I have just arrived at the airport in Harare – a day
behind the time scheduled for me to be in Zimbabwe on the Moving Africa Project
organized by Goethe Institut South Africa that sponsors African artists to attend
art and cultural festivals going on anywhere on the African continent. I have
come for SHOKO 2013 an extravaganza of a series of remarkable celebrations of
art and culture in the city ‘Where the Purple Rains’ in the Southern Hemisphere,
where all traffic is heading for the next five days. I am really looking
forward to touching bumpers with some of the travelers this convoy brings, especially
my other fellows on the project from Uganda, Mozambique, Malawi, Tanzania and
Angola.
I am DK Osei-Yaw, and I’ve come from Ghana in West
Africa. I have just gone through the Zimbabwean airport immigration checks and
now emerging out of the arrival hall. I do a scan of the different names or
tags held out by people on mostly A4 sheets printed in block solid letters and
I don’t see my name – or SHOKO… - or MOVING AFRICA – at least any of these in
print. Howbeit I proceed, rather to the embrace of the open terrace just outside
the doorway through the arrival hall. I am first spotted by its sunny daylight
and bright skies, smiled at by its interesting landscape, cuddled by its climate,
and kissed by a distinct blooming plant that stood out from amongst its peers
within this noteworthy view from the airport terrace where I stood, and could
see taxis parked, next to a lower wall along a beautifully tarred road that
slightly curved in front of the doorway at the arrival. I could hear airport
trolleys being ridden.
Harmattan is my favorite weather in Ghana, and the
climate here at Harare isn’t too far from what I like. It was still humid and hot
back in Accra when I left and wasn’t yet time for Harmattan, which begins from
November into March the following year, and therefore I felt blessed to be
ahead of the occasion and simply enjoyed the season.
A good amount of time has gone by now and I have
still not been picked up from the airport. But it’s not been a sad past
40minutes at all, apart from the great climate, and the excitement of devising
a plan B, I have been engaged with a Zimbabwean airport staff trying to learn a
few expressions in their native language. I kept glued to the airport trolley
where I had been offered a seat and took my lessons in Shona.
‘Ma’ngonaani’ he tooted, ‘means good morning’
I thought this wasn’t so different from the South
African greeting of ‘Saa’mbonaani....’ that I’d heard many times on my South
African Airways flight, which went through the O.A Thambo Airport in
Johannesburg from Accra to Harare. This helped a lot in learning greetings in
Shona and my teachers were quite impressed that I followed quite well and
easily.
‘Ma’ngonaani, then Maamugaase’ my teacher continued,
‘now you’re taking it further and you want to know how they are doing’
Just out of the blue, it occurred to me that a group
of people had just disembarked from a bus while I was engaged with the airport staff,
and could possibly be of help with information regarding SHOKO 2013. I quickly approached
one of them, a young man with a camera snapping away at the Rastafarian and his
entourage that had just arrived outside the airport like I did a while ago. Before
long, he and I were discussing the Zimbabwean-German society. It was my
thinking that the A4 sized bent-in-2-halves fact-a-zeens (Fact Magazines) of
African Image – Baasa Kro printed in Bonne by Robert Sobotta, the Director of
Goethe Institut Ghana, would only be useful later at the festival when there
were exchanges of some sort of cards, brochures or contacts with other artists.
Here is the case however, that it is serving as a point of contact now. Even
before I uttered a word about who I was and my mission, the green and white
logo of Goethe Institut at the bottom of the back page of the fact-a-zeen that
I handed to the young photographer, was what begun our discussion, then I knew
I was speaking to the right person. Well over some minutes later, I was in a
convoy of vehicles with the Rastafarian and his entourage, whom I discovered
later, was the reggae artist Tony Rebel. The procession drove down the highways of
Harare from the airport into the city centre where the beautiful hotel set in a
garden called Bronte was situated, a colonial British architecture of brick
roofs and pavements, polished wooden balusters and window outlines with cute
balconies and stairways.
The checking-in process took quite a little while,
but as the automated door knob to room 85 clicked open at the touch of a key
card, I could not help but toss myself and my hand luggage into the soft
forthcoming beds of Bronte Hotel and scream, ‘Thank you Jesus!’ as a way of welcoming
myself to Harare.
From that point on everything was fast and I liked
it. Before I could inadvertently be lured to a nap in the 17 degrees weather
and inside a room adorned by two stunning impressionist styled framed paintings,
- one of them showing two men in a fishing boat whose reflections could be seen
in the water, I was hurriedly reminded of a press briefing that was about to
start in the conference room upstairs of the hotel. It had been just a little
over half past 17 hours when it dawned on me, and later that evening at about 20
hours was going to be the comedy night at the Waterwhirled, the first SHOKO event
I would be attending. The press conference was chaired by Comrade Fetso, the creative
director of SHOKO 2013, and flanked by a panel of mostly musical artists who have
come from all over the world, including the rapper and poet Ian Kamau from
Toronto Canada, and the two comedians from neighboring South Africa who were on
the bill to perform that evening, Tumi Moriake and Kagiso Lediga. As Clive
Chigubu, a Zimbabwean comedian and the host of the press conference as well as
host for the comedy night, noticed a hand that had flung up in the rear of the
conference room, I could not wait to be an active part of the high spirited
discussion and the inspiring atmosphere of fellowship going on amongst young
people of a continental, cross cultural and global perspective. As it turned
out later on, the rapper Ian Kamau and I had met in Accra 7 years earlier at an
open-mic session that he still had not forgotten at all the incident that led
him to give me a CD of his. I also learnt from the comedian Tumi Moriake that
she was married to a Ghanaian. Later that night at the comedy event, I heard
Ghana and Azonto and Church many times in her act. She and I as well as Kagiso,
were driven together in the same right hand drive car by Nikita, and the driver
to the Waterwhirld. In the car I called her my in-law (she was actually the one
who first addressed me by that at the press conference).
Subsequent to the press conference, when we had all
exchanged welcomes and anything there was to exchange when people meet the
first time, one gentleman and I had only just begun a discussion about
freestyle Rap and were just warming up to it. He was Simba, the Moving Africa
Representative from Mozambique, a recording rap artist with endorsements in Maputo.
He was the one who revealed to me that our Angolan counterpart could not make
it. Quite strangely though somehow, Simba and I, after parting ways at the
press conference and planning to meet again to catch-up with our discussion, actually
narrowly missed each other and failed the entire rest of the day at several
attempts to reconnect. There seem to have been some broken link in communication
between us and the other Moving Africa reps that were there. For me it was a
little challenging to identify one person who could lead me to a Moving Africa
rep because it was impossible to phone any of them without a number. Hence I
was alone the whole evening at the comedy night, even though I ran once again
into the photographer that I’d met at the airport before, and moreover hanged-out
for a little while with Mateu, one of the festival organizers - a Kenyan, and
two of her friends also from Kenya who were siblings – a brother and a sister. It
was not until the next evening at the slam poetry session at the book café,
after I’d stopped by Carol’s place and listened to her play the guitar and
sing, and after I’d had some Mazoe to drink that Simba and I reconnected. I was
on the rebound from the restroom, when we bumped into each other. It was a very
delightful moment for both of us as we found ourselves doing straight 15
minutes of talking unbeknownst to us both still standing at the same spot at
the book café. After several minutes of conversing, mainly about what had gone
on with us so far, Simba said, ‘that’s her’ gesturing the glass of wine in his right
hand in the direction of a lady in a green top, ‘The girl from Malawi’ he added.
Simba and I both returned to our seats. I returned to the table where I had
been offered a seat by Dickson, one of the festival organizers, and two other
ladies, one of whom was Ruth Daniel from the UK, that I was to later discover
is behind the organization ‘Unconvention’, who are into networking artists from
all over the world to discuss creative ideas and helping build the
infrastructure for the development of these ideas. At one of the SHOKO panel
discussions at the gallery amphitheatre, the very articulate Ruth disclosed
several of such creative efforts taking place around the world that
‘Unconvention’ had been part of. One of
those striking examples was a place in Colombia called Medellin, the hometown
of Pablo Escoba, where the mayor of the city built escalators in the mountains
and saturated the whole place with wi-fi networks in order to facilitate the
creative use of the web and interaction through movement. I arrived back at the
table to see that we had been joined by Comrade Fetso, and one other gentleman who
introduced himself to me as Espen, the Moving Africa Rep for Tanzania. Espen is
a professional musician who performs by the name Mzungu Kichaa.
In a while, just before everything were to be
rounded up for the night, I saw a lady get up and excuse herself to a more
discrete part of the building, detached from the bar and the stage area. I
quickly followed suit. Shortly, I was shaking hands with Rina, the Moving
Africa Rep from Malawi, who Simba had gestured to me.
Almost immediately, Rina and I were joined by Simba
and Mzungu, therefore it was Ghana, Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania; I was yet
to meet the Ugandan. This happened on my second day in Harare, Thursday the 19th
of September, 2013. And for the first time, at the SHOKO Festival ‘Breaking
Boundaries Poetry Slam’, Moving Africa was reconnecting. Does that say anything
to you? Well for me as a poet, and the one who popularized Spoken Word (Slam)
Poetry in Ghana, the occasion surrounding our reunion was significant. And even
more considerable was the discovery of Poets such as Afurakan, Ewok and their local
counterparts in Zimbabwe with whom they fiercely competed in a Slam. I learnt
and discovered a lot about artistic content in this Sothern Hemisphere part of
Africa, which turned to be more favorable towards racial issues, politics and religiosity.
And whose style of delivery more revolutionary than in Ghana, where there was
more optimism going on, of things personal about everyday life, through a
delivery that is more classic by nature. I must admit though, that our brothers
and sisters in Zimbabwe have a better understanding and use of art as a tool
for social change and are exploiting it.
Therefore one can see a lot of commitment, consistency and orderliness in the
way that they go about art. This understanding of the art also gives them a
much wider perspective, and greater goals that merit their working together as
one. This however is the biggest test in Ghana now, where young and old, the
old especially have still not understood art as a tool for social change. Even
those in the industry have a partial commitment to art, and are divided in
their attentiveness in doing things excellently, hence the lack of inspiration
to work together.
The afternoon of the day before I left Zimbabwe,
after a music workshop at the Waterwhirled, I discussed this with a Zimbabwean
guitarist and vocalist by name Tarera, and also with Margaret, one of the
festival organizers who also runs an artist management agency. Now Rina, Mzungu,
Simba and I are sharing outlook on the same issues. The slam had been delightful
and revealing for me, the bus is here now to take us to our hotel.
The next day was to begin yet another very pleasant
phase of this whole journey to Harare, – time at breakfast. For me the time at
breakfast revealed a lot about all five of us representing our various
countries, and the one guy from the Diaspora – Ian Kamau. Breakfast was all
about the aspirations and expectations we bore for our diverse careers as
artists, and for our nations. We would dream at that table till the sun shed
its bright rays on us through the garden foliage. Our desire to be of
assistance to one another, irrespective of the border challenges, and to influence
the African continent and the world at large with our ideas, through such exclusive
platforms as the Moving Africa Project marked our daydream.
Waking up in the morning at Bronte Hotel was what
prepared me every day to look forward to a great time with my colleagues.
Breakfast was between half after six, and about a quarter to 10am. Some
mornings I was up for breakfast early before seven, or quite late after nine. Every
morning was fresh in the midst of the garden – birds tweeting, the feel and
sound of the cool morning breeze just whirling through the leaves, and just the
sight of the whole place and atmosphere made one feel they were part of a work
of art. Walking down the curving
cobblestone path from room 85 to the Palms Restaurant, your eyes could not resist
the sight of the fish ponds, and the metal sculptures, especially that of the
owl placed at the edge of one of the ponds, and also the numerous stone
sculptures set in different parts of the garden. Monkey nuts were constantly
raining down from tall trees. What’s more, it was such a wonder to observe suddenly
whilst on foot, that your feet are walking over an area covered all purple with
the flowers of the tropical Jacaranda tree, a sight to behold. For me when that
moment occurs, it is as if this plant that had kissed me at the airport upon
arrival, had been following me everywhere I went in Harare, and forever
shedding its flowers at my feet as if to settle me with the welcome that I
dreamt of. I enter another area covered in its flowers and I asked myself, ‘Did
it rain purple here too today?’
Last night after comedy, when we all had arrived back
at the hotel, Remy, the Moving Africa Rep for Uganda joined us for a meeting
inside Ian Kamau’s room, that was initiated by one of us. We had such a remarkable
moment together for the first time. Being the first of its kind, we so wished
that we had not been that fatigued from the day’s activities.
‘Coffee or tea Sir?’
‘Coffee please’
It was a brief instance away from the conversation
to respond to the waiter. I turned my head back in, only to meet the faces of
at least three others glaring back at the waiter. I did not even realize when
the conversation had paused for us all to order coffee.
‘I would also like a cup of coffee please’ Rina threw
in quickly before the waiter had reached far, ‘with milk’ she added.
‘Ok Madam’ said the waiter politely.
I have lost count of the number of times all the
others ordered something because one person ordered it, and vice versa. But
this was real co-operation going on at the breakfast table, a heartfelt one, as
we got consumed and excited by our conversation about visions, aspirations,
goals and change. Although we were five Moving Africa representatives, there
were six of us at the table. The kind of co-operation going on was unique in
its own right. We were always honored to have the Poet and Rapper Ian Kamau
join us for breakfast. In fact he went with us everywhere together.
We were next door neighbors at Bronte Hotel. It was
the first time after 7 years that he and I were officially meeting, and this
happened nowhere else than in Harare. He even made me play Congas to back him
on stage, and that’s the way it was, things just happened – they were
unplanned, but they turned out all perfect. As I sat at the table with my
colleagues from Uganda, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania and Canada, it dawned on me
how the Moving Africa Project was such an eye opening experience of
contemporary or urban Africans learning certain important lessons about
themselves and their various societies through the unique environment of
festivals.
DK OSEI-YAW, Kasoa, Ghana 25/09/13
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