Frank in Africa ‘08

Blog about my Trip to Tanzania, Malawi, Namibia and South Africa

feb 9th

Sooo, I’m sitting here on my bed, I just got home from the internet cafe, finally some peace and quiet, I think Beer is taking a shower and the other people are still away or sitting on the balcony. I miss being alone from time to time, I know that sounds strange but having some time to yourself to get your head sorted isn’t just something that’s nice sometimes, it’s something I need, maybe it’s because I’m used to being on my own and doing everything my way and by my own scedule.

I got to talk to Will today for a few minutes and it somewhat made me miss home, not “home” the location, or the feeling of being home, just the few hours a day I have at home just for me. There’s non of that over here right now, things are really chaotic and there are always people talking, ahhh peace and quiet is over now, beer just walked in and is gonna start packing his bag for malawi… I guess I should do the same after I’m done writing this…

lets go back a few days and write something about everything I experienced, I have no clue about my last “real” post, it’s been a lot harder to write since my laptop died, I basically type it in a few minutes and quickly upload some pictures… I hope Blaxtar (the dutch rapper who’ll come to ) will bring me a harddrive (I mailed him today).

The studio…after the workshops the rappers went to the studio for 3 days, and I went there the last day to take some pics, I had never been in a music studio before, not that this would really qulify I think… basically there were 2 couches, a table with water bottles and crisps, a desk with a computer and a chair, and a small recording booth. The results of the recordings were pretty cool, even though I’m sick of hearing those songs (because we edit the video to the music) I was impressed that they could make songs that quickly, I always figured it took days, but Prinz pi told me he does it in a few hours back home…

The video shoot… we shot the video at the school across from the kaya guesthouse, which we’re staying at. it was great to see a real african school and how simplistic everything was, they had these really cool drawings on the wall, some about science some about math. the first part of the video shoot I didnt like, it was too forced and I felt bad for the kids, it just felt wrong to me that a bunch of white guys wth cameras were telling these poor black kids what to do, they werent getting paid, or didn’t get any rewards at all…all I kept thinking was, just turn up the volume and let the kids dance and party with the rappers, which happened later on and made me feel a little better, we also donated 2 footballs to the school which is something I guess. it was a special experience though, and I’m glad I was there, even with those mixed feelings…

today was the day after the video shoot, and we caught up on some work, mostly some of the image galleries. we didn’t really get to edit because the video guys didnt load the movie onto the external hard drives for us. Theres still some friction there, but its to little to really get into a discussion about, even though it does build up.

Things will be different in Malawi, we’ll all have seperate rooms, and I’m hoping for easy internet access, but I’m not expecting it.

Tomorrow is Beers birthday, and We’ll be going to a small iland I think and hang out for most of the afternoon, some much needed rest, maybe I’ll take a walk on my own or something to clean my head…

yea not much else to talk about, I better start packing and do some laundry…mannn I still hate laundry…

Tags: Tanzania by Frank
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Another day at the Millennium Towers

Soooo… here I am, sitting at the millenium towers again, I’m gettting a little tired of walking the same short distance every day to upload things to the site. but I guess thats what I have to do.

Yesterday morning we went to the beach for a while, we had lunch there (which took forever) but swimming was impossible, it was low water which meant there were a lot of slippery rocks and millions of those spiky black balls of pain and suffering… Beer and I both got some of those needles in our feet, I managed to get mine out easily, but Beer is suffering… I also got a little red at the beach and found some cool sea-shells.

After we got home from the beach work started on Webisode 3, I went to bed at 10pm or so, I was dead tired which I somehow still am…

I took some pics, tried some black and white ish photography style… for fun…

some of the pics are of the concert for street children, which was the day before yesterday. not much else to report right now…

pics:

http://www.simplygiz.com/files/Afrika/TZconcert/

Tags: Tanzania by Frank
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Day 7

today the first webisode (made in africa) went live. I’m in it, or atleast my arm is, so its worth checking out, I did some of the eding on it, check out www.virusfreegeneration.eu/hiphoptour

It’s been a long coupe of days, lots of editing and activities, and a lot of pointless discussions, I guess everybody in the team still has to get used to the way the other team members work, audio visual students talk a lot! they have discussions about everything, while the Digital Media students just get started on the work.

Nothing spectacular has happened since yesterday, we checked out 1 of the workshops, where local musicians were working together with FidQ (the Tanzanian rapper) and Prinz Pi (the German rapper) It sounded really good.

After that we had dinner with the crew and the rappers, we went to a good pizza place where they had really hot chilli sauce, I talked to fidQ most of the night and he had some interesting stories and did a lot of rapping for me, and explained where he gets his inspiration and how zwahilli rhymes, and the combo fo english/zwahilli…after that I edited video till 3am….

I got up at 9, and we finished the video (with lots of discussions) and now Beer and I are at the internet cafe again, uploading the webisode…I’m a little tired… and walking to the internet cafe and back every day is getting boring… but I guess thats just something that has to be done…

I also saw a really big insect flying by today on the balcony, it was black with white, and it was like a huge bumble bee, just a lil bit smaller than a small bird… creepy…

after Ill upload this post we’ll be going to a concert, of the rappers… wonder what thats like. I’ll take pictures and keep you guys updated.

Frank

Tags: Tanzania by Frank
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day 5 and 6

on day 5 we visited a shelter for homeless kids, with the 2 rappers, it was pretty impressive to see people with so little being so positive, and taking every change they can get, to do something to try to make their lives more fun… the basketball field was covered with positive graffiti. all together it was a really special place. I took pictures which are on the virus free generation hip hop tour site.

on day 6 we spend most of the day editing the sie and fixing small website bugs… right now we’re using free internet, since everything is closed, the weekends are strange here, people party til late at night, and theres a lot of stuff going on everywhere…

lots of things are happening, I dont have my laptop so its hard to keep posting and to keep uploading pics… but I’ll do my best…

on day 4 I think, me and beer played chess on the balcony, and he took a really shitty pic of me and my awesome haircut, check it out!!!

http://www.simplygiz.com/files/afrika/frank.JPG

Tags: Tanzania by Frank
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Last Night I killed a mosquito

It was flying through the air,
I noticed it because it was landing on my hand

It took a rest on the left side of my laptop,
I lifted my hand in the air slowly,

I hit it, Hard! “Die” I said out loud,
and It did…

—

My harddrive made a sound,
I looked worried

It was a good lil machine,
It held my data like a spare brain,

My little storage friend will be missed,
The Mosquito will not.

R.I.P. Hard Drive….

Tags: Tanzania by Frank
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A stressfree life without electricity

so after writing my last post Beer and I spend most of the day at the internet cafe trying to upload things to the virusfreegeneration hiphop tour site, we uploaded a 5mb video which took 10 minutes, and after that wasted about an hour on trying to upload 20kb (2 small thumbnails).

I decided it was a good day to wear my official tour t-shirt today, but its really thich fabric and the print on it doesnt let any air go through, so I have a wet spot between my boobs, sexy I know, more sexy stuff I forgot to mention, last night I got rid of a lot of my hair, it was just too hot for long hair, the usual routine, using 2 hair elastics and cutting in between them removing the pony tail completely in one go.

not much else happened today, im tired after 2 sleepless nights, but I can’t really seem to relax. I talked to an african person from music mayday today after the electricity went down, and the first thing she said was “don’t worry about it just relax, and after a while they’ll find a way to fix it” so that’s what I’ve been doing, no website updates without laptops, and those run on electricity, since my battery has 3 more minutes on it, it’s time to start living the african way, walk slowly, relax, have a drink, and don’t worry man…

Tags: Tanzania, Uncategorized by Frank
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It’s hot in Paradise

Mamba (that’s what all the people say here),

Day 1 started with a walk around the neighbourhood, after which we cooled down for a while in a luxery shopping centre, with marble floors known as “the Millenium Towers”.

It’s strange to see a big marble block with futuristic reflective windows in a place like this, there are a lot of small dirt roads with a lot of small shops, they sell food pretty much everywhere, there are a lot of strong smells while walking around, 1 moment you’re enjoying the smell of meat being grilled and the next its the typical smell of hot trash.

There are lots of chickens walking around and dogs sleeping in the shade, it’s really a different world, and even though it’s a pretty “rich” part of town it’s still really poor by my western standards.

All the people are really friendly, but for the most obvious reason, white people have money, as soon as you stop and talk to them it’ll result in them trying to sell you artsy stuff, or trying to get you in their taxi.

After all that walking we decided to go back, eat and drink something and after that try if we could get some money at the ATM, which we couldn’t, just the receipt, no money, but that’s pretty normal here, nothing to worry about, after finding an internet cafe (see previous post) and buying some SIM cards for our phones we took a taxi to the kilimanjaro hotel, where Beer, Jeroen and I met the rest of the crew.

We walked to the ferry to paradise, which was an experience on it’s own, we’re were told to watch our bags/wallets because it was gonna be crowded, so crowded that it wasn’t possible to move at all, we took a taxi to a nice resort at the beach where we sat on the beach and drank a beer, it was heaven, and hard to believe that it was all real, the contrast between the poor city life and the beautiful beach was a surreal experience.

I walked down the beach and through the water for a bit (setting foot in the indian ocean for the first time), chased some crabs and within 5 minutes found found more cool sea shells and pieces of coral than I’ve collected in the previous 23 years of my life, too bad it’s illegal to take things with you, guess the small sea shell that’s in my bag now officially makes me a smuggler.

We had dinner, I had chicken curry, and after that went back to the guesthouse, where I edited pictures for a while and got my first mosquito bite (on my foot), all together a great first day.

the power just died, so I better save my battery and end this post.

some (small) pictures:

the wing

the plane

the view from the mil. towers

the ferry

the treasures

the beach

Tags: Tanzania by Frank
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