Humble God
The project title is the literal translation of the subject's name - Irele (humble, from his mother's language - Yoruba) Chukwu (god, from his father's language - Igbo).
In the modern discourse about politic, optics play a great role. Most people don't tend to question information if it comes with a positive message or an emotional content (or both). So if we are told that doing so and so will help change the world for the better, we eagerly do so. Because that makes us feel better about ourselves. However, most big bright slogans come with asterisks, that we choose not to notice. A lot of seemingly small things slip through the cracks. The bigger the crack (pun intended) the bigger the "small things". The subject of this project is one of those.
This is a story about war, about racism, about the way the world is loosing its heart. But most importantly, it is about human strength and relentlessness in the face of that. Irele is a beautiful person I run into around a refugee camp in Poland as we were picking up people to take back with us to the Netherlands, into safety. We had 1 extra space and I was desperate to find one more person. Irele is from Nigeria, he was doing his IT master's in Kharkiv at the moment first bombs landed in the city. He had to flee with only 3 months left of his studies to start all over in a totally new country. As a person of colour he had trouble finding transportation to Lviv and even more so crossing the border. He had to walk all night in a freezing cold only to be let through at the third border post. He ended up living with me and my boyfriend for about 3 months before trying to go and make it completely on his own. I hope he finds what he is looking for.
All the descriptions for the photos are quotes from our conversation.
Circumstances
I am being dealt whatever card belongs to me. I do not see it as being good or bad, it is my card. How I deal with it - is my choice. I don't look at it thinking that life treats me unfairly (even if it is true), I see it as something that I have to face.
Death
Death is a natural phenomenon that we humans decided to make unnatural and become angels of death ourselves. Death comes for people in different ways. I do not think about it, because when it happens to me it is going to be out my control.
My body is my memory
My body has different "faces": there is a colour of it, there is a shape of it, there is a form of it, there is a gender of it. There are different areas that govern what my body is and the memories that come along with it. I am a man of color, but I won't even scratch the surface if I talk about it. I have good genes, I can do sports, there is strength to my body. I like to think of myself as a strong person. My journey out of Ukraine was intense. By the time I got to the Netherlands I had lost 5 kilograms. It took a toll on my body.
Notes on hope and desperation
Hope is that substance in your belly, telling you that something that does not exist will exist. It's that unspoken assurance that you are on the right track. Hope is what we hold on to when nothing exists. Desperation for me is the state when you know that you have to do something next but there just aren't any options. I remember walking to two different borders by foot only to be turned away. Over 20 hours in a freezing cold. Those were desperate times.
The light within
To me happiness is that sense of freedom when my mind, my thoughts are free from worries and challenges. Then I am a happy soul. But I am not always free of mind. Me pushing to acknowledge this issue, trancends it into a necessity and not something that makes me sad - that is me striving for happiness. Darkness does exist. The world is a messed up place in the moment. But I look at the world as my world, knowing that what I give into it is what I'll get back. I can become the victim of this darkness, but I don't see it as my world, it is their world. It does impact me, they are polluting my world, so I have to be creating that much more light in order to cleanse my world.
Leaving in haste
I was hoping people would come together to help each other. But there was panic. We knew the war was coming. To an extent I had some things packed. I had a lot of food stuff in the house. I didn't pack a lot of things, I couldn't take 3-4 boxes with me. I took some clothes, one of my two laptops (and the hard drive of the other one), I took a lot of food (which I am sure at some point will become a meme) that made up about 40% of my bag. I also took my x-box controller with the notion that if in this dark times it so happens that someone has an x-box, here is an extra controller so we could play together.
The uncertainty of the future
Unknown for me has 2 different perspectives. 1. The fact, that you don't know what happens next means there might be something interesting, you look forward to it, you are anxious, you are anticipating. 2. But also not knowing what will be, because it is out of your hands, makes you feel more than a little worried, you are concerned, you are disturbed, it even leaves you sleepless sometimes.
Trust
[When Irele was a child in Nigeria he was rather timid. His family had financial means and he had a bit more of the pocket money than other kids. One day a "friend" stole some money from another boy and told everybody that it was Irele when he was caught. In the face of the teacher he said he didn't do it after his mother reassured everyone that he wouldn't lie. However, his parents did not believe him and he was birched by his father till the point Irele's back was red and bleeding].
This story taught me that no matter how awesome the human being is to you, no matter how much do they care and love you, every human being has a limit to which they can go for you. In my dealings with people when someone is doing something for me I appreciate it so much, but I don't want to get to the end of the rope so I stay cautious
When the bombs hit
Before the war started, social media was overwhelmed with information and it created a scenario where every day you knew it was getting closer, there was no longer any doubt the war will occur. It was a question of when, where and how. You were doing shopping, doing chores, spending your money knowing the war was coming.
When the bombs hit I was at a friend's house and we just thought: "Oh shit. We are screwed". I was disappointed that we as humans couldn't find reconciliation without violence. You can only imagine the devastation that is forthcoming. These days you can google what weapons humanity has and you start to imagine that raining down on you. But I needed to kickstart immediately all the plans to escape and help others.
White shroud
Trying to get out of the country, is when my skin colour became a problem. You don't want to be caught up in the war between two countries that you don't hold allegiance to. When we are desperate, in a very urgent need, that's when we find out who we are as human beings. I don't want to point fingers directly at Ukrainians and judge those who decided to save their own first. Regardless of whether it was right or wrong of them, I needed to get out, even if my skin color was a big issue.