Salaam to All of You Readers and Thank You for Taking the Time to Check This Blog Out. You may have noticed that the name and description of the website has changed, and I hope to be able to announce some other new content in the coming months.
This site, which began as a personal travel blog, is becoming something else: a knowledge resource where students, writers, travellers, linguists, and anyone interested in the Indian Ocean can come to learn. The web is a tool like any other, and I am only beginning to tap into its potential. That is why over the next few months, I hope to add new contributors and team members, a clarified mission statement, and several visual bells and whistles.
For now, I would like to introduce the site’s new name, The Azanian Sea, which is the ancient name given by Roman philosopher Pliny the Elder for the western Indian Ocean that borders East Africa, particularly Somalia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Mozambique. As always, please feel free to leave comments and suggestions. One Love.
Ok, I’m an about-to-be-Georgetown alum and I finally had time to finish this project of translating one of Professor Jay’s best songs from Swahili. Its a bit rough, but its all there. The words which I didn’t know I left in the original Kiswahili. Thanks to Mwalimu Lusweti for the consultation.
Naamka asubuhi nipo chwiri tena mapema Nautoa mkeka sakafuni kisha naukunja vyema Nawaza nitakula nini mentali kisha naguna Naanza kujikongoja kichwa chini mikono nyuma Naelekea kilingeni nilikopaki mkokoteni Nasaga na rumba kimshazali nyie acheni Nawapa ‘Hi’ machizi wananipa peace tunafurahi Tunapiga stori nyingi walah bila maslahi Mara napata zali napeleka kago uswahili Wananipa bukumbili dangaa chee nazisunda chini Wakati natoka huku kijasho chembamba kikinitoka Nikaona toto ya nguvu nikajikuta nimeropoka “Dada habari samahani naomba niulize swali” Akajibu “maskini koma tafadhali hii ngoma ya gari” “Ehee unajua dada”, “we vipi hebu nipishe” “Dada mbona mkali”, “wee kinyago kubali yaishe”
Nikasema Inshala sawa hiyo yote kwa sababu ya fukara Nisije nikakubaka nitupwe selo nikawe kafara Nikaachana nae sehemu za nyuma akizitingsha Nilikula kwa macho hali yangu haikuridhisha Nageuza mkokoteni nakuelekea maskani Nikawapa stori machizi wakanicheka ikawa utani Siku moja nililemaa maskani sikuwa na tenda Na nilikuwa nikitafakari ni vipi siku itakwenda Kumbe kuna gari ilikuja na kupaki karibu yangu Sikuweza kuisikia labda sababu ya njaa yangu Nilishtushwa ghafla na mlio mkali wa honi Nilipatwa na mshtuko na hofu kubwa moyoni Kuangalia pembeni ilikuwa imepaki Toyota Surf Kulikuwa na sura ngeni ya malaika akaomba tafu Nilisita kunyanyuka kwa sababu nilikuwa mchafu Na alitoa elfu kumi na alikuwa akitaka dafu Nilipokea hela alichotaka nilimletea akakipokea Tabasamu zito akanitolea nilimpa chenji “Ohh no keep chenji, una mawazo mengi itakufariji week end” Alikunywa maji ya dafu alitupa na kunikonyeza Niliganda kama nyamafu nikahisi alinibeza Alinipa busu la huba shavuni akanichombeza “I love You” Akawasha gari akateleza
Chorus – Kiitikio Zali la mentali limetokea wakati mimi n’njaa Nikapendwa na demu mkali Na kuwaacha watu wote wakinishangaa ‘katika mitaaa’
Verse 2 Zilipita siku mbili nikiwaza kilichotokea Nikawaza yule ni mtu au jini amenitokea Potelea mbali uchawi hauendi kwa mentali Narudi nanyonya napuliza mentali nakuwa shwari Nabeba rumbesa nakatiza Samora Avenue Mara kwa ghafla mbele yangu inapaki Toyota mark II Ohh napata ghadhabu mara nyingi sipendi dharau Naifuata gari kuanza kupaka mara nahema juu juuu “Aaa” ni yule mrembo” “Maskini pole sana mzigo mbona mzito kweli utafika nao salama” Natabasamu “Oh nimeshazoea mama na namshukuru Mwenyezi Mungu kwani hii ni kama karama” Anakuwa mnyonge anakata kucha anantazama anaaza kulia anatoa leso anainama “Namwambia bibie ni mara ya pili tunaonana na sidhani kama ni mbaya iwapo tutafahamiana” “Naitwa Vicki, nina miaka 22 ni mtoto wa kipekee kwenye familia ya kitajiri” ‘Oh naitwa Jay ukiniita fukara haukosei Na naishi kwa nguvu za macho siku zenyewe hazisogei Alishuka toka garini na kusema “Jay nakupenda” Akaruka kwangu mdomoni nakuanza kupata denda Nilichomoka kwake na kuanza kurudi nyuma “Tafadhali mpenzi Jay jamani nionee huruma Acha kubeba mizigo panda ndani kwenye mchuna Twende Mbezi Beach kwangu upepo unapovuma” Sikiliza Vick napenda tuwe marafiki Lakini hadhi yako hutakiwi kuwa na mtu wa dhiki Hata wazazi wako naaamini hawataafiki Tajiri na tajiri maskini thithaminiki Tafuta kibopa mwenzio ili usishushe hadhi yako Mimi sistahili hata kuwa kijakazi wako “Tafadhali Jay usitamke maneno hayo Naomba unielewe haya machache niyasemayo Hadi huu wakati mimi nimekupenda kwa dhati Ukikubali niwe wako nitajiita mwenye bahati” Nimeelewa Vicki naomba niwahishe mzigo Tajiri ni mkorofi anan’subiri migomigo Na kila nikichelewa mwenzako napata kipigo Nasaga na rumba jua na mvua kwa mpigo Tuliongea mengi akanipa hela za matumizi Sikuwahi hata kuziona nilikuwa kama chizi Niliacha kubeba mizigo penzi letu likaota mizizi Watu wa uswahili wakasema natumia kizizi Baada ya miezi mitano Vick alipata ujauzito Tulifurahi sana mambo yakawa mpwito-mpwito Swala la kwenda kwa wazazi wake halikuwa zito Walifurahi sana kuniona tukafanya tambiko Walisema Jay maisha ya Vick yapo chini yako Tumefurahi mmpendana kumlea ni jukumu lako Ilipangwa mikakati kamambe ya kufunga ndoa Watu hawakuamini kama mimi vipi nitamuoa Ilifika siku ya siku mentali Jay ndani ya jumba Na Vick ndani ya shela hakuna uchawi wala ndumba Tulishikana mikono ni nderemo na vifijo Tukafunga pingu za maisha kanisani bila ya fujo Furaha isiyo kifani lilifanyika bonge la party Watoto wa uswahili walibeba wali kwenye mashati (du) Zawadi zilizagaa zilikuwa nyingi tena kemkem Baba mkwe alitupa benzi, kiwanda nyumba na bm Acha zawadi nyingi kutoka kila sehemu Nilikumbuka nikacheka nilivyoteswa na wale mademu Mambo swadakta nipo na Vick ndio my wife Kidume nang’aa wanajigonga shenzi tipe (shenzi tipe) Nilipokuwa arosto mlinikwepa kama ukoma Mambo juu ya mstari kunisalimu mnaona noma Sasa hivi napeta nabadili gari full kipupwe Mlio nicheka wanataka ardhi ipasuke Naelekea kilingeni kuwapa dili machizi wangu Tena mara kwa mara siwezi kuwacha asili yangu Vick ni Jay, Jay ni Vick mustarehe kutoka ndani ya dhiki Sasa kila siku sherehe ahaaaa!
AND NOW THE TRANSLATION: I woke up early in the morning weary again, I took the mat from the floor and I folded it neatly. I’m dreaming of what I’ll eat (my mentality is food) and then I grumble I began to stagger, head and hands down Facing the bar, where I parked my handcart I grind the dance (rumba) out of wack/you all stop. I say hi to my friends they say ‘peace’ we are happy. We tell a lot of stories, trading them freely. Once I get good luck, I am taking one of those Swahili charms. My peoples give me 2000 shillings While doing this I’m sweating so much I’m losing weight I saw this big girl and found myself talking without thinking “Hey girl, excuse me, I’d like to ask you a question.” She answered ‘poor man’, please stop this ‘ngoma ya gari’ (worthless talk) “Hey, you know sis!” “Well, YOU, I need to pass!” “Sis, why are you being so harsh?” “You are a clown, and I agree you will always be one.” I said, “Inshallah, ok, that’s all cuz I’m a beggar. Lest I rape you and be thrown in jail where I may become a sacrifice! I left her, watching her backside bounce and shake I feasted with my eyes, but the feeling didn’t return I turned the cart over and pointed it towards home I told my mates the story and they laughed like it was a joke. One day, I was paralyzed at home, not doing anything and I was thinking of how my day would go. Well then a car comes up to park near my place I wasn’t able to hear it, maybe cuz of my hunger I was suddenly surprised by the loud blast of its horn. I was shocked, and fear came over my heart to look to the corner post; there was parked a Toyota Surf There was a strange picture of an angel she begged me to spread (?) I hesitated to get up because I was so dirty; she gave me 10,000 shillings and wanted an unripe coconut to drink I took the money and gave her what she wanted, she smiled mysteriously as I passed it to her. She removed the change I gave her: “Oh no, keep change. You’ve got lots of dreams to make your weekend happy!” She drank the coconut water and gave me a wink; I was petrified with silence, thinking she was making fun of me. Then she gave me a loving kiss, with her arms enticing me, “I love you.” She started the car and slipped away.
V 2 2 days passed with me thinking about what happened I pondered, trying to decide whether that girl was a person or a djinn I got lost in different charms, it wasn’t coming from my mentality? I returned, nursed, and blew into my mentality; I was peaceful. I carried and shortcutted across Samora Avenue, when all of a sudden in front of me parked a Toyota Mark II. I have dignity, and I don’t like to insulted; I followed the car as it began to park. I was out of breath and very excited: aha, its that DIME! “Maskini, sorry that load is so heavy, I hope you arrive with it safely.” She smiled, “I have already told my mother and thanked God for an honor like this.” She was humble, she wanted to watch me all night; she began to cry, folding her leso. “I am telling Bibi, this is the second time we have met, and I don’t think its wrong if we get to know each other. I am Vicky, 22 years old, from a rich family.” “And I’m Jay, if you called me a beggar you wouldn’t be wrong. I live by the power of my eyes and sometimes the days themselves go by so slowly.” She got out from her car and said “Jay, I love you”, jumping into my arms, teeth began to get French kissed. I was freeing myself from her grip and began to return back. “Please Jay, lets go, I should be decent. Stop carrying loads and climbing in cars. Lets go to Mbezi Beach (my place) when the wind is rough.” “Listen Vicky, I’d love for us to be friends but your honor will be spoiled by me, an cursed (or unfortunate) person. Your parents, especially, I believe they won’t agree. The rich and rich wannabes don’t respect each other. Look for a person who is rich like you so that you don’t lower your status. I am not even worthy to be your slave.” “Please Jay, don’t tell me this, I beg you understand me, there is no shame in what I say. The feeling of loving you it is indescribable and genuine, if you agree that I should be yours I will call myself lucky.” “I understand Vicky, and beg that I may deliver the package on time. The rich are cruel and he is waiting in Magomeni. We talked a lot, she gave me cash to carry, I was not on time to feel like I was one of the boys. I stopped carrying loads, our love gave me roots, The Swahili said, I use kizizi.
V 3 After 5 months, Vicky got pregnant, we very happy, the news was pandemonium. The question of going to her parents wasn’t an issue; They were very happy to see me and they made offerings for my health and safety. They said “Jay, Vicky’s life is in your care. We were very happy that you all love each other, and to care for her is your responsibility. Plans commenced quickly and intensively to set a wedding date. People didn’t believe me that I would marry Vicky. The day arrived, the day I had been dreaming of; I was inside the mansion and Vicky inside her wedding veil. There was no witchcraft nor ndumba. We held hands to joyful shouts of applause, opening the pingu of life in the church with no disruption. Happinness which has no equal, our wedding party was gigantic. The kids carried rice in their shirt, gifts glittered and were plentiful. The father of the bride gave us a Benz, a house with a yard, and a BMW, leaving many gifts from every place. I laughingly remembered how I was tortured by my old working clothes. Things are cool, and Vicky is my wife. My glittering manliness collided with some ‘shenzi. (??) I was broke, She used to avoid me like leprosy, now my conditions are the top like a ruler, greeting me, she saw my status. Now I bend and turn the car cool season. They laughed at me before and now they want the earth to split (and swallow her up). I am headed to a mystery place to give my people a deal! And from time to time I cant abandon my origins. Vicky and Jay, Jay and Vicky celebrate coming from misfortune. Now every day celebrate!
Afropop magazine brings it again with an interesting interview about music and islam. Below is an excerpt:
B.E.: You also looked into the state of this debate about Islam and music in the contemporary American scene. Tell us about Sheikh Tamer Salim.
J.B.: I wanted to get a local perspective from the Muslim community on how teachings and ideas about music play out among Muslims here in the United States. So I went down to Bensonherst, here in Brooklyn, and visited with a young, up-and-coming cleric, Tamer Salim, 27 years old, three years in this country, fresh from Egypt where he was educated at the prestigious Al Azhar Islamic seminary. Tamer is a good-looking, broad smiling, very warm and engaging spiritual leader who has reached out to monotheistic faiths with a hand of friendship and really gotten himself on the map here in New York as a respected Muslim cleric.
When I asked him about ideas about music within his own congregation, he told me:
Tamer Salim: Actually I am being asked about this issue all the time, because you know it’s very hard to avoid listening to music in this country. So when I came here to the United States, I found the people differing about this issue as well. And I found a group of people who are being raised, or even being born in this country, even those people who received their education in this country, who are following directly the rulings of Saudi Arabia, those people who are extreme when it comes to music and musical instruments. For me personally, I would consider it a very extreme view if you tell people not to listen to music in this country. But at same time, I would adopt the view of those moderate people that not every kind of music is worth listening to. So when the Muslim community would come to me asking about this, I would tell them, “Me personally, I don’t see anything wrong with music as long as the content of the music doesn’t have anything contradicting to Islamic culture, or Islamic law.
J.B.: Sheikh Tamer took pains to distinguish himself from the Salafi position, which has that default restrictive attitude toward so many different types of music. He actually made the point that Islam encourages many forms of art, including music, starting with the recitation of the Koran itself:
Tamer Salim: Allah told us to beautify reading and reciting the Koran. If you listen to the Koran from a good reciter, you would find this kind of beauty. Islam is requiring of us that we never read the Koran without making it beautiful in the ears of the people. We try to sing it in a good way. We try to make it affect the hearts of the people who would listen to it. The same is true of the Azan, which is the call for prayer. And actually, at the time of the prophet, when people wanted to make Azan, the Prophet said, ‘Leave that to Bilal,’ one of the companions of the Prophet. Bilal used to have a very beautiful voice when it came to saying the Azan itself. The Prophet would not let just anybody make the call for prayer. He would choose those people who had beautiful voices in order to have an impact on the hearts and the minds of the people. So we are here encouraged in many ways to listen to the beautiful voices of the people, and Islam is encouraging that.
All hell broke loose on the Lomami River during the 1890s.It began east of the Lualaba in the 1860s, with the rise of the Arab ivory trade. Tippo Tib from Zanzibar (where he started life as Hamed bin Muhammed el Murjebi ) carved out a Congolese Sultanate. Slaves hauled his ivory to the markets of Zanzibar often hefting a single tusk at over a 100 pounds.Tippo Tib, ivory merchant and slave trader, built a successful empire in eastern Congo. This picture first published in 1889, The Illustrated London News.His favorite slave, Ngongo Luteta, came to him as a young boy. Luteta was from the Batetela tribe that lives where the Lomami plunges from high savannah plateau, to forest islands and into unbroken forest. Ngongo Luteta rose fast and became a leader of Tippo Tib’s wanguaana (Arabized Congolese) warriors and the strategist who brought the most ivory and slaves back to his master. Tippu Tib was so pleased with the dashing Luteta, that he freed him when he was only 25 and sent him home to the Lomami. But Tippo Tib sent Ngongo Luteta with a clear mission: caravans of ivory must come east to him from the Lomami and the Tshuapa basins. Luteta was immensely successful. Great graves of elephant bone rotted in the forest duff, the ivory was carried east. The people of the Lomami who carried the ivory, were enslaved and their societies torn asunder by the firearms and cold determination of Ngongo Luteta. Ashley, 120 years later, when his dugout was not more than two days south of Opala , wrote “Not many people here. This forest is empty” . He repeated it all the way to the savanna. Were the massive slave campaigns initiated by Ngongo Luteta partly to blame?The Lomami River is depopulated here in the north and Ashley found fewer and fewer people as he moved up stream and deeper into the forest.Ngongo Lutete is hero and nemesis. I have no picture of him (send it if you find one), but here is a description written by a begrudgingly respectful European of the 19th century (The Fall of the Congo Arabs, Sydney Hinde, 1894) He was a well-built, intelligent- looking man…with a brown skin, large brown eyes, very long lashes, …and a straight narrow nose. His hands were his most remarkable characteristic: curiously supple, with long narrow fingers. One or both hands were in constant movement, opening or shutting restlessly. His features meanwhile remained absolutely immovable. The description of him in battle was even more suggestive:[Ngongo Luteta] hissed out his orders one after another without a moment’s hesitation. He was capable of sustaining intense fatigue, and would lead his warriors through the country at a run for hours together. Ivory was big money and the Europeans wanted it. Ngongo Luteta met the Belgians on the rivers of their new colony and realized he could make more profit trading his ivory to them. The Arab’s suzerainty was at stake. Tensions rose, a European ivory merchant who had set up two trading posts on the Lomami River, Arthur Hodister , was massacred with ten other whites and the Belgo-Arab wars began in earnest. Nongo Luteta was fighting on the side of the Belgians and the Congo Free State. Although carrying an anti-slavery banner, there was no doubt that control of resources (importantly elephants) was central to the Belgian King, Leopold II.Francis Dhanis, main Belgian architect of the war, marched to Ngandu, Nongo Luteta’s post on the Lomami River in 1892. Hinde describes it thus:N’Gandu was a fortified town by the river-bank, with four gates, each approached by a very handsome pavement of human skulls, the bregma being the only part showing above ground. I counted more than 2000 skulls in the pavement of one gate alone. The campaign trail followed by Commander Dhanis with Capt. Hinde. First stop, before engaging in battle, was for reinforcement at Ngongo Lutete’s village of N’Gandu Francis Dhanis with his Belgian officers and fighting men were strengthened by Ngongo Luteta and 10,000 of his men. Together they marched on to meet the Arabs further east.Fighting at the Arab stronghold, Nyangwe Numerous times Ngongo Luteta’s courageous tactics pushed a battle to victory for the Belgians. In January 1894 the Belgians prevailed and central African trade routes no longer led to Zanzibar in the east but now the ivory and eventually the rubber, copper and gold all went out to the Atlantic on the west.Commander Dhanis led the campaign to drive the Arabs from the Lomami, Lualaba and all Maniema province, 1892-1894 Francis Dhanis was made a baron by King Leopold II of Belgium for his exemplary perseverance, foresight and skill throughout the campaign. But Baron Dhanis expressed a strong regret over what had occurred just four months before he received his honors in Belgium: At N’gandu, Ngongo Luteta’s home on the Lomami, on the 15th of September 1893, a Belgian army officer named Jean Scheerlinck independently decided that Ngongo Luteta was a traitor. Without consulting his superior, Francis Dhanis, he court-martialed Luteta, had him condemned to death, and put before a firing squad. Curious and sad what is excused by war.
Humanity is facing “water bankruptcy” as a result of a crisis even greater than the financial meltdown now destabilising the global economy, two authoritative new reports show. They add that it is already beginning to take effect, and there will be no way of bailing the earth out of water scarcity.
The two reports – one by the world’s foremost international economic forum and the other by 24 United Nations agencies – presage the opening tomorrow of the most important conference on the looming crisis for three years. The World Water Forum, which will be attended by 20,000 people in Istanbul, will hear stark warnings of how half the world’s population will be affected by water shortages in just 20 years’ time, with millions dying and increasing conflicts over dwindling resources.
A report by the World Economic Forum, which runs the annual Davos meetings of the international business and financial elite, says that lack of water, will “soon tear into various parts of the global economic system” and “start to emerge as a headline geopolitical issue”.
It adds: “The financial crisis gives us a stark warning of what can happen if known economic risks are left to fester. We are living in a water ‘bubble’ as unsustainable and fragile as that which precipitated the collapse in world financial markets. We are now on the verge of bankruptcy in many places with no way of paying the debt back.”
The Earth – a blue-green oasis in the limitless black desert of space – has a finite stock of water. There is precisely the same amount of it on the planet as there was in the age of the dinosaurs, and the world’s population of more than 6.7 billion people has to share the same quantity as the 300 million global inhabitants of Roman times.
Water use has been growing far faster than the number of people. During the 20th century the world population increased fourfold, but the amount of freshwater that it used increased nine times over. Already 2.8 billion people live in areas of high water stress, the report calculates, and this will rise to 3.9 billion – more than half the expected population of the world – by 2030. By that time, water scarcity could cut world harvests by 30 per cent – equivalent to all the grain grown in the US and India – even as human numbers and appetites increase.
Some 60 per cent of China’s 669 cities are already short of water. The huge Yellow River is now left with only 10 per cent of its natural flow, sometimes failing to reach the sea altogether. And the glaciers of the Himalayas, which act as gigantic water banks supplying two billion people in Asia, are melting ever faster as global warming accelerates. Meanwhile devastating droughts are crippling Australia and Texas.
The World Water Development Report, compiled by 24 UN agencies under the auspices of Unesco, adds that shortages are already beginning to constrain economic growth in areas as diverse and California, China, Australia, India and Indonesia. The report, which will be published tomorrow, also expects water conflicts to break out in the Middle East, Haiti, Sri Lanka, Colombia and other countries.
“Conflicts about water can occur at all scales,” it warns. “Hydrological shocks” brought about by climate change are likely to “increase the risk of major national and international security threats”.
The Azanian Sea 