Wiki Loves Africa. 

Wiki Loves Africa photo competition on Wikipedia

I have the honour and privilege of wining Traditional Culture Prize  Wiki Loves Africa’s photo competition on Wikipedia 2021 THEME: HEALTH AND WELLNESS. 
Africa is incredible rich, vibrant, colorful and at the same time both ancient and youthful. For too long the narrative has not reflected the reality of our potential for reasons of exploitation of natural resources at below market prices without duty of care to the people and the environment. Wiki allows us, Africans, to affect and change the not only the narrative but also how we have become to see and value ourselves. 

“I have a strong belief that all our answers lie in the natural world, including healing, from which we copy most of our philosophy, engineering, science and medicine. We are the hollow bone or channel for the spirit and ancestors that facilitates the healing forces that lie within each of us. … I have felt the power of the San Trance Healing Dance, the healing of plants and this is why I submitted this image. Traditional medicine is the foundation of modern medicine.”

Kgara Kevin Rack

Traditional Culture Prize: Kevin Rack 
Attribution: Oldest Healing Dance (Botswana) by Kgara Kevin Rack, Wikimedia Commons CC-BY-SA 4.0
image: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Oldest_Healing_Dance.jpg 

Social media: 
https://www.facebook.com/kevin.rack/photos_albums
https://www.instagram.com/kgara_kevin_rack/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4qEXx3dPxflmhz1x_yGR-w
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinrack/
https://www.facebook.com/GreyEnvironmentalWarriors/ 

1. Why did you take that specific photograph? 

The shaman of the Giraffe group, like all great shamans, has a wicked sense of humour and placed his hands on me during a 5 Clan Trans Healing Dance passing me nails of healing. I bought him a large beautiful abalone shell as a gift. He merely admired its beautiful colours, turning it over and over in his wrinkled hands, placed it on his head like a cap, laughed, passed it on to his wife and walked away laughing. One must give with no attachments. I have great admiration for the Giraffe Group’s healers. 

2. What made you enter this photograph to Wiki Loves Africa this year under the theme Health + Wellness? 

I am a trainee Igqirha (African Traditional Medicine) on ukuthwasa to the Dlamini Clan and a wannabe Shaman. I have a strong belief that all our answers lie in the natural world, including healing, from which we copy most of our philosophy, engineering, science and medicine. We are the hollow bone or channel for the spirit and ancestors that facilitates the healing forces that lie within each of us. I always turn to the inner cause and herbal cures first or at times as the only resort when one is very far off the beaten track before invasive medicine. I have felt the power of the San Trans Healing Dance, the healing of plants and this is why I submitted this image. Traditional medicine is the foundation of modern medicine. 

3. This is not the first time you have entered Wiki Loves Africa… has contributing to Wiki Loves Africa impacted your work in any way? If so, how? 

Yes, I have contributed before as Wiki Africa offers me a platform to give back. I don’t sell the images as I am very fortunate to go to extraordinary places meeting remarkable people. By offering the images to Wiki Loves Africa I feel I can receive in good faith and I sure do. Wiki Loves Africa has allowed me to upgrade my 30-year-old entry-level Canon camera.