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The Goats That Took the Bus

October 11, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Instagram/TriMet.
Two pygmy goats hitched a ride aboard a Portland, Oregon, public bus in August.

I commuted by train and bus for around 20 years and the most interesting things I saw were musicians and fancy shoes. Having read today’s story, I feel indignant: how come I never saw barn animals try to get on board?

Neil Vigdor wrote at the New York Times that such things can happen.

“There was not a moment to spare. The doors to the TriMet bus, which was heading west on Tuesday morning toward downtown Portland, Ore., had started to close when they opened for two stragglers. Neither paid the fare. …

“Not in the case of these two juvenile goats, which transit officials and the police said had escaped from their enclosure and ventured onto a lime green FX2-Division bus.

“Security camera footage chronicled their strange escapade, showing some other passengers doing a double take before … the driver reopened the doors. …

” ‘They don’t have a valid pass,’ the driver playfully told the other passengers as the goats exited the bus.

“The goats belong to a family that lives less than two blocks from the bus stop and are named Billy the Kid and Billy the Goat, Lrae Anderson, who identified himself as the owner, said in an interview on Friday.

“ ‘I couldn’t believe that they actually went across the busy street and tried to get on the bus and all that,’ Mr. Anderson said. …

“Mr. Anderson, 48, a rapper who also goes by the name Copper Loc, said his children — he has four sons — sometimes forget to close the gate of the goats’ enclosure.

“A neighbor brought the goats back to their home the same day, Mr. Anderson said, noting that he had since installed a lock and improved the fencing. Mr. Anderson said the family acquired the goats about three months ago after moving to the property at the suggestion of a friend, who told him they would feed on plentiful blackberries from sticker bushes on the property. …

“Footage of the horned interlopers, which TriMet posted on Wednesday to Instagram, had amassed more than 5.4 million views, according to the transit agency. …

“Not every passenger paid much attention to the escapees, video footage from inside the bus showed.

“ ‘I see the one lady,’ Mr. Anderson said. “She’s sitting there and she’s on her phone and she didn’t even notice the goats on the bus.’ …

“As he was preparing for a rap show in Seattle scheduled for Saturday, Mr. Anderson said the episode had provided musical inspiration.

“ ‘I’ve already started making a song about the goats,’ he said.”

More at the Times, here.

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Eating an Apple Attracts a Crowd

October 10, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Tierney L. Cross/Washington Post.
Carl Endrulat, right, and his girlfriend Jenny Mandl were behind the “Eat an Apple With Me” event in Washington, DC.

October is the time for apple picking most places, but it was a hot day in August when Washington, DC, focused on apples. On that day, a lot of strangers arrived in Malcolm X Park to eat an apple together.

Liam Scott writes at the Washington Post, “Carl Endrulat is a Pink Lady type of guy. The first time he ate one was euphoric. …

“Endrulat’s love of apples reached a new high when about 1,000 people gathered at Meridian Hill Park in Northwest Washington to eat an apple together. Endrulat organized the ‘Eat an Apple With Me’ event with his girlfriend, Jenny Mandl. …

“There’s no deep or hidden meaning in the event, Endrulat said. The wackiness is the point. ‘It’s really an exercise in silly joy,’ said Endrulat, who works as a software engineer for a Defense Department contractor.

“Bringing people together was the goal, too, Mandl said. ‘People yearn for community,’ she said. ‘It doesn’t have to make sense.’ …

“At the park, which is also known as Malcolm X Park, the cascading fountain was flowing, and hundreds of people were bustling around. Temperatures were high. Spirits were higher. Apples were everywhere.

“Red Bull brand ambassadors were on site, passing out free white peach energy drinks. ‘Gotta support the whimsy,’ Bryce Waweru said as he hawked cans.

“Nearby, Rose Dallimore, 26, and her friends wore red papier-mâché apple hats that Dallimore’s mom had made for them.

“ ‘It’s an awesome way to bring people together for something that isn’t super high stakes, which is needed in DC,’ Dallimore said.

“Jack Wilson, 38, came with his two kids, 4-year-old Wilhelmina and 7-year-old Thomas. Wilson said his son asked him why they were eating apples in the park.

“ ‘And the answer was because it’s silly, and it had been a while since we’d done anything silly,’ Wilson said.

“Madison Gee came with a few friends for what she called her ‘impromptu bachelorette party.’ The DC Tutoring and Mentorship Initiative took advantage of the crowd to sign up volunteers. …

“When Endrulat and Mandl first posted the event on Partiful in June, Endrulat didn’t think more than 20 or 30 people would come. But then Mandl reached out to several Partiful employees on LinkedIn. One responded and put the event on the app’s discover page. ‘Then it started blowing up,’ Mandl said.

“The event grew so popular that Endrulat and Mandl had to get a permit from the National Park Service. On Wednesday, the couple met with representatives from D.C. police and the park service to go over final details. …

“At first, Endrulat and Mandl were planning to provide apples to the attendees. Mandl had visions of her car overflowing with the fruit. But they said the National Park Service told them that public health concerns meant they couldn’t offer any fruit that people eat the skin of. Oranges and bananas were okay, the park service said. … So they pivoted to making the event BYOA: Bring Your Own Apple.

“Why apples? Why not? …

“The fruit is also a comedy bit for Endrulat: His Instagram is filled with pictures of him eating apples in front of sites like the Charging Bull in New York’s financial district and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. There’s also one of him eating an apple while running a race.

“It’s really funny to me to have a photo of some notable thing behind me while I’m eating an apple,” Endrulat said.

“At 2 p.m., a collective crunch filled the park as hundreds of people took a bite of their apples at the same time. Juice dripped down their chins, and Endrulat took a selfie.”

Almost as silly as the outhouse races of Minnesota! More at the Post, here.

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Comedians Dealing with Hecklers

October 9, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Ben Martin/Getty Images.
Comedian George Jessel performing at the Tappan Zee Motor Inn in Nyack, New York, in 1966.

When I was small, which was quite a while ago, a close family member had a sad drinking problem. Having had one too many back in the day, he went to hear comedian George Jessel and got thrown out for heckling.

That’s why I was particularly interested in today’s story about how comedians handle hecklers. Nick A. Zaino III wrote about it at the Boston Globe.

“For a stand-up comedian, dealing with a vocal audience is often just part of the job, for better or worse. Sometimes it’s magic, sometimes it ruins the vibe. More recently, audiences have come to expect more interaction thanks to the influx of crowd work videos on social media. Those were already on the rise pre-COVID, but the effect intensified as more people experienced comedy online during lockdown. For working comics, the results have been mixed.

“Stand-ups have very practical reasons for posting a lot of crowd work clips. They’re easy to produce if a comedian is touring or playing out regularly, and they don’t have to ‘burn’ material they want to save for a special or a TV set. ‘They’re posting the stuff to keep people interested,’ says Boston comic Corey Rodrigues. … ‘Some people are better at it than others.’

“But some watching have come away with the impression that a live comedy show is mostly crowd work. ‘A lot of people have never been to a live show,’ adds Rodrigues. …

“ ‘COVID caused people to see a lot of comedy because they were stuck in their houses watching YouTube and all the different social media channels,’ says comedian and Boston Comedy Festival founder Jim McCue, ‘so I think that had an effect on people.’

“And they may be more enthusiastic to talk back and break up the show. As Rodrigues said, some comics handle it better than others. And heckling has always been a part of the live experience, going back at least as far as vaudeville audiences tossing tomatoes at an act they didn’t like. But dealing with the disruptions is a separate skillset from writing material to deliver, and not every comedian is interested in developing that. …

“Says comedian Josh Gondelman … ‘The audience participating in a stand-up set by chiming in and by answering questions or shouting something out is a more prevalent expectation — that’s a feature of comedy, rather than an interruption.’

“McCue has used crowd work in his act for decades. He’s adept at interacting with his audiences, but it’s not his whole act, and sometimes people look down on him for it. …

“Some comedians leaned into their audience interaction and get a label of a ‘crowd work comic.’ Matt Rife took the label personally and signed off his first Netflix special, ‘Natural Selection,’ with a message about believing in himself after 12 years of stand-up, and then a mic drop with the words, ‘But what do I know? I only do crowd work, right?’

“But not every comedian who does it has gotten flack for it. Paula Poundstone is a master of crowd work, stashing away details about different audience members and weaving them together as the show goes on. Todd Barry released The Crowd Work Tour special, for which he came onstage with no prepared material, in 2014 — way before social media made it trendy. …

“If a comedian is having a bad set, or they’re not a very polished act yet, that opens them up to problems. If a comic is doing well, and someone still tries to draw attention to themselves, the rest of the crowd might even drown them out without the comedian even having to step in. ‘Most of the people in that room showed up to laugh and have a great time,’ says Rodrigues. ‘So if you are providing that, that’s what they want.’

“Kelly MacFarland has noticed the effect of social media on audience behavior, but she has more than two decades of stand-up experience to fall back on. ‘There’s definitely a shift in the way that you’ve got to hit hard and fast,’ she says. ‘Audiences are used to instant gratification with their phone, iPad, computer, streaming services. I feel like I’m teaching them what to expect, and to trust me they’re going to like it. For the record, I always love the audience. Quiet, wild, loud, or sweet. Without them, there’s no show. You have to adapt and stay true to yourself.’ ”

More at the Globe, here.

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Art and Nature Photos

October 8, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photos: John and Suzanne’s Mom.
Providence’s Seekonk River in early October.

I’ve been enjoying the changing seasons so much lately, I often forget to take a picture of what I see. I’m just walking along and thinking, “How wonderful!”

Nevertheless, I have a few nature scenes for you today, and art pieces from a fascinating mosaic show by Cynthia Fisher at Umbrella Arts.

The first shot below is from a tree I pass when taking walks in New Shoreham. My app calls it a Chinese chestnut.

Next is an exotic-looking fungus said to be edible. It’s a Black-staining polybore on a red oak stump. I didn’t take a bite!

Kristina gave me a sweet-smelling lavender wand, an example of a French folk tradition involving sticks of lavender woven with ribbon. I had never seen one.

The first of Fisher’s mosaics here honors the American “tapestry,” the rainbow of skin colors (and personalities and traditions and cultures) that shows the best of us. Next we see Fisher’s modern version of ancient art, including cave paintings and figures from pyramids. The lovely blue mosaic drew me in but turned out to be a harsh commentary on what we have allowed plastics to do to our waterways. It’s called “PFAS,” pollutants you may know as “forever chemicals.”

Last is the stream by the Nashoba Bakery in Concord, Massachusetts, a favorite spot to eat a sandwich or pastry. The water is very low, reflecting the drought this year.

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The Vanishing Sea Star

October 7, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Jennifer Adler.
Three-year-old sunflower stars explore the kelp forest for the first time. They come in a rainbow of colors but are all the same species.

The kind of starfish or sea star I recall seeing as a child on Fire Island is the echinaster serpentarius, I remember how after a big storm they would wash up on the shore by the thousands. We children in our ignorance would collect handfuls and dry them out at home. We imagined there were plenty more in the sea.

Now we know that sea stars — and their habitat — are in grave danger. Today’s article explains more,

John Ryan writes at National Public Radio, “On a spring morning so blustery that the National Weather Service issued a small craft advisory, a Samish Indian Nation research boat, called the Chinook (Yómech), set out from Anacortes, Washington, just east of the San Juan Islands.

“A team of divers crammed into the cabin as the small craft bounced and slammed across Rosario Strait. They were on their way to pick up precious cargo: 20 endangered sunflower stars, raised by hand in a lab at Friday Harbor on San Juan Island.

“Sunflower stars are one of the Pacific Ocean’s most endangered sea creatures. For the past year, University of Washington researchers have worked closely with the Samish Indian Nation to bring this 24-armed creature back from the brink of extinction after a vast underwater pandemic nearly wiped it out.

“The choppy waters of Rosario Strait were only the latest obstacle in the tribe’s effort to bring sunflower stars back to traditional Samish territory.

” ‘I’ve had dreams about this day. I’ve had nightmares about this day,’ said Samish Nation biologist Sam Strauss. ‘Many things have already gone wrong that I didn’t anticipate, and I’m sure there will be a couple more.’

“The stars were supposed to be turned loose [October 2025]. Then divers found the deadly sea-star wasting disease — the cause of the species’ near-annihilation — surging throughout the San Juans. They called off the release. Six months later, it was back on.

“Sunflower stars can grow more than 3 feet wide and are the fastest of all sea stars. They cruise the seabed at up to 5 feet per minute in search of sea urchins or sea cucumbers to grab for a meal.

“They’re considered a keystone species, whose presence or absence can reshape a whole ecosystem. But the speedy predators have been unable to outrun a wasting disease that’s killed billions of sea stars. It took researchers a decade to pinpoint the Vibrio bacteria behind the disease that dissolved sea stars into goo. Researchers say ocean heat waves, amplified by climate change, helped the bacteria grow.

” ‘We definitely have lost a lot of sea stars,’ University of Washington research scientist Jason Hodin said. “We’ve lost 90% of our sunflower stars, we think.’

“Hodin runs the sea star lab at the university’s Friday Harbor Laboratories. ‘This was a really, really big outbreak,’ Hodin. “It spread from northern Mexico all the way to Alaska, affecting dozens and dozens of sea star species.’ No species was harder hit than the sunflower star.

“International scientists declared the once-common species critically endangered. …

“Inside the sea star lab, tanks of filtered seawater harbor hundreds of sunflower stars, from microscopic larvae up to adults as big as stop signs.

“The researchers have figured out by trial and error how to breed these little-studied animals. They’ve also cured some of them when wasting disease got into the lab. …

“Sunflower stars were never a big part of Samish culture, unlike salmon. … But the stars have played a supporting role in Samish culture by protecting kelp. Many kelp forests on the West Coast have been stripped bare by sea urchins. Sunflower stars prey on urchins, which protects kelp. …

“A dozen labs up and down the West Coast are currently raising sunflower stars, with small releases planned later this year in California and Oregon. It is unlikely biologists will ever raise anything close to the 5 billion sunflower stars lost to wasting disease.

“But they hope to raise enough of them to point the species, and kelp forests, toward recovery.

More details at NPR, here. No paywall.

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World Record for Toppling Dominoes

October 6, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: http://www.Techenlog.com.
A US domino team’s triumphant pyramid.

As you may have noticed, I love sharing anything offbeat or unusual. I love having interesting things to think about. It might be a story on an unusual job. It might be an exceptionally beautiful place. It might be an offbeat hobby reaching for a record.

Munis Raza wrote just what I mean at Interesting Engineering.

“A team of ten domino artists has set a new Guinness World Record for the most dominoes toppled in a three-dimensional pyramid, bringing down 29,193 tiles in a single chain reaction at a gym in Garden City, Michigan, on June 20.

“Guinness World Records has officially certified the achievement, which was set by the FALLDOWN Domino Team led by Steven Price of Sprice Machines as part of a larger installation that incorporated no fewer than 123,456 dominoes in total.

“The feat, documented in a YouTube video titled “123,456 Dominoes SUPERSIZED — FALLDOWN 2026,” has attracted widespread attention online for the scale and precision of its construction. [Price] holds a mechanical engineering degree, a background that is evident in the structural ambition of this project.

“The three-dimensional pyramid that forms the centerpiece of the record sits on a base of 35 by 35 dominoes and rises in layers to a pointed apex. Constructing a 3D pyramid of this scale requires a level of precision that flat domino runs do not — every tile must be positioned accurately while the structure beneath it remains stable, and a single mistimed touch anywhere in the grid can bring the entire build crashing down prematurely.

“The FALLDOWN team, which includes Michael Fantauzzo, Matt VanVleck, Gabe Dean, Alex Koops, Derek Koops, Stephan Burton, Brady Dolan, Evan Voeltner, and Aaron Bimrah alongside Price, spent multiple days installing the complete setup.

“The pyramid was not the only engineering feat in the room. The team built a themed installation around 123,456 dominoes arranged into giant versions of ordinary objects — enormous paperclips, oversized friendship bracelets, massive bonsai trees, school supplies and a rubber duck that appears mid-sequence. Watch the video here.

“These elements fed into a series of Rube Goldberg-style chain reactions that snaked through the entire installation before converging on the pyramid, making the final topple a product of everything that came before it.

“The team had originally planned to use a special mechanical trigger to bring the pyramid down. Guinness World Records rejected the approach: to qualify for an official record, the entire chain must begin with a conventional domino touching the next in sequence, with no external mechanism initiating the fall. The team revised their plans accordingly, and the record-setting run began exactly as the rules required.

“The FALLDOWN record is Steven Price’s fifth Guinness certification in domino-related categories. … His YouTube channel, Sprice Machines, includes videos with over 30 million views, with the Lemonade Machine — a chain reaction that travels through an entire house to serve lemonade — among the most-watched.”

Imagine getting back up after the pyramid crashed and starting all over! That’s commitment. More at Interesting Engineering via Yahoo, here.

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At-Risk Youths Meet Nature

October 5, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Shandra Back.
Danny Chaparro at Bayer farm in Santa Rosa, California’s Roseland neighborhood where he hosts outdoor activities for young people through LandPaths.

A California organization is doing some great work with young people drawn to gangs.

Shandra Back writes at the Guardian about LandPaths, which “takes at-risk youth out of their concrete, urban environments and into the natural one, offering many their first encounters with the land.” She begins with one of the participants.

“Alejandro Elizarraraz stands in the middle of a grassy field with a saw in his hands. On a hillside overlooking the lush forests of northern California, the 18-year-old cuts back brush and branches as a way to help prevent wildfires.

“ ‘We’re going to give the tree a high fade cuz it’s 10 feet,’ he said, grinning. …

“Wiping rain and sweat from his brow, he leans into the last branch, hears a crack, and lets out a whoop as it falls to the ground. His black Nike Air Force squelch through mud as he carries the pieces to a large pile, which will later be burned to eliminate fuel for future wildfires.

“He grew up in the northern California city of Santa Rosa, nearly 60 miles north of San Francisco. While the surrounding region is best known as a destination for wine, redwoods and rugged coastline, the city also has high levels of gang activity.

“The city has also been touted for its innovative youth violence prevention work. Now, it’s pioneering a new strategy: outdoor youth violence‑prevention programs that use the natural beauty of the region as a way to mitigate gun violence.

“Working with the city, LandPaths, an environmental conservancy non-profit, takes at-risk youth out of their concrete, urban environments and into the natural one, where they hike, camp and explore the natural wonders of Sonoma county, offering many of them their first encounters with the land. …

Elizarraraz pulls back the hood of his poncho for a better view of the mist-filled hills. ‘Like, damn,’ he said. ‘I feel amazed when I see all of this.

“Ocean Song/Meyers preserve, the coastal prairie and oak woodland where LandPaths hosts some of its programming, is only a 45‑minute drive from the neighborhood Elizarraraz grew up in. But the high schooler, who started in the program last year, says he had never spent time outdoors before he started working with the group.

“ ‘I never had a personal connection with nature,’ he said. Most Saturdays he would stay inside and watch TV. Now, things are different. …

“Like many teens who come through LandPaths’s violence prevention program, Danny Chaparro grew up in Roseland, a predominantly Latino neighborhood in Santa Rosa with a long history of gang violence. For more than a decade he has worked in youth violence prevention, showing young people that a kid from Roseland who looks like them can grow up to lead a prosperous life. …

“As LandPaths’s new audiences manager, he oversees programs that bring underserved communities out into nature. Chaparro always knew he wanted to uplift the community he came from, but never imagined his job would be bringing at-risk youth into outdoor spaces he himself never explored. …

“ ‘If you look around,’ he said of Roseland, ‘everywhere that you see, there isn’t a mountain view in your sight.’

“But since the violence prevention program was created early last year, he’s already seeing the effects of connecting teens with the natural world. …

“During his work at other organizations, Chaparro said many young people would walk into the building, sit down and stay put the whole time. But LandPaths, he says, brings out a different side of them. ‘I’ve seen some of those same youths now through my time at LandPaths show up to a preserve and start running and climbing a tree and just being a kid.’ …

“Some of the students who came to LandPaths were so enthusiastic that after graduating from the program, Chaparro hired them for another initiative that teaches environmental stewardship skills. One of them was Elizarraraz. The Young Stewards program is a part-time outdoor program that has teens work on trail building, habitat restoration and land-stewardship projects in Sonoma county.

“Out of more than two dozen Saturday sessions, Elizarraraz has never missed a day. The consistency matters because Chaparro knows the struggles many young Latino kids are navigating outside these programs: the lack of a stable income, the influence of gangs, a parent who’s always working, easy access to guns. …

“Chaparro recalled a night-time walk when the students were getting rowdy and messing around. So he set them to a challenge: two minutes, no talking, just staring up at the stars. As the students settled in, staring up at the open sky, two minutes passed, then three, four, five. Chaparro stopped the timer and let the silence expand.

“Later, in a reflection circle, he asked them why they let the time stretch longer than the challenge. Many told him that ‘they’ve never felt that much peace.’ “

More at the Guardian, here.

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Community Buy-In Slashed Traffic Deaths

October 4, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Cameron Pugh/Christian Science Monitor.
A sign marks an upcoming raised crosswalk near Union Square in Somerville, Massachusetts, Aug. 4, 2026. Raised crosswalks have been a critical part of the city’s efforts to slow down traffic.

Everywhere I turn, I see another story about how people pulling together is key for success. Today’s example shows that the effort to put a stop to traffic deaths in a Massachusetts city mainly succeeded because the community accepted some changes and inconveniences.

At the Christian Science Monitor recently, Cameron Pugh talked to residents of Somerville.

“Alessandra Seiter avoids driving. She doesn’t enjoy it, and concedes to not being very good at it. Seiter rides her bike to her job as a librarian at Harvard University’s Kennedy School, and walks everywhere else.

“That isn’t a risky lifestyle for Seiter to lead in Somerville. This densely populated Boston suburb has recently been on a streak: It’s gone three years without a traffic death, making it a prime example of what can go right in road safety.

“ ‘I’m not surprised to see Somerville really stand out as a traffic safety leader,’ says Leah Shahum, founder and executive director of the Vision Zero Network, a national nonprofit that works to eliminate traffic deaths. ‘They’ve had really consistent and strong leadership.’ …

“American streets remain hazardous. Some 36,640 people died on the road in 2025, according to government data. … Few places have had more success bucking those trends than Somerville. For roughly a decade, officials in this city of 81,000 people have focused on reducing car speeds, both by lowering limits and improving infrastructure. And it’s done so, proponents say, with a commitment to community engagement and working with volunteer residents to flag safety problems. ….

In 2017, Somerville – following in the footsteps of neighboring Boston and Cambridge – committed to ‘Vision Zero,’ an international road safety initiative holding that smartly designed infrastructure can prevent all traffic deaths. The idea started in Sweden in 1997 and has since spread around the world. More than 70 other U.S. cities, including Savannah, Georgia; New York; and Portland, Oregon, have made a Vision Zero commitment, according to Vision Zero Network.

“ ‘We as humans do not have to accept the status quo that people lose their lives on the street,’ says Brad Rawson, who has worked as Somerville’s chief transportation official for more than a decade.

“Yet the city was eyeing safer streets even before Vision Zero. In 2006, a Massachusetts Highway Department report found the city had the most accident-prone intersection in the state. In 2016, Somerville lowered speed limits on most roads from 30 mph to 25 mph, taking advantage of a recently passed state law allowing lower speed limits in certain areas. Since then, the city has created more than 500 ‘safety zones’ where the speed limit is 20 mph, according to a report by LiveableStreets.

“Vision Zero, though, is about more than legal limits. Road infrastructure, proponents say, must encourage lower speeds – and accommodate human error. To that end, Somerville has made hundreds of changes to create what Mr. Rawson calls ‘physical traffic calming.’ …

“Of those features, the speed hump has reigned supreme. Since 2019, the city has installed 139 of them. (Drivers can comfortably ride over these gradual mounds of raised road at about 15 mph – faster than they can traverse the steeper and taller speed bumps.) …

“ ‘Speed humps work. They really work,’ says Peter Furth, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Northeastern University.

“Data backs that up. On Laurel Street, a short residential thoroughfare, speeds fell from between 25 to 30 mph to less than 20 mph after speed humps were added. The number of vehicles hitting pedestrians has dropped citywide for years: Somerville reported 26 such collisions in 2025, compared to 40 in 2013. Fewer cyclists are being hit, too: falling from more than 60 in 2013 to 36 last year.

“Other traffic-calming features included raised crosswalks, which can lower vehicle speeds and reduce the risk of someone getting hit by 45%, according to the Federal Highway Administration. Curb extensions – where curbs at intersections protrude into the street to shorten crosswalks – have also proven popular in Somerville.

“Other cities have seen success using similar tools. Hoboken, New Jersey, just over the river from New York City, has gone nine years without a traffic fatality.”

More at the Monitor, here.

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A Peaceful Part of Africa

October 3, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Aïcha Fall.
Artist Nuits Balnéaires in the courtyard of his studio in Grand Bassam, Côte d’Ivoire, Africa.

To maintain a reasonably accurate view of the world, sometimes we have to remind ourselves that no particular person is exactly like another even if two people may share things in common. The same is true of places. Do we picture parts of Africa overrun with Boko Haram terrorists? Well, what about the parts full of peaceful artists? They exist, too.

Eromo Egbejule wrote recently at the Guardian, “By the poolside of La Fourchette de Rōze hotel in Grand Bassam, a Côte d’Ivoire city sandwiched between the Ébrié lagoon and the Atlantic Ocean, a birthday party was in progress. On the second-floor gallery, the artist Nuits Balnéaires stood by a huge painting in one corner and looked out through the window towards the billowing waves of the Atlantic Ocean.

“ ‘It’s poetic … that immense energy of the ocean, which also fuels my work,’ the Ivorian visual artist said. ‘The natural elements are the very essence and foundation of my artistic practice,’ he added. …

“Many families in Abidjan, the commercial capital of the west African country, have often drifted to Grand Bassam, just 30 miles (45km) to the east, for Sunday relaxation, including Nuits Balnéaires, whose visits from childhood gave him a strong connection to the city. In July 2019 he moved there permanently from his family home in Abidjan.

“In the last decade, it has become a road well travelled. As rents continue to rise amid a cost of living crisis in Abidjan, residents there, especially artists, have been reconsidering their lives in the city.

“ ‘It [is] increasingly difficult for many artists to maintain studio spaces in the city,’ said the Abidjan-based art collector Ozong Agborsangaya-Fiteu. ‘As a result, they are seeking more affordable alternatives in places such as Grand Bassam, Bingerville, and increasingly even farther afield.’ …

“The biggest beneficiary of the exodus from Abidjan has undisputedly been Grand Bassam, the country’s first capital where the colonial architecture was listed as a Unesco world heritage site in 2012. With its scenic beachfronts, fresher food, cheaper markets, proximity to the airport and a sense of nostalgia even in the abandoned colonial buildings, the city represents an easier pick than Abidjan, its livelier and more chaotic cousin.

“This, for the Guadeloupe-born artist Elladj Lincy Deloumeaux, makes it ‘a very calm and soothing place that’s conducive to working and finding inspiration.’ Five years ago, he moved from Paris to Abidjan, and then two years ago to Grand Bassam, where he now has a studio and apartment.

“Once a centre of cultural trade and tourism, Grand Bassam lost some of its appeal over the years as Abidjan became more cosmopolitan and opportunities in arts and entertainment increased. A jihadist attack in 2016 that left 19 people dead also punctured the town’s reputation.

“These days, evidence of its renaissance abounds. Last year, the former colonial customs and post office building was reopened after a restoration project as La Maison de l’Art, a contemporary art museum with a sculpture garden and a cafe in the courtyard. At the launch, the culture minister, Françoise Remarck, said the collaboration between the private and public sector to protect local history and shine a spotlight on the country’s modern art was a ‘fresh breath of life’ to the old city. …

“Other organizations in the vicinity are following the same route. La Fourchette de Rōze, a boutique hotel, has become a creative hub: in January 2023, it began an artist-in-residence program that has brought in more than two dozen artists and musicians so far from all over the globe. …

“Across Grand Bassam, dozens of new studios are popping up. … Later this year, the Ivorian-French photographer Aïcha Fall will add another to that number.

“ ‘I grew up in the French countryside and I’ve always loved a place that is calm, said Fall, who moved to Grand Bassam on her return from Paris in 2023, despite an attachment to Abidjan where she had spent her early years. ‘Bassam represents all of that. It offers you time for reverie, unlike Abidjan, which is always effervescent.’ …

“ ‘Rather than weakening the scene, this geographical shift has created a different dynamic,’ Agborsangaya-Fiteu said. ‘Artists benefit from more affordable and inspiring places to work while remaining close enough to the city to participate in exhibitions, openings, and other cultural activities whenever needed.’

“As he sipped his coffee, legs crossed, Nuits Balnéaires agreed, before pointing out that the situation was a bit like having his cake and eating it.”

More at the Guardian, here.

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Finding Cardboard Worth Millions

October 2, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Dan McGowan.
A one-of-one Cooper Flag card believed to be worth millions was won in August at Baseball Cards of Rhode Island.

For card collectors, whether it’s someone hoping for a Babe Ruth baseball card or a rare Pokémon card, there’s a new way to score. In a new market estimated at nearly $8 billion in the US, lucky people are finding what they’re looking for.

Dan McGowan has a story at the Boston Globe about one exciting card acquisition, when the new kind of collecting hit the news.

“His name is Chris Card,” notes McGowen. “Seriously. If you were writing the script for a guy to pull one of the rarest basketball cards in the world — a one-of-one Cooper Flagg autographed card that could be worth millions — you couldn’t come up with a better name.

“And it all happened on a livestream [August 10] in a nondescript card shop in North Kingstown, R.I., that has been around for nearly 40 years, where the old-fashioned business of selling cards has collided with the very new business of broadcasting their unboxing to an audience around the country.

“Card started Rhody Breakers with Soren Ibsen and Chris Louth, two longtime friends he met as a student at the University of Rhode Island, turning a shared obsession with sports cards into a livestreaming business. Three nights a week, they gather at Card’s father’s shop, Baseball Cards of Rhode Island, to rip open boxes in front of an audience of card collectors. Their livestreams typically draw 15 to 30 viewers, most of whom have paid for a specific team and are hoping to land something valuable.

“One of those viewers hit the jackpot. … .

“Card was opening a pack of cards live when he began to realize what he could be holding: a Cooper Flagg Update NBA Debut Patch Autograph Topps card, a one-of-one featuring Flagg’s signature and a patch from his jersey.

“Sports card aficionados knew there was only one like it out there, among other valuable — but not singular — Flagg cards. …

“Flagg, who grew up in Maine, was one of the most highly touted basketball prospects New England has produced in decades. At 19, he became the youngest player in NBA history to score 50 points in a game, and he went on to win Rookie of the Year in April with the Dallas Mavericks.

“ ‘It really is like hitting the lottery,’ Card told me Tuesday afternoon while sitting in the shop with Ibsen, nervously checking his phone while waiting to hear from the winner, who was traveling to Rhode Island from out of state.

“The viewer paid $515 for the Mavericks. … The $515, of course, did not buy the Flagg card. It bought a chance at it.

“That is the basic premise of a modern sports-card ‘break,’ a new frontier of collecting that combines the thrill of opening a pack with the mechanics of a wager. Customers buy a spot — often a particular team — in a box or case of unopened cards. The breakers then open the cards live on camera. If a card featuring that team comes out, it belongs to the customer. If not, the money is gone and the next box awaits.

“For Rhody Breakers, Monday night’s suspense lasted 11 hours. Their typical livestreams run two to four hours, but it kept going long after the Flagg card was pulled as the guys answered questions from a suddenly captivated audience. At one point, more than 400 people were watching simultaneously.

“And because they knew they could be dealing with a card worth millions, they paid for a North Kingstown police detail that remained at the shop throughout the night, making sure nobody did anything suspicious while the card was in their possession. …

“There was another strange wrinkle: the card Card pulled wasn’t actually the Flagg card.

“What emerged from the pack was a redemption card, essentially a placeholder that entitles the winner to receive the actual Flagg card directly from Fanatics, the company that owns Topps. A Fanatics representative flew to Rhode Island and was in the shop before 10 a.m. Tuesday.

More at the Boston Globe, here.

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The Art of Making Dummies

October 1, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Sasha Arutyunova.
Austin Phillips, one of the last full-time professional makers of ventriloquist dummies in America.

Sometimes the unusual careers that one reads about seem to fall out of the blue onto the people.

Not so in the case of the young man making ventriloquist dummies in today’s story. It sounds like he was born to do this work.

Cornelia Channing writes at the New York Times, “In the backroom of a small, cluttered workshop in Portland, Maine, a figure lies facedown on a table. Its head has been cut open, exposing a delicate anatomy of brass rods, hinges and levers.

“It is motionless, as though sleeping. But soon it will turn its head, blink, crack a wry smile and part its lips to speak. Each movement will be directed by an intricate network of hand-soldered mechanisms concealed inside its small, hollow body.

“The figure is a recent creation of Austin Phillips, one of the last full-time professional makers of ventriloquist dummies in America. A craftsman working in a tradition that stretches back to Victorian music halls and vaudeville theaters, Phillips, 33, creates custom figures for performers and collectors while preserving a disappearing art.

“ ‘To some people, these are just puppets,’ Phillips said in a recent interview at his shop. ‘To me, there’s so much to them. It’s sculpture, casting, painting, sewing, mechanics, history, research, performance design — all at once. ‘They are like kinetic art objects.’ …

“Making a dummy begins with the face. Phillips pours resin into a handmade mold and then reinforces the shell with epoxy. Once the casting cures, a hollow skull is ready for eyes, a mouth and internal mechanisms. Phillips then paints the dummy’s features, creating distinct, expressive characters. …

“Phillips’s fascination with puppets began early. When he was 5, his parents took him to a mall where he spotted in a shop window a toy Charlie McCarthy, the monocled dummy made famous by the ventriloquist Edgar Bergen.

“Phillips was transfixed. ‘There was something about it that really drew me in,’ he said. ‘It looked mechanical and yet somehow alive.’

“By 14, he was carving his own figures from wood and building simple machines, obsessed with anything that could be taken apart and fixed, like pinball machines and motorcycles. While studying technical theater at the University of Maine at Farmington, he built dummies in his dorm and began selling them on eBay, which snowballed into a career. …

“To create the interior mechanisms, Phillips hand-solders brass components that will control every blink and smile. Each element is attached, via wires or strings that run through the neck, to a small lever in the puppet’s torso. …

“The puppets vary in complexity. Some have simple designs with just a moving head and mouth, while others are elaborately mechanized with 10 or more finger-operated levers. These can have eyelids that blink and wink, eyebrows that rise and lower, lips that appear to spit, ears that wiggle and legs that kick — all in one figure. …

“Most of his customers are collectors and hobbyists, but a few are professional ventriloquists. He recently repaired a talking-dog apparatus for a performer. Another customer, the comedian and ventriloquist Sophie Becker, has called him from the road for emergency repairs.

“ ‘We changed a string over FaceTime once,’ he said.”

More at the Times, here.

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Poetry Flourishes on Social Media

September 30, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: David M Benett/Getty Images.
Poet Nikita Gill built a following on Instagram.

It’s funny but the poetry slams I’ve written about before — hip-hop-like, shouted performances that showcased new, nontraditional poets — already seem like a stage in literary history. And their significance seems to lie in their emphasis on connecting with audiences, getting “in your face.” No distancing “poet voice” for these folks!

Social media, too, is all about the need for connection, and that is where you’ll find the newest poets building audiences.

Ella Risbridger has some opinions at the Guardian.

“The death of poetry – much anticipated, much prematurely mourned – has been put off again, this time by the Odyssey. Thanks to Christopher Nolan’s film, sales of Homer’s epic rose 1,400% in the weeks around release – and it’s not alone. Poetry collections are once again sailing up the charts: Lucas Jones, Donna Ashworth and Nikita Gill, among others, have all burst forth on to the bestseller lists. …

“Poetry is a genre more often relegated to the adolescent, the academic, or the words inside sentimental birthday cards: either over-emotional or elitist, depending on which poet and which perspective. What it certainly is not is a money-spinner: nobody gets into poetry to make the big bucks. Nobody gets into poetry – not these days, anyway, not since Byron’s day – for the fame or the fortune.

“Poetry is the underdog of publishing and yet this year, according to a recent Guardian article, it is ‘expected to exceed £15m [$20 m] in annual sales for the first time since records began.’ … Even without the bolstering influence of Homer, poetry has been steadily climbing for the last three years, each one the best on record.

“In fact, reports of poetry’s surprising rise have been kicking around for more than a decade: Rupi Kaur’s million-dollar debut, Milk and Honey, set new records in 2014, and continues to sell. US magazine the New Republic named Kaur the ‘writer of the decade.’ And yet she came to stand not so much for great art, as for a kind of synecdoche for what was wrong with art: Kaur became the mockable face of ‘the new poetry.’ …

“A new audience is finding poetry, particularly (though not exclusively) through social media: a new generation of poets, particularly but not exclusively performance poets, have come to prominence through Instagram, TikTok, and other short-form video formats. These writers, while we can quote them on the page, lose something by being written down.

“ ‘At my funeral I’d like there to be sunflowers, a truly inconvenient amount / For I too will have spent a lifetime searching for the light,’ runs a couplet from Harry Baker’s ‘Sunflowers,’ but the poet’s charismatic presence somehow conveys something more of the full power of his meaning.

“Many of these poems, beginning on social media and ending in huge sold-out tours, rely on a connection between speaker and listener: a pause, a stillness, a sustained thread in the chaos of the internet, of singular attention to one poem through to the end.

“This is poetry for the social media age, for sure. But then, what is the Odyssey except social media [meant] to be read out loud; to be told; to be spread; to be shared. …

“It is tempting to think of these bestsellers as a new kind of poetry, but it is in fact a very old one. It is unafraid of emotion, of sentimentality, of faith and love; it is concerned less with the establishment of a brand new voice than with the need to give voice to a collective thought. It is not about originality. (Hence, perhaps, the accusations of self-help; banality; and even plagiarism that have been flung at some of these newly popular poets.) These are poems designed to resonate rather than to disturb. In times of division, these poems are made to connect.

“All writing is about connection, even when it’s not. But the immediacy of the connection between author and reader is somehow easiest in poetry: when it works, there’s a direct shot to the heart, a human-to-human hot-wiring together that compresses time and space to get to the point.

“What social media offers these poets is a new way to gather people round the fire – and, for some, a way to get to be the one speaking at last. If poets can reach their audiences directly, then different poets may be, perhaps, given a chance not just to speak but to be heard: working-class poets, queer poets, poets who don’t fit the … classical canon.”

Read up on “five bestselling poets you should know about” at the Guardian, here. No paywall.

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Chicago’s Block Clubs

September 29, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Chicago Sun-Times/Chicago History Museum.
Block club members at West Van Buren and South Springfield Avenue, Chicago, in 1979.

What a difference a small group of determined individuals can make when they band together!

For example, read what Jewél Jackson reported for WBEZ about people who improved their neighborhood in Chicago by organizing block clubs.

“Helen King sits in her dining room in West Garfield Park. She’s been living in the home for more than 50 years and chuckles at the couch and lampshades covered in plastic.

“ ‘Can you imagine that color if I didn’t have plastic on? All the kids and stuff,’ she asked.

“King raised her children here with her late husband, Harry. She takes pride that her couches are still their original shade of yellow. …

“ ‘Alexa, play Ray Charles,’ she said as she walked over to the kitchen. The music takes her back to summer parties organized by her block club. Neighbors gathered outside for some barbecue and good company. …

“Today, you’ll still see evidence of block clubs in South Side and West Side neighborhoods: colorful signs, often wooden and hand-painted. They might be decorated with flowers and trees, and most tell readers what is allowed or not allowed on the block.

“Block clubs are coalitions of neighbors who volunteer to improve the physical and social conditions of their block. That can range from planting flowers on the parkway to buying abandoned homes in order to increase the neighborhood’s market value. These clubs differ from homeowners associations because they are not legally mandated for residents to participate in or pay fees toward.

“The history of block clubs in Chicago go back to the Great Migration. According to Amanda Seligman, author of Chicago’s Block Clubs: How Neighbors Shape the City, block clubs likely originated in Atlanta. In 1908, Lugenia Burns Hope started the Atlanta Neighborhood Union, where she and a team of mothers worked to bring education and health programs to African American families. It’s often credited as the road map for the Civil Rights Movement and block clubs.

“ ‘[Block clubs] really grew to their mature form in Chicago, especially thanks to the work of the Chicago Urban League,’ said Seligman, who is a professor of history and urban studies at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee.

“During the early 20th century, over 6 million African Americans left the Jim Crow South for Northern cities like Chicago, Detroit and New York. The Chicago Urban League helped to provide financial and community support, including the formation of block clubs.

“ They wanted to … cultivate local leadership skills and to improve the physical environment that African Americans were living in,’ Seligman said. ‘And also to demonstrate to white organizations and leaders in Chicago that Black people would make good neighbors.’ …

“Helen King is a member of the Westside Block Club Association. When the association leader, Talei Thompson, started the block club, he was told to speak with neighbors and elders like King. She moved to Chicago in the 1950s from Jackson, Mississippi. …

WBEZ
“After you moved to Chicago, what happened?

Helen King
 ”I did get a job, and I kept a job until I eventually retired. I got  married, and my husband and I were able to purchase our own home, something that we picked out, and I’m so pleased with it.

WBEZ
“What were block clubs like when you first bought your home? …

King
We’d meet at each other’s home, once a month. We’d have little refreshments, and if we had issues or if we were planning anything, we would just discuss stuff that was important. I kept track of the funds we took up. …

“It starts with a small group, and then it grows. Back in the day, we’d take the kids on trips, and we’d have cookouts for the kids. We didn’t do an awful lot because we paid very little, $5 or something, nothing much. 

“It starts with a small group, and then it grows. Back in the day, we’d take the kids on trips, and we’d have cookouts for the kids. We didn’t do an awful lot because we paid very little, $5 or something, nothing much. But it was just the idea that everybody owned their own home, so they wanted something.

“If one had a problem, then the next had a problem. We worked together. We all needed and wanted the same things. We wanted success, and we wanted our kids to be safe.”

Read more at WBEZ, here.

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Medieval Revivalism

September 28, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: mor Charpentier,
Malo Chapuy’s “Scene of Pilgrimage,” 2025, is an example of one contemporary artist’s love of the medieval.

Here’s an artist who imitates the medieval painters, adding threatening hints about our world’s destiny. Not exactly upbeat, but interesting. His paintings make me wonder if I have missed hidden messages in paintings that were actually created in the Middle Ages.

Wilson Tarbox writes at Artnews, “Medieval art continues to resurface as a foil for the art of subsequent generations. … By the mid-19th century [revivalists] looked to it for inspiration, an egress from the calcified obsequiousness of neoclassicism and the depredations of industrialization.

“The latter had torn up the old social fabric, killed hundreds of thousands during the Napoleonic wars, and displaced millions from the countryside to the cities. Yet what emerged was a radically new interaction between old forms and new ideologies. William Morris, the socialist founder of the Arts and Crafts movement, believed medieval art embodied artisanal brilliance and collaboration. By contrast, Augustus Pugin, a monarchist architect of Westminster Palace, hoped it would usher in ‘a return to the faith and the social structures of the Middle Ages.’

“Malo Chapuy is the latest avatar of medieval revivalism. Born in 1995 in northeastern France, he studied philosophy before turning to art history at the Sorbonne, and then to studio art at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. At art school, Chapuy resisted pressure from his advisor to ‘paint like Rothko,’ gravitating to late 13th- and early 14th-century art. He obsessed over ancient techniques, probing manuals by famous conservationists and counterfeiters. He learned how to not only paint like the Old Masters but also make his surfaces look faded and cracked. For his thesis exhibition in 2022, he produced an illuminated manuscript, several small paintings in egg tempera, and a tapestry of faux stained glass made from Covid-19 face shields.

“Today he paints religious scenes, altarpieces, and early Renaissance-style portraits that look like museum artifacts save for the proliferation of wind turbines, water towers, astronauts, and spaceships. … When we met, he had just returned from Bogota, where his gallery, Mor Charpentier, had organized a solo show of recent work.

“Chapuy isn’t his gallery’s only medieval revivalist. Sacha Cambier de Montravel, a Belgian artist also born in 1995, whose studio is located across the courtyard from Chapuy’s, contributed dark diptychs and triptychs evocative of Hieronymus Bosch to the [Lens, France] ‘Gothiques’ exhibition. … Clearly, there is a movement—a new neogothic revival — to which Chapuy belongs.

“Big tech, after all, has created a new click-based serfdom, as Yanis Varoufakis asserts in Technofeudalism, replacing capitalist markets and profit with platforms and rents. But Chapuy’s skewering of techno-feudalist fantasies shuns the digital in favor of tactile materiality, just as his 19th-century counterparts resisted industrialization. Although he denies any specific political subtext, something is happening underneath the artificially aged surfaces of his work — a new synthesis of past forms and modern ideas that says as much about ambient apocalyptic fears as it does about desires for alternative futures.

“In one of his two paintings of Saint George (2024), the monstrous dragon of legend appears as a serpentine oil pipeline. Black viscera seeps from its flank, pierced by George’s lance, as the saint raises his sword to strike the fatal finishing blow. Here, the potent beauty and storytelling of medieval religious art, used to such great disciplinary effect under feudalism, is reimagined as indistinguishable from the dream of overcoming present ecological and political crises.”

More at ArtNews, here. Strange pictures. No paywall.

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Goofy, Super Fast African Dance

September 27, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Miléquêm Diarassouba.
Biama is a frenetic subgenre of the dance style coupé-décalé, popular on TikTok and in the Ivory Coast.

There’s a joyful kind of dance in East Africa that just makes people want to laugh and join in. According to this article in the Guardian, it’s not unusual for happy dances to emerge in Côte d’Ivoire, but the silly elements added to coupé-décalé, have special appeal to the young.

Eromo Egbejule writes, “The 400-strong crowd, perched on plastic chairs and wooden benches in Abidjan’s Yopougon-Selmer neighbourhood, roared with approval as Sauce Graine twisted and turned on the spot with breathtaking speed and dexterity.

“The dancer, named after the Ivorian palm nut delicacy, was competing in a series of street dance battles set to biama, a frenetic offshoot of coupé-décalé, a type of percussive dance music popular across west Africa that originated in Côte d’Ivoire around the turn of the century.

“A neighborhood square in Yopougon-Selmer had been transformed into a dance arena. … The performers were all under 25, with some as young as five. Audience members, some munching on skewered meat or drinking from beer bottles or plastic cups, periodically joined in as one competitor after another showcased intricate footwork and dramatic chest pops. …

“Says Sauce Graine, a 15-year-old whose real name is Arnold and who began dancing to biama six years ago, ‘Since many people aren’t very familiar with the dance yet, they think it’s just a neighborhood thing. All we have to do is create the dance so that more people can see it and love it.’ …

“Biama has become emblematic of the resurgence of Ivorian pop culture over the past decade. There is some debate over exactly when biama emerged, but it exploded in popularity after the coronavirus pandemic as young people turned to TikTok to post and respond to dance challenges that fused acrobatics with goofiness that pushed bodies to their limits. …

“Says Cédric Kouamé, a music producer and chief archivist at Baoulecore Archive Center in the Angrè district of Abidjan, ‘Like maïmouna, it comes from Yopougon [where] a lot of artists started their career.’

“For decades, this working-class district has dictated the cultural zeitgeist of both Abidjan and Côte d’Ivoire. Stéphane Doukouré, better known as Douk Saga, grew up there before founding coupé-décalé with his Jet 7 crew after returning from Paris in the early 2000s. There, he had made a name for himself in a nightclub frequented by wealthy young partygoers by setting light to thousands of euros.

“Their genre championed the philosophy of sagacité – the shrewdness needed to outwit authority – alongside farotement, the flamboyant display of wealth. …

“The genre was propelled to new heights by Ange Didier Houon, who was born in Yopougon to an icon of the Ivorian sound engineering industry. In his teens, his Lebanese friends gave him the stage name DJ Arafat, after the Palestinian political leader. …

“Over time, he increased the tempo of his music to match the high-energy, acrobatic roukaskas routines devised by his dancers, drawing on traditional Ivorian dance. Their feet shuffling quickly in lêkê – the ubiquitous Ivorian water-resistant plastic sandals – the dancers performing Arafat’s roukaskas continued a long tradition of audience participation in Ivorian popular music. …

“Today, a new generation of artists is vying to be the next megastar of Ivorian pop. Among those hoisting the flag for maïmouna are Didi B, who has gained international recognition, and the more street-famous Himra. The rappers’ rivalry entered a new phase last year when both filled stadiums just weeks apart in different parts of the country.

“Biama remains the more popular of the two subgeres, particularly among children and young people, who proudly call themselves biamaseurs and eagerly accept dance challenges shared across social media. …

“Kouamé argues that dance has always been inseparable form Ivorian music. ‘Since the beginning of Ivorian music, as artists were creating their sounds, they were also thinking of the dance moves,’ he says. …

“Some cultural observers in Côte d’Ivoire dismiss the genre as little more than ‘street music,’ but biamaseurs remain undeterred. ‘People will love us,’ Sauce Graine says. “[They] will spread the word through their social networks. Then it will take off.’ ”

More at the Guardian, here.

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