read the comments

[asakiyume]

It's a general truth of online life that you shouldn't read the comments--it's where the virulent nastiness lives.

Every now and then, that's not true though. After falling in love with the song "Xam Xam," by Cheikh Ibra Fam, I let Youtube take me on a tour of related songs.

It brought me "Gambia," by Sona Jobarteh, a beautiful song written to celebrate 50 years of Gambian independence (in 2015).

I happened to glance at the comments, and--my heart!

I'm a German, 55 years and my husband was a Gambian. He died here in Germany in 2011 (cancer). Today he would have celebrated his 62nd birthday. In 1998 he took me to his country and we spent there two years. This was the most beautiful time in my life. For the first time in my life, I felt like real living – I felt alive like never before. So I want to say "thank you" to my husband again, who showed me a place where my soul could breath. Whenever I feel down, doubting what this life is all about, I go back in my mind and think of those glory days.

And this...

Oh, i can recognise my grandmother at the end of this clip dancing with a group of women's. Thank you sister sona for futuring my granny. This will go down in history. Gambia for ever true.

And this...

I am from Ukraine and this music made me cry. It touches something deep in my heart. I think we missed Africa and we miss it. I play it and dance in the kitchen. I would like the whole world to go out in the streets and dance African dances. As not only live in our brains, but also in our bodies and our hearts.

And this..

From Somalia 🇸🇴 much love ❤️ our brothers & sisters 🇬🇲 beautiful country & beautiful people ❤️

And on and on...

"Am from Uganda ... I am from the Caribbean ... I'm a dutch old (63) man ... I'm latina from Colombia ... Je suis de la Côte d'Ivoire 🇨🇮 ... I'm Argentinian ... I'm a Proud ERITREAN-AFRICAN ... I am from India ... I'm a japanese student ... I'm from Morocco ... I am welsh ... I am from Spain ... I am white African from Mozambique ... I'm Nigerian ... I am peruvian ... I am from Croatia ... I am from Bangladesh .... I am Congolese... Sending love from Ghana ... Greetings and best wishes from Latvia..."

(And several from the United States, too.)

All full of love for the song. Really made me feel like part of one human family.

Comments

[sartorias]

Wow, those are just lovely.

I also see lovely comments for vids aobut helping animalos, and for the Chinese travel blogger I follow. (I think the audiences for these sorts of things are looking for the positive.)

[sovay]

All full of love for the song. Really made me feel like part of one human family.

*hugs*

Those are very good comments.

[genarti]

Oh wow, this is wonderful. Thank you for sharing them. And thank you for sharing the song, too -- that was beautiful! The video and the music both.

[heleninwales]

I usually avoid the comments completely, but it's always a wonderful surprise when they are almost unanimously positive. I'm glad people liked the song and that it spoke to people from such diverse places.

[light_of_summer]

Thank you for sharing these songs and comments!

I found the music pleasant to listen to, and I went and found English translations of the lyrics of each song. I love the positivity of the lyrics and the comments you shared, and the colors and musical instruments and dancing and carving and other creativity shown in the videos! 😊😊😊

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...I hope you are OK with the rest of this comment including some less positive thoughts. (If you prefer, please feel free to stop here!)

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I think I may be somewhat unschooled in appreciating the medium of music videos—I find that I get somewhat distracted by costume and jump-cut scene changes. Something about the contrast between the continuity of the music and the lack of obvious temporal sequence in the visual imagery bothers me. (Does anyone else here experience that?)

After reading the translation of the Gambia song, I found myself sadly longing to feel as positive about my own country, the USA.

I also found myself feeling curious about the country of Gambia (which I know basically nothing about), so I went and looked up where it's located and read some of the Wikipedia article about it. Almost everything I read surprised me. I am still curious to know more, but what I read seemed to show that the people of Gambia have as many problems in & with their country as we do in the USA. So, now I feel wistful about the gap between what we want our countries to be and what we may actually experience, but I don't feel envious of the people of Gambia, in particular, anymore. (And that is a breath of relief—a milder version of the kind of difference that comes when I stop making an experience worse for myself, reducing unnecessary 'suffering' to simpler and more manageable 'pain.')

Back to a positive frame of mind—I feel thankful for human creativity, in its many beautiful forms, and for the senses to appreciate them, and for everything that helps us learn what creative people make in places that are not physically nearby!

\🙂/ \🙂/ \🙂/ \🙂/

Thanks, again!

[smokingboot]

So lovely! Thank you for this share.

[athenais]

What good music. I know very little about Gambia, but now I'm going to look into it more.