Frank Cousins III

This dispatch is written by Frank Cousins III. He is  going into his third year and is thinking of a major in the School of Education. He has travelled with his guitar and has played everywhere we went much to the delight of our many hosts. Mama Gugu for whom he played at her home in Empangeni said that she wrote every note that he played in her heart. He also played with Himbara and it is this connection that he remembers here.

Enjoy, Nesha

Dr. Himbara

Himbara,was one of the first speakers we had in Johannesburg  was originally from Rwanda. Before I say more I would like to share my fondest memory of him.

I was sitting outside playing my guitar which I do frequently, and out of nowhere I hear a saxophone. Moments later Himbara was walking out with an old tenor sax as he was practicing a scale. Once he was outside, he played a melody that I picked up and soon we were having a little jam session.

He didn’t play the sax often but he had no fear of feeling the song out again as we took turns soloing. Later on that day while talking to him I learned he was taught how to play briefly while he worked in Louisiana. He was very easy to talk to though we have many differences: he has a clean shaven head, and I have an afro that is wild on its best day, he had on casual business attire and I had on multicolored plaid shorts and a bright green shirt. The biggest difference between us is status, I am an undergraduate college student and he is a key consultant to the United Nations Development Program in South Africa and was recently the assistant to the president of Rwanda.

This formal, business oriented side of him was how we knew him from our first interaction with him. We first met Himbara when he came to speak to us about his work and how he got to where he is (e.g. having to attend meetings with President Obama, and other presidents) while he came from so little, materially speaking. Himbara was a Rwandan refugee when he was young and inside the refugee camp where he lived there was a Canadian man that was so impressed with his abilities in mathematics  that he offered to give him a scholarship to go to a university in Canada. Himbara completed his PhD degree and after working in the US for some years, he moved back and forth from Rwanda and South Africa, where his family lives, and even though he found the work in Rwanda frustrating, mainly due to the government infrastructure, he returned to the same job in his home country another time.

Himbara has, as many African people have, two names they can go by. One is their traditional name using the customs of names from their cultures and a western, usually English name. His full professional name is Dr. David Himbara. We however, only knew him as Himbara because that is what he prefers to be called.

Who he is and hearing what he has been through helps us to understand South Africa and Africa much better. The kindness he has showed to me by playing music and talking to me as if he were a relative, an uncle perhaps, is something I have experienced from people in this country though they come from other parts of Africa (Zimbabwe,Mozambique, the Ivory Coast, etc.). Many African-Americans have a false sense of what Africa is in relation to them, in that they think it is their home because they are the same as Africans. Though African-Americans are considered Americans to everyone here, Africa is in the truest sense a home to us all, no matter our race. This comfort we have developed is through relationships with sincere and kind people such as Himbara. It is often a part of African stereotypes that the people are naturally good at music and dancing. There is a tendency of people here to not be shy about singing, dancing or playing music no matter how comfortable they are with their ability, however this is due to their willingness to put effort forth and try, even if they are not experts.

The opportunity Himbara had when he was able to attend college in Canada is an unusual and unlikely one for a Rwandan refugee, however there is still much to be said about the responsibility he feels toward his home country and his character. He has overcome many obstacles  on his way to his current position in life and it speaks volumes of the possibilities of the disadvantaged in Africa and those who occupy refugee camps. There could be many more potential government officials and UN consultants in any given refugee camp on this continent if only they were given such an opportunity to succeed. No longer will I hear the number of tens of thousands of refugees in a country and take it so lightly, I will think about Dr. Himbara and what a great person the world would have missed  if he had not made it out to do the great things he has done and continues to do. Through his personality and his words I have come to understand more about the people in this country and on this continent. I will never lose these bonds I have with the people I have met here, like the one I have with Uncle Himbara.

Signing Off,  Pedagogy of Action 2010 Team Member

Frank Cousins III