Old Girl & Old Loughburian News
Bill Brookman Newsletter No 5 February 2010
Hello from Bill Brookman. I returned home safely from Somaliland in October and then went on to the London Somali Festival making links with the Somali diaspora and building them into our peace-making efforts. The festival, very ably organised by Ayan Mahamoud (she also organised the Hargeisa book festival), showcased Somali poetry, art and music, and very importantly demonstrated to second-generation Somalis a rich cultural heritage that has nothing to do with the fighting. On the 16th of December 2010 Geediga Nabada launched its first tour in Puntland and the disputed border region between Puntland and Somaliland avoiding two bomb outrages. The tour was a stunning success and a documentary film was made. Geeiga Nabada or "Peace Caravan" is our creation, around 10 paid and 10 volunteer artists who tour the region reinforcing the UN's policy of community safety:- local communities taking responsibility for their own safety and security. www.billbrookman.co.uk/geediga The Bill Brookman Foundation runs this project in conjunction with Kow Media Corporation, the media company operating throughout the Horn of Africa. We are developing radio and television projects promoting peace. I have just returned to the region, mid February 2010, to help form strategic peace initiatives with local, national and international organisations and government ministries. We take on the pirates next! Dates for your diary: On March 6th 2010 I shall be giving a talk about Geediga Nabada and also our plans to support the relief efforts in Haiti at Loughborough Parish Church. We are honoured to be hosting Baroness Caroline Cox of the Hart organisationwho will be talking about her work with child soldiers and other kinds of modern slavery. This will be preceded with a dance performance by members of the 101 Performing Arts Group and will be followed by a party. On 26th February there will be a ‘sixties night' at Newfoundpool Working Men's Club, Beatrice Road, Leicester in aid of relief for Haiti. For more information, write to janet@billbrookman.co.uk
Somali Newsletter No 4, 5th October 09
Along with witnessing a double murder in Nairobi and taking part in a mercifully unsuccessful hyena hunt in the Somaliland desert, Bill Brookman is successfully creating "Geediga Nabada" The Somali Peace Caravan.
This group of around 10 actors, dancers, poets and musicians will tour the Somali territories advancing the peace agenda at a community level. They will drive forward planned and existing initiatives highlighting rape, gang-warfare, crime and other ills affecting Somali society.
The artists have a rich tradition of music, played on the evocative ud, the Arab lute, accompanied by drums and bells. Poetry is second nature and powerful poems addressing the violation of women have been created as well as puppet plays for children.
The first public performance of the company is planned for Tuesday 12th October, 2.30 in a park in Hargeisa, the capital of the, as yet internationally unrecognised, break-away state of Somaliland.
Bill plans to return to the UK on the 15th October to assist in the running of the London Somali festival, 23rd - 31st October and return to the Somali territories in January 2010.
Landline: 01509 554623 mobile: 07894665456 8, Holbein Close, LOUGHBOROUGH Leics, LE11 1PS.
Somali Newsletter No 3
Bill Brookman will tour the breakaway republic of Somaliland, the quasi-autonomous state of Puntland, then Djibouti and Nairobi, Kenya from the 20th - 28th September 2009 to asses the security situation in the Horn of Africa. He was to visit Mogadishu in south-central Somalia. However the situation is too dangerous so that part of the tour has been abandoned. The tour is part of his on-going commitment to the establishment of a professional group of Somali artists, composers and poets who will advance the cause of community safety; combatting violence especially from armed gangs and militias throughout the Somali territories.
He will base the design of this team on his previous creation, Caravane de la Paix, which reached a million Haitians in 2007/8. The team is being assembled now and will rehearse in isolation for three weeks in the comparatively quiet capital of Somaliland, Hargeisa and on safari before beginning its more challenging work in Garowe and other troubled places in Puntland.
It is important that the group does not favour any one clan, and the members will be selected with this in mind. The group will use the magnificent Somali tradition of poetry as well as music and dance as it ventures into negotiation, mediation and alleviation and mitigation of the present difficulties experienced by so many Somalis at a local level.
The group is funded by UN and will advance the UN Community Safety Framework programme aimed at combatting violence by local community organisation and action.
Bill will give a public talk on this project at Loughborough all Saints parish church on Saturday, 6th March 2010 at 7.30. Bill is currently touring Somali territories so please contact me in the first instance if you want to know anything else. More information can be found at www.billbrookman.co.uk/foundation - then present projects - Somalia.
If you know of anyone else who might like to have Bill's news please let me know and I will put them on the list.
Janet Grant
(secretary, Bill Brookman Foundation)
In September 2009 OL Edward Hackett (1st XV Rugby Captain 2002-03) will be swimming the English Channel in aid of Help for Heroes.
Our Just Giving page can be found at www.justgiving.com/chuckleswim and any donations would be greatly received as we work our way towards a £10,000 target.
There will be regular training updates and photos which are more than likely to be eventful and hilarious!! Please do support this challenge www.justgiving.com/chuckleswim
OL and OG at the Smithsonian Institute Washington DC
Beside Mr A Lowings (LGS 1954-62) and Ms Jennifer Olle (LHS 1961- 1969) are: Iraqi Cultural Attaché in Washington: Dr Hadi Al Khalili and wife and Mr Donny George, past Director of the Baghdad Museum.
Mr Lowings later gave a talk at the Library of Congress on the Gold Lyre of Ur 2,550 BC
They were also recently in Peterborough Cathedral and did a varied presentation which was well received. It began with a short background to the project, explaining that the lyre is a playable replica of a 4,500 year old instrument, and then performed some poetry, translated from the original Sumerian texts, accompanied by the lyre, then some dialogue from the same era, culminating with a story entitled "the Death of the Last Lyre Player", which was written by Old Girl Jennifer Sturdy nee Olle, inspired by the deaths of the women who died with the Queen Pu-Abi.
You can also download the latest Lyre of Ur news by clicking here
