Essence of DOPE
Posts tagged Brown Condor
The Ethiopian Determined to be the Next Barack Obama
12 days
by teddyfikre
in Uncategorized
I know one day Ethiopians will realize that they are better-off being united than working apart and against each other.
by Samuel Getachew dated: Thursday, May 17th, 2012
(from Huffington Post) In a city like Washington D.C. that has a large Ethiopian American population, it is a controversial radio personality that may just make the biggest symbolic impact. Tewodros “Teddy” Fikre, a D.C.-based popular internet radio host is on the verge of announcing a run for the U.S. Congress in the eighth Congressional District in the Commonwealth of Virginia.
The idea of even making such a bold attempt places the young and ambitious entrepreneur in the historical journey of Ethiopians, as he becomes the very first to try such a daring feat.
The 37 year old Ethiopian-born, Virginia-raised entrepreneur and community organizer knows the challenge he has before him; however, he takes solace in knowing the story of Barack Obama. He admires President Obama and his great political journey. Teddy knows all too well that Obama started from a place of obscurity. In his often imperfect Amharic, Teddy has been preaching—every night on his popular blog and radio show—about the virtue of being engaged in American politics to a population that is transfixed mostly with Ethiopian politics.
In the great mass of Ethiopians, estimated to be in the hundreds of thousands in the U.S., Teddy sees great potential for America’s newest immigrants, and a potential powerful voting block in the mold of (more…)
Copper Wire
44 days
by teddyfikre
in Uncategorized
I am no longer going to transmit negative energy with my Brown Wires, I will instead transmit the change I seek and spread hope with Copper Wires::
by Teddy (CW) Fikre dated: Monday, May 15th, 2012 BC
Jesus walked the desert for 40 days; 85% of Christians know this fact. Jesus was tempted by the devil, 10% of Christians know this fact. The devil was not Lucifer, the devil that tempted Christ was Jesus himself—only 5% of Christians know this fact. To be honest, it was not until a righteous brother revealed the last fact to me by dropping Biblical knowledge that the scales from my eyes were shed. This scholastic prophet transcended my soul from the 10% squad to the 5% crew. This is a story of fractions and wires; this is a chronicle of intermittent steps and the search of enlightenment that always leads to the next iteration of illumination.
This world is a beautiful place if you choose to accept her splendor in between the crevices of feces that we at times smell life out to be. We are all interconnected and inter-meshed—most of us are sheep while the enlightened few are shepherds. I am far from a shepherd; if I was I would not react with vitriol with each perceived slight. I am a sheep that bleats and bleeds each time a staff is injected in my soul—I guess you can say I have staff infection. I am perfecting my walk even as I continue to fall to the same devil that Jesus almost succumbed to. The war at the end of the day is within us; before fundamentalists hijacked the word “Jihad”, jihad was a concept of fighting a battle within and overcoming our innate evil nature with our virtuous self.
This leads me to a conversation I shared this evening with a good friend. This man—he will go unnamed—is the one person that keeps me in awe with intellect. I always brag about getting the last arat netib in any conversation; this fella not only gets the last arat netib, he writes the last paragraph because he is humble and free-thinking. This prophet also spoke words of truth that shook my soul much the same way that Andrew Fingall did yesterday—further proof that God keeps placing people in my life for reasons that I finally understand. He told me that I am blessed with knowledge but that my downfall is pride. People who are blessed with knowledge stand at the precipice of full cognition and can make history if they (more…)
Walk that Walk
06 days
by teddyfikre
in Uncategorized
I shall focus on self and hope that others follow my lead not by my dictum but based on the examples I set forth::
by Teddy (imperfect) Fikre dated: Sunday, May 13th, 20212
Irony! Funny how we all delve and dwell in between the bed sheets of hypocrisy. Often, those who preach the most are guilty of the very same sins they seek to outcast others for. This fact is true from the inception of humanity; we are all guilty of the devil’s touch where we put on the clothe of invisibility and search out souls to burn to the core for their malfeasance even as we continue to smell like feces concurrently throwing stones at the foreheads of the endless victims. We act like Jesus at times; always seeking to sanctify others and absolve them from their sins while acting like Lucifer by never acknowledging and bearing witness to our own limitations and iniquities.
This epiphany of my own hypocrisy was rendered on my conscience this morning with a profound conversation I shared with my fraternity brother Andrew Fingall. Andrew and I have war stories from George Mason University when we were both undergraduate “Ques”. We traveled to many states and shared almost as many fables as David Jonathan—we are bonded for life and we are true friends to the core. When my heart was broken, it was Andrew I turned for wisdom and counsel. In my moments of weakness, Andrew lifted me up not by judging me or by telling me how to walk that walk. Rather, Andrew just stood in place of my misery and gave me a bible as he outlined the verse and chapter for me to read. To this day, I hold dear and near that Bible he gave me as a remembrance of my most tender moments and a memory of a friend who gave me an embrace of (more…)
Badme for Assab
08 days
by teddyfikre
in Uncategorized
We are at the precipice of death—we stand at the gates of infernal hell—simply because we refuse to cooperate and believe in compromise::
by Teddy Fikre dated: Friday, May 11th, 2012
Here I go again about to make a rational offer between Ethiopians and Eritreans. I am about to extend a hand of a friendship and make an offer where both sides win and both sides save face—in the process ensure that a needless war does not break out where thousands of lives are not lost needlessly. I am about to make a broad offer where not only would both sides save face and lives but where both sides prosper as they enter into an agreement where both would reap an economic windfall. In other words, I am about to offer a solution that involves compromise.
What? Why are you laughing? Yes, I said compromise eko! Ere, why oh why are you chuckling? Jesus, man my friend Mimi was right, the word “compromise” does not exist in the Habesha lexicon. This article is pretty much going to be as useful as the paper it is written on—this might as well be a counterfeit chronicle. Alas, I shall push forward and offer the compromise nonetheless in hopes that a few people would see the folly of winning at all cost and see the value of compromise. They say that politics is the art of compromise; in Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Africa as a whole, compromise is the art of genocide. Given this fact, I shall make a concession that offers both sides losing and both sides winning and see where the dirkosh falls.
So here is my offer. Ethiopia gives Badme back to Eritrea and in return Eritrea gives back Assab to Ethiopia. Oh lord; here goes the angry ranting of the lynch mob! Ethiopians all over Starbucks are at this present moment spitting up the “Yigerachief” buna as they call me “banda” while Eritreans are calling me a neo-colonial Woyane as they sip their bun. They do this reflexively because to them giving up an inch is akin to betraying their motherland and selling out their soul. Never mind that both Ethiopia and Eritrea are suffering innumerable misfortunes while they spend ungodly amounts on “national defense”. Did you know that Ethiopia spends (more…)
Of Oromo and Insults
310 days
by teddyfikre
in Uncategorized
It’s crazy how we have adopted a true insult like Habesha while we continue to use beautiful words like Oromo, Woyane, and Guragaye as insults::
by Teddy (kilija) Fikre dated: Thursday, May 10th, 2012
As exhausted as I am at this exact moment from a day’s worth of hustling as though I was a Guragaye sheep seller, I felt compelled to write this article due to the injury I caused a dear friend last evening. Alas, the injury I caused this dear friend of mine was precisely the type of gratuitous slur I just hurled at the proud Guragaye people of Ethiopia. After a life that has hurled at me more insults than I can count, I have learned to take the hurtful intentions of people and turn silly comments into trite jokes to lessen the slings and arrows of stereotypes that people in position of power hurl at those without clout in order to perpetuate a cycle of inferiority complexes and superiority reflexes.
I don’t think anyone in their right mind can accuse me of being a bigot. I have throughout my life stood up for those who have been oppressed and those who have been subjected to humiliation from those who live in the lap of luxury. Maybe it’s because I feel a certain responsibility as an Amhara—a people that many insist are the powers that be in Ethiopia—even though I grew up as close to the lap of luxury as Mitt Romney’s dog grew up in luxury as he drove shivering in a tinder box from America to Canada on the roof of Mitt’s car. The truth is, we Amharas have been given a bad rap—our people have bled and died the same as other ethnic groups in Ethiopia. We too have suffered pain and agony—my father grew up without a father because his father was murdered by Haile Selassie. So when I say that I too, as an Amhara, know the discomforts of being plagued by the powers that be—my stories of agony should not be (more…)