Tag Archives: African Jazz Pioneers

Rainbow Flokati Pioneers

The wonderful African Jazz Pioneers were appearing at the RAINBOW Jazz Club in the Pinetown taxi rank! Could NOT miss the opportunity. HAD to go and experience their wonderful sound and vibe. The only time I’d heard them live was years before, at Sun City.

At Ben Pretorius’ Rainbow Restaurant they serve their beers in ‘quart’ bottles, about 750ml in the shade. What can you do? I ordered a small Castle. I wasn’t boycotting SAB that night (could only have done so by going teetotal and that was not gonna happen). Then I noticed the guys next door were drinking Black Label and saw theirs was 5,5% alcohol while Castle was only 5%, so I ordered a Black Label next. No use wasting time and effort drinking and not getting full value.

But hey! Some okes were drinking Milk Stout quarts – and theirs was 6% alcohol! I smoothly oozed over to Milk Stout and then stuck with it. I’m not the kind of person who would mix his drinks. All the while the African Jazz Pioneers were playing their seductive swinging special jazz. Between sips we would stand up and dance like umLungus amongst them who really could sway and jive, hoping we were unobtrusive.

Many milk stouts later we might have been asked to leave, last song, last round and all that sad stuff. Tell you what! Let’s gate crash Mike Lello for a ‘last drink’ on our way home! Good Idea! Who’s driving?

The delightful and hospitable Lellos were sober and just sitting down to supper when we staggered in. Feeling slightly hungry, I sat in Mike’s chair and polished off his supper. Feeling a slight need for a leak and maybe a small burp, I meandered down the passage and here’s where people start to embellish the story.

Rubbish!

Who has a white flokati rug in a loo anyway? Loo carpets are usually short-haired and much closer to a milk stout colour. In my experience.

~~~oo0oo~~~

~~~oo0oo~~~

Anyway, what’s a flokati? enlightenment:
A flokati rug is a handmade shag wool rug. Making flokatis is a long-time tradition of the Vlachs in the Pindus mountains. The natural color of a flokati rug is off-white, but they may be – and SHOULD be! – dyed different colors. The entire rug is wool, including the backing from which the tapered shag emerges. After the rug is woven, it is placed in the cold water of a river to fluff the shag. They continue to be handmade in the mountains of Greece and are regarded as desirable in American modern decor and children’s rooms.
~~~oo0oo~~~

I’m off to fluff the shag

~~~oo0oo~~~

A Real Live African Jazz Pioneer

What do you do? I ask the old soldier sitting in my chair. He’s come to me for an eye test. I’m a musician in the army band, he says. Aha! Cool! What do you play? asks I.

The Saxophone, he says. The best of all the instruments! I flatter. How long have you been a soldier? Not long, he says, I joined a couple years ago and I’m just about to retire on a small army pension. What did you do before?

I was saxophonist in big bands. I toured the world. Mario Montereggi’s Big Band? I ask. Yes, indeed, I played with Mario.

And then he drops the big one:

I was with the African Jazz Pioneers for years. Wow! African Jazz Royalty in my chair!!

He might even have played with Mario at my fiftieth, where Aitch surprised me by getting Mario’s small ensemble to blow me away:

Is this him entertaining the kids, maybe?

– Tommy charms the sax player; Jess watches in awe . . –

~~oo0oo~~

Road Safety and the Elderly

On Saturday, January 18, 2014, I wrote reasonably:

Subject: A PBH solution for the PHBrauers of the world

I’ve been very worried about people driving Audis into school walls, but I feel a bit better now, as a Pretoria Boys High (PBH) boykie has put his mind to a solution for the big Audi / Brauer problem and here’s what he has come up with:

Google is not the only company that thinks auto-piloted cars are the future. Tesla has estimated that their time frame for having automated cars on the road is ‘within the next 3 years.’ So Elon Musk says we could be seeing cars running on auto-pilot as soon as 2016.

And none too soon!! This way we could have inebriation AND safety . . among certain elderly drivers.

~~~oo0oo~~~

Steve Reed wrote enquiringly:

Regarding Audis getting driven into school walls, I need to be updated in this regard.

~~~oo0oo~~~

Brauer quickly jumped in and wrote defensively:

Would you like an accurate version or will you settle for Koos’ ‘Clive Nel’-ified version?

~~~oo0oo~~~

I calmly wrote the simple truth:

All I’m saying is,

The ingredients were:

– Golf;

– Beer;

– an Audi sedan;

– a school wall.

The results were:

– Damage to two of the above (the elderly greying culprit / suspect escaped largely unharmed due to being limp at point of impact).

– Lo-ong boring tales of walls ambushing unsuspecting cars in the depths of Gramadoelas suburb in Tswanie at the dead of night; * yawn *

~~~oo0oo~~~

Culprit / Suspect Brauer wrote:

Total distortion of facts. ‘Twasn’t beer. . . . whiskey, mate.

~~~oo0oo~~~

I fretted:

That’s a worrying development. I get worried when people start drinking stuff that slides down easily and stinks less when belched up. I feel that beer and red wine allow your companions to know more about your drinking habits, and give earlier warnings about ‘when’s enough’. Just by looking at his white flokati rug one night Mike Lello knew a lot about Milk Stout and the Rainbow Club.

~~~oo0oo~~~

Interloper Bruce Soutar now jumps in with his tuppence worth:

At the RAINBOW Jazz Club in the Pinetown taxi rank they serve their beers in ‘quart’ bottles (750ml). One special and memorable night The African Jazz Pioneers were playing, and Swanepoel ordered a Castle. He noticed the guys next door were drinking Black Label and saw theirs was 5,5% alcohol while Castle was only 5%, so he ordered a Black Label next. Then he saw some okes drinking Milk Stout and noticed that was 6% alcohol so he smoothly oozed over to Milk Stout and then stuck with it. All the while the African Jazz Pioneers were playing their seductive swinging special jazz. Many, many milk stouts later we decided to gate crash Mike Lello for a ‘last drink’ on the way home.

They were sitting down to supper when we staggered in. Pete S was feeling hungry, sat in Mike’s chair and polished off his supper. Then had an urge to burp? . . . but did not quite make the toilet bowl. Hence the flocked–up-carti rug.

~~~oo0oo~~~

Public Service Notice: This hugely exaggerated story is to be taken with a large pinch of salt. But as interesting aside, you can see what it MIGHT have looked like under a microscope.

~~~oo0oo~~~

I objected:

TMI !! As I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted: Self-driving cars for the elderly – that’s what we need.

Driverless Car

~~~oo0oo~~~