rootwork the rootsblog: a cyberhoodoo webspace

kwani? kommentary: sls kenya: rastaman freeman: keeping the faith

hello world

just got my last kwani - sls kenya post ate
pissed me off when you paying
the kind of bob im paying for computer time

ima do a quick version and im outta here
only one set of computers in town and thats at the postoffice
100 bob a card

on lamu, island in the indian ocean off kenya
its like ive gone back in time about 2 centuries

little islamic coasttown, tight little mazed streets
people hanging out on their roofs and balconies to
catch the sea breeze you dont catch in the mazes below

im living separate from everybody else on the roof
of somebodys house, didnt realize it till i came down
stairs and this guy was brushing his teeth in the courtyard below

we stood there staring at each other in still life surprise
before we nodded good morning and went on about our business . .

my carnivore reading went well
working with this band called sent-a-lain
and we took the roof off the sucker

jumped off the stage (havent done that in years - its a wonder
my trick knee didnt give out on me)
and went out amongst the audience using my longtailed
rattle to remove conditions and all

started dancing and prancing behind the bandwork
doing my shamans dance

and i been doing this thing lately when i do shine where i use
when the shark trying to get shine to stop swimming to
comment on politics of the day

had the shark offer shine some personalized social security accounts
some fema trailers and some ocean front propety down in cuba

shark said dont pay no attention to all those reports about torture shine
you know i wouldnt do that shine, you know i wouldnt hurt you shine

then i commence to commenting on kenyan politics, scandals i been reading about
the shark offer shine a big mess of tribal patronage in the expanded cabinet
offered him some police jobs (big bribery thing) and his your own breathalyzer shine,
your own bank account (police corruption again)

oh i was on a roll

then i preached and prophesized my firstborn mythwork (it was east africa afterall)
and spoke truth to the people (at least my truth)

instead of my customary general audience act w/its healing theme
i did my hoodoo prophet act which i only do when i got a downhome audience
deeprooted in the tradition

and sometime you do your act and the magic dont come down
this time the magic came down, in large part because of sentalein
we didnt even rehearse or nothing - but they took me to higherground

they were fronted by this incredible blind guitarist michel onigaro
my boy oneko on drums and two other brothers
ima hit with them again - swear by all thats holy i am

and i threw divination while i was hitting the highpoints like
stand up you mighty race and
i have had visions, ive seen the promised land

if you would reclaim your legacy as gods holy instrument
you must stand on higherground

i been pondering public divination ever since i read a book
on the prophets of east africa that said the difference between a diviner
in these cultures and a diviner/prophet was that the diviners readings
were private readings for personal issues

while the diviner/prophets readings
were also public readings concerning tribal issues
and as you may or may not know, i aspire to the prophetic

was at one point inspired to give binya one of the
highjohn roots from my divination pouch

told them what highjohn means to us
the hopebringer, the burdenbearer, the battlefighter, the jackpot winner
an ultimate force, a mighty power

said he might be in mississippi when the lash falls on a slave in the sudan
but before the blood is dry on the back the conqueror is there
whispering hold on - our day is coming

told them the old folk say the conqueror got blackfolk out of slavery
by tricking old massa - that afterwards the soul of the conqueror went into
the highjohn root - to return whenever  blackfolk in need

even the space contributed, i wont even try to describe the carnivore
but i got posters, kwani reading featuring yours truly - a good time was had by all

so then we came to lamu, a airkenya commuter flight and a dhow
and its like we are in another world

and im living on somebodys roof with very archaic facilities, its deep
and at night everybody is on roofs and balconies catching those sea breezes
its like the rooftops of lamu are another city on top of the one below

i slept on the roof last night, theres a bed out there with a mosquito net
this roof cat has adopted me and we sat there watching our world
and stars like you wouldnt believe

my little group back in naroibi decided to call themselves
the page

i dont know what got into me making all those commitments
but ima try to get them through - feel like they depending on me
i made a lot of promises - babajohn o killens kind of promises

tripping me out that im the only african american writer again
specially since its such a special moment with this kwani thing

and there is a hunger for that connection
both among the young kenyan writers and
regular folk - at least here on lamu

since i been here folk calling out to me
when they see me walking down the street
cause of my dreads mostly - burning spear they call me

this morning i was talking to this brother running solidarity mack
(he was trying to sell me something)
but after the deal he was still full of solidarity and talking about how
african americans are 'fighting for all of us'

he said, there you are strong, here we are still weak, you are fighting for us all

and i kept trying to tell him that we struggling there too, and i wouldnt exactly call us strong
but he was insistent, no you are strong and you are fighting for us all

and all his buddies came up pleased to see an african american brother touristing
talking about how they have to maintain and how inspired they are by our struggle
though i think they would have been even more inspired if i had been from kingston
cause it was the dreads more than anything else that spoke to them

burning spear is obviously iconic with them cause when i walk down the street
folk point me out and whisper burning spear burning spear

its a friendly town
tight little town with folk all up in your space like that i guess they have to be
interesting dynamic w/the african/islamic - tourist/cosmopolite character

folk still wary but they smile, nod greetings, try to be helpful
whereas in nairobi folk got that urban armor on
look at you with that sharp urban wariness or like you fresh meat

the blackfolk of lamu obviously feeling a little pressured
cause they got that blackworld solidarity thing happening

aint nothing like it - resonates in my africanamerican soul
when blackfolk on the twisty little streets of lamu call out
to me as i walk by - smile when they see me

give me that little nod all blackfolk understand

like this young guy keep riding by on one of those lamu donkeys
when he see me he raise he fist and yell rastaman freeman

somewhat embarassed
i fist him back and go respect respect

and i hear him yelling at my back
rastaman freeman

i try my brother
i try
             
my love to you all

may the gods be good to us all
in the coming year

rickydoc flowers

wouldbe prophet of
the hoodoo way

awaken the sleeper
protect the weak
guide the strong

kwani? kommentary:sls kenya: working at the crossroads

tropichello world
sorry i been tardy with my postings

been running hard
got so much to say one wonders where to start

okay, kwani?

last time i was here they were just putting it together
didnt have the first issue out, it was still a dream

this time, kwani? has become a powerful and sometimes controversial force
kwani? 3 just came out, and its extraordinary what theyve done
all sorts of cutting edge fiction and nonfiction

including works by folk like billy khora that use all kinds
of fictional and film techniques in journalism and you have
to read it to really understand the delightful thing hes done

and there are dazzling literary moments all thru the work

now for the juicy parts - its has become such a powerful force
in kenyan literature that folks are taking potshots at it and
binyavanga, the editor and nurturer of the movement it represents

binyavanga is a most interesting brother, im very biased in his favor
so dont expect me to be objective

he reminds me of myself during the new ren days
but is is far more powerful a force than i ever was
i envy him his power - and the future in front of him

a big man, big presence, you can tell when hes in the room
a fierce artistic intellect whose interests and conversations
will leap from the role of ngugi in kenyan literature to parasites in the sudan
to the influence of crises on african nationalism to the integrity of artistic spaces and all about the conceptual universe and all fiercely done

his commitment of nurturing a kenyan literary infrastructure is unassailable
though obviously folk are doing it

he and tony mochama got into a big to do over dinner the other evening
over a debate thats been going on in the literary section of local newspaper, the standard
where somebody (i will have to get the name from my tapes) attacked kwani?
and binyavanga

tony is an editor of the page and binya was attacking the page
as debasing the kenyan literary conversation

his arguments as always were pristine in their quality
but the intensity of the attack showed the depths of the hurt he was feeling

and tony was squirming cause he could feel the fire of binyas hurt
but tony is an irrepressible wildman at heart, one of those mad trickster types
whose wild flights of eccentricity contain moments of mad brilliance
and they mostly ace boon coons getting a little exercise

apparently some folk had called binya the 'high priest of kwani culture'
(sometimes phrased 'high priest of the kwani cult') and the table was laughing at him
calling him pope binya the 1st and he was spouting fire

the table was full of young kenyan literary talent, binya and tony, paraselo and june
and billy and others and the conversation was fiercely and exhilaratingly literary

and they are fiercer than literary dialogues in the states
cause they feel more is at stake,
if they fail they feel that literature will die again in kenya

apparently after ngugi there was a big lull in literary energy
and ngugi is still this huge force in kenyan literature and everything seems to be
ag and bg, before ngugi and after ngugi and everything is judged by its relation to ngugi

now that theyve generated all this literary energy and getting play from the world for it
(they won the caine prize for african literature twice in a row, first binya, then yvonne)

met this brother joshua who has a dream of a theatre for the deaf
told him i would try to publicize it for him (promises promises)
it was such a sincere little dream, i did an interview of him that i will podcast

it was my conversation w/joshua that made me conscious of why
i was really here, moved me out of literary tourist mode into observer/recorder mode

and then their relationship with summer literary seminars - kenya has really played out well for them and sls
sls is the work of mikhail iossel
mikhail is a russian writer who set up the summer literary seminars in russia every summer

hes married to a kenyan, vika, and travels here often, decided he would try to
set one up in kenya

he just happened to meet binya in a bar, the first time they were just interacting
that was in 2002, he asked some african american writers to be faculty and had
some students and the very week we were supposed to come to mombasa
it got bombed and all the writers bailed but me - no way i wasnt going to africa

my first time too, me and bonnie, we had a wonderful time
our first introduction to the kwani crew, the magazine was still just a dream then
they were working on the 1st issue

wasnt but a few students, all american and after daily workshops
we spent a lot of time touristing kenya - animal parks, navisha, riftvalley, etc
which was cool, and we were in the middle of downtown nairobi which was intense
spent last 3 or 4 days on beaches of mombasa which was also cool after intensity of nairobi

but it was a radically different experience this time
this time there were only 3 american students and this time kwani had become a force and
there were something like 70 kenyan writers involved and
the days were filled with panel discussions/workshops about kenyan literature and issues
it was an incredible experience

interesting the alliance between kwani and sls
mikhail has been a vehicle of international exposure for binya and kwani
and binya/kwani have provided an incalculable literary substance
to mikhails dream of a sls kenyan component

the kwani movement is a serious literary movement whose influence
will be incalculable as only powerful literary movements can be
and mikhail likes being part of literary energy - he feeds off it

what has made this time so special is interacting with the young literary aspirants
they are very hungry for connections that can help them break into the industry
into the global literary family

and a couple of them have come at me hard
help me with my work
what can you do for me
can you help me get published

help me master the word
or performance

some of the ones ive met whove come at me so hard ima take them under my wing

like christopher, wouldbe novelist whose idea of african american lit stops at richard wright
i got to bring him up to date

muki garang, performance poet, from the southern sudan, calling for revolution in the southern sudan, fan of sekou and def poetry jam, jamming the stage

binta, softspoken would be novelist, wondering how to get into a masters in writing, im supposed to send her info on mfa programs, while i work with her on her stories so shes ready for primetime when we send her on the application process

another softspoken young sister (found out later her name is lucy) that i didnt realize was coming at me for help because she was so self effacing about it, once i realized that the men and the women came at me differently, the young brothers would come forthright, im such a such, i do such and such, can you help me, whereas the young sisters are much shyer and self effacing and ask for help in a more indirect manner that i didnt recognize at first and found myself not giving them as much attention but im clear now

when she did performance poetry at paa ya paa is when i got my understanding

and of course the mighty and incomperable grandmaster

okay this is going on and on
ima go through and edit it down

i know other folk who have tried to give chronicles of literary activities and
they are almost inevitably windy
everything thats important to me aint in important to you

got a lot more i want to say

want to speak on my fellow faculty, tom and mike and fionna and john, really interesting folk

and doreen baingana, earlier i put doreen w/the kenyan writers, noticed it and decided to leave her there cause i figure uganda is kinda enuf and her affinity w/the kenyan literary experience is stronger even than the africanamerican affinity i so prize but actually she is from uganda (based in dc) and tropical fish, her first book of shorts, won the awp award, im really looking forward to reading them

and there is red sarah the poet, cool vicki and pat - there is a certain bonding that happens at these things, folk become family of sorts

and i need to speak on being the only african american writer involved
in something that should intrigue african american writers

folk missing out on an interesting experience and i feel honored to be
the observer on this one

got to tell you about my boy oneko, a kindred spirit
dreadlocked drummerman, and michel onigaro, blind guitar player

we both supposed to perform at this big nightclub tuesday
i asked them if they would hit with me on one of my pieces

(note: i expected a little acoustic drum thing happening, turned
out they were a real band,sent-a-lain, they took me to higher ground)

my griotic performances have been going on real big here
they like that traditional storyteller thing in my work

i been inquiring about the local highgods so i know whose territory this is
who to call on tuesday,  ngai of the kikuyu, nayasi of the luo, nkai of the massi
nyasaye of the luo,  nyasa of the kissi, mungu of the coastal tribes

and ima try something new on them, my piece that i been working on, de geas of rickydoc
i got this point where ima stop, layout my divination circle and divine right there and then
we will see if i lose my nerve or otherwise blow it, but right now thats what im feeling

specially where i expect oneko and michael to be taking me

okay, one more point and im out of here

went to this artists colony paa ya paa yesterday
met the founders, two most wonderful folk

first the colony itself is an extraordinary nature compound

the owner is this dignified elder brother, who came in macking
your excellency he addressed me, surely you would rather be outside (in the parklike areas)

the bus driver had parked in it and he came out going
this bus is not part of nature, it must be moved

he was fascinating everybody, i said hes a mack,
and had to explain what a mack was
a master of the word i told them

im the last bushman in kenya he said mischievously
turns out his wife is american, sister, philla, from chicago
one of those classic elder artistic black women
and just as gracious as she could be

when i did oscars signifying monkey
we bonded immediately
turns out she and her performance group, ensemble bush back
had done the same version some years before
she was shocked to hear that oscar brown had died

they have artist residencies, said i could come anytime i want
got the 411 on them later from other folk
turns out their story was even more fascinating that i assumed it would be

okay im out of here
will edit this later

you know my philosophy
get it out on my head and onpaper/online
i will clean it up later

as you know im always trying to be attuned to the significant
tryhing to determine what is most significant about this moment, this experience

i think for me at the moment the important thing is to follow thru
on my offers to help these kids
cause you know i dont have time for it but i told them i would

what im going to do i think is try to establish an online workshop with them
maybe some sort of connection to the new ren workshop
so that folk in brooklyn critique the nairobi works and vice versa

get them up to speed - then start trying to funnel them into mfa programs
in the states - just more frustrations is what this is going to be
but i will probably be able to nurture some of them through

ima make time - i believe john o would approve

this kwani/sls kenyan experience has been just as magical
as the first one, but for radically different reasons
im as excited about being part of kwani culture as mikhail is

i recognize a crossroads when i see one
im standing on holyground

im outta here
found an ethiopian place last night

i love ethiopian food and last night somebody mentioned ethiopian
and i was like, damn thats right, ethiopia is next door, they probably
got plenty ethiopian restaurants here, best i get on that

later

rdoc

kwani? kommentary: presentation on craft: singing your own song

hello world

this is the presentation im making this morning

got some kwani kommentary to make but im
going to find a internet cafe to do it cause

this hotel business center is expensive
will do that later today

be well:

-------------------------------------------------

thankyou for inviting me

i was here 2002 and my fondest memories was meeting binyavanga and the kwani? folk

so im tickled to be back and seeing kwani and meeting more of kenyas literary folk

being asked to speak on advanced perspectives on craft
is kinda intimidating cause i man struggling with craft everyday

by the time you become what im calling a mature writer your concept of craft has become very individualized. mostly id say that the advanced perspective on craft boils down to the attitude you bring to the work

of craft itself all i can speak on is the lifelong attempt to master it.

you cant just assume you will figure it out as you go along, you must go out there and master it. there is no greater struggle for the would be writer, for the aspiring scribe tin the house of life than the lifelong struggle to master craft

been doing this 30 odd years now and its still a daily struggle to become a better craftsperson.

you don’t get there unless you have gone through a lot of deadends, a lot of bad pages

a friend of mine once told me one of the most useful things anybody ever told me

aisha rahman, playwright,

i once said to her that i wanted to be the greatest novelist that ever lived

she said that’s not what you want art, she said you want to sing your song

the best you can sing it, then you can appreciate other folk singing theirs

that’s been one of the most helpful things ive ever heard as a young writer,

not only did it keep me from being jealous of my friends when they made it or

when they wrote good stuff, or getting lost trying to get other folks styles
but its gotten me in the habit of listening to my own song

thats the key struggle of any writer, developing their own voice,

being attuned to your own literary song.. trusting your own literary instinct
.

which basically means that you comfortable breaking the rules,

this is how you gain your own distinctive voice
when you learn to trust your own rules of the literary road

you grow by trying to master the licks of writers that impress you
there was a time when everything i did sounded like bad marquez

but you dont want to stay there and become derivative
you just want to add their licks to your own repetoire

also you want to learn to listen to your projects cause every book demands its own voice,

it’s the story you telling that tells you what kind of narrative licks a piece will demand

another friend of mine, george saunders, once said that its in following your mistakes

that you find new ground,

ive heard jazz musicians say some of their best licks came from some mistake they made

that they heard something new in and they tried that mistake over and over again on purpose

until they made in it something new and wonderful, until it lead them into new and higher ground

novel, the name of the form, novel new and seminal, covering new cultural ground
adding something new to the literary line - to human understanding 
trusting your own literary instinct only comes from years of crunching it

often without the outside world valuing it

but you cant let the outside worlds valuation of you as a writer influence your own

specially if you forging new ground, the world will tell you you cant do that

but you write whats inside you to write, say whats inside you to say and

you write it so good it cannot be denied

and it would be nice to get published and get paid

but that aint whats driving you, whats driving you is the need to see this work happen

when you young you have to get trained, you cant go but so far on heart

there is a trajectory for serious writers, you start off with heart, then you learn craft and for a minute you just a technician and then you move back into heart but with all these new skilz

but you cant get lost and stay a technician, once you learn the rules you abandon them

young writers generally don’t have the control.

you have to master the rules before you break them with the control that identifies mature work.. another friend of mine once told me anything you can control, control it.

for instance african american writers like wideman or gayle jones

will have multiple voices and povs in the same sentence much less the same paragraph

and have done it so well that the critics gave it a name - the speakerly text. 

for instance when im writing raw manuscript my tenses sprawl all over the place,

and folk say you got to fix that - but i like my tenses sprawling, give me more room to play

so what i have to do is go in there and make sure that its controlled, that there is a pattern,

that its doing something disciplined and controlled in the text.

i make sure it works for me, that’s controlling it.

but when your tenses sprawl because you don’t know they shouldn’t that’s lack of craft. 

young writers follow the rules, but the mature writer who follows the rules is a weak writer

but now when you wandering around on literary ground nobody else has ever covered

you have to believe in yourself, you have to believe in your godgiven talent, you got to keep the faith, not matter what the world says

most of you will end up slaving in the vineyards,
and the vineyards will winnow out the weak hearted

you want to be a writer you got to be hardheaded and obsessive about it,
you just cant take a no.

was recently reading this book called 13 ways of looking at the novel

said the primary determinate of who was successful at being a writer

was the absolute determination to be one. 

you got to show that determination in life if you want to be a writer,

you got to bust the move, if you need to move to nairobi, do it,

if you need to move to newyork, do it

but most of all you can never give up, giving up is the only fatal move

also you have to be attuned to the times.

fiction has been transformed by the advent of media

and if we want to retain our cultural primacy we to to deal with that.

this media saturated generation processes information differently from my own

and future generations will even more so

doctorow did a piece in the nytimes series on writers

where he said that contemporary fiction devalues exposition and transitions

cause contemporary readers an mtv generation, used to following MTV cuts and multitasking

you can write those longwinded plodding narrations if you want,
the critics might love it but future generations wont read it,
they will start multitasking on you.

better get to some hypernarration if you want to be competitive in the media saturated future

im a stylist and i often dont trust my work

cause it so often doesn’t look like a novel supposed to look,

but ive come to trust my literary instinct,

and i have learned it does my literary heart good to take chances

when you a mature writer craft is subsumed to vision and literary sensibility

that intimate connection to the human condition that understands the significant
that instinct for whats true and important, whats truly significant.

here is where we, the writers of the black world, have the advantage.

mainstream writers they have to search for things to write about

and often end up literary techinicians without heart

you want desperately to be competent and even masterful literary technicians

but if that’s all your work is about you’ve lost the way.

you want to write work that means something, work that counts,

work that speaks from your heart to the readers.heart

i tell young writers all the time, a novel that dont cost you emotionally

is probably not worth writing. 

you want to be a writer whose passionate about his or her work,

you want to be a writer with a mission.

african american writers are fortunate in this regard, we were born with a mission.

same thing i assume with kenyan writers,

this is not some abstract endeavor where you can write any old thing,

it is too important to our lives, the lives our of people

the future of our generations and the culture that has nurtured you.

your works mean something,

along the lines joyce refers to in portrait when he says he goes to meet life to

‘forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscious of my race.”

my mentor, john o killens, used to say the more important that you have to say

the more obligated you are to say it well.

for all its cost me over the years i love being a writer,
and choosing to give it all i had to give is one of the best decisions i ever made in my life. 
if you feel like you got it in you to writer, go for it with everything you got

master craft and go beyond

i am not comfortable that i can give you something about the advanced perspectives on craft,

depends on how im feeling that day, sometimes i feel like a master, sometimes i feel like i fool

but i have never given the word anything less than my very best.

and in return the word has been good to me.

i like feeling like im making a contribution to the human condition,

to human destiny.

i consider literature a sacred calling,
writers are creators, gods assistants on the planet,
and if you would be a god you must be a worthy god.

advanced craft moves beyond craft into vision

work that matters, work that means something

may the god of literature be good to you.

may the gods be good to us all.

thankyou.

that is all

kenya kommentary: representing: african american to the bone

hello world
on my way to kenya
plan to keep a running commentary
if i can find an internet cafe like i did
last time

im too tickled
had a wonderful time last time
mostly cause i met this kwani crew
its like they got a harlem renaissance thing happening
nairobi style

ive attached the schedule
kwani has a much higher profile this year

gon be interesting

always trying when about to go through an experience to
gain the most out of it  -  at all times in a what is most significant about this moment
mode - alert to moments of fa

looking forward to it

and im very conscious of representing
african american to the bone

gon do my act
it went over well last time - mostly,
oral tradition and all

so often folk from the continent dont think we can throw down
think we lost our licks

so i enjoy representing, bells on the ankles and my longtailed rattle
and all, doing an afroamerican hoodoo thing

my ritual performancework being acknowledged as the real thing
on the continent mean a lot to me

last time i didnt have my instruments
this time im taking it all the way home

thats why i been working on my signature piece
gon initiate that bad boy on the continent

got to represent and leave that good impression
cause im very proud of being african american
and i want folk of the world to think well of us

folk around the world like to sneer at us cause when
they think afroamerican they think MTV and BET

but thats alright cause when i was coming up being afroamerican meant
something else - our struggle was the model for struggles around the world
thats what im representing when im in the world

im looking im listening im learning
im growing in struggle
do a little good here and there all the better

solidarity means more to us than it does to blacks of the world
that grew up in black countries
where the very being of blackness is not challenged and defined every day

we grew up under the gun and solidarity is one of our greatest values

when im somewhere and i see another black person and i give them that
little you and me nod and they dont respond it hurts my feelings

i expect that acknowledgement to the point where it totally throws me off
when i dont get it

i get to kenya and its like when i went to jamaica recently
im just overwhelmed with the blackness

naive or not, for better or worse
my attitude is damn, look at all this solidarity

im outta here
keep you up as i can

in struggle
rdoc

awaken the sleeper
protect the weak
guide the strong

-----------------------------------------------

Summer Literary Seminars - Kenya 2005 Schedule

 

Wednesday, Dec 14th

Noon – 2pm

Registration/meet and greet.

2 – 4pm

Official opening of program.

Remarks from Binyavanga Wainaina, Mikhail Iossel and Thomas Burke.

Lecture by Marjorie Oludhe-McGoye

 

6 pm Welcome Cocktail

 

Thursday, December 15^th

10am – 12noon

Craft-based Lectures

New Journalism and Investigative Journalism

Nonfiction within a context - an introduction to the nonfiction process

  Parselelo Kantai

Fiction 

Fundamentals of good fiction writing  Thomas Burke

Advanced Fiction Writing 

Advanced Perspectives on the craft  Arthur Flowers &

Mikhail Iossel

2 – 4 pm

Roundtable presentation followed by group discussion The Business of Writing in

Kenya

Stanley

Gazemba, Binyavanga Wainaina, Fiona MCrae, Mike Vasquez and Mikhail Iossel

 

Friday, December 16^th

10am – 12noon

Craft-based Lectures

New Journalism and Investigative Journalism

Translating

Kenya

for Kenyans - perspective and audience in non-fiction    Billy Kahora

Fiction

Crafting the short story    Doreen Baingana

Advanced Fiction Writing 

The editor’s perspective - what kind of work excites us?  Fiona McCrae &

Mike Vasquez

2 – 4 pm

Lecture:

“Soundtracks: The Meeting Of Music And Creative Writing” Dr Joyce Nyairo

Roundtable presentation followed by group discussion Spoken word: Where Literature meets Music

Arthur Flowers, Oneko Arina, and Kama of Kalamashaka.

 

Saturday, December 17^th

11 am – 6pm

All day event: excursion to Paa ya Paa artist colony in the outskirts of

Nairobi

for an afternoon of visual arts, music, and nyama choma barbeque.

 

Sunday, December 18^th

Free day.

 

Monday, December 19^th

10am – 12noon

Craft-based lectures

New Journalism and Investigative Journalism

Building a viable career as a nonfiction writer Parselelo Kantai

Fiction

An editor’s perspective - what do editor’s look for?  Mike Vazquez

Fiona McCrae

Advanced Fiction Writing

The editing process and experimentation with form and style  Binyavanga Wainaina

Thomas Burke

2 – 4 pm

Lecture: The

Matatu Culture Dr.

Mbugua wa Mungai

Roundtable presentation followed by group discussion Writing within a Context: The Kenyan Conversation

Binyavanga Wainaina, Tony Mochama and

Stanley

Gazemba

 

Tuesday, December 20^th

10am – 12noon

Roundtable presentation followed by group discussion Opportunities and challenges of getting published in the

US

Arthur Flowers, Doreen Baingana, Mikhail Iossel, Thomas Burke, Mike Vazquez, Fiona McCrae

 

Noon: Closure, SLS-Kenya 2005

Remarks by Mikhail Iossel

Invitation to participate in SLS-St Petersburg 2006.

 

7pm

Kwani Reading with Arthur Flowers

Carnivore’s Simba Saloon

 

Wednesday, December 21^st

Transition to Lamu/safaris begin.

 

Wednesday, December 21^st – Saturday, December 24^th

Meet on

Lamu

Island

.

Independent writing time, with nightly group dinners at one of several oceanfront restaurants.

 

Saturday, December 24^th

Evening: Christmas Eve party on

Manda

Beach

.

 

Sunday, December 25^th

Morning: group breakfast and writing time.

Optional group trips to

Lamu

Museum

,

Swahili

House

Museum

, and Donkey Sanctuary.

Afternoon:

Dhow ride with stop at Manda beach for swimming.

Evening: sunset participant reading and workshop on Yumbe House rooftop area; group dinner to follow.

Nighttime: Christmas party on Manda beach.

 

Monday, December 26^th

Morning: group breakfast and writing time

Afternoon: walk to Shella beach for lunch and swimming; take dhow home.

Evening: sunset participant reading and workshop on Yumbe House rooftop area; group dinner to follow.

 

Tuesday, December 27^th

Morning: group breakfast and writing time

Afternoon: TBA

Evening: Farewell group dinner at Hapa Hapa.

 

Wednesday, December 28^th

Lamu to

Nairobi

.

Program finished.

Fees(KSh)
Students:
Private Schools & Universities                           KSh 3,500
Public Universities Literature Students                KSh 1,300 (Subsidised by Kwani Trust)

Non-students:                                                  KSh 5,000

Contact Jacqueline Achwoka at the Kwani Trust office or on 0733298689 for more details on SLS.

  

Suite 1S, 1st Floor
Madonna House( opp Soin Arcade)
Westlands Road
Westlands
Nairobi
______________________________

P. O. Box 2895
Nairobi 00100
KENYA
______________________________

Tel :  +254 20 4451383 / 4450490
Cell : +254 733 526358
Cell : +254 721 934807
______________________________

Email : [email protected]
URL : http://www.kwani.org
MSN : [email protected]
______________________________

kwani?

de geas of rickydoc: i have had a vision and this is what i see

hello world
been working on a performance piece
gon be my signature piece

still fumbling with it
but im getting better w/it
decided its a kalimba piece
always have to decide if a piece works better
with kalimba or mouthharp
this is a kalimba

what i do is do it over and over in the ipod
listen to it over and over and see whats working
and whats not and just keep doing it until i
can do it in my sleep

its weak now and i pity the audiences ill be trying it on
the next couple of months but eventually this will be
my signature piece

what i would like to do is put this on podcast
got to see if thats viable,got to figure that out

latest version:  i am rickydoc  (w/kalimba and ankle bells)
first stanzas sung, go into chantmode on i am rickydoc, intimate on troubles & tribulations
end in prayer/preaching mode

--------------------------------------------

(this section sung, so kalimba got to be tight, ive learned to start easy)

i am rickydoc rootdoctor, i am the hoodooman
i am the firstborn son of a delta hoodoo clan
i have got the power, get it while you can
a gift from rickydoc rootdoctor, i am the hoodooman

i know everything  -  that there is to know
secrets that you thought you had  - you dont have no more
love    power   money -   even serenity
tell me what you want my friend  - and i will give you what you need

cause im rickydoc rootdoctor - and i am the hoodooman

(refrain - still singing  - sometimes singing works sometimes it doesnt,
if it doesnt sound like its working i segue into chant earlier)

i raise the sun up in the morning - put the blues out at night
whatever gon wrong in your life - rickydoc will make it right

cause im rickydoc rootdoctor - i am the hoodooman

(segue into chant mode:)

i am rickydoc rootdoctor
i am mythmaker
a weaver of conjure, a worker of storm
a caster of bones and tomorrows truths
i make myth and myth makes tomorrow
as i define so shall it be

for you see my friends i am a conjuror
a dread delta hoodoo with twisted left hands and seared mouthharp lungs
come to call through fierce arrogant hunger   to me o mighty race
for ive had visions    ive seen the promised land
i have seen the promised land

and this is what i see
i see a people tall and strong, a powerful people
an illuminated people, a culture is spread out
amongst the stars and leading humanity to its ever greater self

this is what i see  -  a people marching unto eternity
guide and guardian of humanitys destiny

it is i, rickydoc rootdoctor
speak in the name of the old gods, of olodumare and nkulunkulu
of nyame and legba and oshun, i works for mr conqueroo

the conqueror

it is i, rickydoc rootdoctor
come to call you firstborn   you who walked first on two feet
humanities living ancestors and gods true chosen
should not the first be the last

listen firstborn to the geas of rickydoc and i will give you a mission
greater than your adversity,

i will give you the stars

listen firstborn to the geas of rickydoc and i will give you power
i will give you responsibility for humanitys march unto its ever greater self

i ask then that you accept responsibility not only for your own destiny
but the destiny of all peoples and all jah creature great and small

if you would reclaim your legacy as gods holy instrument you must stand on higher ground
stand up you mighty race and god will give you power - stand up you mighty race

and when you come to the crossroads, always take the highroad,
always strive to be greater than you are

i ask only that you be the great and glorious people you were meant to be
the illuminated children of the sun - humanities living ancestors, gods true chosen

(segue into intimate mode  - bluessung)

and when the hardtimes come, they always do
i want you to hold on, be strong,
you fight the battles friend   no one else could win

and the next time that you find yourself in trouble
i want you to remember what the old bluesdoctor said

every goodby aint gone, cause you sick dont mean you dead
lord know that trouble dont last always

long as you hold on, long as you growing strong
you fight the battles friend no one else could win

(segue into healing mode - prayer)

we have gathered here this evening in the name of the word
the almighty and healing word, that condition been bothering you
we gon leave that behind

when you come see me you check your troubles at the door
im the hoodooman

so when you wake up in the morning
wake up with the understanding that today gon be a day of struggle
that today gon be a brand new day
today ima fight the battle nobody else could win

awaken the sleeper
protect the weak
guide the strong

and when you need me
you call me
i will come
i am rickydoc

that it all
it is done

gods blessings on us all
gods blessings on us all

katrina commentary: call to action: conference/march from miss to neworleans: dec 8,9,10 (and a couple of my thoughts on what really should be done)

hello world

received this katrina call to action over the black radical congress list
dont know who sponsoring organization is, an email address but no link - unfortunate

the presentation is not as sophisticated as i would prefer it be
and no attendant website further indication of  perhaps not ready for primetime activism
which is really unfortunate cause struggle in the 21st century got to be primetime

needs editing too but im gon to put it up as i received it 

had i been asked i would have suggested changing the tone of it also

something a little less predictable (thereby less dismissible)
folk hear that same old rhetoric it goes in one ear and out the other
unless you already a true believer

and i would have dumped the repeated attempts to link katrina to reparations

(i had hoped we were going to let reparations slide for awhile - i had hoped
katrina would make it clear to black activists that it is a new day (hell its a new
century)  - and that oldtime gimme gimme needs to be left behind w/the dodo bird - 

notice how they mention  self determination almost everytime they mention reparations, 

cause they know thats where the hole in the wall - ohwell im not going to worry
about it, strategically speaking reparations is a dead end street and eventually we gon come
to the end of that road - and i do make a distinction between reparations
for slavery and the government helping its citizens after a natural disaster - thats
what i expect of any government - calling that reparations instead of disaster aid
confuses the issue and makes it less likely - clumsy rhetoric points is all that is)

but i have to give credit where credit is due (the folk in the arena 
always get some slack, i depend on that myself) - they trying to bust the move 
and i love them for it
eventually they will get around to asking me about them archaic strategies

what i wish this crowd would do instead is get busy

get up in there and start rebuilding them blocks one by one
just get busy, imtalking strongbusy, then get folk to get and keep necessary funding going
if folk were in there habitat of humanity style, just building with whatever they
got the world would get behind that with the necessary funding and expertise

im talking dahomeyan dopkwe, im talking collective work, 
one of the black nationalist verities 

im not down, im in my own struggle, but the new orleans folk need to be
throwing down with the fuck this attitude, with the no god we aint accepting this
attitude, we gon raise these barns together one by one until we done attitude - 

forget waiting for the federal government to save us - legbas beard, if this dont 
convince us to move on what will

obviously not the whole answer, im talking about the limbo folk in
cause im feeling that spiritual pain, my hoodoo feelers been twitching bad

other issues like making sure it doesnt happen again (wetlands & levees)
and better prep for when it does 
and other such have to constitute a comprehensive approach but i need to
get folk into hearth and home, either in new orleans or elsewhere, and i for
one am not willing to give up new orleans, not new orleans, one of the 
afrospiritual and artistic centers of the americas, of the world, no, not new orleans

in the meantime i am relieved to see the activist community busting a move
of any sort
cause the condition of the katrina survivors getting worse off every day

i know some of them and they are caught in this catch 22
neworleans wont let them back in their homes/neighborhoods
they getting mortgage and eviction threats
insurance company balking for one friend cause they say his 9th ward house
isnt really totally destroyed just almost destroyed and therefore not eligible
and fema help is just a frustrating joke
for folk scattered across the country and living in shelters, hotelrooms and 
with tired of it all family

folk really depressed, both katrinafolk and their hosts
and there seems to be no end in sight
because the bush administration and fema not even trying to help
beyond a politically motivated minimum they just dont care 
about them people and their indifference becomes more glaring every day

the anger that attended the original tragedy continues to grow
and bush just a fiddling

folk gon have to take matters into their own hands
this march is just the beginning - that anger reaching critical mass

i was reading where fema feared riots in mississippi
the possibility of civil disorder is still there

mark my words

(unless of course they listen to me and use that energy
to get to building - ima go ahead and put this commentary
on some venues but i dont expect its gon do the do - none
of the others have - dont know why i still hit it, just dont know
no other way to be - in my deepest soul i believe in the 
power of the word)

rickydoc trickmaster
wouldbe prophet of the hoodoo way

awaken the sleeper
protect the weak
guide the strong

--------------------------------

THE CALL!
FROM OUTRAGE TO ACTION !!!

********************************************** 

STATE OF EMERGENCY CONFERENCE AND SURVIVORS 

GENERAL ASSEMBLY, JACKSON, MS

DECEMBER 8, 9, 2005 

************************** 

MARCH ON NEW ORLEANS 

DECEMBER 10, 2005 

“DEMAND THE RIGHT TO RETURN”

On December 8, 2005 through December 10, 2005 scores of survivors and

their supporters,(people who believe in freedom and justice) will gather in

Jackson, MS and New Orleans. We will gather for the National State of

Emergency Conference in Jackson on the 8th and 9th of December. Supporters and

representatives and leaders from over 50 black organizations, and labor unions

and their third world and anti-racists allies will meet in support and

solidarity of the survivors initiate an action plan to rescue the black

population and all oppressed populations from their dependency on racist and

incompetent governments. Most important the Katrina Survivors will gather at

the same place and time to form a General Assembly to speak for themselves and

to exercise their rights to self determination.

Survivors have raised the demands are for immediate jobs, education, housing,

clothing and food. Survivors have made the demand to place the control and

direction of Gulf Coast reconstruction in their hands. Survivors demand

opportunity to exercise the right to return to the Gulf Coast with dignity and

without poverty. Survivors have demand ed a complete investigation into and

prosecution of all government agencies for crimes against humanity and human

rights violations.

 LOCATION OF EVENTS

On December 8, 2005 7pm-11pm the youth will speak out on Katrina at the

Business School of Jackson State University at 1300 Lynch Street, Jackson, MS, room 134.

On December 9, 2005 from 9am-6pm in the State of Emergency Conference the

survivors will tell their stories and conference participants will organize

for action in support of Katrina Survivors demands and to build a front which

will confront and combat the racist and abusive human rights violations of the

American Government and its friends.

The General Assembly and the Conference will take place at Anderson United

Methodist Church, located in Jackson, MS at

6205 Hanging Moss Road, off I-220.

On Friday evening December 9, 2005 from 8pm-11pm there will be a cultural

program and rally at a location to be announced in Jackson, MS.

On Saturday, December 10, 2005 which is International Human Rights Day. The

survivors and their supporters (all of us) will march on New Orleans in

support of all the survivors demands and in particular in support of the right

of the survivors to return to the Gulf Coast.

OBJECTIVES

The Objectives of the December 8-10, 2005 Assembly/Conference and the

Demonstration are as follows:

1. To build a Hurricane Katrina Survivors General Assembly which will speak

for the Gulf Coast Survivors and which will demand and exercise the peoples

right to self determination in New Orleans and other effected gulf coast areas

in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

2. To demand the people’s right to return to New Orleans and to the

Mississippi and Alabama Gulf Coast with dignity and without poverty.

3. To demand reparations for the governments’ criminal indifference,

negligence, and malicious actions towards the Victims and Survivors, before,

during and after Katrina.

4. To demand, launch and/or continue investigations, law suits and

prosecutions of governments, agencies and persons responsible for the human

rights violations and crimes against humanity committed before, during and

after Katrina.

5. To build a national united front in support and solidarity with the self

determination and reparation demands of Katrina Survivors, and through this

front to design and initiate a plan of action and institutions which will

allow black people to fortify themselves and serve their own needs in the face

of future disasters which are either natural or by human hands.

6. To link today’s demands for reparations and self determination to the

historical and future struggle of black people and other oppressed populations

for self determination and reparations.

THE BACKGROUND

On August 29, 2005 Katrina struck New Orleans and the Gulf Coast with the full

force of a category 5 hurricane. Within hours flood waters would rush the City

of New Orleans pouring out of an outdated levee system that, due to years of

gross and blatant government neglect, was not prepared to withstand Katrina’s

powerful winds. Quickly these waters would find and swallow up the city’s

blackest and poorest communities. Indeed many reported hearing explosions

before seeing the advancing waters. This has left some to conclude that the

floods invaded some black communities and missed some white ones not by chance

but by design.

For many there was a memory of 1927 when white business owners busted

the levee in black areas in order to guide the water away from their

businesses and affluent communities. This history supported the belief that

Katrina flood waters found their way to the jet black ninth ward and East New

Orleans by design.

Within days after Katrina struck, dead bodies, mostly black bodies,

floated through the streets, as ambulances and helicopters rushed passed black

and poor victims toward white and affluent communities, leaving the

economially less advantaged and the black to fend for themselves.

The situation would produce countless acts of heroism and courage as

men, women and children would reach out to each other and save the lives of

family, friends and strangers as government agencies and the red cross either

rushed to the aid of the affluent and the white or dilly dallied as the

devastation and disaster mushroomed. The survivors would seek refuge in the

New Orleans Super Dome and at the Civic Center as they would gather and then

wait for buses which took three, four and often five and six days to come. The

people waited in dangerous and unhealthy conditions without clean clothing,

water, electricity, toiletries, and often without food.

The major media would turn away, ignore or fail to show the peoples act

of courage and heroism and become preoccupied with what they termed acts of

thugs. Although there were few if any gun shot casualties reported to any law

enforcement or medical personnel, the media repeatedly ran stories on phantom

shootings at police and medical aids by so called armed thugs, while

broadcasting over and over again the same picture of the same few people

carrying gym shoes, clothing, food, and in one case a T.V. from a few stores.

To the major media blacks seeking and finding food from abandoned stores were

looters, while whites doing the same were identified as having found food.

The Governor of Louisiana would call on State and local law enforcement

to shoot to kill the so-called looters. The numbers of those gunned down by

police and National Guards are suspected to be at least thirty (30). In

Mississippi and New Orleans many were herded into jail with high bonds for

petty larceny or on other exaggerated charges.

When the buses finally arrived, blacks and much of the poor were taken

to so called shelters and placed in concentration camp like conditions at gun

point. Whites and the more affluent were transported to white churches and

other facilities and shelters.

Across the country outrage has grown and still grows as the criminal

indifference and mistreatment by the U. S. Government, FEMA, the Red Cross,

State Governments, Local Governments and others towards the survivors and

victims of hurricane Katrina became and still becomes more and more apparent.

The outrageousness of the behavior of these Governments and agencies

becomes even more obvious, as Katrina survivors were left with little money,

without homes, jobs and dignity and some without their children who could not

be found and nowhere have the American governments given adequate help or

shown genuine concern. Survivors seeking help have been shuffled from the Red

Cross, to FEMA, to insurance companies and back to the Red Cross again without

and have received little relief and full recovery is nowhere in sight. The

insurance companies refuse to pay for homes lost, FEMA pays too little, too

slow. Large numbers of Red Cross workers are racist, often dishonest, and

unreliable at best. The U.S.Government, the State and Local governments

involved and big time money changers go forward on plans to rebuild New

Orleans without most of its displaced black and poor populations. Meanwhile

hundreds of Katrina survivors linger in jail charged with a variety of

illegitimate charges, and well over 1,000 families of Katrina and the

government’s brutal neglect have buried their dead and no compensation for

wrongful death has been offered or seriously considered.

The burden of suffering and financial loss will once again be slung on

the back of the poor and a nation of black people which already finds millions

of its people in poverty, prison and jails, many being held as political

prisoners. This cross is to be carried by a nation of people already owed

reparation for centuries of slave trade, slavery, Jim Crow, lynching,

discrimination and countless other acts of lawlessness.

 Remembering the horrors of Katrina and the history of racial and class

oppression is not enough. The time has come to turn outrage to action.

CONTACT INFORMATION 

For further information call 1-888-310-PHRF(7473), or call 601-353-5566, or

email [email protected] 

i works the soul

MONDAY
i works the soul

hello world

just got back from brooklyn
had a good newren workshop
its really growing well
workshops are such a longgame thing
that sometimes you wonder

but we got some good strong writers in there
and we been working lately on preparing the next generation,
most of us now are in our 50s, oldschool warriors still hitting that lick

and we didnt have but a couple of youngsters
so we been concentrating on young talent
we 50 odds figure we got about 10 good productive years left before
we start getting shall we say tired
(hopefully 20, 30 or more, but 10 we can count on)

and im real pleased with the young folk we been
gathering, some good and true talent

got to work on structuring a strong institution to
leave them

those of you who know the history know that i was once
exec dir of the harlem writers guild, a 50 year old institution
ran into some problems with my youthful enthusiasms
and got tossed,

when they tossed me, my whole generation of writers left with me
the real writers, the ones that really cared

they bet on flowers
just couldnt leave me hanging in the wind by myself

the harlem writers guild put out an anthology recently
and didnt include me or my generation, they excommunicated us - that hurt

so me maintaining and taking newren to higher ground
this an act of redemption for me

plus that john o killens, my mentor, was a founder of the guild
i remember a delegation of us going to john and asking him if it was okay if we broke off and started a new guild and him saying okay

just maintain

i was trained to approach this workshopping thing as part of building black institutions

john tried to build into african american literature an infrastructure
that facilitates the nurturing of committed black writers and thinkers

literary visionaries
you train a strong artist/visionary and no telling what they will contribute

(samesame hoodooman, my specialty is unleashing artists - then they produce a healthy body of work and its just grows and grows)

a lot of that is passing on what each generation in the tradition learns to the next generation
i would not be who i am today if i had not been the beneficiary of john o killens life
of struggle and service - and he of the ones who passed it on to him

ive reached that point in my artistic and hoodoo life where passing it on to the next generation
is as important as getting my own work done

i cant let john o, the newren crew, or my literary tradition down
every month i trek on down to the city
finances, weather or weariness, dont nothing stop that show (unless the crick rise)

ima do whatever i got to do to take
that operation to higher ground

whenever you get hammered
when you regroup you got to regroup on higherground
then its all progress, all part of the growing process

that way adversity is transformed into strength
thats what the blues is about

i got to go, got to get todays work done
just wanted to get a post started

my hit numbers been growing since katrina
i got to maintain that

gon be interesting to see what my next phase gon be
i can feel a new level of engagement coming down
i think cause i been in the woodshed and the things i work out in
my novels i generally try to manifest in the 'realworld'

the effort of which feeds back into the authenticity of the novel

prophecy for instance
its a difficult process to explain, maybe later

today im feeling fey today like i sometimes get
dont know where this post will go this week

reason i started this post is i was back there ripping these two tapes
i found at the library:  one - violin, sing the blues for me: african american fiddlers 1926 - 1949
oldschool violin blues, im really enjoying it too

seems the violin was the instrument of choice for african american
musicians until the 1930s or so when the guitar took over

the other - clasic blues: recordings of the smithsonian collection
and im reading the liner notes, right - its been such a music education reading the liner notes
of the 1000s of cds ive listened to since i discovered the public librarys stash

and there was this quote of roosevelt sykes that spoke to me
both as a bluesman and a hoodooman (for me thats always been a paired set)

"now some people dont understand.  they think a blues player has to be worried, troubled to sing the blues.  thats wrong.  ill put it this way: theres a doctor, he has medicine.  he aint sick but he has stuff for the sick people.  so the blues player, he aint worried and bothered, but hes got something for the worried people.  doctor you can see his medicine you can see his patient.  blues you cant see the music, you cant see the patient cause its soul.  so i works the soul, and the doctor works on the body"

thats me
i works the soul

as some of you know my daddy was a prominent medical doctor in old memphis
back when being a black doctor was a big struggle and achievement

believe me, i know

id love to tell his story but im shamed to say
i just dont know it that well
does any man ever really know his father

but i do know he had this abiding sense of responsibility for the health
of the colored folk of south memphis

one of my favorite lines, i use it every chance i get
was one i heard as a child:

doctor flowers still own half the kids on the southside
cause they havent been paid for

ive always wanted to walk in his footsteps
thats what i call myself doing as a hoodoo doctor
he worked the body, i works the soul

rickydoc flowers
spiritdoctor

awaken the sleeper
protect the weak
guide the strong

feeding my obsessions and ifa chosen by unesco heritage list: wish i had known, i would have submitted hoodoo

hello world

this was sent on a listserve w/o a link
tried to confirm this and could not
did find out that the new additions to unesco
list were just announced so i assume its true
and of interest even if not

at least to folk like myself
interested in divination

wish i had known they were doing this
i would have submitted hoodoo

ohwell, moving right along . . .

i scheduled 2 days for my breakdown of rest
it took about 7, god aint it always like that

it was a very humbling experience
noting all the problems to be fixed

and im still coming up with ideas
which is really bad, new ideas means raw manuscript
and some would say dont do it arthur, just go with what you got

but whats happening is that now that i have the storyline down
the magic is staring to come thru and i want this to be a magical text

for instance:

one of my folkloric neighborhood characters is staggerlee
a gangsta rapper who after katrina becomes political

there is this rumor in the neighborhood that the crossroads
where you sell your soul to legba to become a great bluesman
is where the person ave crosses the expressway into the park
highjohn and most of the neighborhood consider it a local urban legend

until staggerlee decides to cut the deal and when he gets the the midnight crossroads
he is surprised to find highjohn waiting for him and this is a surprise to highjohn too
that he the one folk been calling legba at the crossroads
so he cuts the deal in legba or rather highjohn the conquerors name

dont know how i will work this out
maybe he takes walks in the woods/park when hes feeling fey, day and night
and realizes that people have seen him walking the woods at night
and thats where the legba at the crossroads rumors have come from

i dont know, got a lot to work out to make this work
and more like it that have been percolating in me

got to just do up the raw manuscript and then start fixing it
i might do that one crossroads one today just to get it started

new ideas like this you have to just do the raw manuscript immediately
then you know eventually you will fix it, but if you dont do the raw manuscript
immediately you might not ever do it, so ima start that today
(after i do the days longhand, finishing draft is still priority)

while i was breaking my draft down i had many such 'what ifs' present themselves
i wont followthru on all of them cause i want to be through more than anybody

but some like this one i cannot resist, i wont even try
when i thought of this one i got that little oh yeah feeling that no writer ignores

messed around and started making some ideological moves too
seems im coming out of the woodshed and did some institutionalization maintenance
on the hoodoo way list, my secretsocieties initiative and newren workshop

and i put my music collection on my ipod (some 7,000 songs now, that was a lot of work)

i had to upgrade recently from a 20 to a 60 meg ipod because of all the goodies
i found at the public library and then i figured what the heck, the best collection in
the world is right here on my shelf

and instead of my absolute favorites which is what i had in the 20, (about 3000 songs)
i put everything that i might want in my digital collection on it  (7000 and counting)

got obsessed with it like i do and bonnie will tell you thats the reason
it took 7 days to do what should have taken 2 but what can i say, music is
an integral part of my artistic being - i work to the beat

finished that project this morning reeling w/fatigue,
now i got to get down with some serious longhand
im behind schedule

and i got to bring my ideological projects back online
i just cannot stand to see them languish any longer

its like im in kind of a half woodshed

but they still my projects instead of the schoolhouse grind
im still good to go - i love feeding my obsessions

i have over the years come to trust my obsessions
i remember when i took up the bluesharp and spent hours and hours
and wondering if i was not being serious about my writing time
w/all this bluesharping

but i was obsessed with it and could not fight the power
samesame kalimba

now the bluesharp and kalimba are integral parts of my literary identity
of my griotic skils as a black writer in the oral tradition and i see
where the gods of literature were looking out for me when they gave
me that obsession

samesame when jeff parker turned me onto hypertext and
online competency, what i cursed as a distractive obsession
turns out to have been a critical skill in my evolution as a
21st century literary man

i have come to trust my obsessions

so i got to maintain my production schedule
and feed my obsessions when they come

thats why im always looking for more gears
(being ever more disciplined and systematic about my productiohn)

im outta here
got to get crunching on my longhand
got to get busy got to get busy

instruggle
rickydoc flowers

------------------------------

Nigeria's Ifa corpus enters UNESCO heritage list
By Kabir Alabi Garba
 
ORUNMILA, the Patron Saint of Ifa practitioners which other praise name is "Okunrin Kikuru Oke Igeti" (the small statured one resident in Igeti Hill), must have beamed a smile at the weekend.
 
The country, in far away Paris, booked another place on the UNESCO cultural heritage map as Ifa, the country's submission to the Proclamation of Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity secured the approval of the international body.
 
The occasion was the Third Proclamation of Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage and Nigeria was among 75 member states whose 65 cultural masterpieces were reviewed by an international jury composed of 18 members.
 
The five-day conference, which ended last Friday in Paris, France, had in attendance two representatives from Nigeria. They were Professors Wande Abimbola, Special Adviser to President Olusegun Obasanjo on Culture and Traditional Matters and Akinwumi Ishola.
 
Nigeria's ambassador and Permanent Delegate to UNESCO, Professor Michael Omolewa described the development as outstanding.
 
"It is with great pleasure that I am announcing to you that our entry of Ifa into the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity is successful. The decision was taken last night by the International Jury and it was announced today (Friday) at the award ceremony held at the UNESCO Headquarters in Paris,'' according to a press statement by Omolewa.
 
He said: "This achievement belongs to the Almighty God alone, He is the one that gave us the very professional expertise of Professor Wande Abimbola and Professor Akinwumi Ishola, both of whom prepared the very rich candidature file of Nigeria.''
 
The diplomat premised the importance of the proclamation on the competitiveness of the award. "Now, the world can appreciate the quality of the wisdom and understanding of the African race before the intrusion of colonial rule, we therefore expect that the award will lead to an enhanced status for tourism promotion and capacity-building in Nigeria,'' remarked Omolewa.
 
Since 2001 when the proclamation was instituted, it has remained an international forum to reward popular and traditional forms of heritage such as oral expressions, music, rituals, social practices, traditional craftmanship or knowledge and practices concerning nature and the universe.
 
The brief on Ifa submitted by the two renowned scholars, said the masterpiece is presented as a West African geomantic system popular among several West African groups like the Yoruba, Igbo, Edo, Bete, Bariba, Eve, Fon, Ebira, Jukun among others.
 
It is stated that "among some of these groups like the Eve of Togo and Ghana, the Fon of Benin Republic, the Bete of Cross River State and others, Ifa has been playing an important role in their social, political, and cultural lives. Perhaps the most important thing to note is the fact that in all these West African cultures, Ifa has been preserved as an oral tradition passed on from one generation to the other by word of mouth, yet it is carefully preserved and disseminated.
 
"Among the Yoruba, the training of an Ifa priest so that he/she can chant or recite the elaborate corpus of the sacred literature in the course of rituals, healing and divination, takes more than 20 years. It is a rigorous and time-consuming exercise in which only the very best can excel.
 
"Everywhere the Ifa divination is practised, the language of ese Ifa is Yoruba, and that is why the first three parts of ese Ifa are chanted in pure Yoruba. However, among non-Yoruba communities, other parts of the ese Ifa are chanted in their local languages or dialects. For example, in Cuba, the first three parts of ese Ifa are chanted in Yoruba while the other parts are chanted in Spanish.
 
"In other words, the contents of the story remains the same but explanation in prose by the babalawo to the client are rendered in local languages or dialects and based on their experiences. However, Ifa literature is not fully developed among the non-Yoruba speaking communities because of lack of competence in the Yoruba language.

 
"Each Ifa poem also has its own adornment of stylistic features. Two of the most important and characteristic features of Ifa style are repetition and word-play. Both of these stylistic features often occur in combination. It will be sufficient to mention that the richness of style and language of Ifa poems is very greatly valued and appreciated by the highly poetically-conscious Yoruba traditional society.
 
"The ordinary Yoruba person patronises the Ifa priests not only because of their belief in the predictions and pronouncements of Ifa but also because of the aesthetic enjoyment which they derive from listening to the chanting of a form of poetry which is exceedingly rich in style and language.
 
"Since traditional Yoruba society was non-literate, going to Ifa priests for divination therefore represented an important medium of contact with such a highly developed form of poetry. The contact which the traditionally minded Yoruba makes constantly with the Ifa literary corpus therefore enriches his aesthetic values and satisfies his imaginative instincts in the same way as modern novels, poems and films educate, satisfy and enrich the city dwellers.
 
"Studies have shown that the oral texts of Ifa divination contain valuable hints on Yoruba history including the history of the Yoruba language. In addition to their roles as experts of Yoruba mythology, divination and sacrifice, Ifa priests also play the role of historians, counselors, and physicians up till today in the communities where they still exist.
 
"Studies have also revealed that Ifa textual materials contain deep philosophical themes which can be regarded as West Africa's contributions to philosophical ideas. The Ifa literary corpus is the storehouse of Yoruba culture, inside which the experiences of the Yoruba people and some of their neighbours have been preserved throughout the ages. This demonstrates that non-literate people can preserve, maintain, transmit and disseminate important ingredients of their own culture without knowing how to read or write. As a profound West African body of knowledge, and West Africa's contribution to intellectual ideas, Ifa deserves to be preserved and made available to a wider audience in the modern world.''