John Vallis
Bio
Dad, uncle, Traveller, guitarist, academic, conservationist, environmentalist and wastewater engineer by trade.
Stories (11)
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William and me Part 4
William and me – Part 4 There are many other traditions in Malawi that I have heard and read about and find horrific. One is the tradition in many villages in Malawi of child marriages. Five out of 10 girls in Malawi get married before they turn 18. They are subjected to sexual initiation paid for by the community with a sex hyena. This is a man who traverses across villages and is paid to have sex with girls as young as 9 years of age. The older man is meant to cleanse them of childhood dust to prepare them to be adults. “Kusasa fumbi” is common in southern Malawi. The practice leaves behind unwanted pregnancies and HIV infection. This contributes to setting the economy behind as children lose parents to AIDS to remain under the care of elderly grandparents unable to work in the fields. No wonder the scourge is on a never-ending upward climb in these places.
By John Vallis5 years ago in Wander
Tales from Ghana 2
Tales from Ghana No 2 – The surf beaches and Juju. Busua - Western Region. Busua is the best surf beach in Ghana. Watching the locals surf is a delight. They are good and the waves are just right for the intermediate surfers. The town is also a working fishing village with colourful boats and daily catches of different fish and lobsters. Here it is possible to buy a big lobster for 3 or 4 USD straight from the boatman. It is 5 hours from Accra by car. Longer by bus and taxi. If you can afford it, you can opt for the 30-minute Passion Air flight from Accra domestic airport. I will do that next time. The Executive STC coach was cheap and comfortable, with A/C and a Nigerian movie playing at the front about a group of armed men holding some politicians hostage and staff hostage and demanding a ramson for their release or they would kill them one by one. The film ended in the usual army/hostage takers shoot out. The journey was 6 hours so another film cam on, again Nigerian, and I soon realised that it was the same storyline with different actors and a different setting!
By John Vallis5 years ago in Wander
William and me
William and me – Part 3 Most of the older musicians and talented youth in Zimbabwe live in poverty and are unable to find the funds for equipment and recording. Talent smothered at birth and once successful men from a generation or two before united in poverty and inertia, still proud and talented but nothing much to show for it. forgotten heroes no one celebrates.
By John Vallis5 years ago in Humans
William and me - Musical adventures in Africa
Chapter 2 The Railway Inn gig in Winchester, William went back to Reading and was at a crossroads in his life with no job and no income to sustain him or send back to Malawi's starving family. He stayed for the weekend with Shadreck and his wife Tracy in Reading, who were Gospel musicians and leaders in a local African Evangelical Church. Shady worked at a tyre fitting place and his brother Samson, who also lived with them and was a mean guitarist in his own right, worked shifts as a security at Reading FC Madjeski stadium. The Chimanimani line up of 2008 was classic: Tomson Chaulke on drums, Shadrick Mugede on bass, Simwinji Zeko (from Bristol but originally from Zambia) on rhythm and twin lead guitar, Chander (a Zimbabwean who had washed up in Plymouth of all places) on lead vocals and Agatha Pulu (from Bristol but originally from Bulawayo) on backing vocals and dancing. Bristol had a thriving African Music scene (and still had in 2019 pre-Covid), with some city-center events entirely consisting of acts from the African diaspora, with gumboot dance, Zulu jive, Traditional Ethiopian music, hip-hop and rap as the main shows.
By John Vallis5 years ago in Beat
William and me - musical adventures in Africa.
Foreword Malawi is a tiny land in South Central Africa, a locked country wedged between Zambia, Tanzania, and Mozambique. Its residents are 98% subsistence farmers, and it has no natural resources except fertile farmland where tobacco, tea, coffee, maize can be grown, and trees (Mango, Avocado, Baobab, Acacia and Neem). Tobacco is the main cash crop and accounts for the largest income in exports in Malawi. With a global decline in tobacco use, more and more families find themselves without a market for their crops.
By John Vallis5 years ago in Beat
A cure for Covid-19?
When I first arrived in Ghana in September a Ghanaian friend told me not to bother taking malaria tablets because they are harmful to the body long-term, as are all western pharmaceuticals. "They all have side effects and make your body weak so that infections can get in" he said. "if you get malaria then just gather some neem tree leaves and boil them in a big pan and drink the tea". It is better at curing malaria than any of your Western drugs and it does not come back. The malaria goes out in your urine and you will feel strong. "Some very good malaria treatments that you can buy at the pharmacy are based on neem" he said. "That is why you will see cars at the roadside under a neem tree with people gathering leaves". It is true, I have seen that and neem trees are all over Ghana. Some reach a huge size. They are the favourite tree for roadside food stalls, sellers to sit under and taxi drivers to park under and wait for customers, as the foliage is plentiful and they on mature neem trees the leaf bearing branches grow at just the right height and angle to provide a lot of shade just above head height.
By John Vallis5 years ago in Longevity
William and me
Malawi is a tiny land in South Central Africa, locked country wedged between Zambia, Tanzania and Mozambique. Its residents are 98% subsistence farmers, and it has no natural resources except fertile farmland where tobacco, tea, coffee, maize can be grown, and trees (Mango, Avocado, Baobab, Acacia and Neem). Tobacco is the main cash crop and accounts for the largest income in exports in Malawi. With a global decline on the use of tobacco, more and more families are finding themselves without a market for their crop.
By John Vallis5 years ago in Beat
Tales from Ghana
Four young men were riding motorbikes in convoy on a bush road between Togo and Tamale, the capital of the Northern Region, through the large swathes of empty bushland, where it is said that there are wild lions. They had set off from Togo late and were returning home to Tamale but night had fallen suddenly and early, as it does in Equatorial lands. One of the young men overtook the lead rider then drove off ahead out of sight. He had the faster bike. When the guy in second rounded a corner, he saw two faint lights shining, ahead at the side of the road. His friend must have developed a problem with his moto he thought, so he approached, and the twin lights got brighter. He slowed down to peer into the darkness to get a look at the moto and his friend. He drew up close. It was a lion! It jumped on him and dragged him off his seat and then went for the throat kill. He was only wearing a T-shirt and an open face helmet, as the youths do in this country, so it was an easy kill. The lion dragged him off into the bush and began consuming him. He had no chance.
By John Vallis5 years ago in Wander
Tales from Ghana
Four young men were riding motorbikes in convoy on a bush road between Togo and Tamale, the capital of the Northern Region, through the large swathes of empty bushland, where it is said that there are wild lions. They had set off from Togo late and were returning home to Tamale but night had fallen suddenly and early, as it does in Equatorial lands. One of the young men overtook the lead rider then drove off ahead out of site. He had the faster bike. When the guy in second rounded a corner, he saw two faint lights shining, ahead at the side of the road. His friend must have developed a problem with his moto he thought, so he approached, and the twin lights got brighter. He slowed down to peer into the darkness to get a look at the moto and his friend. He drew up close. It was a lion! It jumped on him and dragged him off his seat and then went for the throat kill. He was only wearing a T-shirt and an open face helmet, as the youths do in this country, so it was an easy kill. The lion dragged him off into the bush and began consuming him. He had no chance.
By John Vallis5 years ago in Wander
Larmer Tree Festival - one of England's best kept secrets.
One of England’s best kept secrets, Larmer Tree Festival is the event of the year for me. A great opportunity to meet friends hang out listening to good music, eat delicious food from all over the world and drink great cider and beers. Held at the Larmer Tree Gardens in England, at Tollard Royal in the Cranborne Chase on the Wiltshire / Dorset border. An area of outstanding natural beauty between Salisbury and Blandford Forum. Stonehenge, Glastonbury, Earthwise, Endorse-it-in-Dorset and many other festivals have been held in this small but historically packed area of England, where the affluent and busy South East changes to a lush green land of fields, hedgerows and woodland, undulating low hills and plains with long barrows (Neolithic burial mounds), barrows (bronze age burial mounds), standing stones, thatched cottages and Inns, ancient oak trees and farmland. My own family history has been traced back to nearby Shrewton, a small village where the local Parish churchyard has many Vallis graves. An unusual name with only two or three in any phone directory. There is even a grave for John Vallis, who lived in the late 18h / early 19th century and was a an agricultural labourer, pre-mechanisation. He would have scythed the wheat at harvest time on the open fields of the Salisbury Plain, baled the straw by hand for thatching and no doubt swilled the local scrumpy, a cloudy cider of unknown strength that this corner of England is famous for, made from the plentiful apples from the many orchards in the area. England has over 3000 varieties of apples, some sweet, some only good for cooking and some perfect for making scrumpy.
By John Vallis5 years ago in Wander
