l'ascenseur pour le ghetto

amadou + miriam feat manu chao - senegal fast food

freshly back from a driving trip from paris to dakar, i'm re-living the sights and sounds of senegal through this track. and i so ache to go back.

this song by malian amadou + miriam (featuring manu chao and his infectious guitar) recalls our travel: choo-chooing train whistles, gearshifting between french and wolof, soulful harmonica and west african guitar.

watching this makes me feel like that's my family i've left behind. brilliant art direction visually bringing lyrics to life: local joints with western names like 'le paris' cinema or 'manhattan fast food' ('over 2,000 served'!) show how eager senegal's people are to leave their country in search for a better life elsewhere... but where? bamako, mopti, algeria, tunisia, italy - pas de problème - anywhere but here! amadou + miriam respond: 'you may leave but never forget your family, your home'.

yes it's midnite in tokyo. it's 5am in mali. but 'what time is it' in the paradise of a rich country? yes we have health care, education and porcelain toilets. but do we have each other?

almost a lyrical-satirical play on 'stairway to heaven' is 'l'ascenseur pour le ghetto': inevitably, most refugees to rich countries land in the heart of the ghetto. so why leave the sun and the beach for the cold and the hustle? funny, my travel partner alexis theorized a country's gross national product is inversely related to its 'human happiness' product. could he be right?

the video gives us a glimpse. yes a west african life is tough. 'family' means a dozen people in the house, grandparents, grandchildren, but it's also all the more love...

i especially treasure how real the video is - endless fishing boats on the coast, sweet tea served in little glasses, donkeys pulling carts, shell-casting by the roadside... if any of this makes you want to get in a car and drive to africa, pas de problème: call me and i may just join you.

amadou + miriam featuring manu chao - senegal fast food:

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