And It Stands in the Grey of the City II

It’s still very small and frail, kindly supported by two sturdy wooden posts and strong ropes. You almost overlook it on your way when passing by. Only a miniature memorial stone embedded by low concrete kerbs in the form of an arrow points to it. In fact, I saw the stone first, and then I followed the arrow, my gaze lingering over the brown mossy grass before I spotted the little tree. There are three or four leaves still dangling from it, light green and lost. You wait till spring, little tree, I thought, and you will be stronger and full of leaves, and you will grow.

The stone was placed there and the tree planted in remembrance of Wangari Muta Maathai, the Kenyan environmental and political activist and first African woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. Again I looked up at the little tree, and I was moved by its symbolic strength and by the hope it emanated in the falling rain around me. I had just read a very idiotic and backward article by one of Germany’s allegedly most respected authors over lunch, an article so condescending and ignorant it made me sad. The author moaned and mourned over the course of things in our world and over how it had all been better in the olden days. Instead of proposing creative solutions against loathed developments, she merely accused. How much better it is to make use of the possibilities we have and to look forward, I thought, and I was grateful for the little tree and the memorial stone and people like Wangari Maathai on the day that Nelson Mandela, whose struggle against apartheid inspired his own country and many far beyond its borders, was being paid common tribute in Soweto.

I walked on, and when I entered the big square building I had mentioned some days ago and passed the bulky Christmas tree with its shiny baubles in the lobby, I gave it a wink. It almost felt as if it winked back.