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     | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 01:27 am Do you know that Nuradin farah is nominated for the nobel price of literature. For those who don't know what nobel price is. It is annual price for the phsics, chemistry, economy, medicine, peace and literature. The ceremony takes place in stockhome, sweden where the best one will be handed the price (along with almost 1mly us dollar.) So are arafat, mandela took the price for the peace and the man who invented (E = mc^2) for the phsics. (i guess ever body knows him) Nevertheless this price is "not islamic one", but i am really very delighted when i read that newspaper. It is for those who made it. This is something special. The world can see at least that we can do a lot of positive things rather than civil war. Be aware coming thursday is the ceremony in sweden.
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 02:07 am Faris Good info. FYI the word is Prize, not price. Price is related to cost as in, what is the price of that new car? Not to nitpick - I got your point. And you are correct, it's quite an accomplishment.
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 05:20 am Faris: his picture n a large logo is hanging in my university's libraray.. imagine my pride everytime I walk into the Library with his title saying.. 'a somali author'.. it feels good man.. his books r great.. specially 'gifts' & 'sweet n sour'.
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 05:27 am Hibo I heard that name means "gift from God" is that true? Anyway, it's a great name. I have a good friend named Hibo, one of the nicest people I've ever met. Glad to see you like the author. I haven't read any of his material yet, but I really need to. I read an article about him last year in Newsweek.
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 06:32 am Hibo $ MADMAC, With you two people i am very happy about the way you react. I wish you are highly qualified people. By anyway would you like to write here what you do study (which field.. where) or your work. Pray for this guy to be the winner. Bye
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 07:52 am I Nominate Faris for a Nobel Prize for E.S.L.
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 07:59 am Anyone who has red Nurradin Farah's latest book Secrets' knows that the guy is a sadist, he writes about a Somali having sex with Animals, and MEN going at each other, !!!! His book is disgusting as I read it I was wondering does this guy have Kids ? what if they read this trash ? what will they think about their father ! He has a very dirty mind. If that is what it takes to Win a Nobel Prize then they should Nominate Little Kim for a Nobel too. She can share it with Ol' dirty basturd'.
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 08:26 am That is great news! but honestly speaking Nuradin disappoited me in his latest novel"secrets". I couldn't believe the writer of "close sesame" and "crooked rip" and "sardine and sour milk" would write novel such "secrets". What a crap! and European sickness!. The whole book is about sex, homosexuality, black magic, animal sex, ancesty and all evil things that you can think of. I was classmate of son, Koshin. And i was always for Nuradin before he wrote the "secrets". People don't think i am against only writer we have. i swear i proud of him and love the guy. But the thing is we 've to know one thing: The muslim born writers get good prize *only* when they wrote dirty or any evil books. For insatance, the Egyptian writer, Najib Mahfouz known to "abaa huzni" which means the father of sorrow, never get any prize before he wrote the book called "the chilren of Gabaloti--Alah". I didn't read the material but he was nearly got killed by islamic movement because of that book. And i was told the reason was the book was plesphamy. And what about Salman Rushdie? Salman was great writer but never get any prize before he wrote "satanic verses". And Nuradin didn't get good prize unless he whore "secrets". By knowing what is westren value is all about, Of course Nuradin knew what he was doing and he planed to get the prize. But he is misleading many young people who don't know what they are doing. Besides, Nuradin is very knowledgeable when it comes to islamic teaching. And anyone who reads his books even the "secrets" can see that. I think it was good idea for Nuradin to write this kind of book. Khalil
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 08:33 am Abdul .. I did read infact i find it very creative.. Maybe u haven't been into the fiction world lately. Coz that is what fiction is all about.. I liked the way he wrote it. MadMac: thnx. Yes Hibo means ' gift from God'. Its good to hear about ur friend. I am very affable person. faris: I am a software enginner bro.. n I would love to know what u do as well.. Take care n peace.
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 12:18 pm I agree with Khalil. I used to really admire Nuurudin, his creativity and his talent before I came across his latest(i think) book(secrets)and I was really disgusted with the first couple of chapters and I couldn't continue reading it. I thought, maybe the guy intended this book for only non-Somali readers. Now, Khalil speculated another possible motive for writing this book; which is to get a prize!!! Oh, well, what can I say? He was our only well-known writer. Let him get a prize, at least. Hey Hibo, I'm Software Engineer, too. I Develop software hoping to get prize for it  Nour
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 01:32 pm CONSTERNATION!!!!!!!! UPROAR!!!!!!! Nuuradiin the pornographer? Nuuradiiin the bestiality peddler? Nuuradiin the pedophile? I say let us assemble a hit squad and rub out this guy, Iman and Weris. Disgraceful humans all. and Basra!!!!!!!!
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 03:12 pm Nour: Good luck.. I for one will feel proud for you... Best wishes always.. Hail Somalia..n Somalis!!..
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 03:13 pm :> :x .')
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 05:33 pm This is all repulsive, and totally demeaning. It doesn't matter how much KNOWLEDGE YOU KNOW OF THE HOLLY QURAN, ALL THAT MATTERS IS HOW YOU USE IT. I believe the only reason he knows so much is because of his childhood, and that he probably knows arabic other then that I believe he's an Atheist, and you can still be a Somali considering that your an Atheist but your most definately not a muslim. Nuuradin is just another writer, you shouldn't chear him on because of his race but because of what he wrote instead! This man is disgusting and is a mochary to us all Somali's , but his writing gets nominated due to the fact that this society is now GAY RIGHTS OVERWHELMED, and that these people want and desperately have an urge for being recognized! Nuradin farah IS A FAG! fact or fiction doesn't really matter, he'll get nominated for being the first gay writer to win a NOBLE PRIZE, AND I FIND THAT shameful that he's a Somali Aswell. A SOMALI fag picks up his prize and brings shame to his people, and brings laughs to America's hatred, and revenge towards us all.
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 06:10 pm I have made my own research after reading the above critism provided by many of you.My research states:There are no findings of homosexuality and or having any sexual with animals.The book is about a love relationship between a man and a woman.an old love interest was ignited from a long separation of time.Nurradin Farah is a married man with three children,residing in Nigeria.It was not a Nobel prize,he won Newstadt international prize for literature.He was not even nominated for nobel
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 06:15 pm GOOD PIECE OF RESEARCH, I WAS WONDERING HOW THE HELL DID A SOMALI GET SOMWHERE THIS FAST IN LIFE, WE'RE JUST ADAPTING AND HOW THE HELL DID ONE OF US GET A NOBLE, WELL ITS FUNNY TO THINK ABOUT THIS GUY WRITING ABOUT ANIMALS AND HOMOSEXUALITY, BUT HOW CAN SO MANY PEOPLE BE SAYING THAT, AND THEY HAVE READ THE BOOK? i DON'T EVEN WANT TO COME NEAR THAT FAGS BOOK BUT EXPLAIN TO ME ABOUT THESE PEOPLE?
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 06:17 pm Ayayayayayayayayayaaaaaa!
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 06:23 pm explanations = jelousy solutions = jelous therapy or put a gun u=in your mouth and pull the triger. Phartwipe
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 06:43 pm i'M JELOUS? He's not even a noble prize winner? WHY WOULD I BE JEALOUS OF A GUY WHO WRITES ABOUT HOMOSEXUALITY AND BEASTIALITY? I WOULD BE JEALOUS IF I WASN'T THE FIRST PERSON TO WRITE ABOUT YOUR MOTHERS HABITS WITH GOATS ANONYMOUS, I BET I'M NOT THE ONLY ONE THOUGH.
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 09:59 pm I have read his book (secrets)and I found it to be un-Somali non-Muslim -Sex with animals.......>come on!!!!! -Gay activities>>>>>>>>>>>give me a break -That female in the book?????? And ooh of course her brother who happened to be the biggest gay rights activist in where else............>San Francisco I wonder why cant the likes of nuuridiin ,waris and iman be a normal Somalis and portray a normal Somali image rather than this western styled image of Somalia!!!!!?
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 11:23 pm Xoogsade What's the matter with you? Assemble a hit squad and rub out Waris???? Hey, if you don't want her give her to me. She's a babe - and she likes gaal. Same with Imaan. Haven't you ever heard of live and let live? Freedom of speech??? Killing good looking women is a technical rules violation.
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| | Thursday, October 05, 2000 - 11:33 pm U can have them both. . .Son of the bitch
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| | Friday, October 06, 2000 - 03:38 am Xoogsade You inspire me to be a better humanbeing.The more i see your vigilant indignats, the more i galant with a hoarse away on the other side of the road!retard!
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| | Friday, October 06, 2000 - 04:03 am Hibo & Nour Guys what kind of softwere Engineer you studying? Glad to heard we are turning....Computer Geegz1 please let me know. peace
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| | Friday, October 06, 2000 - 07:22 am Hei there thecies! Nour, and Hibo, Ssis forget about winning noble prize because we are soft engineers!!!. do you know what! I am doing this business since 1996 nd the best prize from this is to fixed couple of buggs which makes your customers and your boss smile!! -. Anyway enjoy it any minute you can, I know someday u hate to go to work in order to fight with last year project's buggs while your current project deadline it about to close !!!
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| | Friday, October 06, 2000 - 07:57 am faris; where did you get that Nuradin won nobel prize?. Last time i heard of wining prize, he won "Neustadt International Prize" but not nobel prize. Yaska; I see so many software Engineers up here! that is good. BTW, where are you at? i mean, which State?. Khalil
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| | Friday, October 06, 2000 - 08:34 am GONGRATULATIONS TO ALL OF YOU, WHO CONTRIPUTED TO THIS TOPIC, IT IS FIRST TIME I SE PEOPLE WRITING I AN OBJECTIVE MANNER!!
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| | Friday, October 06, 2000 - 08:48 am Hibo, Dear of me I am a candidate (final year)of bachelor of science for mechanical engineering. Would you like to tell me in which part of the world your university is located. Khalil, I say he is nominated for this prize. He has other two competitives ( an American and Nigerian)
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| | Friday, October 06, 2000 - 04:00 pm Nuuradiin Faarax may all the beasts of hell descend on your filthy mind. The man's filthy beyond reason. Mad Mac we don't care who they go with but why are they dragging our good name through the muck. Because of Weris as soon as I am recognized as a Somal the conversation turns to women's "business". Why do I gotta talk about stuff like that. Mad Mac if you want to add to your considerable tally of Soamli scalps we will hire you to do a job. Three jobs to be precise, lol.
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| | Friday, October 06, 2000 - 11:50 pm Xoogsade Sorry abowe, I only kill Mooryan. But I'll give you twenty camels for that Waris chick. That's a good price!!!!
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| | Saturday, October 07, 2000 - 12:51 am Hei ! Khalil, Very far away from any states! I am launching from Scandenevian end points. Keep cruzing on the ocean of challangies.
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| | Saturday, October 07, 2000 - 05:52 pm Since we talking about books, why dont let go nura diin and check this book out....THE LAST CAMEL by jeanne D'haem. This book will make u lough out load---that is what i liked most about it. would at least explain the un-explained, kinsmen, justice, love and culture. for example did u know there is a tree called the somali tree on the moon and that when somali baby is born a new leaf grows on the tree and when somali dies a leaf drops from the tree, did u know that american rocket propelled satelite that was sent to the moon (the moonlanding) almost hit the tree and killed all the somalis who lived at the time. and this event caused a major problem in small village... find out and....
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| | Saturday, October 07, 2000 - 06:43 pm Waryaa you have difinitely made me not to read the book.Imagine the plot you just described?Get serious,do you expect me to go to the Barnes & noble bookstore counter and purchase this book.I dont want to get a scrouge look from the bookstore salesperson.It's embarrassing.Kwaheri!
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| | Saturday, October 07, 2000 - 06:56 pm yaska, woow! scandanevia ?. Yaska don't tell me you live in Sweden and you are the one who owns yaasiin homepage?. by the way there are many somalis in hight in Europe. I know one guy who wrote somali language software--kind of MS word or WordPerfect. I guess his name was tohow. But i am not sure. Waryaa, that funny story. You are right . somalis say "qofkaas caleentiisa cadaatey" which means "that person's leaf from the tree in the moon is nearly falling down--the person is going to die". And give a try that LAST CAMEl. Abdul, Nuradin has children. Koshin, his eldest son whose mother is Indian was my classmate in SIDAM(somali instituite of Account and Management). And he has also many young ones i guess they are 3 or 4 from Nigeriam woman. If you read the "secrets" you can find all this info from the back of the book. The guy wasn't such that bad. I don't know why he meant this strange book "the secrets". I hope you all keep the peace and keep the hope alive! khalil
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| | Saturday, October 07, 2000 - 10:21 pm well my uncle knew the guy and speaks about him highly but honestly iam not so thrilled about his latest work however as writer i would rate him as being one of the best.
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 12:10 am Hey how come I never heard of the man or his Books? Dang that means I should update my expired library card? AGAIN!!!!!! HIBO It is so uplifting to know that our sistas are into building their future & educating themselves. U know what they say....... If U educate a man...U educate a man...but if ya educate a woman...U educate a nation. All the best dear PEACE TROUBLE PS:- Hey Londoners where can I find this man's books....Help....?
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 08:06 am t; you can buy from amazon.com. I guess it cost less than 30 bucks. ANd if you don't know Nurradin farah, for sure your somaliness is in doubt lol. He is one of the best writers even lived. Don't take my word for it. rad the review of the book and you can see what the people said about him. He wrotemany books and took many small prizes before like German prize--i don't recall the name. So go to amazon.com click directory. then books. then search then write nuradin farah at "author's name". you will find all his books. then click the book you want and read the customer review or editorial review to see the comments. By the way you can buy the book online. amazon.com has UK site. good luck. Khalil
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 09:11 am T-GIRL U CAN HAVE MY BOOK I DON'T NEED IT ANYMORE WHAT A WASTE OF MONEY I HAVE SPENT 18$ON A WORTHLESS BOOK FROM BARNES&NOBLES
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 09:38 am Khalil: Why you like this man? He is a complete toad. And from what I gather, the Nobel has no official shortlisted nominees. All academy members are free to consider as wide a range of candidates as they please. Apparently the African frontrunners are Coetzee(S. Africa) and Chinua Achebe of Nigeria. I hope Achebe wins. He is a great writer. And unlike Farah, his writings do not debase the great culture that inspires him. Farah degrades and drags our culture through the muck with great literary license. Achebe elevates and exalts his Ibo culture.
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 11:50 am xoogsade, Don't be emotional man. Achebe comes from society who listens and understand not like us somalis who kills each other for no apparent reason. Besides did you read "close sesame" of farah?. What about "maps"? what about "sardine and sour milk"?. All that books are good ones. And i think Nuradin farah is not such that bad guy. You gotta love the guy's english and how he plays with words and also how he comes the language into vivid. and one more thing Nuradin advocates for somali literature. You see he can write about anything else but it is the love of his country that he only writes somali's problem. Tell you what xoogsade, We 've many people who degrading us. But you gotta give credit what they contribute to us too. Althought i heard Iiman degrading somali men, i read many pistives things that she always says about somali women. Whenever asked why she is so beatifull or is she has white blood in her, Iiman consistently says she is average somali woman. And beauty is part of being somali. Nuradin contributes a lot. in every book of his there must some teaching about somalis and sayings. sometimes he wrotes pages of somali poem written in somali in his English writtne book. Can you believe that?. Read "close sesame" and you will see "adaa koofiloow jiitayaan dunida joogeyne" written in somali in a whole page. People i hate most are Mohamed Siciid Samater-the professor and waris diiriye- the model. they are nothing but complete disgrace to us. Don't be emotinal be reasonable instead. and hey take it easy. Khalil
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 12:32 pm Why are people so angry with Nuradiin Farah?? Are people angry because 1. He writes about homosexuality and bestiality etc. or. 2. People feel that he lied about Somali cutlture or 3. People feel he shouldn't air Somalia's "dirty linen" in public? By the way, I haven't read this particular book, I read a reveiw of the book given by professor Samater. The review was negative, because Prof. Samatar claims (and he cites valid points) that the book is written for Western consumption (he emphasis the consversations in the book that use a mode of talking among protaganists that is more British and American rather than Somali) etc....
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 02:02 pm Khalil: You know I respect you and everything but you can't convince me this man is anything but a no-good wanker. I fell off my chair when I heard about this bestiality business and homosexual business. There may very well be Somalis who indulge in these depraved practices(allah give me strength) although I very much doubt it. But even if it were true he shouldn't have written stuff like that. He should have set his story in a fictional African country called Uhurundu or something rather than drag the noble Somali name through the mud. If he ever sets foot in Somalia he has a charge to answer. If he thought Siyaad Barre was rough on him wait till I get a hold of him. But someone else will probably beat me to the punch. We have to guard against all the pollution people are bringing back to us from the perverted westerners. This reminds of the story of the Somali lad who came back from abroad. He got off the plane at Bali Doogle. He is wearing an earring!!!!!!. One Moorryaan guy sees him and asks if this is a guy or a girl. They tell him IT is a guy. The Moorryaan guy takes out his knife and says: You have two choices get on the plane and go back to whatever filthy place you come from or I am gonna cut off your penis and put a dress on you. The guy promptly got on the plane and went back to that filthy place called Holland.
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 02:25 pm Honest to God...every time i read this Xoogsade Guy he somehow inspires me in a greater level.Xoogsade keep up the great work!
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 02:31 pm Yes he is a great man isn't he?
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 05:02 pm Xoogsade you have sunk into a New low, you are now talking to you self..
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 06:11 pm I really Agree Abdul. and other people who oppose this man so-called Author his filthy books I hope he don't win anything not because I hate him personally but his message is insult to us bye
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 06:16 pm Khaliil@lol
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 06:57 pm T-Girl: thnx sis... I hope n pray the same is true about urself.. sis. I, for one, felt like i had to congradulate you folks on presenting ur opinions without personal insults. Walaahi I am so happy. Somali Yankee... I couldn't agree any lesser bro. He is indeed the best author Somalia has to offer. Someday I hope to be considered as one too. I will strife and do the best, rest is on my luck. Xoogsade: u never seize to amuse me.. Xaali: great work sis... u really did a good job in reasoning. Khaliil:.. is all i can offer rite now..lol
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 07:27 pm Xaali, who is the samater you are talking about. I think there are two samaters. Both of them are professors. I am after Ma'med siciid Samater the historian and "leylkase" one. Khalil
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 07:38 pm xoogsade, One good philosophy to remember is we don't have to friends to agree on everything. We can agree to disagree and yet can be friends. I like Nuradin farah and i think he is great guy. You disagree with me , that is fine. That doesn't mean we don't respect each other's opinion. it is just we are different. Hibo, thanks for that smile. Should i have to pay back sis?. Khalil
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 07:56 pm khalil good for you.I like Nurradin too.If anything he is successful.Thats a fact.
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| | Sunday, October 08, 2000 - 10:21 pm Xoogsade: You are too damn funny! I wouldn't insult you and nominate you for NOBEL, but instead will give you my vote for being the best writer on this Forum! I like to warn the people of this forums to be aware and really be cautious when agreeing with the only "GAAL" in this discussion group. MAD MAC! He is always trying to add his two cents to everything we talk about regardless of how knowledgeable he is of the issue being discussed. MAD MAC you are nothing but a filthy soldier who has only seen a good country and good people (SOMALIA?SOMALIA) once in his sorry life. The fact is you can't let go of it.
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| | Monday, October 09, 2000 - 09:25 am WHAT ! ARE YOU ALL FUCKKING INSANE?? Shame on you born idiots!. I didn't know that you are in such low ebb when it comes to english language. FYI there is such thing called "figure of speech". In this categories we have simile, metaphor annalogy. I think i don't need to go into details here and teach you what your bastard instructors dind't teach. but my point is to read a book or a sentence, you need to have the basic undersanding of the "abstarct language". And in Nuradin's Book of SECRETS is a metaphor of somali civil war. Don't be fooled the painting of the book which is painted sex. Of course he can make another metaphor and i don't know why he chosed sex metaphor. But to say the book is about sex means you missed the whole damn point which you makes to go back to school. this is your go back to school call! Alipapa
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| | Monday, October 09, 2000 - 10:33 am Khalil, here is a copy/paste of the review I was referring to. It is by the "Lelkase" guy Research in African Literatures 31.1 (2000) 137-143 Are There Secrets in Secrets? by Said S. Samatar "Industriousness," so goes a venerable Somali aphorism, "never comes home empty-handed." No author has ever more strikingly demonstrated the truth of this aphorism than Nuruddin Farah whose prodigious history has taken the world by storm. Secrets, his eighth novel, is the latest evidence of Farah's energy and industrial output. The prodigious output has had its intimidating effects in African writing circles, to judge by the odes on the cover of this book. That he is now the laureate of the prestigious Neustadt International Prize for Literature should redound to the good of his already established reputation as "one of the world's great writers." The award represents a personal triumph for Farah, a vindication for his fiction, and, most important, a victory for a badly demoralized Somalia that one of the "sons of her soil" should be so rarely honored. As a fellow Somali myself, I should crave to be counted as one of his principal cheerleaders, applauding him on and on to high! er and higher heights. But sentimental fellow feeling is one thing; integrity in assessing a work of fiction is another; and on the latter basis it must be said that Secrets arouses, at least in this reader, certain concerns of context and credibility. I shall examine these by and by. Set against the background of civil-war Somalia, Secrets, a novel of luxuriant prose and strange similes--"grins as self-conscious as a sparrow dipping its head in the river's mist"--attempts to recount a family saga, that of the Nonno clan, in multiple angles of vision and in a maddening maze of mechanical metaphors.The tale begins in Mogadishu, Somalia's once charming but now ruined capital, where Kalaman, the protagonist, offers us a slice of his early insouciant coming-of-age and then takes a leap, without transition, to his growth into a thirty-three-year-old up-and-coming Somali yuppie, who runs a successful enterprise as a computer programmer. Grandpa Nonno, nicknamed Matukade, or "He-Who-Never-Prays," possesses a dilapidated estate, composed of a bungalow and numerous acres of not unpleasant woodlands, on the banks of the Shebeele, or "River of Leopards." He had, we are told, run south in the early decades of the century from the former British Somaliland Protectorate ! for reasons that are unsaid. Nonno's son, and Kalaman's father, Yaqut, earns his upkeep as an engraver of headstones for graves. Macabre enough. Yaqut's wife Damac, Kalaman's putative mother, is a "four-breasted" boneless wonder, who has made well off enough on the "beads trade" to own a vehicle for movement, and a firearm for self-defense against marauding militias. Second in significance to the Nonnos are Madoobe, or the Black, and his pair of progeny--Sholoongo, a "shape-shifting" witch of a lass "with animal powers," "raised by a lioness"; and Madoobe's son Timir who, among other improbabilities, holds office as an "active member of the American gay movement." Then there is Fidow, Nonno's general hand man, wild honey collector, crocodile trapper, elephant poacher, and goer of "both ways in sexual matters." This just about closes the circle of significant characters in Secrets. [End Page 137] As to the events in Secrets, it must be said that not much happens. There is no character development, there is no plot, there is no sign of humans doing things to other humans to stir the reader's admiration, pity, or scorn. There is only a cloud of verbiage. In the end a work of fiction must stand--or fall--by the measure of its plausibility. Judged on this criterion, Secrets fails to measure up. To offer a running sample of the various grounds for complaint: first, there are the elementary errors: dibqaloo', hanqaraloo', or hangaraloo' (all three Somali for "scorpion"  is misnamed as "hangaroole." This should have been a petty objection if the dibqaloo' didn't play a central role in the folk myth employed to carry the story forward. Arraweello, the archetypal Queen of Somali mythology in pre-Islamic matriarchal Somalia is misrendered throughout as Carraweello. Now suppose a Yoruba novelist of note in a book on the Yoruba persistently got the name of Oduduwa wrong. Would not! such occasion a few raised eyebrows? More serious: the English idioms and utterances that Farah selects to depict his chosen slice of Somali experience sit rather awkwardly with Somali life and lore, to say nothing of Somali literary temper and tastes. Consider, for example, these snippets of dialogue taken randomly from the first four or so pages: "Now why on earth did we not think of that?" "I gather that Sholoongo was delivered . .] ." "I cannot vouch for its truth [ . . .]." "I named you Kalaman because it is a cul-de-sac of a name." And a little later: "We are damned if we do, and damned if we don't." (Emphasis added in all cases.) These are all nice idioms. The trouble is that they are fiercely foreign to Somali speech mannerisms. To put them in the mouth of a Somali is positively a literary abomination. Apparently unwilling--maybe unable--to squeeze out of English the corresponding sound and syntax of Somali speechifying, Farah packs in, higgledy-piggledy, the accents, idioms, even mannerisms, of the British Isles. The result is charmingly comical, making the creatures that populate Secrets sound rather like a party of British dandies out on a picnic in the Bounds Green suburb of London. Take a look: Kalaman in quarrel with grandpa utters aloud: "The cheek of it all!" (280). Can anyone, in the know, imagine a Somali saying the above? And this: "If they pitied me, it would be because I was the poor sod who hadn't a blood family to be loyal to . . ." (237). The poor sod! Is this not a Britishism? Kalaman the child, not the grown-up, is made to say: "Where other boys' braggadocio underlined for me their overly [. . .]" (8). Braggadocio in the mouth of a Somali child? Secrets sports a legion of Americanisms, too. In fact, it could be said justly that the language of Secrets is roughly evenly divided between Britishisms and Americanisms to the outrage of the reader appreciative of the violence done to the Somali style of speaking. Sample: "The Lord knows he had a plethora of these phrases, shibboleths pointing to his nervous or joyous state" [End Page 138] (5). Shibboleth? How did the "eight-plus-year-old" Kalaman come to acquire this Hebrew-English idiom? "I dared not betray Sholoongo, my secret-sharer [here Joseph Conrad sneaks in!] whose daredevilry never ceased to amaze me" (8). Imagine a Somali child making side-bar allusions to a novella of Joseph Conrad's! And daredevilry? The pity is that there is a reservoir of corresponding native Somali idioms that Farah could have easily rendered in English, and into which he is unwilling--maybe unable--to dip. And: "[. . .] Barni would hang around all day if need be, patient like a groupie waiting! for an instant's sight of her idol" (10). Groupie? How did this Americanism get into the mouth of a Somali child? Then there is the problem of misplaced events, objects, and historical chronology: Arbaco, a barely sedentarized "floater," makes this remarkable analogy: "If you make it into the big league, they pay you a lot [. . .]" (222). Did she learn about the terminology of American sports lingo among the camels in the desert?! And Kalaman holding forth on the superiority of his moral probity over the warlords: ". . . [I]f I were one the vigilantes [sic] or besotted with the idea of power like the cowboy politicians?" Instead of "cowboy," why not "camelboy" (since the camel reigns supreme in Somalia) so as to ground the sentiment in the local color of its environment, instead of borrowing an Americanism? It is this kind of consistent failure to contextualize that undermines the text. Equally extraordinarily, Madoobe, or Blackie, is portrayed as having made "his living taming wild horses, which he exported to the Middle East and out of which, it was rumored, he made a mint" (10). Only one problem!: there are precious few horses, wild or domestic, left in Somalia. I've written at length about horses and horse culture in Somalia, and while there used to be a great horse population in the country, it is all but extinct nowadays from the combination of the increasing dessication of the environment and the introduction of motorized transport that has made the horse irrelevant. Today there are about three spots where horses exist in any appreciable numbers: the valley of Nuggal in eastern Somalia, the coastal region around 'Eel-Buur, and the environs of Harrodigeet in Ogaadeen country. For the rest, nothing--certainly not in Afgoi. In the nineteenth century, the American navy imported camels from Morocco for transport use in the American southwest, but the project failed on account of the inhospitable climate, and the last solitary camel was sighted wandering listlessly in the desert wilds of New Mexico. Now imagine that an American novelist in a work set in New Mexico (circa 1900) has a character "making a mint" out of breaking camels! And this: "I hurt in the eyes," he said. "Summer one moment, and on its heels a sudden winter, with frostbite more bitter than any the world has known" There is no summer or winter in Somalia, indeed none of the four seasons of European culture; there are only the dry and wet seasons--more dry than wet (And "frostbite" in equator-sun-scorched Somalia where there is not even a word for snow, let alone frostbite.) And yet Farah's Somalis are projected as seasoned Alaskans waxing sagely on the existential angst of "frostbites." Still more intriguing: Grandpa Nonno admires grandchild Kalaman's teeth: "As I prepared myself to light a cigarette, I remarked how, with the [End Page 139] residual tobacco stains removed, Kalaman's teeth looked TV-commercial clean." There has never been a TV-station in Afgoi, indeed only briefly in Mogadishu, in the mid-eighties. Where would the village-bound Nonno have seen TV commercials? And the barely literate Arbaco delivers herself of this pointer: "It will be great fun to fill the tyrant's boots. It is good for my CV." Only one rub: the word "CV," as well as the concept, does not exist in Somali culture, and only the small staff in the ministries who are able to read Italian or English--which Arbaco is not--would have come across it. In Farah's pen, pastoral Somalia is made to sound, amazingly, like a Manhattan-style bureaucracy! And Grandpa Nonno pontificates: "The Prophet Mohammed [sic] was once asked to define Allah. Responding to the question, the Prophet said God is different from any Identity kit that a human being is capable of constructing!" (104) Identikit: identity + kit--a darling twaddle of the anti-narrative brigade--in the mouth of Muhammad? Why, Farah's Prophet Muhammad sounds, remarkably, like a latter-day postmodernist steeped in the argot of deconstructionism! Then there is the matter of "Complexification." Farah's style is characterized by an alternation of brilliant verbal executions that achieve the poetic, and a barrage of rancid mouth-fillers that deteriorate into pompous verbosity. A sample of the former: I suggested Arbaco and I find a place out of his earshot so we could talk in peace. I drove away fast, the tires of my vehicle stirring so much dust you would have thought that a horde of hippopotami was having a wrestling bout with elephants. (229) Or: >When Arbaco reemerged she wasn't alone. A man with whom she had a kind of conspiratorial harmony was with her, the type of harmony informed by corruption. I could tell that they didn't trust each other either, like accomplices in a murder having no faith in one another. The man, who was sixty if a day, had about him the air of a blackmailer. (227) Even the sternest detractor has to concede that by such passages as the above Farah achieves verbal deftness of immeasurable elegance. Secrets contains many such literary gems. At his best Farah so deploys language as to construct breathtakingly bucolic lyrics, a stunning achievement in which not a syntax, not a syllable, nay, not even an accent, misses the mark. At such moments the reader must feel immensely rewarded. But at his worst, Farah plunges into the muddy pond of verbal gobbledygook. Take any page of Secrets and you will find, guaranteed, the weirdest of sentence-constructions since Adam babbled his first halting syllables in the Garden of Eden. Sample: Young Kalaman is instructing us on how his name was coined: "The K was joined to an L, then marked with the appropriate vowel-point for the sound he wished to achieve: accents of [End Page 140] focus, of a skirmished relevance" (238). What in Allah's name--or Waaq's (sky-god), for that matter--is "a skirmished relevance"? And: "The ants marked my body with polygonal and polyhedral messages." Polygonal and polyhedral? What purpose do these mouth-jammers serve, other than to complexify? Farah seems to have a thing for the big and obscure word--i.e., for "weeping" he deploys "lachrymose"; for "car," "jalopy"; and for "general manager," "factotum." A corollary of the itch to complexify is the urge to overwrite, and overwrite, and overwrite. Child Kalaman explains his gullet's reaction to a chilled drink of tamarind: "My larynx loosened up, so did my pharynx, my voice organs bounced into action, with the Adam's apple jerking to life, functioning with the ease of a recently greased engine" (3). This child talks too grown-up; also the sentence might have worked more effectively if Farah stopped it right after "loosened up" and deleted the frothy coda. Indeed it is frothy codas that have conspired to ruin Secrets. Undoubtedly Farah would have benefited by his editors cutting out every third sentence at random to make the effort learner, tidier, and therefore aesthetically more rewarding. The second major issue that arises out of reading Secrets relates to the absence in it of a sustaining core--a skeleton around which to hang the various strands of thematic devices in order to propel the story forward. So the text keeps falling back on itself in a circular tangle of overwriting. In the first half of the account, Farah seeks an anchoring center in phantasmagoria. Hence the allegorical naming of his characters: Kalaman (split mind), Nonno (Italian for grandfather), Damac (Desire), Qalin (Pen), Fidow (Evening), and so on; and the providential name-giving crow that comes down from the sky as a Somali deus ex machina to cry out "Kalaman!" on the instant of the child's birth. There are also various and sundry allusions in the rehashing of the Somali myth of the Milky Way, or Dhabaha 'Irka. But he leaves out (maybe doesn't know of) the key component of the Road-of-the-Sky cosmology, namely, Awrka 'Irka, or the Camel of the Sky whose tail got pulled off from the weigh! t of so many folk hanging from it, causing an entire clan to plunge down to >earth--this a Somali version of the Biblical myth of the Tower of Babel. When the Milky Way myth fails to rescue Secrets, Farah tries magical realism, of a sort reminiscent of Gabriel García Márquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude. There are invading armies of locusts, termites, birds of all manner doing bizarre things, geckos, lizards, snakes, and the ubiquitous scorpion--conundrums. The elephant in Secrets that crosses "international boundaries" to avenge himself on the poacher Fidow is every bit as fantastical as the "Jews of Amsterdam" invading García Márquez's mythical South American forest republic. But the Buendia clan in One Hundred Years do rather better as an incarnation of allegory than do the Nonnos in Secrets. When the magical realism in its turn doesn't work, Farah dusts up astrology, this perhaps as a concession to the Psychic Friends Network, but it, too, doesn't do the trick, so resort is had to numerology (last thirty pages or so), and when the numbers, too, don't add up, Secrets collapses into a soupy Islamic theology. Altogether! a work in despair. [End Page 141] Another cause for alarm is the growing cancer of bestiality in Farah's recent fiction. In 1990 (1991?) in St. Louis at the ASA's annual convention, a party of Somalis (including me) went to cheer him on. We were all rooting for him pridefully, as a native son made good. To the discomfiture of the Somalis in the audience--maybe to others, too--Farah, reading an extract from one of the books--Maps?--embarked on an extended graphic description of a stud of a man banging away at a cow. The reading went on ad nauseam, replete with gruntings, groanings, mooings, and mumblings--in short, all manner of man-cow love noises . . . until the fellow beside me lurched forward and whimpered in a shaky voice, "Where is the men's room? I fear I want to vomit." In Secrets Farah has this: Now his nakedness was prominent with an erection. In a moment he was standing behind a heifer, saying something, his voice even. The nearer I got to him and the young cow, the clearer his voice was, only I couldn't decipher his words, maybe because he was speaking to the cow in a coded tongue, comparable to children's private babble. Was he appeasing the cow's beastly instincts by talking to her in a secret language? (16) One cannot cavil at the employment of bestiality as a thematic technique; after all, a fictionist has his fictional license, but the bestiality here does nothing for the narrative structure. It is merely a paste-on. In any case, if Farah wishes to present the Somalis as a race of recidivist bestialists, it is his authorial prerogative to do so. But then he should not have picked on the poor cow, a minority species in the land, but rather on the proud camel since Somalia is decidedly a camel country. There are, too, the gratuitous crudities: does not the reader weary of being reminded of grandpa Nonno's "large member"? For his part Nonno is an octogenarian Peeping Tom who delights in secretly-and voyeuristically--eyeing the jerkings off of grandchild Kalaman. Then Kalaman reminisces of childhood when a bad head cold oppressed him and father Yaqut came to the rescue: "When I couldn't breathe because my nasal passages were clogged, my father took my nose in his mouth and, at a single drag, sucked the unease out of me, phlegm and mucus and all." I called my doctor to inquire if this was technically possible. He assured me it was not. Which means Farah sojourns in the realm of the unbelievable even in relating an obscenity. The objection here is not to the crudity per se: no African work is ever cruder than Ayi Kwei Armah's classic The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born or a European effort earthier than James Joyce's Dubliners. The difference is that the crudities in the latter! text are part of a craft designed to lift them off to sublime beauties. Farah's is just lumped on. Farah is hailed by the publisher of Secrets as having "a life-long project"--that of "keep[ing] my country alive by writing about it." Would that he had done so. The Somali civil war (in its clan massacres, mass starvations, international interventions, in the muddlings of Operation Restore Hope, the draggings of the dead bodies of American Rangers--in short, in its evocation of the very apocalypse) constitutes an epic tale crying for an oracular pen to give it a tongue. It remains the untold secret. [End Page 142] Which introduces the subject of secrets in Secrets. The word "secret" jumps out at the reader practically in every page, indeed almost every paragraph. In Farah's telling, the universe is crawling with secrets: locusts have secrets, as do termites, as does the scorpion, as does the "belly" of a dead hippo, as does Sholoongo's culture of "lice in a jelly jar," as do her monthlies, as does the gang-rape of Damac, as does Kalaman's birth from this violation, and so on ! . . . until upon the word the wearied reader screams out with Horatio: "There needs no ghost come from the grave to tell us this, my lord!" Only in the last sentence of the last page do you discover the god-awful secret--that there are no secrets in Secrets. All in all, this is a fiercely non-Somali novel. But what does this matter beside the charging juggernaut of a fearsome will power? Calvin Coolidge: "Press on. Nothing can take the place of persistence. TALENT will not; the world is full of unsuccessful people with talent. GENIUS will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. EDUCATION alone will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent." Farah has persistence and determination in abundance. And therein lies the guarantee of his fame. Said S. Samatar is Professor in the Department of History at Rutgers University, Newark, New Jersey.
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| | Monday, October 09, 2000 - 11:13 am Khalil sis would you please contact me cuz Koshin is in the USA and he wants to find out where u @ since u went school with him back then in Somali. Khalil please email me as soon as you can @ fardowsa.maalin@we-inc.com. Thank you
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| | Monday, October 09, 2000 - 12:50 pm Nurudin Din is misnomer His name should be the Dark slave. I am disgusted that we share somali Identity. Guys, those of you who want to be remembered for something, betraying your people is not one of them. I bet Farah and Edward Siad (0rientalism)would be remembered differently. One made his career by degrading his identity in the hope getting western approval, good boy, while the other strived for excellency in exposing oreintalism, Western writers who claim their expertise in a particular country and write about what they want to see not what is out there which usually turns out to be a pure racism. Ironically, Said lists one of the three main objectives in writing his book as to prevent third world writers from using what oreintalist themselves have used against them. Let is hope that Farah sees trees and not the forest, in other words farah might be too close to his work to be positively reasoning. I think people are responsible for what they do and Nurdin Farah name should be synonymous with somali disgrace. If he wins nobal price then he should be remembered SOMALI DISGRACE NOBELPRICE WINER.
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| | Monday, October 09, 2000 - 01:06 pm I am happy for his achievements. There is something I thought is pertitent to this that I would like to share with you evreyone here. There was a friend of mine in New Delhi University who did his Ph.D on the writings of Nurudin Farah. Back then we would always mock him for having chosen that as his subject. I guess my friend must be feeling kind of vindicated today for his what he did. His guru being nominated for the nobel prize. He could not ask for more.
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| | Monday, October 09, 2000 - 10:26 pm Xaali, Thanks walaashiis. That was nice of you!. It is true that no somali ever liked this book-secrets. However, althought i hate to say anything negative about anyone, for some reason, i don't like Mo'med Said Samater himself. And hey Xaali if you like him, i have some articles of him. just let me know. by the way Xaali are you in VA?. Alipapa, That was nice shot. And i do agree with you the book is about somali problem and sex, mblack magic, homosexuality and animal sex are just metaphor. but the point is as you already pointed out, why did he chose this horrible "painting"--sex?. That is what we all are talking about. And please don't give up on us. lol. Nor send us back to school.lol. Zaawi, That is good comparison--Edward said and Nuradin. But before you go any further do you know any book that Nuradin degarded somalis other than SECRETS?.
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| | Tuesday, October 10, 2000 - 07:42 am Hi Khalil, you are welcome walaalkiis! Yep, I live in Virginia. Please do email me the articles you have of M. Said Samatar Thanks in advance.
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| | Tuesday, October 10, 2000 - 08:12 am I have to say that Secrets, the book is Is dazzling and magnificently written that is language wise, but the contents thoroughly appalling. He portrays Somalis to be more liberal than even those who invented the practice itself. When I first read I thought woow, what a masterpiece of literature this is! But when I propitiously dissected I found I lot of pages that need to be burned…! I am certain those of you who had the opportunity to read! you saw that load of refuse things he writes about shallongo, noone and madoobe. It is unconditionally witless of him to write such thing about our beloved Somalis. I am aware the fact that he was trying to beguile and enthral his western readers nevertheless that is not repentance for him to lessen out beautiful culture and religion. I was a fan " I am quite sure whether I can employ that word here…" of him before I read that nonsensically inane book "SECRETS". Drwho@pediatrician.com London
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| | Tuesday, October 10, 2000 - 01:32 pm Metaphor my ass. The man is just pandering to his leftist, secularist academic sponsors. There is nothing these people hate more than tradition, history and religion. This man has taken a piledriver to everything we as Somalis cherish and hold dear. If you wanna talk about war criminals this guy should be at the head of the procession. We can bury and pray for the dead, we can rebuild the houses. How are we supposed to rebuild the national honour and dignity that has been compromised by this squalid pervert and his gross and unspeakably horrifying book. He should be hanged by his eyelids. That would be a start. Xoogsade
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| | Tuesday, October 10, 2000 - 03:35 pm Khaliil: NO bro.. those things don't require repays.... but i offer u another...
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| | Tuesday, October 10, 2000 - 04:02 pm Alipapa !!! what an idiot. Check out what you wrote: >>"And in Nuradin's Book of SECRETS is a metaphor of somali civil war. Don't be fooled the painting of the book which is painted sex. Of course he can make another metaphor and i don't know why he chosed sex metaphor. But to say the book is about sex means you missed the whole damn point which you makes to go back to school."<< I think you should do the English language a great favour and take your own advice. Go buy a spell Checker and a basic grammar book. If you live in a glass house, dont throw stones !!
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| | Tuesday, October 10, 2000 - 04:31 pm "Those who think that everything is metaphor, and those who affect the belief that culture is the richest source of same, have a huge advantage over the rest of us. Like the quacks who used to produce divination and augury from the flights of birds and the investigation of entrails, they need never do any serious work, or run the risk of exhausting their raw material. Their experiments take place in an unquantifiable universe, of mingled psychobabble and remembered snatches of song". Consider this little passage I came across. Mr. Faraq, er sorry I meant to say Mr Farah tells us these perversions he writes are a metaphor for something or the other about Somalia. Perhaps I am not so quick on the uptake but can somebody tell me how getting up a cow is supposed to lead us to clarity about the human condition in Somalia? What is this metaphor everybody is carrying on about? Abdul: I am just glad I am no longer in your line of fire. Train the big guns on that idiot he is a more deserving target. Run Cali Baabah while you can.. Xoogsade
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| | Wednesday, October 11, 2000 - 04:54 am Wow the CONTROVERSY......I can't believe I never heard of this Somalian "Sidney Sheldon". Khaliil U R right brother. If I don't know about the real things that affect our nation, my Somali-ness is in jeopardy. LOL....No seriously I should hang my head in shame. Thanx for making me feel worse off than I was B4. And about the Amazon.com site...I sure will check his book out. FYI....I am a real somalian. How on earth did ya assume I like in the UK? What R U telepathic? Ali Why do I get the feeling that U R refering to a dictionary as U type......?Stop acting like a dead Edwardian and get with the damn program CAPISHE PEACE TROUBLE
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| | Wednesday, October 11, 2000 - 04:57 pm Hibo, Thanks again. But this time i 've to pay back. . By the way are you the one that said you are softwear Engineer?. T-Girl, you lost me. If you mean how do i know you live in UK then you were asking Londenrs where you can get this book. And i knew you live in UK. You told us many times. khalil
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| | Wednesday, October 11, 2000 - 09:54 pm Alipapa: People like yourself should not comment on others' ability to understand and comprehend the English language !!! You wrote... {FYI there is such thing called "figure of speech". In this categories we have simile, metaphor annalogy. I think i don't need to go into details here and teach you what your bastard instructors dind't teach. but my point is to read a book or a sentence, you need to have the basic undersanding of the "abstarct language".} ...and you have the damn nerve to call the people in this forums idiots????????? Talk about "INDHA ADEEG ?" Do us a favour and make use of the built-in dictionary !!!!!!!! Peace
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| | Thursday, October 12, 2000 - 03:49 am Khalil: lol.... I will accpet it but it wasn't rquired. yes bro.. i am a software engineering surviving in a world where everyone n everything is ajinabi.. 
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| | Thursday, October 12, 2000 - 04:10 am Salaam, Hibo; I hope your analyser and debbugers and not any more ajinabi ):- to you !!!. Bye the way ru studying or practising engineer? Yusuf tired of writting IP and Signalling System Nro 7 routines!!
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| | Thursday, October 12, 2000 - 10:13 am Abdul and Anti-idiot, There was this great poet who was nearly kicking at the end of his life when a very young poet picked on him. The great poet didn't argue much with young one trying to score some points. He only said the following words: Cad haduu carada ku dhaco amaba ciidoobo Caqli nimuu ku weyn yahay ma cuno oonta qaarkeede Anigana caruuraha yar yari weyga caynkaase maxaan hebel kala hadlaa caaqil baan ahaye. marka maxaan Abdul iyo anti-idiot kala hadlaa naigu caaqil baan ahaye. And last but not the least ian't molesting you kids. Alipapa,the desert man is not known committing child molesting crime. Please note kids i am belong to heavy-weight boxers while on the other hand, you are on the light-weight division boxers. To challenge me, you gotta make your ways up and come heavy-weight division. Even promoter Don King can't convince me to fight with you kids. so take it easy. i have no appetite to molest children. Alipapa
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| | Thursday, October 12, 2000 - 11:34 am in otherwise you have appetite to molest older childrens.Why do you have to bring the molestation subject at all.Ali baba,therapy is not a bad idea walaaalo!
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| | Thursday, October 12, 2000 - 04:10 pm This Guy is Punch drunk ! AliPaPa You seem to be suffering from acute verbal diarrhoea. Everytime you open your mouth •••• comes out.
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| | Thursday, October 12, 2000 - 10:19 pm Hibo, sis, i can relate to that ajanib story. But hey keep on the good work. Thought Software engineering is not easy,it is promosing and paying off career. get a firm grip Hibo and don't you look back coz you are on your way to success. Good luck hibo.and wished you the best. Khalil
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| | Thursday, October 12, 2000 - 11:54 pm Khalil Who are you? You mentioned that you were classmate to koschin NURUDIN at SIDAM.. so am i!! here is my e-mail adress " hersi10@hotmail.com keep in touch
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| | Monday, October 16, 2000 - 01:36 am nurridin a superb writer....i liked "yesterday, tommorow"...and i don't intend to read secrets after all those reviews....i don't like to check the dictionary couple times every page to understand BIG,"complexified words". it won't be pleasant afterall. there is one instance in "yesterday...", he mentions homosexual act in that book also that i did not personally think was appropriate. however, his audience (westerners) think otherwise. besides, who should censor who when it comes to libral-thinking, and comtemporary writing? no one..... regardless of how offensive it might seem. is their a limit to how far one can go with fiction-writing even after misrepresentation of things? could he not, (farah) himself, be aware of the way he manifested his creative ideas? all i know is i admire him simply because he is good, contemporary writer. in his most recent book "yesterday, tommorow" in so many instances, he identified with his fellow somalis, he seemed emotionally withdrawn and less sympathic to the refugees he interviewed as he was reporting for the CNN, and that made some somalis reluctant to give him behind the scene look of they were going through. whatever expectation one has for a leader or an athlete or a writer in this case, one will disappoint our taste.
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