Oklahoma

I am a thicko when it comes to American History. I am sure if I was an American citizenship candidate, I would do pretty badly on the test. Yes, they do test prospective citizens. I would do pretty well on any baseball questions that related to the past 3 seasons but I dare say they don’t have those kinds of questions.

I didn’t know that the State of Oklahoma was so young. It was 7 years old at the start of world war one and only 38 at the start of world war 2, that brings to mind all sorts of questions such as: would I go and fight for a country that had not accepted my father as one of its citizens, (see chronology) or would I go to war in the Pacific in WW2 for a country that may or may not have been mine at the time of my birth. Native American history is not one of my strong points but I would love to find out more. It strikes me that these true Americans are those who have lost the most by the formation of a country around them that, until 1919, excluded them from the process.

I am, like so many others, completely ignorant of history. Maybe I should study a bit more – maybe I would like it.

In Anadarko, last weekend, the Kiowa and Apaches celebrated long remembered raids on the Spanish forces who occupied New Mexico. They also honored the Native Americans who fought for a country that had taken so much from them. Tolerant and accepting: that’s not what hollywood would tell us. Brave – still to this day.

Nothing to do with Taekwondo – or maybe it is.