My Diary (now after then)

Hello Everyone,

First I’d like to (re)introduce myself. My name’s Renée. I started blogging a few years ago. I posted a couple of articles, but then, almost suddenly, my life completely changed, and I stopped blogging. In reality, I think I didn’t have the maturity to start something like that, that requires dedication and discipline. And, more importantly, I needed to have something interesting to say.

Back then, I lived in New York. I’ve actually lived in every New York neighborhood (or almost in): in Spanish Harlem, in Queens - the Korean/Greek neighborhood part of Queens, in the Upper West Side – Manhattan, and before leaving the States to come back to Africa, I was living in Brooklyn, in the artsy area of Clinton Washington. What’s great about living in NYC is the availability and promiscuity with everything : eating fusion argentinan-japanese sushi in the middle of the night, going to see Swan Lake at the theatre on Friday night before going to small, smoky free style jazz concert downtown, and getting fresh vegetables and bread at the farmers market in Union Square during the week-end before meeting up girlfriends for a nice window shopping in the 3 B’s (Barney, Bendel & Bloomingdales) after brunch.

Shopping is second nature of any new-yorker, whether (s)he realizes it or not. Simply because needs are constantly created at the sight of the latest ad campaign inciting us to get the new (magical) face cream that will make our skin glow like never before. So I, predictibly, became a lover of shopping – just for the sake of shopping. The Japanese have their tea ceremony ; I had Soho.

Now, a few years later, this life seems long past. I’m now a mom of two wonderfully girly daughters and wife of a very seriously professional man, who values work ethnics and result-productivity…. I still can’t believe we make a good match and, to this day, that we’re still in love because we’re soooo different ! Maybe, it’s because we never get bored… who knows; but it works.

Nonetheless, life in Africa has been quite a lot adaptation. 

Remember that movie « Lost in translation »? This is how I often feel in this microcosme of pseudo-modern Africa, where tradition and modernity often clash, leading to a weird cocktail that actually finally works (once you’ve grasped the do’s and donts and whys). After all, I am African.  I’m supposed to be completely fluent in « weird » (yes, it is a language !). But I sometimes need to just go to an empty room, close the door, and scream the hell out of my lungs to decompress. Hence, the decision to go back to blogging ! I hope this diary won’t just be about stuff that makes me mad ; actually, I want it to be more of a testimony of what it is to be a modern African woman, who has lived most of her adult life out of the continent, and who has come back with her head full of illusions and fantasies, and who is now facing the reality of her people.

OF COURSE, I’ll also speak about style and fashion. I'll share my little DIY secrets. When I first got back to Africa, I was very disappointed at the lack of beauty products available here. Once I ran out of my NY stock, I felt helpless. Plus, there was this hot weather that did not help at all feel glamorous. But with time, I've learned to adapt; to do with the products I found, to create, mix my own products, and (it's actually a good thing), to use natural ingredients. Talk about green behavior! Yeah!

So, this blog's about me, about everything that I like:  fashion, beauty, sometimes I may talk about my kids, about other women living similar situations as me… well, I’ll talk about everything. 

I may write in French and in English, depending on my mood. This'd be a good excuse for you to learn one or the other if you're not already fluent in it. Somehow, for some topics, English comes naturally, but for others, my francophone self seems to push its way out and impose itself. We’ll see. Hopefully, it’ll all be fun !