Feeling hot, hot hot!

Don't they look appetising? I didn't grow them tho, the pic is from WikiMedia Commons

Ok, so today’s a scorcher, but thank goodness for the slightly cooler spell earlier this week. After blistering heat on Sunday, there was a drop in temperature and some rain – just the right conditions to nurture my newly transplanted  chilli seedlings. This is important, because my first attempt to grow chillies this season failed the week before when I forgot to organise AM to water them while I was away for three days – during which time there was a heatwave.  If this lot don’t survive, it will be too late to find any more seedlings.

I don’t grow chillies for myself. I rarely cook with them. I grow them for DadaK and Obaapa, who, being Ghanaian, cannot live without them. DadaK always looks quite betrayed if I give any to other people, or the crop is poor or worse – the plants have died due to extreme heat.

This will be about the 8th year I’ve grown them – squashy orange habaneros, the third hottest chillies in the world according to the Scoville Scale of hotness. I guess that’s why DadaK likes them – in his household they are the only acceptable chillies. They stockpile them in the freezer. But Habaneros are hard to get – which is why I’ve been growing them. Sydney greengrocers mostly stock the pointy red and green chillies, which seem hot enough to me, but perhaps I’m missing some subtlety of flavour. It’s also hard to find the seedlings and they’re only available for a few weeks each year – so you see why it’s important that we had some milder weather to keep them alive. I read on Wikipedia that habanero plants love hot weather and grow all year round in tropical climates, but that doesn’t seem to to happen here.

The most tragic of my balcony-farming attempts.

My first crop of habaneros was stupendous. Hundreds of chillies from just one bush, which kept producing for so long I could afford to be generous. Not only DadaK but AM’s cousin Gyamfi, my brother, work colleagues, friends, all got samples. Some appreciated them, others did not. The pungency of frying Habaneros set off a chain of vomiting in one family. Oops. Then there was the friend of AM who thought they were capsicums and started a food fight with them. Ouch. Or should that be AAAAAArrrrrrggghhhhh!? As it is on YouTube, where you can find hundreds of videos just on the painful subject of eating raw habaneros.

I’ve never had quite as much success as I did that first year. I’ve realised now that they need a lot of manure, and these days I have to grow them on a balcony instead of a back yard, so getting the conditions right is more of a challenge. Last year DadaK tried growing them in pots himself – with great results. Not a large crop but larger chillies than any I’ve ever grown.

I’ve seriously let him down this year. I didn’t have time to go hunting for seedlings at the right time and then managed to kill off the only one that I found. I went looking again last week and could only find a single punnet of three seedlings – but I’m not sure if they’ll be acceptable. They are – according to the label – RED habaneros, not orange. So it’s possible I may end up with a bumper crop of the wrong kind of chilli. But this may turn out to be a good thing. It’s possible that they are really Red Savina, a cultivar of the habanero and the second hottest chilli on the Scoville Scale. I guess DadaK would like that.

No, he’s my son …

She's my mum, OK!?!

The other day I was  reading an article on Intermix by Canadian ‘Piss’ comedian Sabrina Jalees. (Piss, by her own definition = Pakistani/Swiss). She listed all the pros and cons of being mixed race. The one that struck a chord with me was “Your innocent mother-daughter love is easily mistaken for a ‘creepy sugar momma and her young misguided brown girl’ lesbian fling.” Not that AM and I have ever been mistaken for lesbians of course, but there was that time in Germany last year when the hotel proprietor seemed to think we’d be needing a double bed … ick. AM was only 13 at the time.

Anyway, her comment prompted me to think of the three major ways in which white mum’s relationships with our kids get mis-identified. From birth through primary school people think you’ve adopted them. (Aren’t you good!, they exclaim to you beside the swings).

Then there’s the Cougar phase I just referred to, starting sometime during puberty and lasting, I assume, a very, very long time. 

And finally, I’m guessing that when I’m old and decrepit, people will think he’s a kindly care worker or volunteer at an old people’s home. (Isn’t he good!, they will think to themselves).

I don’t really hold it against people. They’re usually just curious about us. I’m sure it’s good for my patience. This pic at right from when he was little, is for everyone who wonders who we are.

Get used to it.

Lemony, floral …

 … winey, citrusey, spicy ….. this is the hotch potch of flavours ascribed to the Fair Trade Ethiopian Yirgacheffe coffee on a poster at my local coffee shop. There must be something wrong with my tastebuds because all I can taste is coffee. Oh well, perhaps that’s because I usually have the decaf, which is Brazilian. Anyway, what I really like about this coffee shop is that it is as much a blend of disparate flavours as the coffee is claimed to be.

Thai-Australian owner and barrista “Harry Roaster” (as he describes himself on a promotional poster) has assembled what seems like an odd assortment of foods to go with your coffee, but are all in their different ways Sydney – if not Australian - culinary icons.

In no particular order:

• The famous Harry’s cafe de Wheels meat pies (established 1938 down on the docks & sampled by people as famous as Frank Sinatra and Elton John)
• Portuguese tarts 
• Banana bread (is there a cafe that doesn’t have it?)
• White & dark chocolate brownies – okay, more American that Oz, but they include that unique Australian nut, the macadamia
• Hot dogs – representing the first incursion of US food imperialism, way before Maccas & KFC - although they seem to have disappeared from the menu in the past couple of weeks
• Chinese steamed & BBQ chicken served with greens & rice. Well actually someone else is selling this, but they share the shopfront.

Take it all together and you have foods and beverages from thousands of years of Australian history, all continents (except Antarctica), and appealing to people from the tendy tops to the Centrelink strata of Australian society. And at $2 a cup, it’s the latter group who seem to most regularly frequent the tables  and chairs on the pavement outside. I’d guess Fair Trade coffee’s usually consumed by middle class lefties like me who don’t mind paying a premium, but here the locals are buying it because it’s cheap and tastes good – and are incidentally supporting people who also struggle on low incomes, instead of the multinational coffee companies. I love that.

I can’t remember the name of the place, it’s on Brown St in Newtown.  I looked for it on Google maps but their satellite pic pre-dates the cafe, which only opened in the past year, so all you can see is an empty shop. But I reckon Harry Roaster is there to stay.

Learning to swim with sickle cell

I seem to be turning into some kind of expert on this. I recently went searching – again – for websites about swimming and sickling, and what should I find but my own post on the first page of Google results! I feel well qualified to be an expert because I have taken Abrantie swimming many times and we’ve only had bad consequences a couple of times – and I’ve learned from them! Mind you, there’s not much to it. Swim in warm water, stay active to keep warm, don’t stay in too long and get out and get dressed before you start to feel cold. Wetsuits may help, if you can make that investment (we haven’t).

However, Abrantie’s school has just started its annual swimming lessons for the whole school, and I thought they may need this spelled out in a little more detail, seeing as how they’ve probably never come across sickle cell before – except perhaps in high school genetics lessons. Also, swimming classes generally follow a particular format that might need to be modifed for a child with sickle cell, whereas with recreational swimming you can do what you like, get out when you like, and you don’t have to stand around (getting cold) waiting for your turn with an instructor. So with DadaK’s permission I wrote an information sheet for the school and the swimming instructor. I’ve uploaded it as a Word document in case anyone wants to modify and use for their own situation.

Today was the first day of swimming lessons and all seemed to go well. Abrantie got wet, got individual attention, had fun, and didn’t get cold or – so far – sick. The catch was that the warmest pool was the baby pool, and it was a bit hard learning to swim in water that was only knee-deep. He’s hoping that tomorrow they’ll try out the bigger pool, which is heated and indoors, though not as hot as the baby pool. Hope that works out okay!

Bouquet to RACP

In late August the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP) released a statement that reaffirmed their position that male circumcision should not be performed on infant boys as a routine procedure. Good on them! Read their statement, a brochure for parents, and the policy which is currently being reviewed.

Circumcision seems to arouse incredible passion and tenacity among its supporters. These are usually – but not always – people from cultures where circumcision is a time-honoured cultural practice. It’s been my observation that in mixed relationships, it’s usually the partner from the non-circumcising culture that gives way, if there’s any disagreement. Well, that may promote marital harmony but seems pretty unfair to the child, who has no choice in the matter. 

I don’t see culture as a defence for what I consider to be an oppressive practice.  Culture is ever-changing and over time, people often repudiate cultural practices that used to be routine – there are, for example, plenty of African women now speaking out against female genital mutilation – and in my own culture many people now reject cultural practices around gender roles that used to be unquestioned.

I also don’t think much of the medical arguments. As the RACP says in its statement, the alleged benefits of male circumcision just don’t stack up against the risks of the operation and the ethical issues around perfoming non-reversible, non-essential surgery without anasthaesia on a minor. And if you are concerned about the big bogey HIV (some studies have shown it may have a protective effect agaist HIV transmission) inform yourself with this briefing paper by the Australian Federation of AIDS Organisations.

I could write a thesis on this topic but that will do for now …. I will sit back and await the brickbats that may shower upon me for revealing that I oppose circumcision.

Dreadlock action plan

AM’s hair is a mess. There, I’m not mincing words. I have nothing against dreadlocks, in fact I like them, but the dreads he’s acquired through wilful neglect of his hair are just dry and yucky. Phew, feels better to get that out in the open.

AM has promised his stepmother Obaapa that he will come to her salon & get his dreads sorted out, (i.e. combed out and re-done) but – well, that was a month ago and nothing’s happened. Partly, as he’s the first to admit, this is due to laziness. But it’s also because he’s afraid he’ll have to cut them all off and have short hair again. And if it turns out that he does have nits somewhere in that birds nest, yes, that’s exactly what will happen, whether he likes it or not. However it may turn out alright … Obaapa recently spent a day combing out another mixed teen’s matted locks – so they could be corn-rowed, and today I happened upon a page with detailed instructions on “How to Comb Out Dredlocks”. It’s on a site that explains “How to do just about everything”, so the side bar lists related articles that I suspect may also be very helpful, such as “How to comb out a horse tail extension”, and “How to comb cats with matted hair”.

I have combed out AM’s before, but it was baby-dreads compared to what he’s got now. Whether this new information will actually get AM as far as Obaapa’s salon is another matter. We’ll see.  perhaps I just have to accept my Matty, (as opposed to Natty) Dread.

And on a slightly related note – I discovered an Australian site with info and products related to dreds: http://www.dreadlocks.com.au/index.php - what was fascinating was that almost all the models are white!

Copping it

AM knows how to play - under attack from two small cousins.

I was at an Australian African Network picnic on the weekend, and got to appreciate once more the benefits of being a member of this organisation. AAN is a group for people in mixed relationships and families, where one of the partners is of African background, and meeting other people at picnics & social events means you get a chance to share stories and experience with people who actually understand the challenges you face.

I took AM’s (half) brothers 50 Cedis, Abrantie and G Ketewa. AM, being now 15, scorns the whole concept of picnics – unless organised and attended by his friends – so of course he wasn’t there.  Lucky I carry his pic in my wallet or no-one from that part of my life would recognise him anymore. In fact, when he got take-away from the latest AAN dinner party, one of my friends didn’t recognise him.

Another reason he doesn’t come to AAN events these days is because they are connected to what he considers my obsession with all things African. I was explaining this to someone at the picnic and she just nodded and laughed and said, “Yes, I’ve got friends who are going through exactly the same thing with their teens”.  Well, it’s great to hear this from another source! I am not the only white parent who’s copping criticism.

I guess to AM it might look like I’m obsessed. I’m very involved with AAN, and as you can tell from this blog I love African music, dance, fabrics, food, etc, etc. I explained to him one day that with limited time on my hands, I usually choose to enjoy those things when I get the chance, rather than doing something more mainstream. Especially when African musicians like Salif Keita only come to Australia once in a blue moon! And also I like to learn about African history, politics and culture because – well, it helps me navigate all my different friendships and relationships. But there are also things about my own culture that I love just as passionately – literature, language, roast dinners, sponge cakes, bagpipes, Irish music, Dr Who, dry humour - the list goes on and on. 

I like to think I’ve got a balance. But I’m not sure. Maybe he’s right to call me on it. It hasn’t been awful, angry criticism – more teasing really. Sometimes when watching TV he’ll accuse me of having a crush on a black character. “Don’t deny it, you know it’s true! Racist, racist!” he’ll crow. My denial only feeds his triumph over having scored against me. Or the other night I was helping him with a school assigment about gender and suggested he search online for pictures of super models – like Naomi Campbell. His response was something like “Ha! gotcha! You only thought of her because she’s BLACK! Ha ha!” I hurriedly cast around in my mind for a white supermodel. Ok, I confess, it took a minute or two to come up with Elle McPherson. “Racist, you’re racist!” he accused. “Oh yes, I’m so sorry, I do my best not to be, please, please forgive me!” I cried, pleading on my knees.

Now before you start worrying about us both, please note that this was all quite playful, even though the content might sound harsh. It ended in laughter, not tears. Play has always been an important part of the way I parent since AM was a baby. Kids are naturally playful and I believe that play helps them work through things that trouble them, express things they can’t in other ways, experiment with roles and power, become closer to their parents - and of course have fun. If as the adult you can stay light and relaxed when kids bring up hard stuff in play you can build trust, gain a lot of insight into their lives and help them heal from hurts. AM’s no longer small but I think these things about play are still true for him.

As well as that though, what he’s raising in this case is a real issue for me too. After all, he’s the black person in this scenario, so perhaps – probably? – he’s got a clearer perspective on my interests than I do. And it’s certainly true that white people often do objectify black people as exotic, fascinating, sexual, other. I’m sure I’ve been guilty of that at times. It may not be vilification, but it is still a kind of racism because it gets in the way of us seeing their full humanity. This has been historically embedded in my culture for centuries, it’s part of how we see and think of black people. As white people we need to be aware of that, reflect upon it, and stop doing it. Self-awareness and a willingness to change is more useful to everyone who cares about equality and justice, than getting defensive about a spot of unaware racism.

So when AM accuses me of being racist I don’t worry about the truth of it, I don’t take offence. Instead, I try and figure out how to keep the playfulness moving us forward. I take it as a good sign that AM can raise these issues with me in this way. A very good sign. For him, for me, for our relationship, and for the future.

Here are my two favourite resources on how play helps build closeness between parents and children:

http://www.playfulparenting.com/

http://www.handinhandparenting.org/

And an article about the role of white people in ending racism: http://www.rc.org/uer/index.html

Jah lives! In far north Queensland …

MaameJ in her own design (tussah silk), 1985. Got that, it was the 80s!

Or he did when I was there in 1985. As I mentioned in a previous post, I was adventuring around Australia that year when I re-discovered African music while waitressing at Fitzroy Island. I lived in the Cairns area – mostly in tourist village Kuranda - for 8 months. I waitressed, bummed around, learned yoga, swam at the Barron River Gorge, tried to sell some weird clothes I’d designed at the Kuranda market, got involved with the campaigns of the local feminist group, travelled to Cape York in a Holden Kingswood. Ah yes, the 80s …

Actually the Kingswood didn’t get us right to the top, it conked out in Weipa and we flew back to Cairns. Another story.

So how did Jah fit into all this? Well FNQ attracted interesting kinds of people in those days. Probably still does, if you exclude the trillions of ravaging tourists from your assessment of the population. So it kind of makes sense that it was in Kuranda that I met the person who introduced me to more African music.

Ibina was a white rastafarian whose parents were building her a house on a rainforest block in Kuranda. I camped in her backyard on my days off from the island, with our mutual friend Breatharian. (I call her that because she was aspiring to live solely on air. Hmm. I think that ambition was stymied by her closet chocolate bar addiction). 

Ibina was a retired dancer who had lived in Jamaica and danced in the US before coming back to Oz with her half-Jamaican son, JahLion. (Omigod, he must be nearly 40 by now!!) Ibina had dreds she could almost sit on and started each day with a fat spliff. She’d changed her anglo name to reflect Rasta beliefs and cooked a yummy vegetarian ital stew with sweet potatos and pigeon peas from a tree in her backyard. Here’s another recipe for it. So yes, Jah lived in far north Queensland.

Ibina inspired both Breatharian and I to learn dance. She was classically trained but her passion was Afro-style contemporary. She choreographed a special piece for the three of us to perform at the Kuranda festival that September. We practised on the spacious verandah of her half-finished house – surrounded on 3 sides by thick foliage. We danced to a Peter Tosh song: Rastafari Is.

Ibina on the left, Breatharian on the right, I'm the skinny one in the middle who's lost her balance.

Wow, almost brings tears to my eyes hearing it again. I can remember the first bit by heart. I can even remember the first few steps. The first bit was choreographed and when it moves into a long instrumental, we got to improvise for a while. It’s a long piece of music and about half way through Tosh stops singing and starts preaching, so Ibina very wisely only used about the first five minutes, then Peter Tosh faded out and Thomas Mapfumo faded in.

Thomas Mapfumo is another of those “master” African musicians – in this case a master of the mbira, or thumb piano. He’s not one of my favourites but this is a lovely piece of music. When I first heard it, it was another one of those gobsmacked moments where I’d never before heard anything like it. At the time, I had no idea who it was – it was just a track on some tape and Ibina didn’t know anything about it except that she liked it.

Breatharian and I didn’t get to dance to this, at least not in public. Ibina used it for her solo with a bunch of local toddlers pretending to be a rainstorm. You can hear the rain in the music, that’s the mbira. Breatharian and I reclined and admired her from the back of the stage, if I remember right.

Lulu's premiere public performance at Kuranda festival. Sorry it's so fuzzy.

The Kuranda festival was the climax of my stay in FNQ. A couple of friends from Sydney even came up for it. One of them, Lulu, had recently learned belly dancing and I will never forget seeing her dance for the first time. On Ibina’s rainforest verandah, in a deep blue skirt, the only light a candle. It was magic. Later, at the festival, Lulu discovered some Aboriginal women selling grass skirts and decided on the spot to buy one. She spent the afternoon sewing shells onto a brown singlet, then undulated to an enthusiastic crowd.

After the festival, Breatharian and I lost little time in fulfilling another dream, also inspired by Ibina: we hitch-hiked from Cairns to Adelaide, via Alice Springs and Uluru, to see the Alvin Ailey dance company perform. I’m not sure if Ibina had ever danced with them – her not actually being black, & all – but she certainly knew them, had gone to classes with them, was influenced by their style, and her passion was so infectious we put our crazy lives at risk to go and see them.

I’m embarrassed to admit that when we finally got there, it felt like a bit of an anti-climax, but then, we were exhausted. I’ve never really enjoyed seeing dance in huge theatres – I prefer small & intimate where you can see the sweat. And the facial expressions. Like at the Laura Dance festival. I don’t know what it’s like now, but when Breatharian and I went there a couple of months before Alvin Ailey, it was heart-stoppingly wonderful. I guess those vibrant, gutsy and dusty performances were a hard act for anyone to follow.

After Adelaide we took a train to Melbourne, Breatharian’s home town. From there I went to visit friends in Tassie, then I came back to Sydney to live, and Breatharian went to work in Weipa. I’m terrible at writing letters so I lost contact with both Breatharian and Ibina. I may never know if Breatharian fulfilled her goal of walking to Africa in a white robe, let alone whether she achieved breatharianism. I don’t know if Ibina’s even alive – she must be in her 70s by now if she is. When I went to Kuranda a few years ago I couldn’t even remember exactly where her house was, everything is so overgrown. Ah well. Those were the days.

Food shock

AM, Owure and 50 Cedis enjoy burgers, chips and Bombe Alaska (!) at the Rexmer Hotel in Kumasi.

It’s school holidays and AM is eating my money. Movies, gaming cafes, junk food, pearl milk tea. Perhaps I should just not give him any money other than pocket money, but I’d rather he went out and had fun than moped around all day in front of the computer. Whatever, he’s going to have to get a job soon, I can’t afford him.

A few days ago he went out with a friend who’s just come back from a trip to grandparents in Ireland and Germany, who was complaining about how much he’d had to eat at his German Grandma’s table. It prompted AM to commiserate and recount his own overseas food trauma. He blamed his tendency to over-eat on our trip to Ghana. Personally, I just think it’s because he’s a child of extremes in everything, but his analysis is that he missed Aussie food so much  that now he’s got unlimited access to it, he’s so relieved that he can’t stop when he should. 

AM told his friend how in Ghana he’d had nothing to eat for weeks on end but rice with a bit of chilli and tomato stew. He missed out on the part of that story where he’d refused point-blank to eat anything else for the last couple of months of our stay. (Unless we went to a ‘European’ hotel , when he’d plow through burgers, chips, steak and pasta). Peanut soup, fried chicken, fresh fish stew with palm oil, all these and more were on offer, but no … now that’s what I call cutting off your nose to spite your face.

However, although it was frustrating to watch, I do understand how he was feeling. (He probably doesn’t think so). I remember feeling the same way at school camp, where at a similar age to him I ate nothing but peanut butter sandwiches for a week and then totally binged when I got home. I also went through much the same experience on my first trip to Ghana. I was only there for four weeks but it was probably only a matter of days before I was craving a simple ham sandwich or a salad – anything but spicy, oily, weird Ghanaian food! At that time (early 90s), it was impossible to find either ham or salad, at least in Kumasi, and I suspect it would still be difficult to find what I think of as good ham, although I hear you can get a decent salad in Accra these days. My saviour was the Chinese restaurant in Kumasi (tender beef! broccoli!), but it was expensive and I couldn’t eat there much.

I tried making my own salad, but it was a dismal, almost inedible disappointment. The lettuce,  carrot and capsicum were bitter and the cucumber turned out to be zucchini (yuk). The tomato was ok but the dressing was awful.

After that, I gave up on substitutes for ‘European’ food and I have never, since, sought it out in Ghana. It’s never teh same as what you’ve grown up on. I’m sure that’s the expereince of expatriates everywhere. My approach these days is to appreciate what’s available rather than mourn for what’s not. However on that first trip it was awful because I got to a point where I just didn’t want to eat anything at all. It was unfamiliar, it was too hot and too heavy, and to make things worse I had a bad stomach bug. I guess that’s the same place AM was in, but for longer than I had to endure it, poor kid. I hope it hasn’t totally put him off.

The next time I went to Ghana I was lucky enough to be staying with my sister-in-law Serwaa, who is a very good cook. Between us, we soon figured out my favourite Ghanaian foods and I survived more than a month in the village, with absolutely no access to any foreign foods (except tinned milk, blech). I still lost weight, due to more or less chronic diarrhoea, but on the whole I was well fed and satisfied. And on our recent trip, I mostly had a wonderful time eating. I just avoided offal and it was all good. So I guess, even tho it had been ten years since the last visit, I’d acclimatised. Just hope AM gets to do the same.

The love story continues

For those who haven’t read my previous post on this topic, I’m referring to my love affair with African dance. I realise ‘African’ is a massive umbrella term so I’ll be more specific. The styles I’m in love with, and know the most about, are mainly West and Central African.

I left off in the last post implying that between 15 and 25 my life was a barren wasteland because I had no contact with African music. Strictly speaking this may not be true. I certainly was hearing a lot of reggae and two-tone, and it was the late 70s, early 80s, so it seems likely that I can across at least Fela Kuti. I can’t really remember. This is possibly because for several years I had quite a lot to do with certain recreational substances that affect memory, but I think that probably I really didn’t hear anything that grabbed me in the way the drum beat did when I was 15.

I did keep dancing during this time. I did classes and the odd performance with fringe dance & theatre groups. In one of them I even got to wear an extraordinarily uncomfortable, tower-like illuminated bird-headdress and slide down banisters on the outside of the Sydeny Opera House. In another I had to portray deep emotion whilst reciting a love poem. It wasn’t difficult, the object of my on-stage desire had his fly undone. It’s amazing how barely controlled hysterical laughter can come across as deep passion. So yes, when I say odd ….

I had friends who were volunteer DJs at the independent radio station Skid Row. Thanks to them I discovered all different kinds of music, including one of my all time favourites, Nigerian Master Guitarist King Sunny Ade. The first time I heard Sunny Ade I was mopping the dining room floor in a resort at Fitzroy Island, offshore from Cairns. This is because I was on an adventure around Australia and working for a few weeks as a waitress.  The dining room was the only place on the island that had a cassette player, and a friend of mine had sent me of two cassette compilations of her own selection, which included tracks from a diverse bunch of musicians: various Sydney indie bands, Gil Scott Heron, Astrud Gilberto, and two tracks from Sunny Ade.  Once again, I had never heard anything like it. And that’s why I figured it must be African. Even though it was far different to my previous experience of African music, no other explanation fitted. Turned out I was right, though I had to wait six months until I got back to Sydney to ask my friend.  This is one of the tracks I heard:

This is the other one. I think of it as an anthem to all those men in nightclubs who want your number within 3 minutes of meeting you. Actually if Sunny Ade had been one of those men I may just have given it to him. Anyway …. one of the reasons I love his music is because he does things with a guitar that I didn’t know were possible. Subtle, complex, flowing, you want it to go on forever and it feels like it will. Wow. After growing up on a diet of strumming, this track was a revelation to me. Amazing things can be done if you put an African musician together with a few strings.

I was pleased to find out that he is still going strong & even performed in the US as recently as June. But why doesn’t he come to Australia!?!? I will tell you my theory about Australia and African musicians in my next post.