ALBINOS: The Fairest in the land.

I have this albino friend, we were in the same Faulty in the University. We had exchanged pleasantries a few times, but confessed later on that he never really took notice of me. But I had always noticed him, everywhere he went. He was so easy to see and still is.

I think one of the most beautiful sight I have ever beheld was watching a mother bathing her albino toddler. The young child was swift in all things. His skin was as clear as gold and had no single "ntupo" (spot).

I don't know if I would have ever noticed my albino friend if he was not so fair. After all, there were hundreds of other guys in my Faulty. Or the mother bathing her child, had the child not being albino. A mother bathing her child in the open is a very common sight.

I don't know. Maybe their light skin is irresistable to see. It's like free advertising.

Eyes cannot help but to gaze upon an attraction. So after albinos catch our eye, then what? Maybe albinos can make the most of this. They can prove that they are more than their skin color and show us what they are beyond it.

Today is International Albinos Day. I do not know what the celebration or commenmoration is really about. I do not know if it is a celebration of the "albino-skinned", or if it is a day to remember the plight of Albinos all over the world.

If the day is in honor of the former, I wonder if there is an glory in being albino. And if it is for the latter, it is saddening that ill can come to one just because of a variation in their pigmentation.

Racism is different. Albinos are our people, they know no other culture, people or tradition. They are no different. If we gather in the dark, not the sound of their voice, or the words of their mouth, or the sound of their breath, or the feel of their skin, or the smell of their sweat, or anything whatsoever would give them away as "the albinos".

Maybe the gods try to prove that they understand the full splendour of color. So with pride, they created the dark and the darker, the brown, the fair and the fairer and the very white, white as snow. With blood running through all our veins. Giving no greater blessing nor laying curse based on color. But in other things, variations of strength and weakness arise.

I have seen albinos in different walks of life - traders, bankers, academicans, diplomants, civil servants, etc. Their life and lifestyle connote nothing else. The albinoism is only in description,asides that, nothing else. It does not alter them better or worse in knowledge, ideas, behavior, intelligence, dreams or aspirations.

I have seen albinos of different ages too. They age and shrink just like everyone else. So they have prolonged lives as well, unless something (unrelated to skin color) cuts it short. Don't be too quick to say skin cancer. Skin cancer is not the exclusive reserve of albinos.

Some shine in the rays of being the fairest in the land. They live in its beauty. They have distinguished themselves in their chosen field of endeavour. They stand up for themselves and call on others to arise too, for the world belongs to us all.