Malawi

August 21 , 2006: Scenes

A few scenes from Africa:

• I listened to a radio program while eating dinner a couple of nights ago. The program was a performance-art-typre show, with a combination of spoken word and techno beats. With the heavy beats in the background, a Malawian DJ chants in English about irrigation techniques.
  
  "Farmers, be wise when you plant your crops," she croons.
  Thump, thump, thump. DJ dance music.
  "Use tie boxes to catch your..." Thump, thump, thump. "...water."
  Thump, thump, thump. The beat picks up tempo.
  "You can even use ridge markers at the end of the rows."
  Thump, thump, thump. Lights flash across the dance floor.
  "Drip irrigation is easy and inexpensive."
  Thump, thump, thump. Sweaty bodies move to the beat.

• Wallace has been reading Glamour Magazine UK for three full days. He especially seems enthralled with the articles about Nicole Richie and her struggle to become a fashion icon in her own right, away from the glare of Paris Hilton. He asked me for it ("I saw a good magazine on your table," he says. "Can I read it?") and I found it the other day, dog-eared and dirty pages, in Frezer's guard house.
  
  
• "Police Rescue Basket Plane." A headline in the newspaper today. Apparently, a man crashed in his witchcraft basket (which also functioned as a plane) in the middle of the night into a house in Ndirande, one of the townships in Blantyre. Police were sent to the rescue.