Dateline Grahamstown April 18, 2010

Dateline Grahamstown -- April 18, 2010
It is one of those wonderful, cool but blue sky days in Grahamstown. The big heat of last term seems to have died down. There has been a lot of rain this week, Most likely too late for the farmers and the water supply. But today the blue skies are back, and it is beautiful. Returning to Grahamstown last Sunday felt like returning home. I truly love this land. Haven't quite figured the whole psychology part of it out. But there is something here that has captured my heart. It has a different beauty from Cape Town. It has a peacefulness yet underneath you can feel the problems. It could be that it's such a contrast from New York. Finally got over the jet lag around Thursday. It seems which ever way I travel, I need four days to get that wooly feeling out of my heady. The trip to New York was magnificent, but there was a lot to do. The pace is so quick. Everyone, including me, rushing to get somewhere. And the somewhere is important. But I do like a slower pace, where every "to do" list is not replaced by another "to do" list.

My moped seemed initially reluctant to start after the week. The engine turned over but would not catch. I found myself running the battery down, so I decided to call my mechanic to come over the following morning. Then after leaving for a couple of hours, on sunday evening I gave it one final chance and the baby caught, so I cancelled him. And so far so good.

School began Wednesday for me with the fourth years in investigative reporting. I had met all the students the first week I was here when I had them for the first week, so there was not much need to introduce ourselves. Their main assignment for this term a 10 minutes investigative piece. It will be a lot of work for them as many interesting stories are out of the area and travel is costly in time and money...but they are game.

The chairman of my department is a talented blues singer and guitar player. Friday night was the naming of his band "Sunspot" They performed for several hours. Almost all of the lyrics for the songs are written by Robert Berrold a well know poet who was there to listen too, and has become a great friend. This group is a hidden gem here in Grahamstown. You'll be hearing more about them and hearing them, as we hope to record one of their performances.

Tonight I work with Thando on assembling my interview with the great TK blue, which I conducted in New York while there. The station here is still not back on the air but hopefully it will be next week, and the 6 pm Jazz Serenade will be back.

Om Shanti