third world connections (Re: I have no Halloween )

[rhys daily <shadow at teuton_org>]

On Fri, 25 Jul 2003, Nathan Swartzendruber wrote:

> > >If you don't know him, you should try to check him out - he has a
> > >Paul Simon quality to his voice, but sings about real things and not
> > >third world day-to-day events that don't mean so much to the average
> > >Joe, like Paul does
> >
> >I'm sorry - can you name a example of a song of Paul Simon's that's
> >about "third world day-to-day events"? Very confused here.


third world day to day

Graceland:
Call me All
African Skies
Diamonds on the Soles of her shoes
I know what i KNow
Homeless

You're the One:
The Teacher
Senorita witha Necklace of Tears
Pigs Sheep and Wolves
Hurrcain eye?


Rhythm of the Saints
Cool River
Coast
Can't Run, But
She moves
Spirit Voices
The Rhythm of the Saints


Satin Summer Nights
Born in PR

gosh, numnbers of them

some of them valid - some you will go 'huh, how'd she get there?'

maybe i've just got more jungle running in my blood,

i like paul simon's music because he does a graceful mixture of american
and third world rhtyms into something nice. he doesn't mangle the rrhytms
from somewhere else.

twist it up with words that don't belong,

> I guess everybody has to decide what world they live in, and you can't be
> everywhere at once. But third world day-to-day is every bit as real as
> home-of-the-brave America.

no one said it wasn't.

> Sure I think most media coverage of the third world is purely academic.

to borrow a southernism, 'what newspaper y'all been reading?'

i disagree.

> Nobody enjoys guilt, though it's an emotion we're too unfamiliar with.

is this what's called a white man's burden? i don't geti it, inever have.
is it because of who my parents are? the colour of my family?

> At $15k, I can live in a way most of the world only imagines, like I
> might imagine living like a mega-star.

true.

> I think people living in the third world have a kind of bravery we're
> not even familiar with here.

brave? no more than you or i. brave? they get up and live, they know no
differently.  brave? sure - living is brave, i'm not tryin got diminish
them - but aggrandizing it into something magical is dangerous. there is
no such thing as the noble savage, we do ourselves a disservice when we do
that - both for us and for them.

they are flawed wonderful beautiful people. and so's your neighbour -
which one is more blessed? more special? hard to say.

third world, yea it's a hard place to be. there's greed, corruption,
selfishness, drugs, guns, knives, mutilations, beauty, smiles, and music
and wonderful food, scenery like nowhere else, culture that dictates half
of the listed things into normality.... sounds like any country i can
think of

> And if people like Paul Simon can connect us to the rest of the world in
> more human ways, we need to hear those songs.

word.

but there's better connections to africa

Salif Kaita
oliver mtukudzi
zap mama
pap wemba
ladysmith black mbazo
orchestra baobab

etc

> Sorry, I'm a little touchy about Africa.

yea.

> Not happy with myself, and still can't please,

why not hapy with your self?

if you're not happy with yourself, what would you change?

a sad fact, if i gave all my money away to a village in africa to make
myself less guilty, it would get used up and i woulda created a dependency

dave, my fiancee, grew up in zegatta, C'ote Ivoire.  when he went back he
made some 'friends' who knew him as a little boy. they write and ask him
to send stuff. having an 'american' is a big dela.

having american stuff is a big deal.

i'm touchy about mexico

i think we all have some secret not so secret painful itchy area that we
hate to hav touched, but wouldn't want to lose

like a friendly scar.
rhys

-- 
End hunger
Save the whales
Free the mallocs

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