W A S S O U L O U

More drawings

2012-02-08T21:49:00.000-08:00

Still in progress:

Some sketch book characters:

And while I'm at it I'll put up some pictures of a recent ice climbing trip to Lillooet, BC. The first picture shows the upper pitches of Night 'N Gale. Notice the climber at the bottom right of the picture.

Grab bag #2

2011-11-11T02:29:00.000-08:00

First out of the bag are two recent drawings. I had a lot of fun developing the border in the first picture, a birthday present. I enlisted the help of some of my Punjabi friends for the writing.

Everybody loves mountains:

Second from the grab bag:

Awhile back I started drawing Cruella de Vil from the various frame sheets posted on Andreas Deja's awesome animation blog, as a practice exercise. I liked the wild expressions that the origianl animator (Marc Davis) came up with, and so only concentrated on her head and face instead of full body poses. I ended up with so many that I could practically read dialog from her mouth as she thrashed back and forth, hair and bangs whipping as she cackles and snarls. And so, in the early morning I was motivated to animate my own sequence, borrowing some of the expressions.

I decided to start with something relatively easy (the Cruella heads and faces), compared to the other ambitious projects I had in mind. I'll tackle those after I struggle through some initial shorter, relatively simpler sequences to become familiar with the mechanics of making a cartoon. Voila my pencil test (scroll down). The original idea was to have a woman huffing and puffing and screaming at her cats. I got through that sequence pretty quickly (and roughly) and thought next about what I could add to it; hence the cat-thrashing and strangling. I don't intend to make this too much longer, as there is no real plot to speak of.

One common thing people write in animation books and on the blogs about pencil tests is that they aren't about producing the final clean, perfect drawings. They're important to get a rough approximation of how the movement in the animated sequence flows. Does it look believable? Do drawings need to be added or subtracted to make the motion work? Then once you've decided that the sequence works, you go back and clean up all the mess and keep the final lines. It is painfully obvious to me that my pencil test will need lots of work to make a "final" product.

Admittedly, I didn't take as much care as I could have to keep the character on model, as they say. Throughout the sequence here her head balloons up, her arms stretch, the dimensions of her face change. But overall I'm happy to have done it, considering I'm teaching myself everything. Also, I am using a hand-held digital camera to capture the images, which explains the shaky aspect to the video. Until I meet my goal of "completing" a cartoon short, I'm withholding from buying a scanner. As I posted before, I use ImageJ (a program provided free by the National Institute of Health) to assemble the drawings into a Quicktime movie. Someday I'll explain step by step how to do that so people who otherwise wouldn't make cartoons (no animation software) can learn how to do it relatively easily.

Hooray for Japanese pens!

2011-11-09T01:41:00.000-08:00

I just ordered some more of the Deleter G nibs and Maru nibs, which are both incredibly fun to draw with. Hopefully I'll be able to afford a scanner soon.

Grab bag

2011-11-05T22:00:00.000-07:00

Late nite pen and ink has been the name of the game recently. I finally settled into the upstairs of a duplex and set up shop. Thanks to kind friends I have tons of desk space for both illustrating and animating. The pages in my sketchbook are filling by the day, sometimes labored and other times more easily.

My main focus as I pieced together my apartment and tried to find work was larger pen and ink drawings. The original idea was to use lyrics that practically begged me to think of something to draw for them and draw it. While taken completely out of context and influenced by Bernie Wrightson's work on Frankenstein, I used "the wind and the willows play tea for two" for this one:

One of the drawings I'm working on now (shown at the top of the post), however, was not influenced by any lyric but only an awesome photo of a friend's baby. Hopefully I'll get the lighting right.

I've been pushing to fill up my sketchbook quickly. And although I haven't been close to meeting my ambitious deadlines, the book has been good so far (to me). One effort made is to draw more of what I see, which many people agree to as being an essential skill; a difficult but essential skill. I've also been tightening my loose grasp on perspective drawing. In the case below I didn't concern myself with staff and customers around the register.

I even got in some landscapes while in-between climbs in Utah this fall, drawn with a trusty, tried and true Bic pen. If anyone as ever been to Indian Creek, these were drawn while sitting at Middle Crack (5.12), at Reservoir Wall.

Another focus has been drawing/coming up with characters, and drawing them as reproducibly as possible in different poses and gestures. Exact reproduction is lacking, but on my radar.

Here are some atypical characters. (Atypical in the sense that I usually draw bald men).

Here's a fun one from the notebook.

However, I have animation on the mind. This is an adventure a little more intimidating to begin and therefore easier to delay. Luckily I have the space and basic equipment necessary to commence production when I can wrap my mind around the project. My first landmark is getting out the first 5 seconds in the form of a pencil test. Once I start and obsess and animation becomes a compulsion that demands insomnia, 5 seconds will become 10 and then after many lost hours of sleep my 10 seconds all of a sudden become minutes, I anticipate that I'll have a decent second effort (first effort). I just need to start.

Anyway, here are some random pictures to finish up my road trip. First off, the rainy Olympic Mountains and the Queets River.

Orcas Island:

Failed attempt on Enchantment Peak:

Indian Creek:

First Pages from a New Sketchbook

2011-09-13T22:48:00.000-07:00

All these drawings are scanned from book #2. Enjoy!

Nib = removable/interchangeable dip pen tip. Used for illustration and calligraphy.

Sometime awhile back I wandered into the Seattle Comicon to talk to artists about equipment and techniques. I had a long conversation with Joe Weems, about whom there is very little information on the internet. He told me that if you care about your drawings and your work you'll only use dip pens.

(the kickass G Pen)

(Maru Pen)

(Hunt 56)

I've been drawing since I was young, copying my brother (who is now a screenwriter in LA). But, as I mentioned many posts back, only these past two years have I become somewhat focused. After 11 months I finally filled up my first ever sketchbook (from which you can see random drawings in previous posts). When younger I typically drew on loose pieces of paper and scraps. Recently I bought a slightly bigger second sketch book and have been working steadily through that. I've been trying to develop further dexterity with quill style pens and black ink.

I initially started using Hunt nibs; predominately 56 (crow quill) and 102 (the smaller equivalent). I only really started with this style in order to try something new; I didn't really know anything about them. Yet I never felt natural drawing with them, however fun they were to use. Thus I relied on the Micron pens to take care of serious business and any sort of sketching. These reminded me of a "professional" bic ballpoint pen. I used to ONLY draw with bic pens when I was in grade school, middle school and high school. The 001 Micron felt natural to me, but I rip through those pens too quickly to be able to afford them; the tiny tips were good for tight parallel lines but too fragile to withstand the pressure with which I draw. For fun I started using the ultra-flexi nibs 99 in some figure drawing sessions and it seemed to be more of a natural loose sketching style, which was motivating. Trouble is I don't naturally draw in loose strokes. I have a heavy hand (which Paul says might catch up with me later).

(Hunt 56)

(Micron 001)

(Hunt 56)

In an effort to avoid constantly changing nibs (which is annoying), I scoured antique stores on the west coast for calligraphy pen handles into which you can insert the nibs and I found two. I was looking for the classic variety that has the cork grip, not like the shitty plastic black Speedball one (although I use the small brown plastic Speedball handle with the 102, and I added a rubber grip to make it a little easier to hold onto for hours at a time (I'd like to get an antique wood handle)).

(Micron 001)

(Hunt 100)

I've admired the pen work of Goseki Kojima, the Japanese illustrator who drew for the Lone Wolf and Cub series. It's amazing stuff with a lot of motion in the badass sword scenes. One thing led to another stepping into the vast internet ocean and I came across common Japanese illustration equipment. I ordered two Japanese handles and some Japanese pen nibs. They finally arrived from Japan and I tried them out not really expecting to notice any difference but I was completely blown away. The G pen especially is amazing. It's the perfect balance for the pressure with which I draw and sketchability/spontaneity. I want to order 10 more. The Maru pen is the smaller equivalent for super tight lines, but the G Pen should be good for most stuff.

I guess the point is that the Japanese know their shit. American nibs are too delicate, too sensitive. I ordered a Deleter free pen holder and the Tachikawa T-40. Both of these "free penholdes" can fit the bigger G Pen as well as the tube style, smaller Maru pen. They'll also take the bigger American Hunt nibs (56, 99, 512) but don't hold the tube nibs tight (102, 107, 108), so it looks like I have to hold onto the shitty Speedball handle...but at the same time these newe Japanese pens feel so good that I don't think I'll be turning back to Hunt anytime soon, except maybe to continue playing with the ultra flexi 99 nib.

(the packaging from one of the new handles)

**Here is an interesting article/interview conducted by Frank Miller with Kazuo Koike (author of Lone Wolf and Cub) and Goseki Kojima (illustrator).

**Check out Audrey Kawasaki's website and blog. Her paintings and drawings are amazing.

Construction Paper and Animation

2011-09-06T14:40:00.001-07:00

I made these last night from some colored construction paper, pen, and a few markers. I don't have access to a larger format scanner to capture the entire first image. Perhaps a future investment once I start paying rent somewhere again.

About a year ago, while working in the lab, I made this simple animation (below) in the wee morning hours before bed. I have a bigger story in mind, but these 20 seconds were the preliminary attempt to see whether or not I could actually do it (animate); 100% hand drawn and colored. I used free software available through the National Institute of Health to assemble each individual drawing (12/second) into a stack that can be played as a digital flip-book, in a sense. (In the lab we used the program to assemble time-lapse snapshots of developing fruit fly embryos into movies). In the near future I hope to put in a strong effort to make a few cartoon shorts. I like the format of Looney Tunes and the grotesque aspects of Ren and Stimpy. We'll see how it plays out. First things first I need to streamline the process, draw more efficiently, and figure out the wonders of PhotoShop in terms of coloring hundreds (hopefully thousands) of images.

So what you first see here is a hairball bouncing across the screen. I want to animate a sequence to appear before this of a cat who hacks up the hairball. After the "dripping faucet bird" (my idea of showing he's dumb) I will eventually have a bird hunting scene, whereby a short fat bald man hunts these birds from inside of a mechanized bird suit, driving it like a construction crane. Eventually he kills a bird with a cowboy gun and the other birds freak out and peck him to death.

As this production process continues hopefully I'll be a little more professionnel and post character designs, storyboard thumbnails and all that other good stuff I see animators posting on their blogs (which if you haven't noticed, can be accessed through the links on the right not dealing with music or climbing. Pencil Test is a good one. It shows the rough pencil sketches of classic Disney, as well as other independent animations before they are cleaned up, inked, and colored) to track how the animation develops. I have ideas for three ~2 minute cartoons, so I'll probably be working on these in a fractured and stop-start sort of fashion, but that's ok.

Enjoy!

Indian Creek

2011-05-14T09:49:00.001-07:00

Consistency

2011-04-30T13:42:00.000-07:00

If there is anything consistent about this blog, which you'll notice by browsing the archives, is that I often change the focus. In the last month I've moved out of my apartment and have been sleeping in my truck in Utah. Sooner or later, when I'm not using the 15 free internet minutes at the library, I'll post some pictures of red sandstone. Probably by the time I get those pictures up I'll have some of Yosemite granite too.

Hope all is well, sorry for the lack of music.

K7-21: Doussouba Traore

2010-12-30T00:42:00.000-08:00

Voici another Doussouba Traore tape. Thanks to Jean Louis for both the tape and the scans. And, as it is the holiday season and the gifts kept coming in, thanks go to Ngoni for the Doussouba video (below) and this cool link.

Here are some scans for the previously posted Aichata Sidibe cassette.

Some more drawings given as holiday gifts:

American Gothic

Aristocrats!

More for your viewing pleasure

2010-12-07T21:00:00.000-08:00

I was kindly donated scans lacking from cassettes that I've previously posted (here, here, and here). I will have more music up shortly but my internet at home is down thanks to the faltering infrastructure, about which Thomas Friedman enjoys writing. Here is a recent example that touches on a variety of topics, including that mentioned above. You may enjoy some of his other writings here, but be warned--he has an obvious bias, with which I tend to agree.

Enjoy the scans in the meantime...

K7-20: Tata Diakite

2010-11-09T00:14:00.000-08:00

(image from here)

Well, it's quite clear that the relatively simple process of posting has taken a far back-row seat recently, for which I apologize. Work is consuming and drawing even more so, and the thought of coming up with posting material has become daunting.

For those of you uninterested in blog content unrelated to cassettes, allow me to direct you to the last few sentences of the previous post for the Aichata Sidibe cassette. It's a good one, and being buried deep down in the text I can understand why the resulting download number would be quite low in comparison to previous posts. However, forgive my assumption if it is the case that you do indeed hold some bizarre distaste for Aichata, and the low download number is a glaring indication of that. In any case you've overlooked a solid tape.

Tonight I offer another of my favorites: Tata Diakite's Album de Laban. Looking at her information on mali-music I don't see this tape listed in the discography, so I wonder if it's not a local selection. Depending on context the word laban can signify the end of something--a life--or it can mean the last in a series--a final cassette. My first inclination favors the former, that this is an album in celebration of Tata after her death. However I don't think it's the same as the listed Album du Souvenir because of the difference in track quantities and titles, yet I've never heard that tape and it's quite possible that this copy is missing some tracks. (Bengaly was usually pretty good about having the originals). I don't guess that this could possibly be a final cassette in her career because it sounds earlier than Djama (to be posted later) which was made in 2002 and is laden with synthesizers and keyboards and drum machines (although very effectively). In contrast, this mystery tape sounds more organic-- less electricity involved-- and that can sometimes be a good indication that it is an earlier tape (not always).

Any way you slice it, it's a damn good tape. Enjoy!

A recent drawing.

Check out the Second Line Social site before it's gone. Recently retired, the archives will be taken down at an unspecified date.

ARt!

2010-09-19T03:20:00.000-07:00

For no particular reason I can come up with, I haven't spent much time coloring greyscale (or French greyscale) like I mentioned a few posts back. But I have spent most of the past month working on ink. I bought a jar of ink and a quill style pen to try to learn from people like R. Crumb and Rand Holmes*, but then to use their lines for my own art.

A few weeks ago I was telling my co-worker that I was in the beginning of a drawing phase, and he automatically shot back by telling me how terrible he is at drawing. And as the days went on I realized how many people say the exact same thing in the same automated response. I found out that for whatever reason-- time, new responsibilities, new interests-- most people haven't sat down to draw since childhood, beyond occasional doodles on the edges of paper or envelopes. They have, however, seen quite a bit of art and established an idea of what looks like good art or bad art. So however rarely they do sit down to draw, anything produced is crumpled into a trash bin; it doesn't look like what they think good, or even decent art should look like.

My hypothesis is that anyone can be a good artist as long as they: draw in whatever style comes out of their hand (left or right), and see their picture as it is on the paper-- not in terms of what they already think their picture should look like, but in their inherent style used to convey the subject. Then their judgement of the quality of the work should be based on how well they were able to convey the idea within their own style. Essentially, how well can you act like yourself? Did you draw that triangle nose like you think a triangle nose should look like? Or does it look like shit because that's just not how people do 'em.

So it's no wonder people automatically doubt their own talent, when they have the weight of a thousand artists' names swirling in their heads and then whatever gurgles out of their pen doesn't fit into any of their forms. In the same way, I used to limit myself to which subjects I'd draw because "so-and-so artist wouldn't draw that". And by looking at a lot of R. Crumb, Rand Holmes, and Heinrich Kley recently, I've realized how diverse each of their subject matters are within themselves. So I figured the best way for me to get better is to put pen to paper and see what comes out (left hand) without worrying about content. No matter how absurd, serious, or strange it all goes.

This past month has been a success in my book. I like the tension drawing straight ink on paper-- no erasing. I have the benefit of having grown up drawing next to my brother (and if you're reading this you should draw more) so I was able to work out a lot of issues when I was young. But even still, sometimes drawings just turn out like crap and there's not much that can be done. Try again later.

And for your blues fans out there...

...that was my attempt at Rand Holmes' style with a R. Crumb butt.

Surprise! Here's Aichata Sidibe. I like this tape because I can hear kamelengoni songs I know how to play (with arrangements on top).

*there aren't a lot of examples of Rand Holmes on the internet that I could find, but you should check him out at a bookstore.

Alpine climbing!

2010-08-15T19:56:00.000-07:00

Caution (I jan to o la! (in bambara)): No music this time.

I had a free weekend away from my flies, so I took to the mountains. Washington's North Cascades are a great alpine playground; tons of (melting) glaciers, fairly solid rock (depending where you are), and tortuous approach hikes that'll put hair on anyone's chest. Since devoting my last two years to research I haven't been out climbing as much as I used to/want to.

Objective: East Ridge of Eldorado (below). A really moderate snow climb from the bottom right up to the left. The approach is actually harder than the climb-- roughly 5000 ft up, straight out of the car, battling through thick trees and endless boulder fields, and then trudging across the glacier in the boiling sun. I camped just off to the right at the base of the rock ridge.

And here is my lovely pad for the night, a cozy nook between some boulders. Surprisingly warm, protected from the wind. And melt-water was running not too far away-- always a plus.

A well deserved dinner: pasta veggies, wine, and hot mango drink! All that's missing are some candles and a date.

I climbed Forbidden peak a few years ago (below), and had a nice view of it from camp.

I don't know why I fool myself, I can't ever get away from fruit flies; I brought along some light reading. This paper (below) describes photo-activating a modified protein by using a laser, in order to activate the modified protein whenever desired. If the protein isn't hit with the laser it's "off". So they blast a group of cells in the fruit fly egg with light and induce its function, which happens to be involved in group cell migration, and study various conditions to suss out the developmental regulation of the specific migration of those cells. Pretty cool.

Settling in after some wine and bedtime reading. It got cold with the wind, but I stayed pretty warm between the rocks in my sleeping bag.

Just after sunrise.

The moderate East Ridge of Eldorado. I didn't take the traditional alpine start to the day (4am) because I knew it didn't get cold enough to completely freeze the snow overnight (none of my water froze), which would make for easier travelling. The climb itself was easy, the exciting part is just up over the sky-line...

...where you traverse this knife ridge. In reality it's probably a solid two feet across, a little smaller than a sidewalk, which everyone can easily walk across. The exciting part is how steeply and immediately it drops off hundreds of feet back down to the glacier on either side, and the whipping wind-- it's fun.

A nice view from the top. This might be Dorado Needle, but I'm not sure. It doesn't really look like a needle.

Peanut butter sandwiches are a staple, although if I eat another one I might vomit. There can be too much of a good thing and I reached my limit on the summit.

On my way down I passed three old-timers slogging up the snow, which was getting progressively softer and mushier as the sun cooked it, making for slow, sometimes painful climbing (why an alpine start, if cold enough, is better).

After climbing, packing up and decending a total of ~6000 feet, I finally made it back to the car to be attacked by big, biting, black-flies. I walked back to the river to jump in and rinse off but just one step in reminded me why I don't like swimming in glacial rivers-- they're too damn cold.

K7-18: Bintou Sidibe

2010-08-02T22:12:00.001-07:00

In place of an image of the Bintou cassette, which I don't have, is a picture my friend drew in one of my notebooks that I rediscovered the other day. Thanks Nicole!

Voici another wassoulou treasure. My brief searches for information on Bintou Sidibe were rather fruitless (although this was cool). The basic knowledge I already had, learned through brief conversations, was that Bintou is of the old school of wassoulou women, among Coumba Sidibe and Kagbe Sidibe. And you can hear the force in her voice, perhaps not as booming as that of Coumba but still the powerful style original to the music, unlike much of the more recent pop singers (which is not to say any one is better than the other, perhaps only a shift in aesthetic).

I like the long form of Neye Dounanye and especially the extended instrumental parts in Djigui. The relaxed tempo of all the music is quite pretty. The small ensemble allows the intricate and rhythmic playing of each instrument to blend very well; nothing is muddled (wait for Vol. 2, full of synthesizers and drum machine). Each musician is damn good.

Enjoy!

In the spirit of homemade art-work, below is a quick drawing of mine--a rather random, twisty staircase. Recently I decided I want to start using grey-scale (rather than just black ink or colors), so this is my first attempt to figure out how to use different shades of grey. But as I was browsing through an art store I discovered French Grey markers. I liked the ghostly brown hue to them so that's what the stairs are. The grassy weedy stuff is 'normal' grey. Why limit myself to one set of greys when I can have all the colors of the grey rainbow? We'll see how this project goes...

Is French vs 'normal' grey something like metric vs English units?

K7-17: Doussou Bagayoko

2010-07-21T01:10:00.000-07:00

My apologies for the absence. I've been concentrating on other things recently and lost track of time.

I realize that I introduce tapes as being another of my favorites quite often, and now's no time to quit. This is another one of my favorites. Doussou Bagayoko is the daughter of Nahawa Doumbia and NGou Bagayoko. Dayele was huge in Bamako and Yanfolila, blaring from push-carts loaded with tapes and speakers, blaring from store fronts and phone booths and taxis. My friend Vieux, who ran a phone booth next to Papa's mechanic shop (pictured below) played Dayele and Black So Man's cassette over and again every day.

At that time Papa's garage was located on the main market road off the (now) paved highway in Yanfolila. Passers-by seeking shade, others needing to make a phone call, or even more waiting for their scooter to be fixed next door sit down and chat, perhaps share tea then move on. Roaring above the already maxed-out stereo is the constant revving of old scooter engines, mufflers completely blown and the motor screeching, spewing thick black smoke into the face of mechanic as he deciphers the problem. Oil pools and eventually seeps through the dirt.

The production and instrumentation on the tape are quite good, but I don't know who the musicians are. Anyone out there? And the harmonizing vocals are strong. No single song is leagues above the others, and the whole cassette is solid. I'm pretty sure that this tape, along with the "second half" are available on line as one set, while they were available as two separate cassettes in Bamako, Dayele and Koungo Sogo (to be posted later).

Enjoy!

(Papa Sidibe is on the right. He and his family have welcomed me on more than one occasion and their kindness is endless.)

K7-16: Satta Kouyate

2010-06-03T23:12:00.000-07:00

While this picture is not the cover to Satta Kouyate's cassette, Guéléya is one of the songs. The tape (Dakan) is another absolutely solid one. Satta has a dynamic voice, strong on top of the full music. It's easy to become accustomed to thin voices on some newer wassoulou music, so I enjoy the beauty of Satta's powerful vocals; it reminds me of Kagbe Sidibe.

Nieba was her first cassette, and I'm fairly certain Dakan is the second. I read a rather grim interview with Satta and she mentions singing Guéléya, but not whether it was the hit song or the title of the album. My tape's jacket was labeled Dakan. Anyway, the interview was overall, as I said, grim. Satta is quite troubled by her talent. I won't go into any of the gory details, but the interview doesn't end on a bright note -- tread with caution. Perhaps you can detect her sorrow in the music.

UPDATE (6/10/10): Satta Kouyate at a party of some sort, from Ngoniba's seemingly endless stock of ORTM videos.

K7-15: Lamissa Bengaly

2010-05-12T02:02:00.000-07:00

Lamissa Bengaly was instrumental in promoting Senoufo culture and balafon music around Mali and beyond. And with that reputation behind him, I would have guessed that Lamissa was an artful and skilled player, however the cassette jacket suggests he may have used it only as a vehicle from which to address his audience, his true art. Then, left in his wake was the instrument, ready for attention.

I don't know many details about his life or how vast was his influence, only that he's from the Sikasso region and is remembered next to Bazoumana Sissoko, Tara Bouare, and Toumani Kone, among others no-less important as major influences. He even has a performance hall named after him where balafon competitions are hammered out, and Nebe Solo, a new balafon musician, paid homage to Lamissa by way of song.

The sticker in the middle of the cassette jacket and the number code printed inside it tell me that the cover is indeed original, but I'm rather skeptical of the cassette itself, no matter what the stamp says. Bear with me...

Five tracks are listed on the cassette jacket, while twelve individual tracks are actually on the tape (five on Face A and seven on Face B). After painstakingly comparing like-tracks side-by-side, down to syllables, I determined that Face A contains the whole tape and Face B repeats the three tracks listed, and at the same time presented Behantane and Meilleur Voux spliced together to make a deceptive new track; don't be fooled though. Therefore I included only those tracks from Face A that I judged to comprise the complete cassette. I don't speak Senoufo (and can't precisely say if Lamissa is occasionally singing in Bamana or not), but the only song I could hear him actually say the name of the title was in Fadja Joghou. It was in this manner, using Fadja Joghou as the landmark, that I titled the tracks.

It sounds like Lamissa is accompanied by one other vocalist who, in between Lamissa's extended phrases, sings cycling choruses. The voices sound similar, though it sounds as if the obviously featured voice (Lamissa) cuts off the other whenever he's ready to speak his mind. Each lyrical phrase and transition between the two is introduced by an accented first syllable.

Notice the vocal styling in the final thirty seconds of Meillure Voux (before it unfortunately fades out) and compare it with the old man who finally demands his turn to speak in the movie Bamako, by Abderrahmane Sissako. If you haven't watched it you may enjoy it; a half-fictional film about many relavent topics, including the strategies and effects of the World Bank and IMF in regards to African nations, unfolded as testimony from villagers and city-dwellers in court. Anyway, the old-timer might be Senoufo.

Enjoy!

**If you're losing sleep at night because I didn't provide the full cassette, just listen to each track a few times in a row and it'll give the same effect while reducing redundancy. (Except for Vavouughou and Fadja Joghou, which play once each on the full tape).**

K7-14: Kagbe Sidibe

2010-04-27T22:39:00.000-07:00

This is a good one. Kagbe Sidibe and her group drive the music forward relentlessly. Each song swaggers so deeply, bouncing between steps quickly but strongly. Indeed, if it were coming down the street, with that heavy swagger, I wouldn't want to get in its way. Kagbe must have been a force in her day. When I heard her on the radio a friend told me it was the song Patron that won Kagbe a spot on the Friday night music show Top Etoiles, in the early 1990s/late 1980s(?).

Don't try to drive home after this one. More Kagbe to come.

Enjoy!

K7-13: Gobou Woletö

2010-04-20T01:07:00.001-07:00

This past month has been absolutely insane. Who knew fruit flies could be so demanding? Every day it was more and more of I'm too hot! I'm too cold! Feed me! Read me a story! Bacterially express and purify my proteins to show a direct interaction!

Man alive! I suppose it's job security, though. Not like those grocery checkers who can be replaced by the machines; flies won't be reading their own bed-time stories anytime soon, that's for sure!

Well, I suppose I'll get back at it here. The picture above was drawn for a friend (and if you haven't received it yet...surprise!) The picture of Samory Touré was printed. The text/lyrics were pilfered and rearranged with a liscence artistique from another Duran article, wherein she quotes from Coumba Sidibe's version of Ndanani. In rearranging the lyrics for my specific needs I'm not sure if I took all sense out of them, perhaps taking them out of context. It makes for nice poetry however:

The road to Wasulu is far for us,/ the little place is far./ Don't you hear the little bell ringing?/ Words cannot be trusted today/ But if you have love,/ love is trust./ Don't you hear the little bell ringing?/ For this is your song./ The bird of Wasulu has sang./

Samory Touré has an interesting story that leads to his founding of the Wassoulou Empire in the latter half of the 1800s, and wanders further until his eventual capture by the French in 1898. Interestingly, Sekou Touré, infamous Guinéen president, is Samory's grandson. This might partly explain Sekou's obstinate objection to French involvement in Guinée--not in the obvious connection between Samory and his evasion of and eventual capture by French armies, but in the sense of Samory's character, who rarely compromised his will or desire in obtaining his vision for a united Wassoulou Empire.

I'll use Sekou Touré as my jumping off point to present my much delayed musical mango, which arrives ripe from deep down in the forest of southern Guinée--N'Zerekore specifically. This small town is near the lively borders of Liberia and Côte d'Ivoire, and it was indeed lively. The crowded and endlessly bumpy modified-Toyota-van ride down from Kankan left everyone caked in red dust.

After a few weeks I was introduced to the group Gobou Woletö. Four guys played wooden trompets (tulu), one a smaller higher-pitched drum, another a slightly larger deeper drum with aluminum fins stuck in the cords of the drum that were lined with soda-can tabs to make the soft jingle, and the last kept all the time on his iron bell. Hearing and seeing this music upfront was incredible. The first song felt like a swirling cloud overhead. It was madness, I couldn't tell where the rhythm was (though it's pretty clear in the recordings that the bell is the anchor).

The trumpeters alternated blowing in the horn and singing syllables which added to the swirling effect. I wish I understood any bit of the language Guerzé to know if they each say a different word to make a phrase in these songs, or if they're all alternately saying different things with their own complete meanings. I don't know and didn't ask.

The trumpeter in the red cap was responsible for obtaining and distributing the gasoline-jug full of palm wine, which was quite tasty. The picture of him climbing the tree with a knife between his teeth and slingshot in his pocket didn't turn out.

Kéwo, the woman off to the right in the picture above, was instrumental in helping me find this group and others in the area. She can't be thanked enough for her effort, patience, and kindness.

Our talented dancer in white explained the significance of each song and Kéwo supplemented his efforts with written notes in a small book, and here are my translations:

1) La Salutation: Song often played for strangers, respected old people, and officials.

2) Nangha ma pa: A song to manifest love or declare our love for someone or something.

3) Yawala ga bhè ghanli: Title-- For those who want to say you don't see me, tell yourself that I've gone. This is a song of goodbye, often sung at the end of ceremonies and events to say goodbye to the crowd.

4) John Paul II: This song was played to get people to go to church. It was a manner of respect for John Paul II; when he goes to church we should follow behind him.

5) Yila löbha kani kokoï: Title-- Patience makes joy. In life we must be patient; don't be hurried. God doesn't forget anyone and knows what he's planned for everyone. Patience is a good thing.

6) Ya yanlo te ghe wa ne ba: Title-- When I cross the river I greet my mother. At the death ofune grande personnalité and at the moment they are to be buried, we sing this song to say goodbye and many other things about the other world.

7) Yawala loga wo bhogho tu wo kè: Title--If you haven't had any children, don't behave badly. Women shouldn't tell themselves, "since I haven't had a child, I'm going to behave badly". Certain women who haven't had children prefer to drink alcohol because they think it diminishes their worries. On the other hand, there are women who haven't had children and they respect themselves. Women should maintain their dignity. The lack of a child should not be at the base of bad behavior.

Enjoy!

(I went straight)

And, does anyone know of any blogs that have Oromo music from Ethiopia? Let me know!

K7-12: Wa Flash

2010-03-23T01:03:00.000-07:00

Let us take a slight detour away from the arid land of Mali and venture into the just-as-arid land of Thiés, Senegal. Enjoy the relatively relaxed mbalax of Masane and Wa Flash. My friend Jules Diop respected Masane because her hair was real, but I suspect that some of his appreciation was reserved for her voice*.

At the time I spoke Wolof well enough to explain the vile things I was willing to do to the mothers of would-be pick-pockets, and that I would eat their days (demai lekk sai funn) if they kept bothering me (I learned these vile words from children or the parents yelling at their children in Dakar). However, as much basic conversation that was to be had, I could never fully understand the lyrics of mbalax, nor did I ever really fully appreciate mbalax, in all its sugary, treble-heavy sabar madness and glory.

Nevertheless, this is one tape that I do enjoy. Some songs are a little blown-out.

My favorite song is Sincerité. I don't know exactly what Masane is singing when she says someone is crying, but when she sings "mingi joy", she sings "he/she is crying", which would make sense in a song titled Sincerité. And she implores someone, presumably the husband and father in the video, to wanko--to show it, sincerité. My best guess is that Masane is singing about anonymous woman married to typical man who refuses to show any sympathy to the woman's situation (the video doesn't reveal much, so perhaps polygamy, which is a relevant topic today) and later in the second little segment between the dancing, the father not being sympathetic to the daughter's situation with her young suitor.

'Soxna' is either the word for woman or a respectful word used to address women. For example, to get the attention of a woman working in a little shop I'd address her generally as, [Hey] woman...soxna si ([hey] this woman). I'm pretty sure adding si, because soxna starts with an 's', makes it a close noun, like saying gorgui, where gor is the word for man, and gui is the grammatically correct thing added after. Since gor starts with a 'g', gui is what follows. I'm not a linguist. However, it was explained to me by a linguist that modern Wolof has generally abandoned the agreement between noun and grammatically-correct-thing-added-after-the-noun, and made them all neutral, in a sense (I'm not sure they took a male/female sex), in that, now nouns are mostly followed grammatically with a 'gui' rather than agreeing with whichever letter the noun starts with. Like I said, I'm not a linguist, so that may have been terribly confusing.

Enjoy the music. More mbalax to be posted later.

But before I go and since I'm feeling rather mbalaxy right now, here's a youtube video of one of my favorite songs, coincidentally enough also concerning women's plight in Senegal.

*and that Masane is very attractive.

K7-11: Allata Broulaye

2010-03-09T00:39:00.001-08:00

Allata Broulaye seems to have wanted to stay out of the media's attention--including the recording industry--preferring to be known through performance instead. He is credited as being the "inventor" of what we all know and love (if not by name at least by sound)--the kamelen n'goni. I hope you'll be lenient with me in light of most of what I am going to write below is taken from one excellent article written by Lucy Duran, as well as from what I remember asking friends in Yanfolila, who didn't speak much French and I very little Bamana, about the origin of the songs I was hearing and learning.

I say Broulaye avoided attention because Duran credits herself as having the only interview he ever gave (1996), months before his death (1997). I say he avoided the recording industry because Duran and another talented researcher, Graeme Counsel, cite his only full-length, official album to have been recorded in 1981/3, titled Spécialiste de Kamelen N'goni. Before I go on with more info about him I want to point something out, if you haven't noticed already.

Duran's note at the end of her article and Counsel's comprehensive discography list Broulaye's only LP/cassette as Spécialiste de Kamelen N'goni (the year of release differs). However, the cassette I present to you, and that was presented to me in the market as Allata Broulaye's "only" cassette, is titled L'Initiateur de Kamele Ngoni. Presently, the only other island in this vast internet ocean where I can find another listing for L'Initiateur de Kamele Ngoni is here, a listening syllabus for a Harvard music class in 2008. I cannot find a single website that provides a track listing for Spécialiste de Kamelen N'goni album, nor for L'Initiateur de Kamele Ngoni, save for the three tracks on the Harvard site linked above. So, your guess is as good as mine as to whether or not I have the true "only" cassette. The score is 2-2. Duran and Counsel -vs- me and Harvard. Perhaps these tapes are one-and-the-same, perhaps not. Let me know if you figure something out. At least here I have home-field advantage.

I'll get back to this conflict with relevant information a little later, but for now, enough of that.

Duran writes that Broulaye was the first to record kamelengoni with his niece Coumba Sidibe (to be posted later) for Radio Mali, in 1977, and it wasn't until the early 1980's that he put his first LP to wax. Brulaye said he was never paid for that album and thus never recorded again. I would like to think that it would be impossible that not a single event where Brulaye may have played for a crowd, such as for the opening of such-and-such market, or such-and-such school, or whatever else might warrant ceremonious music in his whole career, wasn't ever recorded by a Radio Mali journalist or Radio Wassoulou journalist, as is quite common. There are plenty of locally recorded tapes available to support this practice, my Seydou Camara post being one of them (although I don't know the exact purpose for that recording). But then I remember one has to consider the original "purpose" of the kamelengoni and what it represented to Malian youth and musicians and artists: freedom from ceremony and ritual, which was required for any occasion that the donsongoni played. Instead, kamelengoni was/is for pure entertainment. So perhaps there aren't any recordings of Brulaye playing for the opening of whatever was opening because he simply didn't play for those events. He only played to make people dance in the villages, a pure expression of "his" art. Broulaye's brother said, "'This was our own dance music. We didn't listen to records or the radio. Young boys and girls would meet in the evenings outside the village and dance to this music until the early hours of the morning...'" (Duran, 2003; I'd give a page number but my copy doesn't have them).

Duran also mentions that shortly before his death, Broulaye recorded a few songs with Oumou Sangare at her house in Bamako. These were recorded by Ousmane Haidara. I'm excited for a future trip to Mali, in part to track down some of these forgotten recordings. Speaking of Oumou Sangare...she is one of the singers on this album. If you listen closely to the songs Dundun Ba and Djigui you can hear Broulaye single out Oumou Sangare, singing her name.

I will never claim that I speak Bambara well (yet), and if someone out there can correct me please do, but to me it sounds like Broulaye is singing something like this, beginning at minute mark 1.29 of Djigui: Oumou Sangare ngoni min y'a djigui ye/ (chorus)/ Kamelengoni kan...//

My translation, if I'm correct would be, roughly: Oumou Sangare, the ngoni that gives her hope/ (chorus)/ The language of kamelengoni...// and then I can't separate the words (plus he sometimes sounds like he doesn't have any teeth). In most cases djigui translates to hope, but from experience it seems to me that any word in Bamana can mean anything depending on the context of the rest of the sentence. Then in the next line, adding -kan after a noun typically means "the language of that noun". Such as Bamanankan = the Bamana language. Konokan = the language of the bird. Side note: when you hear many Wassoulou artists sing "wassoulou konokan bora", they're singing that their words have left. (bo = to go--among other things--and -ra makes that verb take the past tense). In this case the singer is the bird of wassoulou who has just said whatever it is they did and the words have left them. Another side note: although Oumou Sangare is most famously given the title of the Bird of Wassoulou, such a title is not unique to her, although she does have a very pretty voice.

A brief return to the conflict of the dueling cassettes: Duran quotes from two of Broulaye's songs from Spécialiste de Kamelen N'goni in her article, listing the titles as Mousso keleyato and Yayoroba. You may notice that neither of those are in my cassette presented to you. However, I have not scoured the lyrics of my tape for those phrases, which if identified, would lead me to believe there is merely a difference in song titles not content. The score is still 2-2 in my book (Harvard has my track titles, and Duran has them for her team).

I've written more than I thought. I love the kamelengoni. The picture at top is a close-up of Sekou Kouyate's axe, who is pictured behind the title of this blog. I hope you enjoyed the brief lesson in Bamana grammar.

Post script: I am hesitant to make any connection between Malian music and the blues, for one because I'm tired of reading about it in the superficial terms by which it is typically presented, and two because what I want to write is not founded on anything beyond an entertaining coincidence; so here goes. I've been listening to a lot of pre-WWII blues lately. Allata Broulaye reminds me of a Henry Sloan type character. Henry Sloan is credited with teaching Charley Patton to play the blues, and Charley Patton, as I understand it, went on to teach people like Son House and Bukka White, among others, and on and on until the blues is what it is today one-hundred years after the fact. There is only one single reference to anyone besides Charley Patton ever having seen Henry Sloan alive (W.C Handy in 1903), and even that is an ongoing debate. Allata Broulaye apparently only gave one interview and he was the founder of a musical movement that cemented a cultural identity.

--an entertaining coincidence, is all. Enjoy!

K7-10: Tara Bouare

2010-02-26T00:58:00.000-08:00

This cropped picture was taken years ago for other purposes and was found now in my computer; not complete, but something.

I know very little about Tara Bouare, and most (all) of what I do know is from brief internet searches. She seems to be regarded as a musical pillar of Malian and Bambara culture, and has remained a vital and inspiring figure in the cultural consciousness as far as twenty years after her death in 1971 or 1972.

Dictator Moussa Traore's caravan was stopped by the now current second-term president Amadou Toumani Toure, in 1991. At the time ATT was general of the military and his coup took place as the result of Traore's violent suppression of growing protests against his thirty year reign as head of state/presidency of Mali. Traore's security forces opened fire on a crowd of protestors, killing around three hundred people on March 22, 1991 in central Bamako. Apparently Tara Bouare's song Sanounegueni was somewhat of an anthem at the time*. The translation is golden rod, and the substance of the song, I've read to be, is that no kingdom is forever. One can imagine that during a time of favourable political upheaval and transition, such a message would be inspiring, and especially--at least from my perspective as an outsider looking in--since that message was delivered by means of a simple song by an artist who had been absent, yet apparently lingering in the public consciousness, for the previous twenty years.

Goes to show the power of song and the Malian musician!

**Interesting note: Friends in Yanfolila told me that during Moussa Traore's reign, his police forces were instructed to stop anyone from playing kamelengoni down south. It was thought that too much entertainment meant too little work, so anyone seen playing was promptly made to stop. This might explain the legends of late-night gatherings and dancing outside of town, of which I have no reference to direct you, but remember reading. I wonder what (negative) effect such a policy had on the prevalence of the instrument today.**

K7-9: Souley Kante

2010-02-18T00:31:00.001-08:00

Souley Kante: artist, auto-mechanic, smith, and traditional doctor*. I had to pay extra for this one. At the time I was searching for kamelengoni tapes and a vendor told me that since he had held onto this copy over the years he wouldn't sell it for the normal 1.ooo CFA, but instead wanted 1.5oo CFA. I bought the tape and I'm quite happy I did.

I didn't know at that time--but soon found out--that Souley Kante has been around the Malian musical block: inspired by Coumba Sidibe, formed a group with Sali Sidibe, and toured with Oumou Sangare until the bird flew off on his own musically successful solo career.

Venture over to Awesome Tapes for another Kante mango if you haven't already.

K7-8: Djeneba Seck

2010-02-11T23:45:00.000-08:00

Speaking of Djeneba Seck, Tigne is another one of my favorites. The beauty of this cassette in my eyes, is its simplicity, Djeneba's simple honesty as a singer. What I mean is that she is not exerting herself to impress us with her prowess as a vocalist; rather, she is impressing us by her effortless talent as a vocalist--like she's just speaking, but speaking very beautifully.

Acoustic musique malienne is my favorite. I like the playful guitar and flute introduction on Yere Ladi. And during the song Foulbe I imagine a courtyard procession with drummers clacking and women dressed in their finest wax, stepping in time as they march down the center of crowded lines of people. It seems as though Zoumana Tereta is the go-to, when it comes to soku. I have no complaints with that.

Sterns put this out as a CD (titled Truth in English) and I can notice two differences: the CD has a twelfth track that my cassette does not, and the cover is different--so I didn't post Sterns', yet mine is with the physical tape miles and miles away. I do suspect however, that my tape--regardless of it having a jacket--is a bootleg anyway, which would explain a lot to me.

I remember standing on a balcony one night in the quartier Hamdallaye in Bamako, hearing this tape blaring out of a boom-box from below and I immediately melted; not because of the absurdly oppressive heat, but because of Djeneba's voice. And months later on a rather uneventful bus-ride, at least in terms of what one might imagine a bus-ride in Mali could be like, Anka Maliba was one of a handful of songs on the one mix-tape in the bus, played morning till night for two-and-a-half days (Bamako-->Dakar, the train had wrecked weeks earlier, sadly killing my friend who preferred to be called Mike (pictured below). If it were not for his friendship and those which followed as a result, my life would be quite different today). Come to think of it, there was a group of Nigerians on that bus who were relocating to Gambia. I served as translator between the French speaking and English speaking, and tossed in whatever Wolof or Bambara I could handle (I was better at Wolof). At the Senegal-Mali border I was the only person not required to bribe my way through; the officers were very cordial. So I guess more happened on that ride than I tend to give credit...in any event, I bought the tape.

Enjoy!

**Pictured below is Mike, from Benin. He more-or-less lived on the train (pictured above), taking and filling orders between the Dakar and Bamako markets. He and dozens others never paid passage but knew exactly when to avoid the train officials, thus avoiding any unfortunate incidents. The train took five days and four nights. I don't know if that's normal, though it wouldn't surprise me.**

For your viewing pleasure

2010-02-07T16:54:00.000-08:00

Scans of the Mali K7 CD release in 1999, courtesy of Scott:

What good detectives we are. Oumou and Kassim, no Baba Salah, and as an added bonus, I'm happy to see Djeneba Seck listed as well.

Post script: In my excitement to make digital these wonders of Wassoulou culture, Bambara culture, West African...etc., I overlooked what I now realize is an important step. You may be aware that my cassettes were not digitized at an optimal bitrate (rather at 128kbps), so I propose this: every new cassette I digitize will be at a higher bitrate. And, as I have time to work through some of the old tapes (which are currently 1986.05 miles/3196.24km away from me), I'll post them, because I too, would enjoy the improved quality.

K7-7: Nabintou Diakite

2010-02-04T23:43:00.000-08:00

La Nouvelle Revelation du Wassoulou is another solid cassette from the region--more undiluted beauty, as someone described the previous cassette to me. Nabintou's is a little more dynamic than that of Doussouba Traore; less driving, you may notice. However, that is not to say one is any better or worse than the other.

Nabintou, I believe, is Oumou Sangare's cousin and was a backing vocalist in her group. I wouldn't be surprised if Oumou is singing on this one too. In fact, I think members of Oumou's group are probably playing on this tape. I saw a roster for the musicians on another of Nabintou's tape, which included Kassim Sidibe, who I know was Oumou's kamelengoni player.

The kamelengoni on this tape is a prominent feature, largely leading the music. On some tracks, the longer cycles of melody it plays before repeating, fills a more melodic role than it usually has on other tapes by Bintou Sidibe or Aissata Sidibe, where it is primarily a rhythm machine with short fills and fast solos that allow more instrumentation to be layered on top for the main melody.

Enjoy!

**If you recall from my post about Seydou Camara, I have had great success tracking down the out of print text, as well as some other interesting resources. When I get something coherent together I'll be sure to share**

**Enjoy scenic downtown Bamako, pictured up top. Amadou Toumani Toure's palais présidentiel looms atop the hill, which is also where you can find Point G, one of the two main hospitals in Bamako and greater Mali. If you get lost wandering the angled streets use the cathedral with the clock as a landmark--it helps**

K7-5: The Jatta Brothers - Joola Akonting from Gambia. K7-6: Groupe Le Fogny - Joola pop from Casamance.

2010-01-29T22:54:00.000-08:00

The Jatta Brothers:

This was the last recording I made while in West Africa in 2007, a rather serendipitous occasion for a few reasons. I left a friend's house in Casamance by road, en route to Dakar to return home and stopped in Gambia for a week. I had previously read about the akonting here, and got the fancy idea to seek it out. I was initially intrigued by the akonting and it's music, especially after having listened to heavy doses of griot-style music at the time, because I learned that it's music was purely recreational, as opposed to ceremonial. So, as Shlomo Pestcoe's article indicated (click the above link if you haven't), I went to Mandinary. Along the way I met a friendly man who was able to set me up with a home-base, so to speak.

When asking around, I was told about an old man around town who was known to play the akonting well. I met his grandsons (pictured above) at his door-way and they told me that their grampa had been in far eastern Gambia for some time and they didn't know when he was to return, but also that they could play for me. We picked the next night for our petite soirée and it passed with great success.

This particular instrument they were playing had three strings, only two of which are fretted; I'm not quite sure what is considered 'standard'. The percussion behind the akonting is a butter-knife on a beer bottle, most likely Flag or Gazelle. I think I remember the bottle being green, so it was probably Gazelle, which is actually out of Dakar--not too far away.

My editing is a bit rough on this one, some of the songs start/stop abruptly in an effort to cut out unrelated pre- or post-music conversation; please don't let that detract from the fun music. Also, I was paranoid about the beer bottle's volume peaking and cutting while I was recording so I kept adjusting the mic level; therefore, some tracks are noticeably louder than others.

Alas, since that recording is rather short, here's another piece of Joola music to satisfy your ears; not my recording, but a more contemporary (2004 or 2006) tape I copied while in Ziguinchor, Senegal. The band is Groupe Le Fogny; they are well known throughout Gambia and Ziguinchor. The drums being played are the bougarabou of the Casamance region. If you listen closely with your linguistically-discerning ears, you may notice the many similarities between the Joola sung on this cassette and the Bambara from previous posts. But, as linguistics is not my field, I'll leave you to whatever research you choose to do in this vast internet ocean to figure out the relationship.

Here's a video, there are others (not mine) and I only chose this one because I like this singers voice the best:

**Fun facts: The name Fogny was taken from the word efogne, which means 'to sing' in Joola (from the band website). Also, fogny is the name of a particular grain from the Casamance region of Séné-Gambia, as well as the name of the specific region at the upper Gambie and Casamance rivers. Read all about it and other agricultural matters concerning the Joola, buried in the dense French text of this 1984 research paper**

K7-4: Doussouba Traore

2010-01-25T02:34:00.000-08:00

Doussouba's cassette Tayele is solid. While my favorite song is Dielaban Tile, there is not otherwise any one song that is an obvious hit; instead the whole cassette from start to finish is consistently good. (I'm easily taken by a pretty melody and Dielaban Tile gives it to me).

I like the instrumentation. The kamelengoni lays down a melodic rhythm on top of which the guitars dance. I like the freedom the djembe player has and the counter rhythms he plays.

I often wonder if the groups that recorded all of these cassettes over the years are actually a "house band," so to speak, or if the performer chooses the musicians. Are these the same kamelengoni player, djembe drummer, and guitar players as on Aïchata Sidibe's cassette Massake (to be posted later), as one example? They could be. Any ideas out there?

Enjoy!

**(I don't have the cassette jacket. Instead I offer a shot of the dusty new paved road cutting through Yanfolila. If you continue from Papa's mechanic shop (just off screen to the left) you'll pass the school Bintou goes to. Continuing southeast, passed the road that leads to the main market, passed a Centre de Sante, curve up the road and cut off left to head straight for the not-so-big radio tower that transmits Radio Wassoulou).**

K7-3: Na Hawa Doumbia

2010-01-21T02:44:00.000-08:00

This album is simply titled "Na Hawa Doumbia". I don't have much information about it. I appreciate the simplicity of the recording; a beautifully powerful voice woven over intricate guitar, played by (I assume) Na Hawa's husband N'Gou Bagayoko. As calm as the music is, there also exists a sense of urgency that is inherent to the phrasing of both vocals and instrumentation--lots of stuccato, syllabic sounds.

To me this is another example of Malian music that characterizes the landscape beyond the Sotramas, taxis, and Jakartas that maintain the hum of very lively city centers. Together, the music with the white noise and atmosphere left between the guitar notes and singing creates a soundtrack for a lonely expanse of red-rock grit, low harsh shrubs, dust, and thoughtful introspection that I think characterizes a certain aspect of Malian culture, which I respect greatly; that when conversation has come to a pause, tea is bubbling and the top of the small blue kettle clinks with each puff of steam, donkey's wander, the wind kicks up dust and an occasional cross-country traveller speeds by on a dirt bike cutting the silence, his head wrapped and an outdated shot-gun strapped across his shoulders.

In Yanfolila this cassette (from an artist raised in Bougouni, not too far away) would be perfect for the downtime in the heat after lunch, before the sun starts to turn an evening gold and thick black plumes of smoke waft through the air as women prepare for dinner. Being here, I enjoy listening towards the end of the night when I take stock of the day and anticipate tomorrow.

For another great Na Hawa Doumbia cassette and video visit here, courtesy of the infinitely entertaining and informative World Service station. Nahawa released another cassette recently, or perhaps she only accompanied her daughter for a song on her new cassette. Doussou Bagayoko will be the subject of future posts. A ka nyi kosebe!

K7-1: Seydou Camara, K7-2: Sali Sidibe

2010-01-18T01:52:00.000-08:00

My first contributions--two, in an effort to make a small splash at this birth announcement--are actually a little harder to find. The first cassette is of kamelengoni master, Seydou Camara, recorded by Radio Wassoulou. He is a very technical player; all of his fills are spot on, his mastery of muting and opening the strings, and the metallic ping he hits on the first string for an accent could ring on forever in space. What I love most is the trotting rhythm and bounce he maintains; definitely a wassoulou sound.

I sadly did not get much information about the recording, as in for what occasion is he playing or where specifically. I presume it's in Yanfolila, but it could be from one of the villages surrounding the Wassoulou capitale. I heard the first track on the radio while hanging out at the mechanic shop recently opened by Papa Sidibe along the recently paved main road from Bamako to Guinee. There's a lick he plays in the first 20 seconds that I recognized immediately as a song I learned to play with Sekou (pictured behind the title of this blog). In the following days I tracked down the tape at Radio Wassoulou and had the DJ, a fellow Sidibe, spin me a copy. The kamelengoni (not necessarily this recording, as I didn't hear this until years after I had already tombe en amour, for some reason I can't get an accent over that e), is one of the many reasons that I fell in love with the dusty corner of Mali. Two of the other reasons are the Sidibe and Coulibaly families, of whom you can read in previous posts. More on the kamelengoni later.

**As I was writing this I took a dip in the internet ocean and came up with this. It is an excerpt from a translated text in the 70s, which I'm trying to track down. If this is the same Seydou Camara, he was a donsongoni player, but this cassette sounds more like the stylings of kamelengoni. And Seydou died in 1981 in his village, as I was told and this article excerpt corroborates, so this tape must be from the 1970s. This assumes that there isn't another ngoni player named Seydou Camara who might have created this gem, which there is, but I think he's more of the contemporary pop-Wassoulou style. Does anyone know?**

Mango number two is the formidable Sali Sidibe. I was told that this recording was made when she was quite young for Radio Mali, which is, at least now, known as our beloved ORTM. Does anyone know more than that? I know one song is about trees, and I think I remember being told it was about deforestation, as people go out into the forest and cut trees to sell for stove-burning. I like the instrumentation, and what sounds like a synthesized snare drum actually works very well, but judging by the hi-hat it could be a real snare. I always like flute and soku, and of course the kamelengoni. Track two opens with a rhythm popularized by Allata Broulaye's song Sabu. I've come across many stories about the true "origins" of popular kamelengoni, mostly parallel stories giving different names more weight. I'll get back to that later. Enjoy! Leave comments.

Most of the tapes I will present were kindly spun by Bengali in Banjul. He loves Ganda Fadiga. Most of that back wall of tapes were Ganda Fadiga performances. At the time I didnt realize how much I liked him as well. Perhaps a future trip will correct this terrible erreur.

Recent History

2009-10-08T01:04:00.000-07:00

Some fly drawings. This is a stage 14 embryo, about 11 hours old, in the middle of a process called dorsal closure. At this stage there is basically a hole in the dorsal side of the fly that eventually closes as the embryo continues development. Anterior is to the left (the head is tucked inside), posterior on the right (the two dots are called the filzkorper, part of the tracheal system), ventral side down (where our lab studies wound healing, which is remarkably similar to dorsal closure), dorsal up (where the guy is pulling out DNA).

In June or so I was reading about oogenesis in fruit flies, and thought their ovaries were good for at least a few comics.

Comic 1. First, an ovary dissection. Public disclaimer: female mutilation is not humorous. When I do a testes dissection I'll draw some morbid male scientist comic to round things out. But until then, enjoy.

Things to keep in mind: 1) some mutant flies won't lay eggs, so in order to study what's happening genetically and molecularly we need to get at the ovaries, using watchmaker forceps. To make these females as happy as possible, so that their ovaries are as happy as possible, we keep them in bottles with yeast at twenty-five degrees celcius. And, 2) flies don't have blood, they have hemolymph.

Comic 2. Other things to consider before reading: A fly ovary looks kind of like a flower that hasn't bloomed (see Figure 1). One of the green leaves that protect the petals and stamen and pistil and those other important flower parts are analogous to one fly ovariole (though the ovarioles aren't concealing anything if you peel them back but more ovarioles, the whole bunch being an ovary). An ovariole is a series of maturing egg chambers--youngest at the tip (germarium), oldest, which will be dumped into the oviduct to be layed, near the stalk.

Figure 1. An ovary and ovariole.

If the female flies aren't happy (not at twenty-five degrees, or not fed well with yeast) they won't lay eggs. The eggs will back-up in their ovarioles. So if you want your fly to lay, you need to feed her. Enjoy. Oh yeah, flies probably don't smoke, and they probably don't drink either, because we dump them in ethanol to kill them.

Recently I wanted to draw a farmer. This turned into a cool series:

More flies

2009-04-09T02:39:00.000-07:00

These are some of the things I've been up to lately. Mostly flies.

Some Garageband.

I don't buy limes.

But flies are always on my mind. I'm nearing the end of a project where I've been mating flies so that they'll have one deleted gene. Next week I can see if this reversion was a success and figure out what the mutant flies are up to. I'm also screening a library of Drosophila genes against our gene to see what is interacting with our gene. We're coming at these genes from a few angles--what they do in a cell, as well as who they interact with to do it-- and then characterize what the proteins do and what happens when they don't work quite right.

We study WASp family proteins (Wiskott Aldrich Syndrome), which when not functionioning properly can cause low blood platelet count as well as immune dificiency, mostly in children (I think). But our lab doesn't study that directly. We're looking at how the genes that cause Wiskott Aldrich Syndrome function in relation to actin and microtubules, which form the scaffolding and intracellular transportation system, and trigger cytoskeletal rearrangments for structural purposes, locomotion, or intracellular transport along cables. I'm working on two of the newer ones that no one really knows much about. We all have some pretty good guesses simply because particular domains of it's DNA sequence is conserved between flies, mammals, and more primitive organisms, so it most likely does a similar job, but with important specific regulations and mechanisms that are unique and we want to figure out. Our lab was collaborating with another who works with mammalian systems to identify one of the genes I'll be studying, and another mammalian researcher found a new member of WASP proteins that's the second I'll be trying to characterize. It's pretty sweet.

And finally, Frank Zappa is rad. Especially his albums the Grand Wazoo, and Waka/Jawaka. If you like fusion like it's supposed to be played, alongside classical arrangements in the Zappa style, these are good. MOstly instrumental, which I kind of like because Zappa has the reputation of having a dirty mouth (depending on the year), yet I also don't like that there's no singing because the album Apostrophe, which was also recorded in the same years as these (1972-4) was so good. Frank Zappa is rad.

Valentine's Day produces more than babies

2009-02-15T14:49:00.000-08:00

These are some of the pictures I drew when I was in Gambia in 2007 with the intention of coloring at some point. Now I've finally gotten around to it. Valentines with no valentine seemed like the perfect time.

I like this one,

And I discovered that in order to take a good picture I should hold it up in front of my lamp. The color from the markers soaking through the paper makes the picture look electric, but then my camera's flash balanced it and the colors came out pretty true. But the lamp trick gave me an idea to build a picture frame with a lit-back housing. These prismacolor markers look crazy when illuminated from behind.

Flies

2009-02-06T00:19:00.000-08:00

One of the positives about working in this lab is that I have flies in my coffee. No one here knows why they love coffee, but from what I observe, they do. I enjoy speaking French to one of two Venezuelans in our lab, who responds in Spanish that I kind of remember. I would like to practice Spanish but she laughs critically at my accent and not hers. Between tearing out ovaries and extracting DNA we have fun. It's a small lab in the middle of publishing a paper I had nothing to do with, but concerning projects I will be continuing to unfold in the next few years.

One of the projects is wound healing mechanisms in fruit fly babies. We basically burn a hole in an early or late stage embryo with a laser, and watch as it fluorescently heals itself, or not, depending on a number of factors. Mounting the embryos on a slide is a fairly delicate process. And a separate DNA identification experiment hasn't been going well lately. The DNA wouldn't go back into solution, it just sat like a fat white plug in 300ul 10mM Tris/10mM EDTA + 20ul RNase (Roche 10mg/ml stock). Just to get to that point, which is still at the beginning of this whole test, took a bit of work. Now we start over and hope it goes well this time. The problem could have been any number of factors. The best bet is that I've never really worked in a research lab before now.

You all should check this out. Look through his archives on the right hand column and listen to anything that has "mp3" after it.

The Funnier Gene

2009-01-10T17:10:00.000-08:00

In fruit fly genetics, genes are named not by the visible, normal, wildtype phenotypic expression, but by the distinguishable mutant form that tells us something isn't how it usually should be. For example, the Curly gene (abbreviated Cy) is expressed normally as standard, flat fruit fly wings. Actual curly wings are only what we see when Cy isn't functioning properly, or when it isn't expressed at all because of random mutation or other genetic or enviornmental factors. The name is not describing what we observe everyday in normal conditions, but the resulting characteristic when normal function is absent.

Another example: Lets say I discover Matt and I need to assign a distinguishable name, one that characterizes life in his absence. I might name him Funnier (abbreviated Fnr) because things are much funnier than they otherwise would be when he's not around.

Here he is in his normal, wildtype expression. Not so funny.

It's cold here

2008-12-24T20:12:00.000-08:00

It's nearly been a heat wave these last few days. I walked to my friend's house in Wisconsin and he was smoking a cigarette on his front porch in a T-shirt. I think today was 22 degrees. I guess that's T-shirt weather, even with all the snow.

I like Wisconsin but I'm leaving to go back to Seattle.

Lansana Conte died yesterday. When I was in Guinee two years ago (today in 2006 I was packing my bag to go to N'Zerekore) people were guessing he'd die any minute. He had disappeared from public view and from any TV broadcasts for the past year, at that time, but it was known his health was failing. Conte kept control pretty tight, so there was no one lined up to take control after him. He left an important empty chair and the immediate, apparent military coup broadcast over the national radio that an interim party, the National Council for Democracy and Development, would rule until elections could be held in a few months. They reported that the constitution and the government was dissolved, and meanwhile the prime minister broadcast from his office that he government was still functioning as it should. We'll see.

The constitution says that the president of the National Assembly should be named president in situations such as this, but it hasn't happened yet. But if everyone, including the military, is really upset with the current conditions, I don't know why they'd obey the constitution. Conte changed most of it throughout his 25 or so years in power, and it's the second the country has had with two presidents. (Mali has had as many constitutions as presidents). Seems to me that if a new National Council for Democracy and Development does take control, they'll probably want a new constitution that doesn't give unlimited terms to the president.

Lansana Conte took control in the 80's after Sekou Toure died. Toure was a brutal dictator who took power at Guineen independence from France in 1958. Among most people I've talked to, besides being a ruthless Guineen president, Toure is revered as a hero because he told France to get out of Guinee, that they weren't needed in Africa and he didn't want their "help", whereas in places like Senegal and Mali, for example, Leopold Senghor and Modibo Keita kept close contact with the French government. Sekou Toure wanted an Africa for Africans. Ever since Guinee has been one of the poorest countries in the world.

Sekou Toure has mythic status and people are still scared of him. When I was in Yanfolila in 2006 we were talking about Toure and my friend Lansine said "Sekou est un sorcere, et il peut mettre sa bouche dans notre coserie". It sounds better in French, but the translation is that Sekou is a witch and he can put his mouth in our conversation, meaning Sekou can control people and events. I don't know, but it was scary at the time. Anyway, even though he was a brutal dictator he at least brought running water and electricity to every region of Guinee. When he died and Conte took over, the far corners of Guinee, away from Conakry, were left behind. No more clean running water, no more electricity, while the powerlines are still connected to the tall poles and the wires droop across the sky into crumbling buildings. I never heard one person say anything good about Conte except that he's going to die soon, which isn't anything good, but the manner in which it was said lead me to believe it was a positive thought. I got really sick in N'Zerekore and took the long road back to Mali. It was one of three things: the water, undercooked chicken, or this one guy's dirty hand that was ripping the chicken off for me.

The road to N'Zerekore:

Early morning in Kankan:

As promised, here are more pictures of Yanfolila from 2007.

Here's Bijou when I left,

This is Sekou Kouyate, who I wanted to see but it turned out that he was somewhere in Bamako. His friend is Yoro Diallo (not the famous Yoro Diallo who's the best ngoni player, but just a different Yoro who plays the metal tube. And unfortunately he's just a substitute for Sekou's main tube player, Solo. When I was last in Yanfolila Solo gave me a tube.)

Here's Sekou's axe. He used the metal alarm disc from a digital watch with stereo wires soldered on, hooked it up to a battery powered pre-amp, then wired that to the dirty stereo speaker. In person the sound is indescribable. Gritty, dirty distortion coming from a folky west African gourd. It was rad.

And now here are climbing pictures.

I want to go climbing.

What the hell is a wassoulou?

2008-12-11T16:28:00.000-08:00

I don't know and no one else seems to have any better idea. Mali, in Bambara, means hippo. Bamako means the crocodile's back. Yanfolila, coincidentally enough, means music is here. So what does wassoulou mean? I know it's a river, but the only answer I got other than that no one knows, was from Asseita, who's pictured somewhere below, who comes from Menaca, a small sandy village near Gao in northern Mali, who married Ancien Coulibaly, then a stunning military man, when she was 15, becoming his third wife, and they eventually moved to Yanfolila to begin their family.

Welcome to Yanfolila, capital of wassoulou:

Yanfolila is in the greater region of Sikasso in the forests of southern Mali, but it's little corner is generally referred to as Wassoulou. That distinction is known all throughout Mali, regardless if anyone knows where Yanfolila actually is. 12 villages surround Yanfolila. Until October, the paved road stopped at Bougouni, and three hundred miles later picked up again in Guinee. The busses sped through, covering the mango trees in red dust.

According to Asseita, Wassoulou signifies the Fula who don't understand Fula. Papa Sidibe is a Fula, and all the other Diakite's, Diallo's, and Sangare's are Fula as well. The story goes that a mother gave birth to four sons, Diallo, Sangare, Sidibe, and Diakite (I think in that order) and started the Kingdom of Wassoulou, which was eventually destroyed by wars, I think from the Bambara (Traore, Diarra, Coulibaly, and some others). It's not uncommon to refer to people only by those names, though now they're like last names. So Wassoulou is full of Fula who don't understand Fula. Then where do they understand Fula? North of Bamako in Mopti and Djenne are the "real" Fula, I'm told. History says that the Fula were cattle herders that came from Ethiopia, and only becuase of similarities in current pop-music, I'd like to say southern Ethiopia, in Oromo. Anyway, I guess that's what Wassoulou means.

The only physical change to Yanfolila was the paved road that cuts through the village en route to Guinee.

Before it was just red dust.

Otherwise there were lots of personnel changes, so to speak. When I get home I'll post pictures of the old family so that this will make more sense. Miney is married and in Bamako. Adja took Fanta to her father's house in Burkina Faso, but left Bijou.

When I left last time, Bijou could barely walk and would only say her mom's name inbetween tears. Now she's adorable, is always strutting around lost in her own world, and claims to remember me.

Kadja is sadly married and off to some village to start a family. Sekou is somewhere in Bamako. That is very upsetting, because I spent the last three months hating Bamako (not the people, but the city), and Sekou was here the whole time, doing who-knows-what. After ATT came to inaugurate the new paved road Sekou hit that road to Bamako, leaving his ngoni and speakers behind at his house, so who knows what he's doing. His wife and brother told me that since he left in October he hasn't called and he never gave a number for contact. His friend Solo Sidibe, who plays the grenye, the metal tube to keep rhythm much like a hi-hat, said he doesn't have any contact either. A few weeks ago I had my parents send me my brothers old guitar amp, a guitar cord, and a pick-up to give to Sekou (I'll post a picture of his old set up, which was amazing, but just weak volume. With the new amp and pick-up he'll be able to rock the village. Sorry Michael, your amp is gone, but gone to a good cause). Anyway, I left all of that and the cassette I recorded my last night in Yanfolila last time, for Sekou's return. I'm upset I couldn't see him this time...next time.

I suppose my point in all of this is that Yanfolila is an amazing place. I realized it the first time I randomly decided to go there, and I remembered it this time that I meant to go there. I randomly decided to go there the first time because I just liked the sound of the instrument that I heard blaring out of the cassette player in a taxi my first day in Bamako, and when I asked who it was and where he was from and the answer was Yoro Sidibe from Wassoulou. Where's Wassoulou? Oh, down by Yanfolila. Luck had it that my Beninoise friend introduced me to another friend who lived with someone who had moved to Bamako from wassoulou, and when I told her I liked the donso ngoni she called her friend Papa in Yanfolila. His initial response was, "yeah, sure he can come, but I don't know what white people like to eat." She told him to kill a chicken for me and it would be fine. He didn't kill a chicken but it was fine. So the next day I hopped on the bus

to go meet this mystery family of Papa Sidibe, which actually turned into two families: that of Papa and that of Ancien Coulibaly. I ended up staying for a few months that time and I just recently returned from a few weeks' visit, during which was the Tobaski holiday, where, if you have the means, every muslim should buy and slaughter a sheep. That explains the fancy clothing you'll see. Here they are today, in no particular order:

Papa is holding the new addition to the family, Abitou. She cries everytime she looks at me. Aisseita is the fireball from the north, kneeling in the carmel color.

L to R: Asseita, Aminata (the second wife), Ancien is seated, and Papa's daugther La.

Ancien and his youngest, Abdoule. They're really not that serious in person.

Abitou and La.

Alou, me, Baba.

Papa and Ali.

Baba and Minata.

Minata, in her finest bazin.

Me and La.

Mai, Bintou (my favorite), Assetou, Asseita, Na, and La in front.

Assetou, Papa's wife, making breakfast.

The Sidibe's: Abi, Assetou, Papa, La, Bintou, Na. Papa said he's going to take a second wife that will hopefully give him a boy.

Abdoule.

The house, with two sleeping dogs.

Ancien taking his son to school in checkers, the day of the party.

The path from the back of the house to Arimatou's house, and a nice mango tree.

Me and ne ka djatigui, Papa, an incredible mechanic who just left his old garage and opened his own.

Brhama and Papa at the garage. I spend the morning's here. The same people are always coming and going everyday. Last year, Papa worked at a garage on the main market street, so it was a pretty lively place. I'd spend the mornings there waiting for Sekou and we'd walk to Ancien's house (next to Papa's) to play ngoni for a few hours. Not too shabby.

I had to do a little sight-seeing. It feels like what I imagine Graceland to be like in wassoulou, or maybe at least like visiting the old streets and studios where Motown was happening. So I went to the radio station. It's coverage is only about 50 miles, reaching all the villages in the circle of Yanfolila, but not beyond.

The locked cabinet is of local musicians who played at parties, or ceremonies of some sort, such as the opening of the new paved road. They keep it locked because that's the good stuff. It's just straight kamele ngoni, vocals and djembe, or donso ngoni. No synthesizers, no drum machines, and no electronics beyond the gritty speakers that the musicians rig-up. I got the director to spin me a few tapes of ngoni players. Now I need to start practicing for the next time when Sekou will be back. Solo said he'd come back, he left his ngoni afterall.

Like I briefly mentioned, Yanfolila is incredible. It and the Olympic mountains are the only two places to which I felt an immediate and unwavering draw, scheming my next return while I'm still there. Maybe one of these days timing will work out that I'll stay for a good chunk of time. I want to tour the villages recording musicians--they don't call the wassoulou capital "music is here" for nothing. There's music and it's good. I also want to play with Sekou again and get really good at ngoni so I can challenge Yoro Diallo. Timing is funny.

Here's another picture of Bijou becuase she's so cute.

She held that pose, gently twisting from side-to-side, until I told her to stop and put the camera away.

In & around the Lab

2008-11-28T16:42:00.000-08:00

This is the team that makes the magic happen:

(L to R: Chita, Diouf, Coulibaly, Nana, Tim)

Now some other things.

Hawa Diallo and her daughter Kadiatou are both incredibly cute,

and this sheep has no idea how good he's going to taste in 8 days. May you rest in peace when we eat you.

30 nanometer analog

2008-11-24T16:20:00.000-08:00

The tape is 11/14/73 from San Diego Sports Arena, San Diego, CA, set II.

Lysine 9 on Histone 3 has been methylated.

30 nanometer chromatin fibers are rad.

I accidentally drew a double bond where there shouldn't be one on the cytosine. It was in pen and I couldn't erase it. My apologies.

Left-handedly

2008-11-13T03:26:00.000-08:00

I really want to learn how to play guitar, a mix between Elizabeth Cotten and Jerry Garcia, who have similar banjo picking styles, and Jerry played some of her songs anyways. It might be very difficult, but with time I could do it.

To undertake this project, the main issue would be how would I want to play the guitar? I can already play the basics right-handed: playing chords and I can work out simple melodies. So would I continue like that? because I'm left handed. When I first started playing drums I started right-handed, imitating most drummers I saw, but when I started studying jazz drumming my teacher had me lead with my left because it was my natural dominant hand. I think it would have gone just as well with either hand but she forced me to go left and so now that's how I play. So maybe I should force myself left, but not with a left-handed guitar.

For example, Elizabeth Cotten stole her brother's right handed guitar, flipped it over and taught herself how to play left-handed with the strings upside-down (fat strings on the bottom, high strings on top. Jimi Hendrix played a right-handed guitar left-handedly too, but I'm pretty sure he restrung it so the strings were normal). I think if I were to play a "normal" left handed guitar, I'd just limit myself by trying to do what I think I already know how to do, attempting to make a direct translation of limited ability and knowledge from the right to the left. But if I took the Cotten picking approach, where all the strings are reversed and the chord structures are completely foreign too, that'd be just as good as playing a whole new instrument and I'd be limited only by my ability and creativity of an unknown, rather than being limited by what I already think I know about what a right-handed guitar is.

For example, in middle-school and high-school art classes our teacher had us draw pictures upside down (take a famous drawing, turn it upside-down, then draw it like that) and she'd tell us, don't think of the ears as being ears or the nose as being an upside-down nose, just draw the shape and the lines you see. If you think you're drawing a nose and you try to draw what a nose would look like upside-down, you'll end up with something weird. She was right--if you tried to draw an upside-down nose rather than whatever the lines and shapes looked like on the pages, the result was never any good. So, if I played an upside down guitar by the sounds I make rather than what a chord is, I think I'll end up with something much better than if I were to play a normal left-handed guitar translated from what I knew to be the right.

We'll see how that goes once I ever get a guitar.

2008-11-07T14:31:00.000-08:00

When my boss visited I was taken around Bamako to meet with doctors and directors of health and anyone else you can imagine being involved with HIV and their clinic (except he who controls the money from the Global Fund. I don't think many people get to see him, except the President when they're sipping mai-tai's on the river). Bamako is split up into six communes, each with a big clinic that administers HIV meds. The director of health of Commune One (GAIA's clinic is located in Sikoro in Commune One) asked if we could take a tour of a clinic in another neighborhood to see if we could help at all, knowing what success GAIA had in constructing a new facility in Sikoro. A few weeks later I finally went, but it was hard to find, not even many people who live in Dianguinebougou knew where it was when we asked for directions. The clinic is located in the back corner of the neighborhood in a non-descript housing compound, exactly like any that a normal family lives in, but with a few red crosses painted on the mudbrick. They rent the space from someone, it's not officially based in this compound but because the neighborhood is so old, as it was described to me, there's no place for the government to build an official ASACO (neighborhood clinic).

The road in,

Welcome to ASACO-Dianguinebougou

Step into the office,

After you've seen the doctor for you consultation, they can provide these services:

Injections and IVs,

With needle disposal,

Babies and delivery,

The pharmacy,

If you need water, which you probably will, pull it from the well and fill the jugs,

Bundles of mosquito nets,

Two beds for malaria and other things,

The road out.

This is even on the low end of the clinics; that's why we were asked to go look at it. Even in regards to other neighborhoods in Bamako this one feels like you stepped out into the village. They're not all this desperate, but don't let that fool you into thinking the others are much better. GAIA's clinic, by comparison, looks great. I've been informed that if we can muster enough activity and find some funds, about $45,000-$60,000 would do the trick and make a lot of people happy and healthy. If you have any ideas or want to help, leave a comment.

Association de Sante Communitaire.

Things everyone should like

2008-11-07T01:02:00.001-08:00

In no particular order:

...and generally old soul music, cell regulation, and alpine climbing.

Number 1

2008-11-05T11:37:00.000-08:00

If you want the paper with references, email me. It's a work in progress and more will be coming about: treatment and prevention, and the future of both in Mali. Hopefully it'll be good.

INTRODUCTION

In 1981, HIV/AIDS was first just a mysterious fatal illness in five American men. Stephen Jay Gould, an evolutionary biologist, wrote in a New York Times op-ed article that AIDS could rank as one of the greatest natural tragedies in human history, and less than twenty years later HIV/AIDS has become the world’s leading cause of death among both men and women between 15-59 years, with an estimated 36.1 million people living with HIV today, two thirds of them in Sub-saharan Africa.

Peter Piot, director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), said we need a response that goes far beyond normal public health parameters of epidemic control or technological interventions in order to check the epidemic, and that unless “a response commensurate with the problem is put in place and sustained” the problem will persist for quite some time. Going beyond normal public health parameters of epidemic control is the best idea I’ve read, but I don’t agree that the response should be limited to one that is as complex or as grand in scale as the problem, as Piot suggests. Too much complexity only fosters inactivity and confusion. It is clear that whatever is our response, it must be sustained.

‘Sustained’ is a word that comes up often in global health documents and it’s usually used as a gentle, prodding reminder of the failed funding and the failed political efforts to predictably mobilize resources to the places that really need them. Also, many of the statements made to offer solutions are in themselves huge global issues that have long, difficult roads to reparation before we can use them as pillars for the AIDS battle. An example: “For a comprehensive AIDS response there must also be strong capacity in education and other social sectors, as well as in terms of overall governance." Good luck! We don’t even have strong education capacity in the US; one needs only to look at what Teach for America is struggling to do all over the country. Globally, the biggest failures of HIV prevention are in the social sectors because of tough issues concerning women’s rights and stigmas against injection drug use, homosexuality, and prostitution--apart from the role of HIV--and consequently limits access to treatment and prevention programs for vulnerable groups either physically, because they just don’t exist, or psychologically, because of the fear of being associated with the disease—take a bite out of that. This is where we need to rethink our plan of attack. And as far as ‘overall governance,’ before the 2008 elections we didn’t have confidence in our own government to do what was right.

Seeing the situation first hand, boots-on-the-ground, I found that the Global Alliance to Immunize against AIDS’ (GAIA) local approach parallels the leading expert's global approach, yet the global approach continually sets lofty goals and falls short. Locally, GAIA finds more success as they negotiate the same murky waters of insufficient and unsustained funding that is pitted against a multiplying HIV/AIDS epidemic. The GAIA project in Sikoro, Mali is an example to be followed throughout the country and perhaps in West Africa in general, but ultimately not the final solution for AIDS. A vaccine is the only solution for the world epidemic, but in light of a recent failure we need to make more efficient use of the funds available for treatment and prevention now and into the next generation by investing in similar projects as GAIA, or the problem will continue to dwarf our capacity to contain it, becoming more devastating to humans every year.

I think of HIV/AIDS in terms of a battle with three fronts of equal importance: vaccine research, treatment and access, and prevention. Vaccine research shouldn’t benefit from Global Fund grants or any international funding agency, I’m not sure that it does, so if not, good. Reagents and logistics in transport are all too financially burdensome to be able to stray too far from the well-equipped countries to warrant using global health funds for those purposes. Lab funding is what the National Institute of Health, National Science Foundation, and other similar agencies are for. They even fund international research labs like the Laboratoire de Biologie Moleculair Appliqué, a partner in the GAIA vaccine project at the University of Bamako. Thus, international as well as domestic funding agencies like the Global Fund, the Gates Foundation, or the William J. Clinton Foundation should focus, as they are, on treatment and prevention programs. It is estimated that the simultaneous scale-up of both prevention and treatment efforts would avert 29 million new HIV infections in sub-Saharan Africa by 2020, while focusing on treatment or prevention alone would not be nearly as effective. Though our direct focus on each of those fronts needs to reinforce the evidence-informed efforts as well as include innovative strategies beyond normal public health parameters, as suggested by Piot.

AIDS is a huge problem that does require a huge effort, although the general, global effort needs to be considered in terms of numerous small, culturally specific programs that are relatively cheap and easily implemented, while effecting the greatest influence on the greatest number of individuals in each region--in this case, Mali.

Stay tuned.

If there was any confusion:

2008-10-23T17:13:00.000-07:00

Images taken from a poster by Le Minestere de la Sante et le Comite Sectoriel de Lutte Contre le SIDA

While it might be slow, it's definitely happening

2008-10-22T07:56:00.001-07:00

There are two major hospitals here, one right in the heart of the city and one so inconveniently placed up a long and winding, hilly road that also leads to the Presidential Palace, that I can't believe anyone goes to it--it's too hard to get to if you don't have the money to take a car. Under those hospitals are commune clinics, and under those are the small neighborhood clinics that are most accessible to people and they can deliver babies, do minor stitching and repairing, consultations and other testing, like for HIV. But they are not equipped to do anything about HIV infections except to refer you to the hospitals. True, one of the hospitals is centrally located, but it's too far to walk and too expensive to take a car to get to if you live outside of that center, and if you don't want people to know you have HIV, you won't want to go, so most people don't go.

GAIA's project has been to sort of revolutionize health care in Mali, not by dominating the scene, but by trudging through the bureaucracy and different levels of health officials to establish a new system and illuminate a model to show that it can be possible to save/improve people's lives easily. One thing to be done is equip those small neighborhood clinics to handle HIV treatment. As it is, people find out their HIV positive, then they might disappear back into their lives, never spending the money to travel to the hospitals. I have a friend who is married, has three kids, lives with the rest of his brothers, sisters, their kids, and he makes $60 a month. He's not HIV positive, but some medications already cost a third of that salary. A lot of other people are in his similar situation, or even worse, most people don't have jobs at all. Then this situation comes up: my kid is sick so should I spent my $2 a day on medicine for the one kid or use that $2 to buy the rice I already can't afford to feed the rest of my family? That's a tough one. I don't want to bring to mind those annoying late-night commercials asking you to "adopt an african" and send a dollar-a-day to some sad looking child in Botswana, but that is the reality for a lot of people, and that's probably why those commercials are annoying.

GAIA is waiting for paperwork to establish their clinic in Sikoroni (which you can apparently see from space on Google world, I haven't searched) as the first to take charge of HIV treatment in the neighborhood clinics and they're looking for a pharmacist now. That is amazing. They've been tracking patients, follow up visits, infection rates...and it's all working.

Another project they have is prevention of Mother-to-Child Transmission of HIV. The mother's blood doesn't mix with the baby's blood and the baby is usually pretty well protected by mucous and membranes when coming out at delivery, so how do they get infected? Breastmilk. I just finished translating a manuscript saying that a lot of babies tested at birth were HIV negative, but then when tested again at 9 months they were HIV positive. So it's thought that breastfeeding is the cause. There are two options: use artificial milk that comes from China to prevent HIV infection but also potentially kill your baby with weird chemicals, or breastfeed exclusively with NO other food up to 6 months. This way nothing upsets the intestine and gives the baby diarrhea as well as an opening for the virus to enter their body. Otherwise the intestine remains intact and the virus will pass out. But HIV detection by blood-testing in infants is confusing because maternal antibodies for the virus can persist for up to 18 months, giving false results saying the child is HIV positive when they're really HIV negative, only to become infected later when it could have been prevented--add another to the list. So, that manuscript proposed using Polymerase Chain Reaction to test for HIV proteins rather than standard antibody testing (because the maternal antibodies muck everything up) and the results showed that most children born to infected mothers were not HIV positive, but when tested by PCR later they WERE positive.

There is no connection between the clinic and the lab besides the person who initiated different projects in both, and that both have a similar goal to improve everything that's being done and can be done about HIV in Mali and the world. So, I proposed a new project to make a link between the lab and clinic to give us valuable work that can occupy time as we wait for blood to continue HIV vaccine research. The new project, if finally accepted by all concerned parties, aims to bring the blood of children born from infected mothers and test it by PCR here in the lab. This lab participated in the research done for the manuscript I translated, but that was in centrally located hospital, and I want to link the little clinic to the lab. This would provide a plan and options for mothers to decide whether or not they want to breastfeed, use artificial milk, start their kid on anti-retroviral prophylaxis, and it would also produce results for the GAIA project that would increase support for their model of public health and the goal of motivating other people, specifically Malian's, to imitate and improve upon the system in other clinics in other neighborhoods. Then we should see a dramatic improvement in the quality of health here.

Now my job is to go to those concerned parties: official agencies, to the village chief, to the doctors in the clinic, the ethics commitee and see if they are on board. Everyone wants to protect the rights and anonymity of the patients. After all, HIV and AIDS are still stigmatized here and that's probably the biggest challenge to improving health, letting people know that care is available and making sure other people don't find out. We ran a PCR yesterday to make sure everything's working, now I need to get the protocol together and figure out when I'm going to go talk to all of these people.

Another project going on is about tuberculosis. TB is 100% curative if you take medications. If you don't take care of it there's a 10% chance dying every month, that compounds every month, if you have active respitory TB (you can be infected but not be sick). Talking, coughing, and singing, among other activities shoot the little bacteria out into the air where it hovers and lingers in rooms, and houses, waiting to infect other people. It's killed by sunlight. Mali is said to be the "laughing stock" of TB care. It gets absolutely no money put into it when faced with HIV and malaria treatment. But people with HIV are susceptible to TB infection and thus that much more likely to die quickly (their immune systems are already beaten down to the ground). So GAIA has just started an initial TB project that sends the same group of kids out into Sikoro that talked about HIV/AIDS, to talk about TB. And if people say they have the symptoms mentioned about TB the kids will give them a signed piece of paper that refers them to the GAIA clinic to talk to a doctor. The person only has to pay 20 cents for the visit, GAIA and the state of Mali have agreed to pay the other 80 cents. If the person is diagnosed with TB GAIA will pay for transport to and from the hospital but not the medications. That's a pretty big step to getting people to start thinking about TB, and then the 100% curative treatment should follow. Everyone else is doing it.

g = ( RPM^2 )( 1.18 x 10^-5 )( r )

2008-10-15T07:16:00.000-07:00

I spent 800% of my daily budget this morning on a pair of shoes. Charlotte York would be proud of me. Luckily I found a guy in my neighborhood who sells oily beans with onions and bread at dinner-time, all for 30 cents. It sits heavier than the rice and it's cheaper. I usually try to get home to eat dinner with Salif or Samou and the neighbor's caretakers, depending on who's working the swing shift, but I've been getting home later and later because I'm working on/finishing translating a manuscript from French to English about HIV transmission from Mother-to-Child through breastfeeding, and it's detection through PCR. It's not as difficult as I thought it would be, I read French better than I speak.

A few days ago I presented the very basics of the ELISpot test to who I was later told is the Ambassador to Ghana and a group of six or so other equally well dressed Ghanians who were touring the lab. All I knew is that we had visitors coming, so I got really nervous when they were all so well dressed. Their shoes were shiny.

I taught a short class yesterday on the theory of ELISpot: why we do each step that we're doing, what we're looking for, and what we ultimately see. Once someone asked a question and a girl laughed at him. I didn't think anything of it but then this morning she came up to me immediately when I walked in the door and apologized, saying that she doesn't normally act like that. It was weird only because I've never had someone apologize to me for them laughing at someone else. I guess I am a visiting teacher. Then after lunch she yelled at me for not inviting her.

I love the banana's here. They're bite size and I find no trouble in eating all 9 that you get for bi-naani (200 FCFA), one after the other. I think must be banana season, though I haven't heard anyone mention it as you'll hear talk long before arrival of the mango season.

Salif and I had a nice bonding moment the other night, trying to make each other understand in languages we don't understand, that we don't like the new music scene in West Africa. The Coupe Decale is ruining everything. That was our conclusion. We were sitting back, lounging in our chairs and boiling some tea, listening to Bintou Sidibe's cassette, which didn't find the same success as Oumou Sangare's when they were both released in the early 80's (Oumou stole Bintou's melody and apparently got her tape to the market before Bintou, but Oumou's Diaraby Nene is better than Bintou's of a different name that I can't remember), and Salif and I mutually agreed that all we need is one guitar, one kamele ngoni, a tam-tam, maybe another guitar, a flute, and some singers. Anything more is just noise and distraction. However, we both made an acception for Doussou Bagayoko; we both have a special place in our hearts for Doussou. Anyway, The Coupe Decale is the dancing-storm that's been blowing out of Cote d'Ivoire to everywhere in West Africa except Senegal. The Senegalese wouldn't dare turn off their overly-trebeled and disco-sugary mbalax. The Coupe Decale is pretty generic, mostly electronic dance music that uses the same rhumba clave played by synthesized drums and most often has the same sounding chorus, but then again I can't understand what they're saying. Some of those songs do have incredible guitar players, but the songs sound mostly the same.

I don't have a TV here and until recently I didn't have a radio, so I haven't been able to keep up on the current pop stars in Mali. Every Friday night a new episode of Top Etoile airs on ORTM, Mali's one national public TV station. Each episode lets a few of the newest pop starts lip-synch their hit song on stage, then at the end of hte show they play the Top 10 songs of the Week. When I was in Yanfolila the same 10 songs were played every week but in different orders for 2 months. Either way that's how I knew who was hot and what cassette to buy. Most of the musicians were Sidibe's or Diakite's or Kouyate's, and Wassoulou music was always the best. And now that I do have a radio, all Salif and I do is listen to his tape collection, which is pretty good. He knows more about the music than I was able to learn when I was here last, so I get good info about musician's I've never heard before, like Nomo Kouma Koro, from Sikasso (Wassoulou is the western half of the region of Sikasso). And I was eating lunch the other day and heard someone new on the radio. But to buy Chata Kouyate's tape I'll have to spend 200% of my daily budget.

If you like fruit flies you might like this.

If you like Ethiopian Oromo music that reminds you of Wassoulou music you might like this, and anything you can find similar to that. I'm told that the Fula, who historically made up the central ethnic population of Wassoulou, originally came from Ethiopia.

More Wassoulou. It has a lot going on in it beyond guitars and ngoni's, but Salif and I don't care. If it's Wassoulou, it's good.

This is funny. It's Malian comedy. That's what most of Bamako looks like. Here's another one, and that is how fast they speak Bambara (hand motions included).

Where is Cranston?

2008-10-13T11:14:00.000-07:00

Pete, where are you? You'd like this. Also, the Numero Group has released some more Eccentric Soul.

Listen to My JamBox

2008-10-08T05:32:00.000-07:00

It will tell you everything you want to hear.

It plays Sam Cooke, Mary Wells, Lilly Allen, The Majestic Arrows, Jamie Lidell, Josephine Taylor, Annette Poindexter, The Temptations, Oumou Sangare, Tata Diakite, The Marvelettes, Martha Reeves, Souley Kante, Nahawa Doumbia, Chris Clark, and Sekou Kouyate.

Buzz

2008-10-06T07:57:00.000-07:00

These are my wonderful students.

This is them washing an ELISpot plate.

The Great Debate

2008-10-02T01:34:00.000-07:00

When I was here last, word on the street was that Yoro Diallo, who is largely considered the best kamele ngoni player in Mali, is dangerous. It was explained to me that he puts juju on people. I always thought juju was a generic word for any typical African mysticism, no matter what region it was from, but apparently Yoro Diallo throws it down hard and it's real in Mali--especially in Wassoulou. Apparently when his wife Tenin Sidibe wanted to seek greater success than they found together on their two cassettes, Yoro killed her. Not murder, but he made his appropriate sacrifices and before long, Tenin was dead. His brother Samba has a mangled hand. He also had a few students, other Malians who learned how to play kamele ngoni, but they're dead too.

I learned how to play kamele ngoni with Sekou Kouyate in Yanfolila, the largest village in Wassoulou. He didn't speak French and I didn't speak Bambara, but it was explained to me that he also studied with Yoro Diallo. And now, it makes sense to me why Sekou wore a lot of gri-gri--leather bands around his biceps and another around his waste, and there were leather amulets around his neck and strung all throughout the inside of the gourd of his ngoni. He wore normal clothes: dirty collared shirts, docker's style pants, and faux-addidas shoes. Under his sleeves and worn like normal necklaces, were all his gri-gri. This was all protection. And what's more, every so often, I don't know his exact schedule, he would buy a new gourd and fill it with fresh cow milk, then take it off into the woods to leave as a sacrifice for his protection. That all was never directly associated to Yoro Diallo, but it makes sense if you want it to.

Doussou Bagayoko is my favorite Malian singer. She's new, she's young, and she sings about important things to teach today's Malian youth. Doussou is also the daughter of Nahawa Doumbia, who was once a very famous singer in Mali. Nahawa was a famous singer, but she is also said to be a very powerful sorciere. I used the French word because I feel like it has more of an impact than if you were to simply call her a sorcerer or a witch. When the Malians here say it, sorciere, I feel like it carries more weight.

So, it being the debate season, last night was pretty heated. Koro and Ablaye were arguing that Nahawa was more powerful, while the guy people call African and Samou were arguing in favor of Yoro. It's said that Nahawa Doumbia was lost when she was born and "she was in a different world." When she came back "she raised herself with no milk." She's from Bougouni, which is on the fringes of Wassoulou, but is said to have a lot of strang things going on as well as to be the most powerful villiage. But, it's said that when Yoro was a child he was capable of "doing things even his father didn't understand," and for that, he's more powerful than Nahawa. Personally, I'm in favor of Nahawa, and not only because I like her first cassette better than Yoro's, nor because I love Doussou, but for these reasons: Apparently Yoro wanted to marry Doussou but Doussou knew that Yoro was mean and dangerous and she said no. If they had gotten married, they'd be the unstoppable couple of Mali--the best singer and the best ngoni player--but nevermind that. Doussou said no. Then it was rumored that Yoro was going to make sacrifices against Doussou, perhaps to kill her or at least to take away her power as a musician. But then Nahawa stepped in. And because Nahawa is older and knows more of the traditions, she was able to intimidate Yoro from doing anything. She told him that if he tried anything she'd put an end to him. I vote for Nahawa because if Yoro were more powerful, then Doussou should be dead by now.

Done. A b'a na. C'est fini.

We got blood and ran the test. For those of you concerned about the good doctor, he had 1.92x10^7 cells. That's good.

A b'a na.

Wherever you've been in the daylight is a whole new world at night. I caught someone trying to pick-pocket me, or pick my pocket, however that goes, as I stepped out of one of the busses last night. I swatted his hand away and raised my finger to shake at him and yell at him, but unfortunately I couldn't tell him I was going to do explicit things to his mother like I can in Wolof, so I only barked at him A man nyi de! --That's no good!. The de gives it extra emphasis.

I spent 500 FCFA in transport everyday: two busses each way. I buy lunch for 250 FCFA and dinner for 500 FCFA. I don't usually eat breakfast and if I do it's cheaper than lunch. Sometimes I'll by a bottle of bissap for 100 FCFA as I walk to find my next bus. In total that's about $2.70 per day.

That's Samou who's wearing the Obama T-shirt. He's one of the caretakers of the house. He and Salif rotate day and night shifts to pass the whole day, or the whole night outside of my house here, drinking tea with the neighboring caretakers and friends and passers-by that want to sit down for awhile and engage in a conversation.

Put your thinking caps on

2008-09-25T06:46:00.000-07:00

My brother sent me these links yesterday. Read this first, then go here. It's interesting because they take ideas from anyone. You don't necessarily need to know how to implement your idea, you just need an idea. Google should take care of the rest.

No news from the desert shore. We're waiting till the end of Ramadan for the doctors to take blood samples, then we should hopefully be able to start research. Until then I suppose it's more tea.

An ka baro ke ni the mi. Funteni be kosebe. An be yirisuma-koro. K'an ben.

Actually, come to think of it, I suppose I do have something to say. I found a rice dealer who offers the choice of the peanut butter sauce with fish or the other option, which I don't know what it is but it's good. I usually pick the other one. I remember when I first came to Senegal last year, the Diop family would practically force me to finish the bowl of food just to make sure I had had enough to eat. "Yaangi lekk bou-baax!" they'd shout and push the bowl closer to me. I'd always do it too. One time as I was stuffing handfulls of rice in my mouth, and probably a chunk fish that was most often booby-trapped with inch long bones that jab into the roof of your mouth and you have to spend more time trying to fish the bones out of your teeth than you do chewing the food, I gagged and threw up in my mouth. I don't know how I stopped it from erupting back into the bowl because the rice wasn't so much chewed as swallowed hole, and I could sift through it and the watery sauce and stomach bile in my mouth with my tongue, feeling every grain of tomato-paste-cooked rice, but somehow I did stop it and my eyes glazed and swam around in their sockets until I swallowed it all back down. Then today I was eating the plate of rice and felt that same queezy feeling brewing. There's not a lot of chewing that happens, you mostly just put a handful in your mouth and swallow, and my decidedly last bite was a tough one to force down. I could feel my esophagus resisting. I didn't throw up this time but now I remember to take it easy until a few months pass and I can really shovel it down.

"Mishi b'i fe wa?" Yes I do have cows, thank you for asking.

2008-09-20T14:57:00.000-07:00

I consider today a big success primarily because my first interaction with a baby didn't end up with her exploding into tears at the sight of me, which often happened last time I was here. Apparently I'm terrifying to small African children. Well, not all African children. Mainly the Senegalese, Guineen, and excpet in this case it was Hawa's baby, Kadiatou, who is Malian. I think she even winked at me while peering from behind her mom's back, or it was a fly that landed on her eye. In any case it was a proud moment for me.

Adjusting has been more difficult than I imagined it would be, considering I've been here before. I live in a gigantic house, my footsteps echo, and I'm alone. It's psychologically difficult, right now at least, to venture out into the public from behind the eight foot wall that surrounds the house, but in time it'll be alright. I'm a cultural chameleon.

Before I only knew Mali as Issa Sidibe, a member of Papa Sidibe's family in Yanfolila. There I'd eat from a bowl with five other people, using our hands to eat, stay up till the early morning hours watching the one TV channel with a lot of the neighbors crowding around the TV set, pull water from a well, and pass morning till night together. There was never time to be alone. These first few days have been quite drastically different. But then again, it's the adjustment period. I have to remember how to handle a severe lack of communication, eyes staring at me from every direction, kids screaming "Toubabou" from a mile away, and lots of other psychological hurdles to be dealt with, like venturing out to find food for myself. I'd prefer eating with my hand with five other people all clawing at the same piece of fish than have a waiter deliver me a coke in an air-conditioned restaurant. I need to make good with the family next door so they invite me to eat.

So this brings me to success number two. After being granted the opportunity last night to complain about my somewhat lonely situation to a friend, via gmail, I pulled myself together and remembered everything I learned/endured the first time I was here and spent the day sitting under the tree out front with the neighbors and passers-by. I'm starting to fall back into stride. I spent the majority of the time trying to decipher what they might be talking about by listening for the few words and phrases I do know in Bambara, then watching body language and other context clues that might tip me off to the rest. Then when I heard something I could repeat, I'd ask what it meant. I remember it being much, much easier with Wolof. It was easy to distinguish the beginnings and ends of words, but with Bambara they all kind of run into each other, and there are a lot of small words like be, ka, ke, bo, ra, so, bi, ni, fe, which, when used in different combinations or attached as suffixes to different words, can mean a variety of things. That's hard. Maybe I learned Wolof so well in comparison to Bambara last time because I invested so much energy to tuning my ear to Wolof that by the time I arrived in Mali, I was too tired and unwilling to go through the painful process again in another language. This time around, without Wolof mucking things up, I can devote myself to Bambara. I already saw some progress today out front. That being said, tomorrow I'm tracking down Ablaye and Jules, my Senegalese friends who I lived with in Bamako previously. They moved but I know where they used to work and I can probably find a phone number for them as well as practice Wolof again.

A third success today was realizing that people prefer not to call me Tim, as Tim is short for Fatima, a woman's name. This was indeed a success, more personal than anything, because that gave me the opportunity to present myself as Issa Sidibe, the name given to me in Yanfolila last year. I think only 3 people in all of Mali knew my name was actually Tim. I was Issa Sidibe to everyone--except Jules and Ablaye, so make that 5 people in all of Mali. I like being known as Issa again because it gives me a sense of comfort and familiarity in the craziness that is Bamako.

Frequently, when people learn that I'm a Sidibe, my conversations go like this:

The first question is usually "I togo be di?" to figure out who I am and why I'm sitting under a tree with a bunch of people drinking tea. It's nothing hostile or unwelcoming, only curious and direct. So I present myself: "Ne togo ko Issa". In rapid succession, still to figure out what's going on, they ask my my last name, "E jamu"? Already expecting what's going to come I answer with a sense of pride, "Ne be Sidibe". "Eh"?!? they exclaim, pleasantly bewildered. "E be fula-ke"? they ask, just to clarify; maybe they didn't hear me well. I tell them, "Owo", it's true. Then they usually furrow their eyebrow, shake their finger like a mother scolds her children and say, "Fula man nyi de"! and they suck air though the sides of their cheeks and against their teeth to emphasize their distaste for Fula. So in defense of Sidibe's, I come back at them, "Aich"! while waving a finger side to side, from the wrist, to emphasize my disagreeance. "A ka nyi"! I add and I might put my foot down to kick up a little dust as a sort of non-verbal period to make my point. So at that, they ask "Mishi b'i fe wa," now starting to entertain the idea that I might be Fula. And I tell them that yes, "mishi be n'fe". Now they grab their chin, drop their jaw a little bit, raise their eyebrows and give a good-hearted chuckle and repeat my last name, emphasizing that it's me, "E Sidibe", and because I'm a male I respond to their recognition of my last name, "Nba". If I were a woman I'd say, "Ise".

It's pretty fun. They ask me if I have cows (mishi) because often times the Fula are cattle herders. The Fula, or otherwise known as Puehl, are from the Wassoulou region in the south. Yanfolila is the main town down there and where I spent the majority of my time in Mali last year. Once I remember who the Sidibe's can joke with I'll be able to respond to people telling me that Sidibe's are no good ("Sidibe man nyi"), by telling them that they're no better than a donkey (fali). That always gets a good laugh because it's so unexpected from me, unless you say it to someone who Sidibe's shouldn't joke with. One guy last year stopped talking to me altogether...awkward. I think I remember that Sidibe's and Diakite's and Sissoko's can all joke with each other. But a Sidibe can't have the same playful relationship with Konate's or Koita's.

More on the micro-finance and HIV

2008-09-19T07:55:00.000-07:00

HIV affects a disproportionate number of women than it does men. Individual men can have multiple sex partners whereas women have more social restrictions placed on them. So in turn, these social restrictions, compounded by the poverty, see women using sex as a means to make money, either through prostitution or as something to receive a favor in return.

The details are being worked out to start a micro-finance program for the women at the clinic, as I mentioned most of the patients there are women with small children. The money would go towards small groups of those women to start making soap, or dying fabric, or any other small business that would give them the money to pay the loan back, make money for their health and family on top of it, as well as to stop the pattern of using sex for favors and money with the small business they started. As I learn more I'll change this info.

It rained today. The sky was dotted with white clouds until about noon, when a dark and dangling front of clouds raced across the sky, painting behind it a solid glacial-silty-green, sickly looking sky that unleashed on us for a few hours. I took that opportunity for a nap.

Ne be Mali la. A ka nyi kosebe!

2008-09-18T05:09:00.000-07:00

Bamako, Mali...Algonquin for "the good land."

When I was here last, spending the blistering hot days next to Ablaye and a broken fan and watching Venezuelan soap operas dubbed into French, I was already scheming on how to most efficiently return. So it's no surprise to me that I'm again embarrassingly soaked with sweat and reluctantly sipping hot tea in the red dust under a mango tree, which unfortunately won't produce again until April or May.

Bamako is as I remember it: hot with lots of motorcycles buzzing around like the hordes of flies I can't escape. I thought that I would arrive before Ramadan started--the muslim holiday where people don't eat from sun-up till sun-down, among other things--but my calculations were wrong. Ramadan started a month earlier this year, mais c'est pas grave. I won't start work until Tuesday. Friday is a half-day, the muslim Sunday, and Monday is Mali's independence day. Happy 48th birthday. Until Tuesday I'll keep practicing my Bambara. Everyone laughs at me, we have fun.

This might be why I like west Africa

2008-09-15T16:03:00.001-07:00

On the back of their 25 Franc CFA, which is roughly 5¢, a woman scientist is doing a titration.

And here's to six months. The dog isn't coming.

9/11/2008 Wisco. My first show.

2008-09-11T14:12:00.001-07:00

It was a sold out show for 2 to 5 year olds (the two year olds hadn't shown up for the pre-concert publicity photos).

HIV Post Exposure Prophylaxis

2008-09-08T13:32:00.000-07:00

Immediately before leaving Bellingham I was prescribed a 28-day supply of Truvada and Kaletra. I felt like I had a fully stocked, illegal medicine cabinet in my van, crossing state lines with the HIV PEP and mefloquine. The mefloquine is preventative anti-malarial meds. Truvada and Kaletra are to be taken in the event I stick myself with a needle or I'm splashed with blood in the lab or clinic. Depending on the "level of risk" of exposure to HIV I'll take one or the other (Truvada or Kaletra) for a full 28-day course. They have the reputation of having some pretty serious side effects, but sound pretty standard for prescription meds: nausea, diarrhea, liver and kidney damage. Though the concentration of the medicine in the blood can increase dramatically if used in combination with other specific drugs, which leads to serious kidney and liver issues, where your blood is basically cleaned by your body. Truvada and Kaletra are an example of one such combination. I'd like to avoid the situation all together.

So, HIV is a virus whose genetic material is carried in RNA rather than DNA. The Central Dogma, which says that DNA will be transcribed into RNA and then translated into protein, was muddled by the enzyme reverse transcriptase, which transcribes RNA back into DNA. Once reverse transcribed into DNA our cells will read that viral DNA as normally as it would our own and produce viral proteins that in turn make more HIV viruses.

Truvada is a nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor. That official description tells you exactly what it does and you can imagine why it's a good thing. Truvada stops HIV from turning it's bad genetic material into a language that our cells are too willing to read, by stopping the enzyme reverse transcriptase. Preventing the viruses from altering our T-cell genetic material stops new virus production and decreases the viral load in our bodies. Our immune system will be able to respond.

Kaletra is a protease inhibitor. It prevents cells infected with HIV from producing new viruses and thereby increasing T cell count in our bodies for a strong immune response. HIV infects our CD4 cells and programs them to make new HIV proteins. HIV has a protein cutter, a protease, that chops up these proteins to make new functional HIV particles. Kaletra inhibits this.

Both of these drugs have been approved by the FDA to be used for people living with HIV and in my case, if I were to be exposed to an HIV infection, to be used immediately after that exposure to prevent an infection. The total cost of the 28-day course is about $2000 but my insurance covered it. Brie and I were wondering how the HIV situation in the world today would be changed if drugs like this were available and distributed at a low cost, or better but more unlikely, free of cost.

Smallpox was beaten down to a single naturally occurring case in Somalia in 1977 after the initiation of a global eradication campaign. Imagine if these HIV PEP drugs (Truvada and Kaletra and others that work similarly to them) were given to newly infected persons and children born to mothers infected with HIV. My impression is that the progression of HIV would be stopped in the individual and their immune system might have a chance to defend their body if the infection was caught early enough. You can imagine the logistical nightmare of monitoring everybody's HIV status in the world, and regularly checking up on them to know the instant they contract the disease. But if we were able to implement this in the perfect world we don't necessarily live in, then we might potentially stop HIV. New infections (from mothers, sex, drugs, whatever) wouldn't have the opportunity to develop beyond the control of our CD4 and CD8 cells. HIV would still be a transmissible disease but our stringent individual monitoring over years and years and decades, and the readily available HIV PEP drugs at no cost to us, might decrease the viral load per individual to a manageable level. By then HIV would be a normally accepted virus, like common flu and such, that we just deal with because most often, it won't kill us if we take our medicine, not the HIV we know now that slowly or quickly wears down our immune system, progresses to AIDS and lets other common things kill our immuno-compromised selves. This is what Brie and I came up with, but don't take it as scientific fact because we don't know enough about immunology and medicine and economics and politics and bureaucracy, among a lot of other things that need to be considered in order to dream up an effective eradication plan.

Climbing is rad

2008-08-24T14:34:00.000-07:00

I'm on Orcas Island with Brett and Nicole, well Nicole is at camp right now--boring. It just started raining, we're going to boil a duck. I found these pictures on Brett's computer.

On the Grand Wall (5.11a/A0). Brett and I basically came off the couch to do this. We didn't make it look pretty but we got up it.

Illusion Dweller (5.10c). Brett being a badass in Joshua Tree in 2006.

Coming off Bellygood Ledge after The Grand Wall in Squamish. This is one of the three sketchy traverses across the face of the Chief. Luckily this one was bolted, but it's still terrifying traversing across a ledge that's no wider than your shoulders and a 1000 feet off the deck.

I think this is on top of the Split Pillar on the Grand Wall.

This is our beautiful rack. The Grand Wall took us a good many hours, lots of blood, and sore feet.

Probably one of the last trips with my van. It'll be hard to part.

Nous parlons en Bambara avec plaisir. An ka bamanankan kalan. A ka nyi kosebe.

2008-08-11T12:32:00.000-07:00

= I ni ce.
= Nba, I ni ce.
= Here sira wa?
= Owo, here doron.
= Sogomow ka kenna wa?
= Tooro t’u la.
= E Coulibaly.
= Nba, Sidibe.
= Nba.
= Mun don?
= Nin ye ne negeso ye.
= A be min?
= A be jirisun koro.
= I be ta min?
= Ne ta Wassoulou sisan. Wassoulou sira be min?
= A be kofe doni.
= I ni ce, ne ta sisan.
= Nba, k’an b’u fo.
= U n’a men.
= Allah ka here tile.
= Amina. Kamben sogoma.

Wax

2008-08-09T13:20:00.000-07:00

CD4, CD8, Killer Cells, and Philly Soul

2008-08-04T01:50:00.000-07:00

After a small investigation I found out that CD4 cells--helper cells--regulate other immune responses by secreting growth hormones and cytokines to give our immune system directions on how best to act. Cytokines are proteins that act like hormones and tell our Killer Cells--their actual name, not a substitution for ease of explanations--that a pathogen is in our blood. CD8 cells are responsible for killing virally infected cells, among other things, by secreting toxins that cause cells to lyse; basically, pop open and die. So Helen is wondering why the Long-Term Non-Progressors' CD8's are able to remain HIV intolerant and kill infected cells, while the Patients' cannot. If you have no idea why I'm writing this you should read my first post.

Philly soul looks exciting. The Delfonics are sweet but pretty heavily orchestrated with lots of strings, which I'm not necessarily so into. Nevertheless, they do well like the Four Mints off of the Capsoul label in Ohio, with tight arrangements. They are all about the early 70's slow jam. While the Delfonics don't have slightly over-weight men in blue leisure suits hanging out in a forest on their album cover like the Four Mints do, I like their use of the sitar in the track The Delfonics Theme (How Could You). It sounds like Frank Zappa's guitar in Peaches En Regalia and Stinkfoot. Funny Feeling is an awesome shuffle, rolling and rollicking, kind of the feel of Bernard Purdie's drumming, though this album didn't have a personnel listing for the tracks so I don't know who their drummer is--probably the studio band of the label. I want to get a few releases from Funkadelphia Records that look good and whose website is so basic and low-key that I feel obligated to support them, but these are obligations I can hang with. Just more Philly Soul.

Motown parties are rad and so are Tequila Saturdays.

The Werwie Archives

2008-08-01T11:57:00.000-07:00

Werwie Archives Vol. 1 = 100% Soul
Werwie Archives Vol. 2 = Letters From the Pleasure Palace

Werwie Archives Vol. 3 = Honey In the Rock

Werwie Archives Vol. 4 = 100% Made for PDX

Pelleted red blood cells lysed in bleach, then poured down the drain looks like Sprecher Root Beer. It even has foam.

When people take action

2008-07-31T01:14:00.000-07:00

I received an enthusiastic request for comment capabilities, and who am I to deny?

Elvin Jones is a Jazz Machine.

Seattle

2008-07-30T15:59:00.001-07:00

A lot of you probably have spent more time in Seattle than I have so this might not be as interesting or new to you as it is to me. There's the one woman in the morning who stumbles with straight knees up to the bus stop on 19th and Thomas. Her thoughts run into each other, dealing with anything from her qualms with heroine to her dissatisfaction with Tom Cruise and Mariah Carey, and then seamlessly to her mom's friend Michelle who used to drive around with a large man in her blue Toyota that, apparently, neither this woman nor Michelle knew very well. I don't get anymore details before she segues beautifully into some of her past medical history that I think, because of confidentiality issues, I shouldn't repeat. Some mornings she's already beaten me to the stop and is sleeping curled up under the awning in her faded but not ragged black sweatpants and an oversized blue hooded jacket. I don't mind so much about the bench because she's there again in the evening, ranting, symbolically wrapping up my day as I pass on the opposite side of the street, walking back from Seattle Biomedical, twenty-five blocks west. People are already asking me about Safeway locations in the Capitol Hill area and I know of two to which I can direct them: 15th and E John, or 23rd and Madison. I prefer 23rd and Madison.

J'attends d'abord

2008-07-29T17:54:00.000-07:00

Today I waited for 2 hours with Elahi, my new 50-something-year-old Iranian friend, for Anonymous Girl to deliver two 40mL blood samples, each HIV negative but potentially Hepatitis B or C positive, in which case we don't care anyways, to our lab bench at Seattle Biomedical Research Institute. This link takes you to Helen Horton's site at SBRI. She is my host for my pre-Africa training and the Principle Investigator of one arm of the Immunology core at SBRI working in the Viral Vaccine Program. Briefly, I got a job that starts in September in a clinic and HIV research lab in Mali. I don't know anything about viruses beyond that if you get a lot of biologists drunk, they'll argue for hours about whether or not the viruses can justly be considered "alive." I know even less about immunology (antibodies and immune responses to anything, specifically HIV for my case).

Well, not exactly true. I'll tell you what I learned about Helen's work after my first "All Staff Meeting," held today. The opening slide-show of the meeting as people filed into the room, that was projected on a large screen almost big enough to cover the glass windows that looked out onto ground-level Seattle streets and the people passing by--who could very well be subjects of the HIV research I describe below, were the head-shots of the all the staff at SBRI. Only my second day and my picture is already up as "visiting scientist." It was somewhat comforting to me that the science and research being done really isn't too far removed from the people they aspire to help.

I pestered enough people long enough to agree to train me in HIV blood tests, cryo-preservation of blood samples that should be frozen at -80 degrees celcius within 8 hours of venipuncture, as it's called, as well as a few other important skills that may or may not come in handy in the labs in Mali. I like to imagine the lab in Bamako as any other building I saw last year in the city: mud bricks that were once sitting in rows, baking to dry in the red streets, then stacked to make a house and painted whitish-blue on the inside, but will most definitely be chipping. And the sun will shoot a visible column of light through the dust in the open window. What I don't like to imagine, though I could be wildly wrong, is the basic and limited lab equipment, un-calibrated centrifuges and pipettes, re-used tips, and data in disarray that I was already warned by the heads of the GAIA Vaccine Foundation (with whom I'll be working in the TB/HIV clinics in Mali, and through whom I got the research job in the HIV lab with Dr. Ousmane Koita) that I'll have to "extract" and "make sense of." I annoyed them too, for the past 4 months until they finally decided that I was willing and determined enough to work for them and found some extra money in their fund to throw at me for an initial 6 months of work.

Anyway, I'm training in Seattle for a few weeks and not leaving for Mali until September. These writings will deal with some science, because that's what I'm doing (I can already see Caitlin falling asleep), but also I hope to make more music recordings in the future, especially in Wassoulou, where my heart lays, as well as write about the goings-on in Bamako, where I'll be stationed for the next 6 months.

Helen and her crew, at SBRI, are looking at populations of HIV positive people in Seattle with the vision to develop possible vaccine based on the differences in immune system bits and pieces between these two groups: Long-Term Non-Progressors, and a second more basically named group, Patients. LTNPs are interesting because, while HIV positive, they show no symptoms and lead as healthy of lives as you or I for years and years and possibly till death. The Patients however, show advanced stages of HIV or have developed AIDS, and their immune system is being beaten down everyday, their immune system becomes tolerant of these foreign viral cells and fails to elicit any sort of response. So what's the difference? CD8 T cells. (And here is where my lack of knowledge will show to anyone who is qualified, but it's good enough to get the point across).

If you remember from middle school or high school or whichever school, we have red blood cells and white blood cells. Our white blood cells make up our immune response team, and that team is further divided into other classes of cells, but we'll focus on T cells. The HIV virus in the Patients group is able to take over a class of white blood cells, the CD4 T cells, and depletes them until their immune system is so compromised that a common cold could be fatal, as well as rendering CD8 T cells, another class of white blood cells, tolerant to the presence of the recently, virally infected cells. As I understand, CD4 T cells recognize foreign invaders diffusing throughout our blood but are vulnerable to HIV that will randomly be captured by receptor proteins on our defense cells and hijacked by the virus, and the CD8 T cells recognize infected cells, perhaps as a second defence. But, as in the case of the Patients, if the CD8 T cells are tolerant, they don't react. If they don't react, we have no defense. For an unknown reason and the subject of Helen Horton's work for which she was awarded another research grant, the CD8 T cells of the Long-Term Non-Progressors remain intolerant to virally infected T cells and continue to battle those sick cells and defend the castle that is our body. For this reason the LTNPs remain healthy. They can still elicit a strong immune response. And they are an interesting place to begin important research.

The internet is a cool place because scientists can search huge databases of sequenced DNA and proteins all at the click of a few buttons, rather than sifting through volumes of Cell, or Genes and Development, or Current Biology back-issues from the last 70 years, jotting down thousands of A's, T's, G's and C's to compare to your samples. Not only is that boring, it would take a million years. Helen's team is, among other things, taking those CD8 T cells and lining up row after row of sequenced DNA to look for any sort of sequence conservation or at least a place to begin investigating possible reasons that LTNP CD8 T cells can remain intolerant while Patient CD8 T cells eventually run out of steam.

HIV is tricky because it evolves rapidly and it is constantly editing and republishing it's own book so that no T cells can read it quickly enough and understand how to stop it. Helen is also aligning thousands of sequenced HIV viruses to see which parts of their book are never edited. T cells in most cases are so specific to any one part of a virus that the chances of them running into a perfect match are tiny. So in order to develop an effective vaccine candidate we should target those areas of the virus, perhaps what might code for the attachment proteins, or the directions to fuse with our immune cells, or whatever paragraph or sentence or word, out of their whole book that might remain un-edited, to develop a potentially effective vaccine for HIV in Seattle that might also work for HIV in Mali, as an example of the grand vision of a "global vaccine."

In comes my future work with GAIA VF, the Global Alliance to Immunize Against AIDS Vaccine Foundation, hence forth known as GAIA. GAIA is a Rhode Island based non-profit organization working in Sikoro district of the capital city, Bamako, in Mali, in West Africa. For those not keen on African geography:

What I like about these people is that they are committed to developing and distributing a global HIV vaccine for free. GAIA, and eventually me, work closely with and employ African physicians and scientists, often educated in Europe or the States, to provide clinical activities that foster important foundational knowledge about TB and HIV in the area. They recently opened a brand new clinic in Sikoro. They have programs called Mother-To-Child, that focuses on transmission of HIV from mothers to children via childbirth and the like, and important peer-education campaigns called Here Bolo, which in Bambara, the predominant language of much of Mali and more or less understood in greater west Africa, translates to le main d'espoire, hand of hope. Each finger represents a different facet of HIV education and treatment.

The stats that you can find on their website are pretty impressive, especially regarding condom distribution, records of patient consultation and treatment, as well as follow-up treatment. For more interesting reading search through the GAIA Blog for the med students' or the GAIA director's writings. The work is interesting, I promise.

Brief stats I learned today: Of the 35 or so million HIV cases today, about 25-28 million are in Sub-Saharan Africa. The first HIV cases in the US were published in 1981. HIV is thought to first have been transmitted to humans from monkeys as recently at 1940, probably through the slaughter of monkeys and eating their meat. Common mechanisms of acquiring HIV are through mucous membranes (eyes) so upon slaughter some blood could have splashed in their eyes, transmitting simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) to humans, and hence human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) in humans.