AFRICANS and AFRICA ...

per·cep·tion [per-sep-shuhn]

noun

1. the act or faculty of apprehending by means of the senses or of the mind; cognition; understanding.

2. immediate or intuitive recognition or appreciation, as of moral, psychological, or aesthetic qualities; insight; intuition; discernment: an artist of rare perception.

3. the result or product of perceiving,  as distinguished from the act of perceiving; percept.

4. Psychology - a single unified awareness derived from sensory processes while a stimulus is present.

5. Law - the taking into possession of rents, crops, profits, etc.

I have three African friends; George Munji from Kenya, Veven Bisetty (South Africa) and Gerald Owachi (Uganda). Munji and Bisetty and I were fellows under the Dag Hammarskjöld Scholarship Fund for Journalists programme in 1993. Owachi and I were on a Wolfson Press Fellowship programme at Cambridge University in 1998.

I spent close to four months with Munji and Bisetty in New York and an equal amount of time with Owachi while in the UK.

In New York, Munji, Veven and I stayed in the same hotel while at Cambridge, Owachi and I was under the same roof at Norton House.

We bantered. We flirted. We had loads of fun. We still communicate with each other, first via emails and now, through Facebook.

When I told the media group travelling with me to Johannesburg recently about my relationship with my African friends, some were stunned.

It is unfortunate that they have this negative perception of Africans in general, although the bad apples are from Nigeria, as widely reported in news portals and newspapers.

But can you really blame them? You can’t really tell between a Nigerian and a Kenyan, a South African or a Ugandan now or can you?

There are hundreds, if not in the thousands yet, of them in our own country.

Seriously, most of us do not harbour any ill feelings towards them but they have become intimidating, loud and, to a certain extent, violent.

They are abusing our hospitality and have increasingly become a menace here. They have not only scammed the locals of thousands of ringgit but use Malaysia as their base to cheat others as far as Australia. Our locals, being promised of travels and loads of money, had be duped into becoming drug mules.

That negative perception over these Africans has made us paranoid too. We are not only wary of them in our own country but we become extremely cautious of them when we are in theirs.

The Wisma Putra advisory to us didn’t help much either.

“… Kementerian dengan sukacita ingin mengingatkan tuan/puan agar menjaga keselamatan tuan/puan sepanjang berada di Afrika Selatan. Sekiranya ingin keluar ke kawasan bandar dan sekitarnya, tuan/puan adalah diminta agar bergerak dalam kumpulan dan tidak berseorangan. Selain itu, tuan/puan juga diminta mengelakkan keluar pada waktu malam melainkan dalam keadaan yang terdesak.”

(“… the ministry would like to remind you to be careful during your stay in South Africa. If you wish to go out into the city area and its surroundings, you are advised to move in groups and not alone. You are also advised not to go out at night unless needed.”)

We kept to the advisory. We were thousands of miles away from home. It was better to be safe than sorry.

It was one city that I didn’t get to explore much, on my own or with the group I was travelling with.

Normally, I would walk the streets to discover the city I’m in and checking out the local bazaars like our own “pasar malam” or night markets and pick up knick-knacks or souvenir pieces for family and friends back home. I sometimes engage the locals and talk to them about their cultures and beliefs.

For our own safety, we confined ourselves to the hotel and the surrounding areas. We even limited our interaction with the locals.

The one time that we went out was to Bloemfontein, in a convoy where we had hired driver who was also a trained security personnel. For the return trip to Johannesburg in the late afternoon, we were advised to leave as early as possible to avoid being on the highway at midnight.

In the city, we passed through areas with the signage “HOT SPOTS” and a telephone number to call in cases of emergency. “You’ll find no cars passing through these areas at night,” our driver told us. “We do not stop when the traffic lights turn red. We will just drive through,” he added.

In Johannesburg, the Malaysian who had arranged for our transportation took us out to Oriental Plaza (where Indians from India trade) and the African craft market.

Without him, we wouldn’t dare venture out by ourselves.

On hindsight, it was a good practice having to be alert at all times and keeping to the schedule. We also have to be street smart wherever we are.

I’m not sure if my African friends know of Malaysians’ general perception of them. Munji, Veven and another fellow from Costa Rica, William Mendez, are actually talking of a reunion in New York soon. I may join them. 

Well, perception can also be positive if one chooses to. It is a matter of choice.