Mutoko Village

MUTOKO VILLAGE

Saturday we drove our gardener Leon home to his wife in the village of Mutoko. Mutoko is 4 hours drive form the centre of Harare, through beautiful, rocky landscapes, on roads with unbelievable potholes and flooded bridges. After some detours and getting a bit lost, we finally arrived in the village and was welcomed by Leons wife and other members of the family.                           
The village is small, with clay houses and fields of corn, ground nuts, bananas, greens and other basic fruits and vegetables that is needed for survival. Due to bad rainy season this year, the crops have not been  as productive as the village people were hoping for and US aid has been crucial resource in food supply and medications.

Picking ground nuts from the fields was a completely new experience to me. My favorite snack in its original shape and context, not only in a Polly peanut packet on a shelf in a supermarket. It actually really hit me how unaware I am of all the imported foods and where they are coming from and how and where they actually grow. After picking, peeling and boiling them, I totally had a new experience of the peanut: never again will anything taste so good.

Leon in his field.

In Mutoko, most of the people in the village has one hut for sleeping, one for cooking

 and one as a living room.

 Outside the chickens are running around alongside

skinny dogs, cows and goats. 

Animals are used either for food or as guards and are not a priority when it comes to being fed or given any social attention. This is naturally a result of not having enough food to feed oneself, and even though it pained me to see the state of some of the animals, I do understand how one can neglect an animal when oneself is living in constant lack of enough foods and hunger.

Zimbabwe College of Music, Harare.

Zimbabwe College of music is one of the main institutions for music education in Harare. In collaboration with the African University and the Zimbabwe University, the college offer NCM (National Certificate of Music) and Bachelor degrees. 

The class we currently teach are in their 4th. and last semester of their Bachelor degree in Ethnomusicology, where 5 of the 19 studens are specializing in Jazz. It is a wonderful group of people we are working with, truly positive and open people, who give us a lot of inspiration as teachers.

The subjects we are currently teaching, are World music, Western and African composition, Advanced Aural Training and Choral and Instrumental studies. Me and my colleague Tor Åge have split the lessons between us, so I am now teaching Aural Training and western Composition. I have also started a Choir and  Vocal improvisation skills groups for both the NCM and the Ethnomusicology students.

We have also had the fortune of getting instrume lessons in the Zimbabwean Mbira (thumb piano) and Marimba. These instruments are beautiful sounding and it is interesting to gain a larger understanding of how these instruments sound and function, also in terms of composing music for and with them.

The Mannenberg is one of the venues in Harare where one can hear and play live music, mainly jazz, but also traditional, funk, and other genres. Opposite the Mannenberg one can find the Book Cafe, another venue for live music and hanging out. The Book cafe mainly hosts traditional Mbira music, Reggae and other African music.

Lazy Saturdays

A beautiful Saturday in our friend Rumbis´ garden with her lovely family. A clear favourite was her little  nephew Levako.  They cooked us traditional Africans food: Sadsa (maize porridge), a peanut and greens mix, pumpkin, chicken (for the meat eaters), local beer: Zambezi and Lion. 

The task next week is to help Rumbi weeding her corn field. I am looking forward to working outdoors, with these substantial and powerful plants.

Week one and two, Harare, Zimbabwe 2009.

I arrived in Harare with my colleague Tor Åge Schuneman on Tuesday the 20th of January. From the plain I could see green fields, and a landscape full of vitality. I had no expectations, trying to keep my heart and mind open to whatever these next coming days, weeks and months would bring, and I sensed an immediate feeling of home as I took my first steps onto this amazing African red soil. I was in Zimbabwe,  I was home.

Warmth; the weather the people. I can only as humbly as possible state the fact that the Zimbabweans are a proud, strong and amazingly helpful and welcoming people. During these two weeks of working at the Zimbabwe College of Music, i have experienced the personality of several people, amongst them, my students and teacher colleagues , and the general feeling I get from them is positivity and strength, and an eager to learn, understand and accept. I have met many challenges as a teacher, having to get used to the new environment, less access to teaching material and also getting to know and relate to a new group of people. I am learning something new everyday; about myself, about this culture and about a people that have already dug themselves deep into my heart. I feel an immense respect for this culture that I have entered and been accepted into, and it is with deep respect I am sharing my experience of Zimbabwe with you: The world.