KENya WeeKENd

Friday:
went to Eritrean hip-hop show. Now, for those of you who have never been to an Eritrean hip-hop show (Carol, u been?) it is prettttty awesome. Actually, just the pre-show is awesome: the DJ's play all the latest Kikuyu club jams, and there's a series of "amateur night"-type performances by Swahili rappers. Kikuyu, btw, is the largest tribe/ethnic group in Kenya, and for some background, let my pause here to excerpt Michela Wrong:

"[the Kikuyu] hail themselves as 'the Jews of Kenya,' envied and hated in equal measure for that entrepreneurial zeal. But there's a difference: Europe's Jews never combined economic influence with political power. The Kikuyu have done just that, providing two of Kenya's three presidents. And their current predicament can be traced to that double-fisted grip on the nation-state and the resentment it stirs among their compatriots."

Muy interesante, no? Anyway, the headliner at the Eritrean club was this dude named, "Nameless" (don't ask). I asked one of my co-workers about him and she was like, "he used to be good a few years ago. Kind of like your Snoop Dogg." Ouch. "Now he's married to one of our best female singers, kind of like your Jay-Z." Nice.

We ate at the Eritrean place beforehand, and I must admit that i can discern no difference between Ethiopian food and Eritrean food, as appalling as that may be to some of my Ethiopian/Eritrean friends. my apologies. the DJ was really killin it tho, and i could tell even without knowing the songs, which is how i could tell in the first place, u know? the crowd was just INTO it. unfortunately, we left before seeing Nameless bc it was 1 am and he still hadn't come on and one of our friends was sick, but not rap sick, sick sick.

Saturday:
Real quick: I tried to go to the office to do some work, but alas, no powa ("no one electric company should have all that POWER"). Instead, I went to my first Kikuyu wedding ("nice day for...a Kikuyu weddding"). What was funny was that i planned to go to Nairobi's Hebrew Congregation Synagogue, but ended-up instead at St. Paul's University Catholic Church (official motto: "rise and evangelize." I'm not making that up). oh well. at least i was with "the Jews of Kenya."

the wedding had everything a wedding should have: DJ, cake, and drunk uncles making speeches and having to have their mics cut off (five minutes into his monologue he literally said, "wait. I wanna say something." haha. everyone was loving it, except maybe his wife). there were also women in incredible beehive-size African hats, which made me think about church-hats in Af-Am churches in the States. there was also outdoor congo-line dancing, which made me wonder if "congo-lines" are from the Congo.

that's pretty much it.