A WHITE TRAVELERS IMPRESSION OF SOMALIS

[Caashaqa]

HE HAS A BLOG OF HIS TRAVELS TO DJIBOUTI, ETHIOPIA, AND SOMALILAND

"Cafeterias line this road in Hargeysa, and all eyes are on me as throngs of Somalis sit in their plastic chairs and listen to the radios. There are no televisions around. Dinner was three samosas and a Fanta for a whopping US dollar's worth of Shillings. The Somali who led me around, surprisingly, didn't ask for a tip. Just by that gesture I knew he wasn't Ethiopian.

We walked back to the hotel. "May I ask you a question?" he said, and then without waiting for my response, proceeded: "What do you think of Somali people?"
I never had the chance to answer him as we walked to the reception in the hotel and I handed over a wad of money – US$6 for the room; it's a double room.

But if I had answered his question. The Somalis: physically, they are often rather tall, skinny, with slightly distorted facial features like an overbite, long chins, and deep set eyes. My instincts tell me they are odd; if you want one word to describe them and their appearance, use "crazy". It's the single word I've heard the most often in reponse to the Somali people:

"Said is crazy." – Ahmed in Djibouti.
"Crazy man..." – The driver of the Land Cruiser after he spoke to the first Somali checkpoint guard.
"They are a bit crazy." – secretary at business centre of Sheraton Hotel in Djibouti.

The Somalian I met on my first night in Djibouti would often grunt in between sentences and shake his head as if to get rid of something inside of it. Somalis are not intellectuals; Somalis are not entirely rational. I will go out on a limb here and say they rely more on their instincts than the other, more colonialized, African ethnic groups.

The Somalis are the people in Africa who have most abruptly rejected any colonial influence, their anarchy in the east a return to ancient tribal warfare. They are devoutly muslim people. They are African, and harbour no outsider's interference in their destiny.

Crazy indeed. Perhaps. But the Somalis are Africans at their most base. They want to do things their way. They will learn through their own mistakes. They will find a purely African solution to their problems.

.....Or, perhaps, I'm wrong. It will be years, even decades, before we find out. But rest assured on one point, and I am certain of this: rationality as we know it in post-European colonies is nonexistent in the Somali mentality. These people think differently. Sometimes talking to them is like talking to a mental patient. And this renders them and their land unpredictable.

That is my first impression, at least. Let's see if it changes during my desperately short visit to this 'secret' country."

http://travel.seanrorison.com/somali.html

[BlackVelvet]

Ufff who cares. He can shove his blog up his meed looking backside

[Adali]

[Caashaqa]

"The Somalian I met on my first night in Djibouti would often grunt in between sentences and shake his head as if to get rid of something inside of it"

[burcaawi14]

lool " Sometimes talking to them is like talking to a mental patient."

[thehappyone]

Just by that gesture I knew he wasn't Ethiopian.

dpmo

[LiquidHYDROGEN]

HE HAS A BLOG OF HIS TRAVELS TO DJIBOUTI, ETHIOPIA, AND SOMALILAND

"Cafeterias line this road in Hargeysa, and all eyes are on me as throngs of Somalis sit in their plastic chairs and listen to the radios. There are no televisions around. Dinner was three samosas and a Fanta for a whopping US dollar's worth of Shillings. The Somali who led me around, surprisingly, didn't ask for a tip. Just by that gesture I knew he wasn't Ethiopian.

We walked back to the hotel. "May I ask you a question?" he said, and then without waiting for my response, proceeded: "What do you think of Somali people?"
I never had the chance to answer him as we walked to the reception in the hotel and I handed over a wad of money – US$6 for the room; it's a double room.

But if I had answered his question. The Somalis: physically, they are often rather tall, skinny, with slightly distorted facial features like an overbite, long chins, and deep set eyes. My instincts tell me they are odd; if you want one word to describe them and their appearance, use "crazy". It's the single word I've heard the most often in reponse to the Somali people:

"Said is crazy." – Ahmed in Djibouti.
"Crazy man..." – The driver of the Land Cruiser after he spoke to the first Somali checkpoint guard.
"They are a bit crazy." – secretary at business centre of Sheraton Hotel in Djibouti.

The Somalian I met on my first night in Djibouti would often grunt in between sentences and shake his head as if to get rid of something inside of it. Somalis are not intellectuals; Somalis are not entirely rational. I will go out on a limb here and say they rely more on their instincts than the other, more colonialized, African ethnic groups.

The Somalis are the people in Africa who have most abruptly rejected any colonial influence, their anarchy in the east a return to ancient tribal warfare. They are devoutly muslim people. They are African, and harbour no outsider's interference in their destiny.

Crazy indeed. Perhaps. But the Somalis are Africans at their most base. They want to do things their way. They will learn through their own mistakes. They will find a purely African solution to their problems.

.....Or, perhaps, I'm wrong. It will be years, even decades, before we find out. But rest assured on one point, and I am certain of this: rationality as we know it in post-European colonies is nonexistent in the Somali mentality. These people think differently. Sometimes talking to them is like talking to a mental patient. And this renders them and their land unpredictable.

That is my first impression, at least. Let's see if it changes during my desperately short visit to this 'secret' country."

http://travel.seanrorison.com/somali.html

The levels of condescension are staggering.

[Basra-]

After reading the words of the "traveler" - I have concluded it is not a white person writing this garbage. It is a Somali/Djiboutian westerner who visited Somaliland. But I could be wrong as he did analyze Somalis well. They are Instinctive rather than Intellectual. They don't have a colonial, slavery mentality. They are crazy. (this last part kinda gave it away that it was a Somali saying these things. Because, I felt like calling or using words like "Crazy" out of millions of words to describe Somalis was a bit too kind; there was a touch congenial, filial love in the crazy calling that I had to associate it with the Djiboutian roaming in this God forsaken Somalinet site.

[burcaawi14]

This actually gives me great pride. Since when were the norms and customs of the white man universal. How can he come to us, in our land, and call us inferior while not even being able to speak or understand our native tongue. We don't need to assimilate with the white mans world.This proves that somalis are the only race that can and will never be psychologically colonised. We refused to follow the rest of Africa in their post colonial mentallity.

[YummyMummy]

Caddaan baa sidaa u hadlaya, wadhwadh!
White people have no culture, FACT!

[Basra-]

Caddaan baa sidaa u hadlaya, wadhwadh!
White people have no culture, FACT!

What about the aristocratic British Whites? Regency and Victorian era is the hottest culture there is.

[YummyMummy]

Cultures live on darling. They changed and modernised so much that they lost all o fthat. You think the cadaan neighbours most of us have reflect anything from that era? Pfft!

[burcaawi14]

It's 2014 and they still don't wash their ceeb marka ee suuliga isticmaalaan..uff

[Methylamine]

He's mad because Somalis weren't subservient to him like other Africans

[Caashaqa]

THIS MAN SPEAKS HIS MIND AND THE TRUTH LOOK AT WHAT HE SAID ABOUT THEY ISRAELIS AND PALESTINIANS

"And indeed the word 'apartheid' would pop into my head again as I passed through the checkpoint, me thinking I am deep in the territory of the Palestinians; and indeed I was, yet what would happen to pass before me but a massive Israeli Egged bus, their bus system, all air-conditioned and finely painted, taking Israelis to and from their settlements perched on hills and surrounded by chain link here in the West Bank. Indeed the irony is immense: the Palestinians are corralled like cattle, forced into limited living areas by their conquerors; yet the conquerors themselves, living in such an insecure part of the world, unable to make peace with their conquered spoils, are forced into very similar gated communities. On the surface at least, this is what it appears to be."

http://travel.seanrorison.com/israel6.html