Live Earth

Was Live Earth a big deal in North America? Like, as big a deal as Live 8?

'Cause the talk on the Johannesburg show didn't really start -- at least on the radio and in the newspapers (I don't have TV) -- until a few days ago. I knew about the show through an MSN ad a few weeks ago, but it didn't seem to draw much popular attention here. I expected there to be more hype around it.

I should check to see what the attendance was for the Jo'burg show.

I was working yesterday, but I spent most of the day at a poetry slam jam in Newtown put on by Sounds of Edutainment. The theme of the day was "Roll back xenophobia and bring back solidarity"; it was to celebrate or recognize World Refugee Day ... which was a few weeks ago (I'm not sure why they were so late).

Anyway, I'm working on a project right now called Musicians Against Xenophobia, which is bringing together Mozambican and South African musicians to produce songs discouraging xenophobia and encouraging pan-Africanism in SA. See, South Africa is the prime destination for migrants from all across Southern Africa (eastern Africa, too), so there are lots of Mozambicans, Zimbabweans, Zambians, Congolese and other African people here. But, like immigrants everywhere, they face a lot of discrimination, both systematically from government and police as well as in their day-to-day life from regular South Africans. Like everywhere else in the world, migrants and immigrants are blamed for crime, unemployment, etc.

Anyway, so I was at this thing yesterday with one of our research students doing interviews and talking to people and that kind of thing. It was interesting to hear people say they wish the artists at the Coca-Cola Dome (where Live Earth was happening) were talking about a local issue, such as xenophobia, rather than climate change.

Funniest part of the day: So the show is a lot about African unity and embracing everyone as African rather than "Amakwerre Amakwerre", which is a derogatory slur that people use for foreign Africans. As the emcee gets started, he says something like, "To all my black brothers and sisters ..." pauses a second, makes eye contact with me, then says, "And everyone else."

It wasn't a small bar and I was the only white guy.

My CMFD partner, Mandla, had tears in his eyes he was laughing so hard. I'm just glad he didn't call me "everyone else" for the rest of the day.

Another note: The only seat available when I went to sit down was in the front row. Yep.

The show was amazing, even though I didn't understand very much; most artists performed their poetry in a mix of African languages (it seemed to be a lot of Sotho, Setswana, Xhosa and Ndebele) and only rarely did they use English.

But I don't know if I'll ever be able to go to a regular poetry reading after seeing these poets perform. It was just so theatrical and musical; even when speaking, there's something about African languages that is so aurally powerful.

Thoughts on Live Earth in North America?