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Showing posts from October, 2009

Staff Benda Bilili

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You can find hope in the most unlikely of places -- and the unlikelier the place and story is, the more it gives me hope for the rest of us and the miseries we witness and inflict on each other. Staff Benda Bilili (Show What's Hidden) is a musical group of street kids from the Democratic Republic of Congo. The live around what passes for a zoo in Kinshasa, scraping out a living by performing with their home made instruments -- homemade guitars, single-stringed harp made of wire stretched over a tin can, and a drum which is a plastic chair beaten by flip-flops. The band members are all disabled, having suffered from polio as kids. Listen to them below. The band won the 2009 Artist Award at Womex and are now off on a European tour. How cool is that? For more, check out their MySpace page .

The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind

When he was just 14-years-old, William Kamkwamba from Malawi, dropped out of school because his family could no longer afford to send him to school. With just a science text book, Kamkwamba decided to build a windmill, for electricity, to power his home and pump water. The people of his village thought he was crazy. But from parts salvaged from junk, a windmill emerged. That has since been replaced by another Kamkwamba built. Now 22-years-old, Kamkwamba is attending university on a scholarship, and plans to go back home and bring electricity to his entire country. Simply amazing. So, what you done today?