“What an elder sees while sitting, a youngster standing on a mountain may never see.”
– African Proverb
This proverb hits differently when you really sit with it for a while. I used to wonder — what are elders seeing that the youth don’t see?
The answer: maybe they’ve lived? They’ve seen heartbreak, joy, loss, miracles, setbacks, love, and more. They carry a thousand life times of wisdom — not learned from printed pages but earned through experience.
During the Witness Program, something beautiful happened.
We didn’t just sit in front of screens or textbooks. We immersed ourselves in African literature, songs, stories, dance, and rhythms that speak louder than printed words ever could.
We learned not just with our heads but with our hearts.
My “siblings” from both Ghana and the USA made a bold decision to find out to step out of our comfort zones, leave behind our fears, and embrace an unknown adventure.
We have no clear roadmap. No promises. But we say to ourselves, 'Que sera, sera whatever will be, will be.'
There’s a song by Osibisa that echoed the heart of our journey, “We are going, Heaven knows where we are going
We know we will
. We will know we're there...
It will be hard, we know
and the road will be muddy and rough
but we'll get there…”
https://youtu.be/yIKDlLrNch8
It wasn’t just music, it was our anthem. Through challenges, joy, exhaustion, and breakthroughs, this song reminded us as the Witness Tree cohort 1 that we’re going and we’ll get there.
I’ve heard it too often:, “If you want to hide something from the African, put it in a book.”
It used to sting. I thought it meant we just don’t like reading. But the truth runs deeper than that.
It doesn’t mean we’re not curious. It means our stories, our truths, haven’t always been written in ink. They’ve been sung, danced, drummed, and spoken into generations.
Reading isn’t just about flipping pages. Africans have always read; just in ways often overlooked. We read the beat of the drum and movement.
' Glem to, Glem to , Glem to - to- to, Gi- dim, Gin - Ga.
We read stories passed through songs.
We read proverbs, riddles, poetry, and symbols.
Some learn by hearing. Some by seeing. Some by doing.
So yes, we read. And our libraries aren’t just buildings. They are people. They are moments. They are our way of life!