Baker Street by Gerry Rafferty Covered by David Green (www.davidgreenson...

To the Democratic Republic of Congo Go I

Here we are again back on the blog I set up for my adventure to Bhutan some years back. This time around it's quite the adventure. I'm off to Lubumbashi in DRC to take up the position of Head of Secondary in a brand new school. It's going to be fluid. Full of unseen challenges and rewards, both professionally and personally. I'm excited about getting back to Africa. When I was motorbiking around Uganda I accidentally went into the no-man's land on the Congolese border. An army man chased me and brought me back, leading to a spectacularly hilarious conversation with a plain-clothes border master who tried to pull the old 'your visa isn't valid' trick as a means to extract dollars from me. I managed to squeak out of that one with my dollars intact, but that's the closest I got. 

Obviously the DRC has a reputation and some of my loved ones have expressed concern about me going. I'm no idiot but I'm also aware of all the cognitive biases that lead us to draw conclusions about faraway places. In my experience most places have people and people are people. That said, I shall take care and be sensible. I'll be looked after; the guys at the school will look after me :-)

I'll be posting here as and when I'm able or inspired so check in if you'd like to know what it's like. And wish me luck xx

Solfamara!!! I’m in a band!

One of the concerns i had before leaving the UK was about music. I’d juat crowdfunded £6k to make an album and I ‘should’ have been all hands to the greasy pump to promote it and get everybody to listen to it. I never felt comfortable with all that jazz. But I was dead proud of what we’d made. The reality of the situation came slamming down at the album launch, which despite being magical and lovely and wonderful was a barely-break-even affair, and only really because  all the splendidly talented and very busy super-musicians who played on the album did the launch gratis. But to get that full band out on the road, I’d need to get gigs paying close to a grand. To get those sort of gigs you need to ‘be someone’ or have a decent following on things like social media. Have you ever run a social media marketing campaign. Urgh. So in the summer I did a few solo gigs like I always used to do. Great fun, but not GREAT fun like standing on a stage with 7 or 8 instruments, minds and souls all playing together. I could have tried to get a band together in the UK. I didn’t. I moved to Kenya, wondering what musical adventures I’d stumble into.

Here we go... Solfamara. A band. We’ve played 3 gigs already, one in a cool as eggs nightclubat the witching hour, one warm up practice gig in a tent and then this Sunday just gone, a two set, twenty song gig. The video footage was a bit ropey, but this track came out alright. Feelin’ Good.

Enjoy!

You're Never On Your Own

I found some time to scribble a song and then record it, rough around the edges, all good fun. A song for anybody wondering whether or not to jump in the river and go swimming to somewhere entirely different and new. It doesn't matter where you go - you're never on your own :-)

In the meantime, Solfamara, the band I've joined, went gigging this weekend and it was fab. Soooo much fun. Footage to come soon.

You're Never On Your Own

I've been walking in these feet so long I do not know where we belong

My love, just sing along: cos I do not know quite yet where we belong.

We can find most anything we need

In a landslide or another's eye
(oh the way she looks at me)

But hold on - don't wash yourself clean.

This river's running faster than you can feel
(if you let it in)

Heaven knows there's no place I'd rather go than right here in this moment.

Welcome home, wherever you may wander or where those feet do roam.

You're never lost in life.

You're never on your own.

Take care of what you find there.

You're never on your own.

Ease that weary mind.

You're never on your own.

You'll be alright.

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