various and sundry

this morning becca and i went to the market at papine again to pick up some fresh fruit and vegetables. my brother nick arrives tonight for a week-long visit, and i have been excited about introducing him to my favorite jamaican delights. we were sure to pick up plenty of ackees, some paw-paw, plaintains, star fruit, sugar cane, june plum juice, and coconut water. we also stumbled upon a new fruit: star apples. round and plump, green and purple, these fruits open up to reveal a squishy, sweet inside. they taste like giant concord grapes. (they are about the size of an apple, thus their name; many things are labeled "apples" here that only partially resemble apples and do not seem to really fit into the apple family.) it was a pleasant discovery. apparently, they are in season now and will be for another two months. we are learning to appreciate the seasonal products here. i am looking forward to the time when the guineps (similar to lychees) are ready.

from papine, becca and i caught a route taxi up to gordon town--a small town just into the mountains on the outskirts of kingston. we went to visit a couple peace corps workers, kyle and jon, with whom we met last week. jon took us on a short hike up the mountain to a charming little waterfall. it was a beautiful day--clear and warm--and the hike up increasingly steep mountain roads made the cool water a sweet reward for our efforts. jon picked a couple of coffee beans from a small plant. he relishes being able to drink blue mountain coffee everyday here--something he says he probably won't be able to afford ever again. i was struck by how loud the water was as it cascaded down the rock and pounded into a pool, only to run along and pound down yet more rocks. i took out my minidisc and recorded some of the sound, knowing full well that i would be able to capture the sound only as well as a camera could capture the grandeur of the mountains and the waterfall itself--which is to say, not so well at all. still, the power of the sound comes through. i couldn't resist remixing it a bit, but i must admit the samples i cut from the waterfall sound more like static than water and remind me more of my radio remix than, say, cipher by the pool. i also added some home-grown percussion. jon pointed out that certain bean-pods growing on trees along our walk, when dry, make great little maracas. he presented me with a pair of them when we returned to his apartment. all the shaker-sounds you hear in gordontownfalls i made with these two bean-pods, which now adorn our wall.

in other news, my wonderful webmaster, becca, updated the .com page by adding cambridge-based mc, kabir, to my growing list of collaborators and redesigning the collabos page. i got a chance to produce a couple songs for kabir this winter, shortly before i left for jamaica. kabir is a thoughtful mc with an incredible voice. he came over to listen to some beats one day and began rapping to them almost immediately. it was fun to work with another artist, since, to this point, i have mostly produced only my own music. i especially appreciated the chance to try out my pro-tools system on some instruments as well as new voices. kabir laid down some guitar riffs for me to sample and rearrange, and he brought in an able turntablist, dj axel foley, to do some scratching. the two songs we came up with together--hunger and war--will appear on his next album. i think they promise a lot for future collaborations. already, i've been corresponding with virtuoso, of omnipotent records, who heard the tracks i did for kabir and thought in particular that the beat for "war" was a true standout. i would have to agree--gotta love some stuttering-hi-hat dancehall. i am hoping to connect a number of boston artists with kingston artists, and vice versa. each camp seems to admire the style of the other. check out kabir's own site for more music and info from this hungry mc with some questions about dc's latest war march.

also, big up to thaddeus miles and the crew over at camfield estates (camfield's neighborhood technology center was the first community computer-lab site for my digital music workshops). according to this article, the entire housing complex just went wireless! this is quite a vanguard step to take, and i hope that we see the fruits of such increased access soon. surely this should mean no delay on getting new music from the kids in roxbury. good going, t (and associates).

finally, speaking of sundry, we experienced another meaning of the word this weekend when our apartment complex's washing machine stopped working for a few hours. in a rush to get towels and sheets clean for our guest, becca washed everything by hand and hung it to dry in the sun. it took a while, being so wet (who knew how much the rinse-cycle actually did?). but now nick has clean linens. perhaps he'll share his own jamaican experience through this blog. initial impressions are quite important, and also rather ephemeral. i remember being quite struck during my first visit to jamaica by such things as the ubiquity of gates (on all kinds of houses), the number of stray dogs, the goats on the road, little kids playing cricket, and the food stands on every corner. now all of these things seem so commonplace it's difficult to tease out the qualities that made them so striking. surely, nick will find other things remarkable. i hope he enjoys staying in our loft. i'm sure he'll enjoy jamaica.