Nairobi night

All of a sudden our time in Kenya is drawing to an end. We are still hectically racing (or crawling through gridlock) to radio interviews, a tv taping for "Churchill Live" (a widely watched talk/comedy show a la Oprah) at the famous Carnivore Restaurant, and band rehearsals. On Friday, Feb. 27 Virunga performs at Club Afrique, with the core tour band augmented by Pepe Ibrahim, ex Virunga singer and now leader of his own band called Ngoma Afrika, and a guest appearance by Bikassy, who led the group Saka Saka in which Samba began his migration out of Zaire and into East Africa in the '70s. The show was a lot of fun. They played for hours, and did all the great Virunga hits. (I was dancing so hard to my favorite song, "Malako" that I hurt my leg and had to stop!)
Photos: Komba Bellow in the dressing room, dancers Mami Watah and Carolyne, and on stage from left: Bikassy, Teddy, Pepe Ibrahim, Syran and Samba.

Lest we forget our mission

Yes, we are here to work, to make music. It's not all sukumawiki and Tuskers. Here is Syran Mbenza and Samba having a little practice in the hotel room. The full band rehearses tomorrow and Thursday, preparing for Virunga's appearance at the Sauti za Busara festival in Zanzibar this weekend.

What to do when you are stuck in traffic

The traffic in Nairobi is horrible! The Uhuru Highway through town is almost always jammed, and then there is the never-ending hell of the dreaded roundabouts. The drivers are daring and fearless, missing each other by millimeters in a constant game of "chicken." No road rage though, someone always gives way at the last second, knowing next time he will win the match, and amazingly I never actually saw any fender-benders. Extremely nervewracking, and we almost always seemed to be going somewhere across town at 5 p.m. Smog control has not yet arrived in this land, and nearly every bus, truck, car and matatu belches clouds of black exhaust smoke and fumes. So to pass the time as we inched along, I did a lot of shooting out of the car window, and sometimes over my head into the back seat. The top shot with the giant hand is Moi's monument to himself.
On the bright side, the weather in Nairobi was perfect, even better than Southern California: sunny, cool, low humidity, a couple of evening rain showers to freshen things up. I was told it's like this 9 months of the year, but no one said what the other 3 months were like. Maybe best not to ask?