Ants (again), Afro Shine, and . . . ACTION!

So by now, I'm pretty much over the ants - I think we've struck somewhat of an alliance, at least in theory (kind of like the Soviets and the Chinese during the Cold War).  Megan on the other hand . . . well I guess she would have to be the United States, but then, if the ants were China, that would make me the Soviet Union, which means she hates me even more than she hates the ants!!!  Oh well, at least she recognizes that I exist (take that China until Richard Nixon's visit in 1972!).

Anyway, I've had quite an exciting week.  On Monday, Megan and I worked with Richi's (from Mascato) choir.  They are quite a new group and are pretty green, but they're coming along nicely.  It was very helpful having Megan there to demonstrate some of the female voice stuff that I just can't do.  We taught them Velile!  For those that know the piece, they couldn't really get the clap on 4, but rhythm and movement tends to come more easily to Canadians that Namibians . . . just kidding.  On Monday night we had a visit from Garth and Michelle, who had some exciting Afro Shine news.  Afro Shine is going to be playing a big concert on June 29th in Windhoek and they want me to play guitar for them!  This is a really cool opportunity, so of course I said yes.

On Tuesday we went to Mrs. Venter's house for lunch, which was nice as always, and then hit up town for some internetting and shopping.  Megan wanted to get some books because she's been going through about 11 or 12 a day.  Unfortunately, the small bookstores here in Swakop don't seem to carry authors "cool" enough for Megan, so we got a 1500 piece puzzle instead!  We also picked up some clothes at Mr. Price - Megan got some jeans and a sweater for $30 CAD, and I got a pair of black choir pants for about $10 CAD.  In the evening we had a short Afro Shine practice.  Another little project that I've had for myself was to write a song for Afro Shine.  Their style is extremely different from mine, so I thought it would be a good challenge (plus it would be super cool to say that Afro Shine sings one of my songs).  So I did it!  I sang it for them and they really liked it.  We're going to make a rough demo of it and send it to their producer and hopefully it'll get recorded!

On Wednesday we sort of ran out of food.  Well, we didn't exactly run out of food, but we blew a fuse in the kitchen on Tuesday night and couldn't figure out how to fix it until Marie got home, so we couldn't cook anything.  Plus, we don't have a functional can-opener.  So, we went into town, had some lunch at the Light House and picked up a can-opener (which was exceedingly hard to find, and now all is well.

Today we walked a lot.  First we walked into town for some internetting and lunch at Village Cafe.  Then picked up some food for dinner.  Then bought a giraffe bowl from the wood market that Megan had been eyeing up.  Then walked home.  Then walked to Richi's school choir rehearsal to work with them again.  Then we walked home.  It was well over two hours of walking.  Tonight Afro Shine is coming over for another rehearsal, and, I think Scott will be getting in (as long as he is up to the 4-hour drive from Windhoek)!

-Joel.