Posted on by sipokazinyeleka

#MamaImadeit: MY WAY

Day one of all things research

There was a time in my life (a very recent time!) when I spent quite a lot of time stressing about how fast my colleagues were moving with their research while my work…. Well, it showed some significant tortoise tendencies.  Even though my colleagues work in very different sub-fields compared to my own, I could not help compare myself to them. But by now I just thank God for introspection. Reflecting on my own work, my own goals, my own reasons, I could ultimately acknowledge – to myself —  that I was doing what no human being should do because “Comparison is an act of violence against the self”. Ultimately I concluded that I must define my success, which makes me think of that Caper song…

Haven’t we all made it?

We all have a different opinion of what Success looks like, feels like, tastes like and how to attain it. And we certainly don’t all have the same experience that leads to attaining it. Funny enough though, we know success when we see it. Or do we?

The #PeopleWhoThinkTheyHaveMadeItInLife has somewhat disturbed me. For some reason I cannot get over the thought that no one -according to this trend- has made it in life because the minute you achieve something somebody has the guts to ask “so you think you have made it in life”?

What if it’s no joke and whoever coined that phrase to you thinks you haven’t made it?  Does what you had defined as success stop being something you’re proud of because it’s different from what the next person perceives as success? A lot of people have used this phrase particularly when I would be telling them about my research and what I’ll ultimately achieve through it.

Subconsciously I started doubting my work and the small yet very large milestones I’ve overcome so far.

“Mama I made it!!”

It’s no secret that I want to make a difference in my sphere of influence, I mean I don’t want to just exist and breathe for the sake of being alive. What I have come to realize though is that whatever makes Casper Nyovest scream “Mama I made” it is not necessarily what makes Barack Obama utter the same words (If he would ever) thus the need to define my own with my own words and in my own time. Will it be my success or our success? (Our, being the people whose lives I aspire to impact and hopefully change for the better through knowledge and skill transfer.)

I suspect (I hope!) after every data point has been “raised”, “analyzed” and submitted (mid-year, 2017 ) I’ll boldly declare “Mama I made it!!” And then? Keep on updating my definition of success.

#teamwork, #friendship
Posted on by sipokazinyeleka

My people, our food

I only have one word to describe Africa, DIVERSE. In this continent there exists more than eight thousand dialects spoken among three thousand tribes that to me is diversity defined! In the past three months I have had the pleasure to experience a bit of that diversity through living with housemates from Zimbabwe, Uganda and of course the rainbow nation. Come to think of it even the chickens had a bit of diversity (in terms of behaviour)… I mean there was one naughty cage. I tell you, those birds would even poke my pants! And then there were my sweet babies, always well behaved (laughs).

Food production in process

Food matters at house no. 24

Anyway, my housemates and I have a lot in common, maybe because we are all students or it could be that our similarities emanate from the fact that we are all nourished by the African sun and our history is stained with the rich soil that produce precious stones. Nonetheless there is a significant difference in the food we eat. Believe you me in this regard (p ˂ 0.005). My house mates from Zimbabwe prefer SADZA (pap) on any day to most dishes. To them it’s their thing and without it they are “food insecure”. On the other hand there’s me, I always feel “food insecure” when I have no vegetables and of course meat. We sometimes explore each other’s meals but what I realised was, though I may like how each dish tastes, I may not necessarily regard it as food for nourishment. Same goes for the rest of the house. I never though diversity would be evident even in food. A simple meal (well, simple in my view) is complicated and sometimes unacceptable to some of my housemates because they didn’t grow up eating such foods and it won’t fulfil their hunger.

There is always hope

Yes, our food is different, but there is beauty in it. I guess as researchers we are trying to find an answer to the same question in different ways for various communities; these ways based on the environment, availability and acceptability of the foods we are so desperate to produce. The quest for food security in Africa is not new, neither is it impossible to attain. I believe food security challenges on our continent can be solved through our diverse strategies to make Africa better — research being one of them. For that reason I will continue to pursue excellence and appreciate diversity in even in food. It’s only been a year into my research about animal production and already I’m thinking it’s too late to quit now. There must be something I can do to redefine the state of our continent… (Sigh).

Food and more food is what I’m striving for.