Complicated Legacy

My life has fallen apart pretty magnificently lately, although you wouldn't necessarily know it from my blogging. I made a promise to myself to write on faith every day for a year, and, much like my time with Proust, I'm determined to keep my promise. Truthfully, it also helps to distract me from personal problems. It has kept me from devoting much time to discussing my recent trip to Namibia, which, as I've said, was epic. I mentioned the complicated colonial legacy of Namibia before; it started out as a German colony before passing to the British and eventually to independence three decades ago (and it's not nearly that simple).  You can really see the lingering German influence in cities like Swakopmund, and not simply because of all the German tourists. On my one full day in Swakopmund, when I didn't end up going on my scheduled flight up and down the Skeleton Coast, I came across a monument dating back to the German days. The statue, dating from 1908 and known as the Marine Denkmal, celebrated the German suppression of a revolt against colonial rule led by the Herero and Nama ethnic groups. Obviously, one group's hero is another group's oppressor. You can clearly see the red paint that was recently sprayed on the statue by protectors who don't appreciate the celebration of colonial rule. If anything, it made the monument more real and more powerful, and shows that colonialism and decolonialism are an organic, and painful, process.