For those that don't already know Swahili is a culture of trading coastal people and Kiswahili is the name of their language. Kiswahili is a language with Bantu origins which arrived in the east from the west due to the Great Bantu Migration. Some scholars use to try to separate the Swahili from their African origins saying that even their language was arabic based so therefore it was other influences that made these people as prosperous as they were. Linguistic historians like Nurse and Spear have however been able to confirm what we knew, which is that though Kiswahili has many loan words from many languages it is definitely of Bantu origins. The Swahili had connections to the Arabs, Indians, Chinese and Europeans.
There were actually ships of Zheng He that sunk near Lamu Island in the Early 15th century. There are Swahili here that have chinese feature and some actually as their real Swahili name have the swahili word for "China" in it. The chinese have recently taken interest in this shared history for multiple reasons as we could all imagine. This shared history gives the Chinese a way into africa without appearing to desire exploitation. Which in no means that they don't posses dreams of such actions. The Chinese are aspiring to do what the Europeans are did/are doing but instead of using race as a means to separate they show another way. There is no bad blood between Africa and China at the moment so the Chinese are welcomed and free to move in the shadows.
The swahili woman that's name was basically indicative of her past heritage had a daughter that also really had chinese features. After DNA test by the Chinese government it was clear that she was part chinese and as a way to reconnect the Chinese government offered her a full scholarship to study in China and learn Chinese. She accepted.
This shared history and trade is evident in the collections of porcelain dishes that decorated Swahili homes till this day.
There were actually ships of Zheng He that sunk near Lamu Island in the Early 15th century. There are Swahili here that have chinese feature and some actually as their real Swahili name have the swahili word for "China" in it. The chinese have recently taken interest in this shared history for multiple reasons as we could all imagine. This shared history gives the Chinese a way into africa without appearing to desire exploitation. Which in no means that they don't posses dreams of such actions. The Chinese are aspiring to do what the Europeans are did/are doing but instead of using race as a means to separate they show another way. There is no bad blood between Africa and China at the moment so the Chinese are welcomed and free to move in the shadows.
The swahili woman that's name was basically indicative of her past heritage had a daughter that also really had chinese features. After DNA test by the Chinese government it was clear that she was part chinese and as a way to reconnect the Chinese government offered her a full scholarship to study in China and learn Chinese. She accepted.
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