If I were even partially educated about astronomy or astrology I would be looking to see what that fella Mercury is up to as I have just enough info to be dangerous and I know that Mercury is the planet that can cause chaos with communications. While looking for a reference to link to I see that Mercury also governs all of the characteristics of my personality. This is not very surprising as it rules Virgo and I am very much a stereotypical Virgo. Read THIS it is interesting (well it is to me anyway but I am a mercurial Virgo soooooo…..yeah that. Just read it.)

The reason I felt like Mercury was interfering on Tuesday was that I woke up to no internet at home. I trundled off to work and the traffic was horrendous. I managed to keep my calm by spotting squirrels in the forest that I was driving through or checking out the strange ways that trees form due to the crazy winds in Cape Town or listening to calming Native American tribal music or watching the people in the cars around me doing weird people things. I do love people watching and goodness knows we got plenty of weird ones in Cape Town.

I finally arrived at work to find I had no internet at work either. I do not have a network cable at my desk, I use the WiFi which was not communicating with my laptop. I spent an exasperating day talking to the unhelpful help-desk and connecting and disconnecting my laptop to try and connect to the database. We then had a client workshop over Skype and we had a horrendous connection, resulting in 50 minutes of frustration and about 10 minutes of productive conversation.

It was if the Universe (side-eyes at Mercury) was trying to stop me communicating to anyone!

On Tuesday evening Norm and I were booked to go to Cafe Roux in Cape Town city centre to hear a local young artist called Odwa Bongo. We love live music and in particular we love this music venue and intend to try and make it at least once a month to hear someone new. We had such fun when we went to watch our friend Mae Sithole perform recently.

We arrived about 7pm and settled in.

We like to arrive a bit early so that we have finished eating when the artist comes on and we can give them the attention they deserve.

I ordered the Mexican pizza which was thin, crispy and full of yummy flavours. I love fresh coriander and it had lots. The chipotle sauce was very tasty and spicy.

Norm ordered the butternut ravioli with a burnt butter and sage sauce.

The artists usually start at 8:30pm but Odwa was a wee bit late starting as some of his audience was late arriving but once the audience settled in he was introduced.  Odwa emerged onto the stage in a long, hooded cape like jacket which was very dramatic.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BgSq9I6FKER/?taken-by=odwabongoofficial

He had a very interesting instrument which he used to open many of the songs.

Odwa has an amazing voice, he can reach some incredibly high notes and his voice is so pure with a lovely, full, rich tone. He was very charming and animated on stage  and talked about his personal challenges in life but he was very inspirational and positive in his outlook. His face is so expressive when he sings.

Odwa sang predominately in Xhosa which I assume is his home language. Even though we had no clue what he was singing about for many of his songs we did not mind as it meant that we could just feel the emotion of the song and not bother with trying to absorb the lyrics. He did sing a new song he has just written in English and it was fabulous! I wish I could find it online to share but he said it was brand spanking new so I feel privileged to hear it at all.

I did post this English track called ‘Confused’ on my last blog, however it is worth posting again so you can appreciate the clarity of his tone if you missed it. You can follow Odwa on Soundcloud here.

Odwa had a band as well as a back up singer on stage with him. I really enjoyed how the bass player and the keyboard player interacted. They were both enjoying themselves and it showed. I love how you can see the joy on some musician’s faces, pure elation at being in the zone doing what they love.

The back up singer was Zolani Bongo, I did not hear if they said whether they were related but it is an interesting surname to have in common if not.

After a few songs Zolani moved to the main microphone at centre stage to do a song on his own. Zolani has an amazing voice and range as well so if they are related there are some good vocal genes in that bloodline.

Zolani sang a gospel song, but I was not sure what it was called even though it was in English (blame it on the vodka). I asked Odwa on Facebook for the track and he told me that it is a song called ‘I remember, I believe’ which as far as I can discover was originally done by Lizz Wright. I would love to go and see Zolani perform a night of blues, his voice is perfect for the old blues classics. He gave me goosebumps.

I found this track of the original artist so you can appreciate the tune. (Zolani did it better in my opinion.)

I managed to track down the lyrics to go with the video if you would like to see them they are HERE. The interesting thing I discovered is that the singer Lizz is from the same state where I grew up! Maybe it was that Georgia girl vibe which got me all in my feels.

 

Then Odwa told us how he had won tickets to see Freshly Ground and that when there he was lucky enough to meet the adorable Zolani Mahola. She is a small, beautiful lady and has the cutest grin so even though she is a grown woman she is indeed adorable.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Ba_UK9WB12s/?taken-by=zolani

Their voices were so complimentary they killed it!! Everyone was up dancing and having such fun.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BgSsaFGlTUT/?taken-by=odwabongoofficial

 

We stayed for a few more songs and then we headed home what with it being a school night. Between the vodkas and my exhaustion I forgot to take my phone out of my handbag when I got home, so I woke up confused and lost and banged around in the dark until I found it just before my alarm went off.

It started drizzling with rain on my way in to work and after stopping for most of the day it has again started this evening, there is the rarely heard sound of rain gushing out the drainpipes in the background as I write, I wish we had a system to collect it all but our plastic drain thingies got trodden on by Navajo and we have finally chucked them out.

Nevermind.

Hopefully our garden will be enjoying the drenching it is getting. I thank the Universe for this water, I hope that it is also falling over our thirsty dams.

The rain has cooled the air off beautifully, Norm is making homemade low carb lasagna for dinner for us and Josh.

Life is good, I am so blessed.

Until next time, Kisses from the Kitten xoxoxoxox