The Dalai Lama and the Land of the Zulus....?

OK folks - here's where we get a little serious. Recently, South Africa pulled the welcome mat from under the Dalai Lama. There's a whole lot more to this than meets the eye, and in a way, it reflects on the book, White Shaka Boy.......

Read on - it's an eye-opener!

Owned by China: South Africa, Dalai Lama and.............America?

By Alan Brody

When South Africa disinvited the Dalai Lama from their Peace Conference on Monday, they did a lot more than become the laughing stock of the Civilized World. They signaled that China is the New Colonial Master of the Universe.

The Great Game is afoot again but only China seems to be playing. And this time, they are making up the rules: be bloodless, as invisible as possible and try to dominate world’s resources. So when the economy recovers and we need commodities again - guess who will be naming the price? And if China decides to call in our national debt, who will we be working for, Mr. Obama?

The South Africa incident is just the first, indirect public display of China’s ten-year resource invasion of the 3rd World. In the land of Mandela, sports officials, exhilarated at hosting the 2010 World Cup Soccer Games call on the Man of the Mandala. With billions invested in stadiums, housing and airport infrastructure, the country is ready to take their seat as the New Africa’s finest at the table of leading nations. So their three Nobel Peace laureates, Nelson Mandela, Bishop Tutu and F.W De Klerk grandly invite the Dalai Lama to join their showcase Peace Conference to let the World know - it’s more than soccer. They’ve arrived!

Then the government, under President Kgalema Motlanthe, very casually informs the World that the Dalai Lama is not welcome because his issues with China “will distract attention from the games.” Amazingly, even the South African Business Press is taken by surprise asking essentially how much business does China do that they would sell their prized moral status down the river? According to South Africa’s Business Day, China only purchases 20% of their commodities. They actually suggested that China needs South Africa more than they need China.

Wake up fellas – you are in post-20th Century, post apartheid-liberation denial. Europe is fading, the US has been leaving town. China is your leading trading partner at over $50+ billion and they just opened a $500 million investment fund in your backyard. What has Tibet done for you lately, anyway?

That South Africa just didn’t see it coming is testament to their economy’s diversity and advanced infrastructure. China’s influence is barely visible, showing up only in banks and lines of credit. So when China dropped $3.6bn in South Africa in 2006 - it was for a chunk of Standard Bank – the bank with Africa’s biggest reach.

But elsewhere in Africa, where there is little development, China’s simple goal – extract resources and cut out competition – is plain to see. They will pay off whomever they need to build whatever infrastructure it takes to get raw material “A” to port “B” to get it to Chinese factory “C.” In the truly impoverished but resource-rich countries, the locals see the new mines, the hydropower dam and one new road with the trucks driving their booty directly to the port. Scads of Chinese engineers show up, learn the language and do the job. Chinese food becomes available in the jungle, the locals get a lowly job or two and ton of Chinese manufactured goods which obliterate most local manufacture. However, Presidents stay in power, new Palaces and luxury cars appear and numbered accounts are opened.

In the Democratic Republic of Congo they have done something no western colonialist has done – built roads into the jungle – swapping some $6 billion for raw materials. They are developing mines and even planning a $60 billion dam that will tower over the colossal 3 Gorges Dam in China. In Nigeria, they put $8 billion into hydropower, and in Kenya, $580 million into dams. In Zimbabwe it is whatever weapons Mugabe needs to stay in power. China is the biggest investor in the Angola’s oil bonanza - putting our easy access to a huge spigot of Atlantic Ocean oil in question. In Darfur, you might want to ask who is funding the oil pipeline?

When I visited South Africa in 2005 to research my book, White Shaka Boy, a kind parable of western neo-colonialism, the only hint I saw of China was in the malls. Almost every product – except the local foodstuffs – were identical to those we found in America. The only reason we scooped up bargains is because we have opposite seasons, as theirnsummer approached, my family loaded up on winter closeouts to take back home.

If it were not for the seasonal arbitrage, the prices would have been about the same as the US. The brands were either exactly the same or jarringly similar. The products however, were exactly the same because, guess what - they are all made in China just like ours. Welcome to the Great Wall Mart, folks……..

Yet, just 10 years earlier when I had visited South Africa – before China began its great resource grab - there were few Supermalls and the products on sale were truly different. Clothing and furnishings were locally made. They were cheap and had genuine African and Indian influences or unique interpretations of European design. Now it’s all world brand/world design and made - in China. From clothes to housewares to electronics – almost every local attempt at manufacture has been hollowed out. Africans are now shopkeepers like everyone else in the world with mostly small scale and specialty manufacturing, assemblers of goods made elsewhere and producers of foodstuffs and of course, raw materials

Like Americans, South Africans have also been blinded to China’s encroachment because the visible side of overseas investment was in Real Estate - fueled by oil money. The northern coastal land, once relegated to sugar cane fields, was being rapidly transformed into luxury housing and resort complexes. The area on the KwaZulu/Natal coast where my Graphic Novel is set, is the site of South Africa’s leading filmmakers’ own multimillion dollar Miami-style real estate play - funded by Middle East money.

Yet event that has faded – the massive $500 million theme park – AmaZulu World, once planned by a Dubai company for the very area where my story is set on the Zulu coast, fell off the map when oil prices plummeted.

China however, remains.

Our only trump card is that Africans like us and they love the fact that we have an African America president. They create Rap on their laptops, wear Yankees caps, Knicks t-shirts and acquire our products wherever they can. Except that they are almost always made in China. So even if we decided to create a kind of African Marshall Plan to grow both continents economies, we’d very quickly discover the new Bamboo Curtain

That’s dark side of the Great New Game which we will see when the economy picks up again. As we need fresh commodities, those checks drawn on the money we borrowed, will all be made out to China at the prices they are likely to dictate. And it is not just Africa - if the Dalai Lama were to keynote a Peace Conference in most of Latin America, my guess is he’d find the welcome mat just as quickly removed. They’ve been dong the same thing there…….

So thank you Mr. Motlanthe, you just informed us of not only of who you’re working for, but who we’ll be working for: and it’s not Uncle Sam, because right now, he too is getting his paycheck from China.

White Shaka Spawns Educational Conference

Following the intense interest by schools and libraries in White Shaka, the author and publisher developed a conference with Fordham University in NY entitled: Graphica in Education.

The first conference on Jan 31 was a great success - opening the door to understanding how schools are actually using graphical oriented material in the classroom.

Read about it:

School Library Journal

Fordham University Report

or go the website at www.graph-ed.com

The Obama Shaka vs. The Zulu Shaka

The Shaka Hand vs Shaka Zulu

What could be more different than the name of a ferocious Zulu Chief and a laid back, hang-cool hand symbol from Hawaii?

Yet they’re both called Shaka.

Thanks to president elect Obama, those two entirely different worlds just came together, when our next commander-in-chief gave the hand signal.

Welcome to the unified field theory – Africa style.

Shaka Boy Spawns Graphic Novels in Education Conference - Jan. 31

Due to the interest in White Shaka Boy by Schools and libraries, author Alan Brody and the publishers, ViziPress are producing an extraordinary new conference with Fordham University in New York City, on Sat Jan. 31 entitled Graphica in Education.

Meet some of the best thinkers, educators and creators in this fascinating intersection between art, literature and education.

Experts are suggesting that a new generation growing up in a highly visual video internet environment seem to perceive information in a new way and they seem to be especially responsive to graphically delivered information. For more information vist our website at http://www.graph-ed.com.

Some of the confirmed speakers are:

James Bucky Carter, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of English Education at the University of Texas at El Paso. His work focuses on literacy issues and popular culture’s connections to education. His work has appeared in Marvels and Tales, ImageTexT, and International Journal of Comic Art. He has taught middle school, high school, community college, and university courses. He is the editor of Building Literacy Connections with Graphic Novels: Page by Page, Panel by Panel, which advises middle and high school teachers ideas on how to use graphic novels in their classrooms.

Dr. Michael Bitz, Ed.D., is the founder of The Comic Book Project and co-founder of the Youth Music Exchange is an internationally recognized innovator in education and is the first recipient of the Mind Trust fellowship in educational entrepreneurship. He was awarded the Distinguished Alumni Early Career Award from Teachers College, Columbia University and is the author of two forthcoming books: Manga High (Harvard Education Press) and When Commas Meet Kryptonite (Teachers College Press).

John Shableski Diamond Book Distributors

Ali T. Kokmen, Del Rey Manga/Random House Publishing Group

www.graph-ed.com.

White Shaka's First South African Review: Great Read

This review gives us a big thumb's up!

Heerlike avontuur maak a lekker lees.

Translation:
THIS ADVENTURE MAKES A GREAT READ

I was really taken by White Shaka Boy.

The author lives in New York but he grew up in Durban.

The history behind the book is so interesting it is worth reading it for that alone.

But before you think it is boring listen to how the story goes: Brad Mahon is a white guy from Brooklyn who dreams of being a rapper.

Before he can become a student he discovers he is filthy rich. The college admissions tell him that his great-great grandfather was a Zulu chief.

When he gets to South Africa things turn out to be pretty dangerous and the strife gets ugly.

Luckily, he makes friends who help him deal with the situation: a beautiful lawyer, Busi, the attractive Zulu girl who captivates Brad, Mu his musical sidekick and Mwazi, the male nurse who is also a witch-doctor.

Brad's music becomes the key to solving the problem....

The book comes with a great accompanying music CD. If you can get your hnds on it, you'll enjoy it.

I am looking forward to Vol. 2

Clarissa Grobler
Volksblad
(People's Paper)

White Shaka in the News - The Inquirer Profile

Author Alan Brody and the White Shaka story are profiled in the Scarsdale Inquirer.

[If you are unable to read this click here.]

Who is White Shaka?

White Shaka is a kind of Barack Obama-in reverse story based on an actual historical occurrence in South Africa in the mid 19th Century.

A white settler, already versed in the ways of the Zulu's was invited by the Paramount Chief, or King, to become a chief with a huge swath of land, his own army and 49 wives.

At one point, he controlled 10 of the 13 Chieftanships of Zululand.

White Shaka Trailer

In his time he created a great fortune, had a fallout with the King but flourished for years afterwards as a local chief. After he died, his wealth was lost and his 100+ mixed race descendants suddenly found themselves in a very uncomfortable position - not very welcome among full-blooded Zulus and not welcome at all among whites.

Many left for other provinces. Some went overseas - the lightest-skinned ones passing for whites in Europe and the U.S.

White Shaka is about one of them, in Brooklyn, NY who discovers his heritage and goes back to claim it only to find him immersed in the wars and great historical conflicts of Africa and the West, all played out in the stunning backdrop of Zululand (now KwaZulu).

Book Release Date April 19, 2008