So here I am — the pan-African weirdo with the strange blogging title — at your service.

Even I was surprised anyone would want me writing about global politics for them, considering my personal aversion (or to put it in more euphemistic terms, “regular challenges”) to long-time western values like democracy, individuality, freedom (in what I consider a misunderstood sense of the term) and the like. But the name of this blog sheds light on why someone with my views is always useful in such discussions.

Of course, to understand that statement you need to know about Eleda. But who or what is Eleda anyway? It’s not even English! And I must confess it was chosen in part for my infatuation with the letter “E”. Since “E is for Error” (my Imprint column name), was already taken, but my love affair with the nickname “E” (a love affair made more ironic by the fact that there is really no “E” in my first name) cannot be ended that quickly, I felt a name that bore such a resemblance to my pan-African music idol, Abami Eda, was strong in its own right. (Besides, I am confident our graphic designers could have a field day making me don hot pants, shirtless, complete with ritualistic white Nzu on my body, for the caption photo — bad idea, guys.)

But the more substantial — or dare I say “intellectual” — reason I picked the name has nothing to do with its component letters and everything to do with its symbolism. To explain this, I must tell you about “Legba” (as he is also fondly called by my people).

It is pretty difficult to define Eleda properly without dipping excessively into my traditional tongue, Yoruba, and having already confounded you into reading a rant on the meaning of a word in this language you honestly should not care a rat’s ass about, I think you have learned enough Yoruba to last you forever… or at least, as long as my blog will.

So let me try with credible difficulty to define my personal and favorite “Orisa,” Eleda:

Like other smaller gods in Yoruba lore, Eleda is powerful and believed to be a rather clever but difficult teacher.

In fact, one story that entrenched Eleda’s legendary status in Yoruba lore as a wise but demanding Orisa involved him walking down the road one day, wearing a large hat that was red on one side and black on the other. The villagers who had seen him walking down this road began arguing with each other over what color his hat was. The people who saw him from the one side of the street thought he was wearing a black hat; the people on the other side insisted he was wearing a red hat.

From across the street they derided each others’ powers of perception and Eleda in his foxiness sat chuckling at the foolishness of these mortals, enjoying all the attention his crafty hat trick was giving him. But as tensions rose and these people seemed to be gearing up to do battle over the color of a random individual’s hat, Eleda saw he must intervene. He took of his hat and showed each side the whole of it. His lesson? One’s perspective can alter his or her perception of reality so they believe theirs is the only true reality.

That is what Eleda taught me: that one thing may mean several different things to several different people, but in the end, it is all the same, because the strife these differences create is itself meaningless. Just as a hat is no excuse to go to war (no matter how different two perspectives about its colour are), so too do we often look for meaning in all the wrong places.

For the time that I blog here, I hope to be your Orisa — but I cannot promise that I will be a wise one. As much as I will do my best to be like Eleda (if only to justify the graphic designer’s creativity), I will confuse you. I will confound you with perspectives that are likely very different from your own, but in the end I will be telling you all my stories from the only perspective I have: my own. Oftentimes, I will only be seeing Eleda’s hat from my own point of view.

And I do not just want to dictate to you blindly with my monochrome view of everything. I want to see Eleda’s hat from your side, too. So if you don’t like my color, please try not to shout insults from the other side. Just tell me which colour you see: I’ll do my best to cross the road.

E Aboyeji will be blogging about global politics and diversity matters every Monday: Tune in next week for his first topical post.