African Flair in the Gomaringen Church

The youth choir Vocal-Freestyle reports on their journey to Africa

"What are you doing here so early? The evening is supposed to start at 7.30 p.m. - it's only  7.40 now. This is not African at all, in Africa all events start 2 - 3 hours late. But now let's have a look if everyone's here, so perhaps we can start a bit earlier then. SabSab!" this is how Dani P. greeted the audience at the beginning of our evening with memories of Tanzania on October 20th.

In our theatre scenes we took the audience along to Africa; from an chilly African night with barking dogs and a Muezzin calling to morning prayers, to a cock crowing to wake everyone up.

We demonstrated what a bus ride on the bumpy roads was like and told them about our concerts, the Mikumi National Park and our  well project. We also told them about our daily meals: rice, potatoes, gristly stew, chicken bones and green vegetables and also about our enthusiastic reaction upon being served fish once and even ice cream! All this was completed by pictures, songs and video clips.

Singing the German national anthem in a church? You don't really do this! But we did! For in Tanzania there is a church song sung to the melody of our national anthem. So, after showing a video clip with this church song, we sang the national anthem in Gomaringen too. Like in Tanzania, where the church visitors were thrilled because we seemed to know the German lyrics of their church song, the reaction of the audience in Gomaringen was laughter because we sang the national anthem in a church.

In order to enhance the African flair, we then put on our made to measure dresses and shirts when singing the song "MFANYENI" which we had rehearsed in Africa. Then we showed the audience that Elisabeth was with us via Skype which made everyone feel that Africa was very close. This feeling was complemented by all the photographs of the animals in the National Park.

The full donation baskets at the end of the concert were proof enough of an successful evening. And it was with great pleasure that we donated the whole amount to Tanzania: half of it for Elisabeth's pharmacy and the other half for the school at Kilimatinde.