back on the road . . .

i'm back on the road now, sitting at my parent's house in the OC, getting a few hours with them and my grandmother. arrived yesterday and leaving tonight for fiji!
it has been a crazy past few day, with JB's party, my party and packing everything up. i must say, i have some great friends. thanks to all of you who helped out, driving me to the airport, giving me thoughtful last minute gifts, and most of all, thank you to all of you who have encouraged me on this crazy journey i'm undertaking. thanks to all of you who called me over the past few days, it has been a wonderful reason to reach out to some old friends and good friends and just have good conversations with many of you. i'm sorry if i was at all not there on the phone, sometimes i was trying to do too many things at once. but your calls all meant a lot to me. my cell phone is getting shut off on friday, so i won't be able to get messages, but my phone number will be activated once i get back to the states in january (if i can battle it all out well with sprint . . .).
my grandmother (the one who had the masectomy) is doing great. she doesn't at all look like she had major surgery not even 2 weeks ago. that she is here, embarking on her own journey of a few weeks in california, is amazing. she's upstairs now doing her daily exercises, and then we're down to the beach to walk around a bit. it's a beautiful day in sunny southern california (if you can get past the smog), and we're going to take advantage of it.
i'm hoping to have regular internet access in fiji, but we'll see! let the fun begin!
peace.
e

party plan change!

ok, so i know it says that my party in on the 12th on friday. but it won't
be.
my friend JB is having a birthday party on friday and i am not stepping on
his big orange toes.
sooo, the party will be on saturday, the 13th.
9 pm onwards
email for directions.
bring a big happy face for big happy times! and music to share, of course.
see you there!
e

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"The arc of history is long, but it bends toward justice"
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

back in the USSA

back in boston for a bit.
made it back on sunday, and didn't even get my customary hassling from the customs guys in boston. which was good cause then i got to see my parents for 5 minutes. they were in boston for the weekend, and headed out on a flight from the same terminal. nice.
and then yesterday back to "work", as i like to call it. i can't believe it. so fun. get to play with music all day and have a great time. whee!
and i had some thoughts to put up here, but i'm forgetting them. anyway, off to get ready for "work."
bis spater.
e

back in the USSA

so i made it back home, and even made it through customs in boston without any hassles. this is a first for me. they always want to give me grief in boston. and thank god they didn't, cause i got out of customs in time to see my parents for 5 minutes. they were in town to see the boston symphony and my sister, and were leaving from the same terminal as me shortly after i arrived. nice.
i got to give them renate's presents and talked with them a bit.
and back to work yesterday. yup, calabash. did i mention that it's my job!?!
great. i will be so psyched once this thing starts paying. so psyched.
i had some great ideas about things to post here, but they're eluding me at this hour. hopefully they'll come back and i'll put up another post today.
bis spater.
e

greifswald

i finally found a hotspot! yeah! adventures of small sorts are fun. i'm sitting now in some old dark pub like restaurant with a hotspot. got to download all my mail onto my computer and send out some contracts from our work at a highly successful WOMEX last week. i've got about 70 new cds to bring back, and we'll soon have another few hundred artists up on CalabashMusic.com

and my grandma is ok, as far as things can be. the 3 lymph nodes they didn't remove, but biopsied are for now cancer free, and she'll probably just have to take medicine daily, but no chemo and no radiation! gott sei dank.

however, i'm trying to hide from the other news from the US, namely that my united states exists no more. some other folks have taken over control, and bent the minds of millions of others. friedman at the times had a great piece today.

i'm going to berlin saturday, home sunday and for all of you in boston, come over to my place on friday night, the 12th, for a little party. if you need directions, email me. pass the word as well. i'm only home for 9 days.

i'm having a good time, playing with my friends kids, walking around scenic little hansa stadt towns, eating great bread and pastries, drinking good beer. good times. and my german is coming back in fits and starts which makes life fun and interesting. i can't do basic things with strangers, but i can carry on some pretty good and deep conversations with my host family, the kirsches.

i even found a group of "african" drummers here in town. pretty simple stuff, but fun nonetheless. and it made renate (my host mom/grandma) super happy, so that was also fun to watch.

hope you are all well, see you soon!
e

hello from germany!

ok, im at womex on the free email machines and the german keyboards dont have an apostrophe in the right place so im just ignoring them. bear with me.
womex is crazy. i havent stopped going since i got to essen on wed eve. tired legs and a tired mind. but good for business.
lots of new records for the site, some new partnerships, and deepening of our existing ones.
and, before i forget - GO RED SOX!!!!
(and someone tell curt shilling that hes got to go since he endorsed bush. thanks for the championship now get the hell out of town)

also, continue to hold my grandmother in your prayers. she has aggressive cancer in a couple lymph nodes. thank you. boppee - i love you!

more later.
e

send thoughts and prayers to buffalo

and to make this trip all the more interesting, my grandmother was diagnosed with cancer last thursday. meaning she's going to have a masectomy this thursday. nothing like finding this stuff out and having your life change in a second. i'm not sure if that's good to have a week to think about a life and body altering surgery or just having it happen right away.
anyway, my sister is going to see my grandmother. i wish i could be there and will be sending my thought and prayers to my grandmother. please send yours as well!
she is an amazing woman, an amazing inspiration and great guide in life. i have faith that she'll make it through this, but it is a very scary proposition nonetheless.
couple sites:
commercial looking foundation
another non-profit

getting ready to go!

fedex finally delivered my plane ticket for my flight tomorrow. i found a door tag today and had to go over to fedex to pick up my ticket. what a pain. but at least i don't have to deal with affidavit's of non-receipt at the airport. that sounds like a total hassle.
in 24 hours i'll be in the air headed to amsterdam. then a train to essen. then the conference. then off to greifswald to visit the kirsch family. then back to boston for a quick stop.
i'm still not packed at all, and have some other stuff to do. it's going to be a long night. good thing terry is around to share late night order in food with.
crazyness abounding. so much to do, it'll be a relief to finally get on the plane.

what am i doing?

no, this is not a post to examine the existential questions about my life. i sent out an email to a bunch of people about this blog, and a couple people asked me what i was going to be doing on my travels. so, here is a quick overview.
i leave soon for my first trip. this one is to germany for WOMEX, a conference for world music folks. this is for Calabash.
then i'm home for about 10 days. (just time to host a party for those of you in boston)
then off to fiji to record this South Pacific World Music Festival. we're going to license and record all the music that gets played there, and check out what other opportunities exist there on those islands for music to distribute.
then pretty much straight to Mali. i'm going for a few reasons. first, to help these guys record a new film. if you haven't seen 1 Giant Leap, you need to.
then i'm going to try and hook up some deals for Calabash and see my friends in Mali and take some dance lessons and remind myself of the rest of the world that is out there beyond our borders.
it should all be lots of fun and new experiences. needless to say, i'm pretty excited about the whole thing. i should be back in the states in january.

fiji baby!

so this is what we're going to record in fiji. can't wait - get that sunscreen ready!
now we just have to get our site back up and running after a server flameout this weekend. not a good thing to have happen right now.