Live music at the warehouse

Wild Weekend in Windhoek

Friday I took in a show at the warehouse with my Spanish professor Juan. The show started late and when it began, it was a solo show. The artist kept watching the door as I he opened with a beautiful traditional song and then launched into a number of covers, i.e. ‘No woman no cry’. After the third song he ran backstage and disappeared for 5 minutes or so. It was becoming painfully obvious that something was wrong! It seems that the band did not show up until about an hour after show time! Once the group got going they were really banging out great music. The show ended up keeping us over three hours in total. By the time the show was finished so was I.

Here are some pictures from our more mellow Friday night at the Warehouse.

I had gone out with a friend from the Polytechnic early Saturday evening. When I returned home I got a demanding message from my friend Desmond to get myself in a cab and head out to Katatura for the night. Normally I never go to Katatura as it is one of the more impoverished and for the most part considered the most dangerous areas in Windhoek. This time I had an opportunity to meet with a great many friends some from Namibia some from abroad, so we would have a large enough group to travel with.

I head to the club and met my friends outside. In Katatura the nightlife is bustling with the highest concentration of Sha’beens (informal bars, sometimes run out of one’s living room) in the world. Inside the club it was the usual scene lots of people dancing and jiving to the latest Kwaito. Inside the club the foreigners in our group were targeted because we were recognized as non-regular patrons of this club. Our friends warned us to be extra careful of our belongings. My friend Phillip had 50RAND lifted right out of his jeans pocket. There was a diversion created and by the time Phillip noticed the 50 was just escaping the crest of his pocket. Rather than cause a scene and try to get it back, he let it go. Our assailants were an interesting bunch as we saw the crew organize around us. One in a suit (the professional), one in an NBA jersey and hat (the muscle), and one in fairly ragged looking clothes (the distracter). We watched them leave as we recognized what they were up to and started to form a neighbourhood watch community.

After the club we hopped in a cab all with different ideas of what to do next. Because it was near the beginning of the month, most people had recently been paid and were in party mode. We saw a large group hanging out in their front yard having a bbq. So somehow it was decided that we would (and could) join the party. We were actually welcomed with open arms to the party and instantly given a cold beer. We stayed for a while and chatted with our new friends.

Our new friends told us of many parties going on this night and thought it best we hop in the old bakkie (pickup truck) and take a spin around the neighbourhood. We spent the next three or four hours driving around the township stopping in here and there, meeting new people, family, friends all the time welcomed by open arms.

Being in a township is a very unique experience. Not all areas are as dilapidated as you may have seen in my earlier pictures. Many people who were once exiled here have made it their home and built their houses from the country’s independence in 1990. Although the history and original purpose of the township is terrible, today you find a great sense of community and pride in these areas.

When we arrived home the sun was beginning to rise. We met a lot of great people this night and had a very surreal experience in the townships of Windhoek. I did not take my camera, so there is no evidence. It might have been a good thing though, as it may have disappeared in the club.