Princess to Princess

Once again, the BBC World Service has managed to thwart my daily plans with one of their captivating interviews. I swear, they need to quit messing with my head AND my schedule.

Today's method of entrapment was an interview with the wildly popular songstress, widely referred to as the "Princess of Africa," Yvonne Chaka Chaka. Whenever I hear that name, I can't help think of "Chaka, Chaka, Chaka, Chaka Khan. Chaka Khan, let me rock you..."

But I digress. This south African singer is a living legend, for a lot of reasons. I just learned through a Google search for her photo that she was the first black South African child to appear on National TV in 1981, on a talent contest. It reminded me of my 1979 High School Senior Year Thesis/Outraged Lament about Apartheid.

So to hear that among her myriad accomplishments, Nelson Mandela calls Yvonne Chaka Chaka "daughter," feels pretty vicariously amazing. I bet that little girl belting her guts out on her path towards history never could have imagined that day would come. And just like with Sierra Leone's Foreign Affairs Minister Zainab Bangura, Yvonne's mother insisted on education, even though she was a mouthy little rascal who almost got her mother fired from her job as a maid.

Again, I could relate. Not with being mouthy, but with having a mother who who was a maid. Apparently, little Yvonne had the audacity to ask the white South African lady of the manor why she and her mother lived in one-room squalor, while Mrs Afrikaaner and her Krew were rocking a spacious crib. Yvonne recalled her mother snatching her up and warning her not to make "her White lady" mad.

I like a kid with spunk. I mean, she wasn't being bratty, she just noticed the blatant inequities and inquired about them. I was such a mute, shy child, I would never in a million years have done something like that. Sure, I've made up for it in recent decades, but back then....

Anyway, there are two main reasons I admire Yvonne Chaka Chaka, based on what I've heard about her in recent years and on today's BBC report. First, the woman seems intensely sincere about wanting to use her fame and fortune to help improve conditions for women and children in Africa. Everything thing I've read and seen about her always leads me to that conclusion. She seems to work just as hard raising awareness about issues like HIV/AIDS and fistula and poverty, and girls' education, as she does when performing her powerful African melodies.

But something Yvonne related in this morning's story intrigued me even more. While her mother insisted she get an education and have a career, she would have preferred that Yvonne become a lawyer. Something a bit more respectable than being an entertainer. Still, I'm sure Mom had to be proud of her...but apparently, only up to a point. You see, Yvonne had already achieved a significant amount of fame when Nelson Mandela came calling one day, a few years after he was released from prison and was President of South Africa. He wanted Yvonne to sing at an ANC event, and even wrote her a letter afterwards, making the request more formal.

Yvonne's moher was absolutely terrified that someone would find that letter and link the family to the ANC. You can't blame the woman for being afraid...she had lived her entire life under the insanely cruel injustice of Apartheid. Even though it seemed those days were over, her mother wasn't taking any chances. She didn't want any evidence of an ANC affiliation lying around so...

She ordered Yvonne to EAT the letter from Nelson Mandela. To literally chew it and swallow it. Get rid of any proof it ever existed.

And Yvonne obeyed.

But from where I sit, it looks like that dramatic concession to fear may have been the ultimate fuel. Yvonne deepened her link with Mandela, and rose to stratospheric heights of stardom on the African continent. Something tells me she's not afraid of much of anything anymore, especially when you have friends like Madiba.

Sounds just like a proud, feisty princess, to me. Yet again, I can relate.