Location is Everything

I took it as an omen perhaps, or a propitious sign
When the then-fiancée defended her PhD dissertation
The setting where scholars had their meeting of minds
The culmination of her Harvard education was in Room 419
Others remarked wryly about the uncanny juxtaposition
Real estate agents would say: location, location, location

Nine months later, marital bliss
The Wife's first academic trip
Butterflies, a case of separation anxiety
For this newly minted professor of African history
Put your game face on, it's about dollars and sense
Modernity too, this was the Science in Africa conference
Auspicious, and a touch surprising, but then what can you do?
It turned out that the proceedings were held in Edinburgh zoo

Location is Everything, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Proper Education by Mikey Dread
• Side by Side by Dianne Reeves
• Africa by Toto
• Sound Education by I Roy
• At the Zoo by Simon and Garfunkel
• Location is Everything by Daniel G. Harmann

File under: humour, culture, observation, perception, juxtaposition, poetry, toli

Writing log. August 29, 2022

An Hour Away

Cape Point. Near the southern tip of the continent
From the cliff, we watched the famed seascape
The blue waves that were said to rival Zanzibar
Then, the Cape of Good Hope.
Tourists. Escapism.

Later, an hour away lay the township
Punishing. We took in the juxtaposition
Apartheid painted from its drab palette
Khayelitsha.
Slum life. Journalism.

(South Africa, Christmas 1993)

Put all this behind you, the scripts were being readied
The recent unpleasantness was all ancient history
Welcome to the New South Africa, they'd started to say
After all, you know, the elections are only months away

A Temporary Inconvenience, a playlist

Some sounds from South Africa. (spotify version)


File under: memory, culture, observation, perception, travel, poetry, South Africa, apartheid, race, poverty, colonialism, juxtaposition, Africa, Observers are worried, toli

Writing log: December 30, 1993, December 1, 2021