moderation in our daily lives. That is the biggest impact you can have on the world: the continual examination and modification of your own lifestyle; of your own worldview. At least, so I have concluded for myself.
So am I a beekeeper?
I would say yes.
No, I don’t have a hive: Langstroth or Top Bar or Clay Pot. In fact, I don’t even have bees, because the fact of the matter is that they’re not mine to have.
I aim to keep bees free: of possession; of subjectification; of exploitation; of miscomprehension.
Simply Ghana Live 