It feels like life until this point has been a rehearsal for 2020. You know, all the attempts, all the experiments, all the disappointments, all the failures. All a process of refinement, leading up to excellence.
Many people I speak to have walked into this new year with a confidence that they’re finally onto a winning formula. Whether that’s with regards to work, life or a way to negotiate both, without compromising the other.
I’ve finally put together my Nairobi city guide. In the last few months, several good friends of mine have visited Nairobi for the first time. It’s been fun coming up with itineraries because, it also gives me the opportunity to explore all that’s good and new in my beloved home city.
It seems that many more people are planning trips to Kenya in 2018 – I keep getting requests for tips! This inspired me to put together this post, sharing some of my favourite places.
I thought I’d do things a little bit differently and suggest some combinations of things you can do on the same day. That way, you can plan your movements easily, if you have limited time. But first
The Renegade Craft Fair London is 3 days away and Lusungu and I have been busy getting our ‘Fly South For Winter’ collection ready! It’s inspired by our motherland love and a yearning for the tropics in these wintry times. All the designs are hand-drawn by me and then hand screen printed by Lusungu (aka Creativity and Noise).
Round off your week with these sounds from two talented and beautiful female musicians, Bumi Thomas and Helen Parker-Jayne Isibor, aka The Venus Bushfires. Both will be performing at the Africa Centre Summer Festival in London, UK, which takes place on the 3rd and 4th of August this year. Curated by artist Yinka Shonibare MBE, it's a free weekend of music, fashion, visual arts, film and more, taking place in and around the Covent Garden Piazza. For those in, near and visiting London, it's a can't-miss event!
The Momo's experience in London, UK, involves North African cuisine, an eclectic African and diaspora music programme (that pulls in major stars and up-and-coming artists alike), beautiful decor and a relaxed boho-luxe ambiance. The restaurant/café/outdoor terrace/basement bar/disco was opened in the late 1990s by Algerian-born Mourad Mazouz.
Nana Ocran is a London-based writer and editor who specialises in contemporary African culture. Under her belt is the Time Out Group's series of guides to Lagos and Abuja (Nana was Editor-in-Chief) along with consulting gigs for established publications on West African culture for the Danish Film Institute, Arts Council England and the Institute of International Visual Arts. Furthermore, Nana was nominated for CNN's African Journalist of the Year in 2011.
Birds Eye View presents a cross-cultural live music commission by East African-influenced jazz musician, Amira Kheir for their 2013 Film Festival: Celebrating Arab Women Filmmakers. Singer, musician, somgwriter (and Afri-love interviewee), Amira will score a landmark silent film, Sumurun (One Arabian Night).
Of the film, a fantasy-drama of forbidden love, the NY Times says: ‘brilliant’.
Of Amira's critically acclaimed first album, View from Somewhere, Songlines says: ‘beautiful and fearless'. I own it and must agree.
Get a taste of Amira's music via today's video (RSS readers click here)
"An eerie murder mystery where a queer wedding might have been, I Stand Corrected is a supernatural story of two black lesbian lovers from two different continents, trying to touch each other across a mortal divide. A new collaboration between the creator of sell-out Ovalhouse shows Moj of the Antarctic and Muhammad Ali and Me, Mojisola Adebayo and South African dancer Mamela Nyamza."
Continuing the sex-talk theme I witnessed with Film Africa, this production is a "passionate artistic response to an epidemic of hate rape and murder in South Africa and the virulent anti-gay marriage lobby in Britain."
This first week is almost sold out – book your tickets now and catch the show before it ends on December 8th. Check out the Ovalhouse website for details on post-show discussions as well as post-show parties!
View the trailer below (if reading via email, click here)
