Ivory Coast orchestra offers rural children an escape

Ivory Coast orchestra offers rural children an escape
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Members of the Odienne Philharmonic Orchestra perform during a rehearsal session at the Sara hotel in Odienne on May 21, 2024. (AFP)
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Updated 03 June 2024
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Ivory Coast orchestra offers rural children an escape

Ivory Coast orchestra offers rural children an escape

ODIENNE: In the hubbub of children’s chatter, nine-year-old Leila Coulibaly deftly tunes her violin ahead of a rehearsal by Ivory Coast’s first philharmonic orchestra.
She is among almost 140 children who make up the ensemble based in the rural northern town of Odienne.
They gather as an orchestra once a week but every day some youngsters, aged six to 16, are picked up by minibus and brought to a hotel.
There, they practice for over two hours incorporating traditional instruments like the balafon, a type of xylophone, and djembe drums.
“I want to be a professional musician because the orchestra changed my life,” Leila told AFP.
Hundreds of kilometers (miles) away from the bustling metropolis of Abidjan, Odienne relies heavily on agriculture, sometimes involving child labor.
Poverty and high unemployment make the future uncertain for many young people in Ivory Coast.
The Odienne orchestra is somewhat of a “crazy project” in a region like this, conductor Fabrice Koffi said, laughing.
In temperatures of 35 degrees Celsius (95 degrees Fahrenheit), 15-year-old trombonist Siaka Sy Savane sits behind the shady stalls of a market.
From dawn “Monday to Friday, I come to help my mother at the market. Saturday and Sunday, I go with my big brother to the field,” he said.
“When I sing the music of the orchestra, I don’t feel tired anymore, it motivates me.
“Ever since I was young, I dreamed of being a musician,” he said, adding: “Today, my dream has come true.”
Last August, less than a year after the orchestra was created, the children played for Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara on the anniversary of independence from France in 1960.
Despite playing the odd wrong note, they play with ease Mozart’s “March of the Priests” from “The Magic Flute” or the “Coup du Marteau,” which became a hit during the 2024 Africa Cup of Nations.
The song by musician Tam Sir was performed by the orchestra at the closing ceremony of the football competition, which Ivory Coast won.
“I enjoyed playing in front of all of those people. I was really scared” but “I regained my self-confidence,” violinist Leila said.
The youth development program is inspired by Venezuelan initiative El Sistema, which teaches music to children from disadvantaged backgrounds.
In the West African nation, the orchestra was set up by Minister for Employment and Social Protection Adama Kamara, who is personally funding it.
Koffi has watched over every student since the very first rehearsal.
“We are doing the opposite of what a traditional orchestra does,” he said.
While an ensemble is usually a “gathering of the very best” musicians, the orchestra in Odienne has taught the children the basics, such as music theory and playing techniques.
Teaching is done collectively, “unlike an academy of music” which gives priority to private lessons, trumpet teacher Jean Caleb Kouadio said.

MUSIC AND SCHOOL
The lessons have also been designed with sometimes conservative parents in mind, in a predominantly Muslim region.
“At first, the parents were downright reluctant,” said Abdramane Doucoure, an intermediary between the families and the orchestra.
“Some people used to say that music doesn’t go with Islam,” he said.
Sarata Kante, a trumpeter in her early teens, had to convince her parents to let her play in the orchestra.
“She insisted for several weeks,” her mother Mawa Keita said.
“It wasn’t my ambition, my vision for her,” said her father Ousmane Kante, fearing she would be too distracted.
“School is serious business,” he added.
It is not a question of “taking children out of school” to become musicians, Koffi said.
He, too, had to stand up to his parents when he was younger in order to become a flautist.
“On the contrary, music” offers “the potential to excel at school,” he added.
Sarata’s grades in school have improved and she dreams of becoming a vet.
For viola teacher Deborah Bodo Israel, the orchestra and its achievements continue to amaze. “What’s happening is magic,” she said.


France finds smuggled dinosaur teeth in parcels bound for Italy

France finds smuggled dinosaur teeth in parcels bound for Italy
Updated 15 February 2025
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France finds smuggled dinosaur teeth in parcels bound for Italy

France finds smuggled dinosaur teeth in parcels bound for Italy
  • The teeth, probably from Morocco, were found during a routine check
  • They included the tooth of a long-necked marine reptile called a zarafasaura oceanis, a type of plesiosaurus at least 66 million years old first discovered in Morocco

NICE: French customs officers seized nine dinosaur teeth last month from a courier truck transiting through the country from Spain on its way to Italy, they said on Friday.
The teeth, probably from Morocco, were found during a routine check along a highway running along France’s Mediterranean coastline near the Italian border, customs official Samantha Verduron said.
Using sniffer dogs and opening some parcels at random, inspectors have been known to find cannabis or even cocaine among such truckloads of hundreds of parcels traveling from Spain to Italy, she said.
But on January 27, officials from the French border town of Menton found nine enormous teeth in two parcels that were destined for addresses near the Italian cities of Genoa and Milan, French customs said.
An expert at the Menton prehistory museum helped identify the fossils as probably dating back tens of millions of years and originating from what is now Morocco.
They included the tooth of a long-necked marine reptile called a zarafasaura oceanis, a type of plesiosaurus at least 66 million years old first discovered in Morocco.
Some people believe plesiosauruses, which lived in different parts of the globe, inspired the legend of the Loch Ness monster in Scotland.
Three other teeth would have once belonged to a mosasaurus, an extinct aquatic lizard with a long snout.
The remaining five teeth were thought to belong to a dyrosaurus, an ancestor of the crocodile.
Fossils must be authorized for export and without such a license are usually returned to their country of origin.
An investigation is under way to identify the receivers and decide how to proceed, Verduron said.
In 2020, France returned 25,000 items including fossils, minerals, stones and art objects to Morocco after intercepting them in 2005 and 2006.
Most had been found during illegal excavations.
In 2015, customs officers in the French city of Lyon found part of the skeleton of a tarbosaurus bataar, a land dinosaur that walked on its hind legs, that had been illegally excavated in Mongolia.
Dinosaur remains have become a hot-ticket item in recent years, with paleontologists voicing concern that museums are losing out to private bidders.
A hedge fund CEO last year spent a record $44.6 million to buy a stegosaurus fossil at a New York auction.
Dinosaurs first appeared at least 230 million years ago, while the first humans are believed to have appeared on Earth only around six million years ago.


Spanish tourist hotspot Malaga to ban horse-drawn carriages

Spanish tourist hotspot Malaga to ban horse-drawn carriages
Updated 15 February 2025
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Spanish tourist hotspot Malaga to ban horse-drawn carriages

Spanish tourist hotspot Malaga to ban horse-drawn carriages

MALAGA: A pair of tourists admire the shimmering Mediterranean from their horse-drawn carriage on the seaside promenade in Spain’s southern port of Malaga — a postcard image whose days are numbered.
The city wants to ban horse-drawn carriages from its streets this year to protect the animals after years of criticism of the trade.
The decision to follow in the footsteps of other tourist hotspots such as Rome and Chicago dismayed visitors including Anastasia, a chef who had traveled from Britain.
“It’s really nice, I was impressed — seeing Malaga like this is completely different,” said the 47-year-old as she dismounted from a carriage.
Fellow British tourist Robert agreed, expressing his wonder at his “amazing” trip with a “beautiful” horse.
“I am sure it helps the city attract more tourists,” added the 46-year-old business owner.
Animal rights activists criticize horse-drawn carriages for tourists because of the strain they put on the animals, especially during the searing summer heat.
Summer temperatures in Malaga can soar to 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit), said Concordia Marquez, founder of a nearby shelter called “Todos los Caballos del Mundo” (All the Horses in the World).
“Horses and horse-drawn carriages have to cover a lot of ground, both to get to where they spend the night, where they sleep, and to get back to their place of work,” added Marquez.
“That’s inhumane to make a horse work like that.”
Malaga city hall had announced in 2015 that it aimed to ban horse-drawn carriages from its streets by 2035, but it now wants to bring the ban forward to this year.
Officials are in talks with the holders of the last 25 licenses to reach an agreement.
“We have been negotiating for a long time, we have met 99 percent of the demands of carriage owners,” Malaga’s city councillor for mobility, Maria Trinidad Hernandez, told AFP.
“What we are looking for is animal welfare, but it is also the case that they used to have more places to circulate,” she added.
“With the building works that have gone on for the last 20 years, there is hardly any left. There is the park and a little bit of the promenade left.”
Horse-drawn carriages will not totally disappear — they will still be allowed as part of festivals and traditions like Malaga’s annual fair in August.
“What there won’t be are municipal licenses, the tourist horse-drawn carriage, the one you take and pay for as if it were a street taxi,” said Hernandez.


A humpback whale briefly swallows kayaker in Chilean Patagonia — and it’s all captured on camera

A humpback whale briefly swallows kayaker in Chilean Patagonia — and it’s all captured on camera
Updated 15 February 2025
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A humpback whale briefly swallows kayaker in Chilean Patagonia — and it’s all captured on camera

A humpback whale briefly swallows kayaker in Chilean Patagonia — and it’s all captured on camera
  • While whale attacks on humans are extremely rare in Chilean waters, whale deaths from collisions with cargo ships have increased in recent years

PUNTA ARENAS, Chile: A humpback whale briefly swallowed a kayaker off Chilean Patagonia before quickly releasing him unharmed. The incident, caught on camera, quickly went viral.
Last Saturday, Adrián Simancas was kayaking with his father, Dell, in Bahía El Águila near the San Isidro Lighthouse in the Strait of Magellan when a humpback whale surfaced, engulfing Adrián and his yellow kayak for a few seconds before letting him go.
Dell, just meters (yards) away, captured the moment on video while encouraging his son to stay calm.
“Stay calm, stay calm,” he can be heard saying after his son was released from the whale’s mouth.
“I thought I was dead,” Adrián told The Associated Press. “I thought it had eaten me, that it had swallowed me.”

He described the “terror” of those few seconds and explained that his real fear set in only after resurfacing, fearing that the huge animal would hurt his father or that he would perish in the frigid waters.
Despite the terrifying experience, Dell remained focused, filming and reassuring his son while grappling with his own worry.
“When I came up and started floating, I was scared that something might happen to my father too, that we wouldn’t reach the shore in time, or that I would get hypothermia,” Adrián said.
After a few seconds in the water, Adrián managed to reach his father’s kayak and was quickly assisted. Despite the scare, both returned to shore uninjured.
Located about 1,600 miles (3,000 kilometers) south of Santiago, Chile’s capital, the Strait of Magellan is a major tourist attraction in the Chilean Patagonia, known for adventure activities.
Its frigid waters pose a challenge for sailors, swimmers and explorers who attempt to cross it in different ways.
Although it’s summer in the Southern Hemisphere, temperatures in the region remain cool, with minimums dropping to 39 degrees Fahrenheit (4 degrees Celsius) and highs rarely exceeding 68 degrees Fahrenheit (20 degrees Celsius.)
While whale attacks on humans are extremely rare in Chilean waters, whale deaths from collisions with cargo ships have increased in recent years, and strandings have become a recurring issue in the last decade.
 


Ukranians mark Valentine's Day with tears

Ukranians mark Valentine's Day with tears
Updated 15 February 2025
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Ukranians mark Valentine's Day with tears

Ukranians mark Valentine's Day with tears
  • "I gave this book to him as a wedding anniversary present. A month later, he was gone," Natalia said through her tears as she gazed at the tombstone
  • Vassyl was a writer, a lover of literature. As he did not have time to enjoy her latest present, Natalia brought it with her to the cemetery, "to read it to him"

LVIV: All Natalia has for Valentine's Day is the grave of her husband, Vassyl, a Ukrainian soldier killed at the front and now buried in the western city of Lviv.
That and a purple book of poems she clutches tightly in her hands.
"I gave this book to him as a wedding anniversary present. A month later, he was gone," Natalia said through her tears as she gazed at the tombstone.
Natalia and Vassyl spent 21 years of their lives together. They had three children, the youngest of whom is just six.
Vassyl was a writer, a lover of literature. As he did not have time to enjoy her latest present, Natalia brought it with her to the cemetery, "to read it to him".
Swaddled in a black puffer jacket, her eyes red with emotion, Natalia recited "So no one has loved," a poem she had learned by heart.
Between the pages of the poetry book she had slipped the dried petals of a yellow rose, the same colour as the roses on Vassyl's grave.
Natalia was not the only soldier's widow at the cemetery in western Ukraine on Friday, where the tombstones were decorated with red heart-shaped balloons, cuddly toys and the yellow and blue national flag.
Maria lost her husband, Andrey, on Christmas Eve last year.
They had never celebrated Valentine's Day, she said, calling it "just a marketing ploy".
"But I don't know. Today I wanted to come," she said.
"It's all very painful. And unfair, really," she added. "Instead of having a good, beautiful life, like we had before this war, now you only have a grave in the cemetery and that's it."
Another widow, also called Natalia, was busy pinning a little heart to the flowers on the grave of her spouse, who was killed when a drone hit his car.
"I can't get used to the fact that he is no more, that I will never hear him again, never see him again," she said.
"My husband loved me very much. He always called me constantly. He loved me. He would have congratulated me today too, if he were alive."
On the other side of the country in Kramatorsk, at the heart of the fighting in the eastern region of Donetsk, 30-year-old combat medic Yaroslav was preparing Thursday to spend a third Valentine's Day in a row without his wife.
Despite the distance, he has resolved to keep the faith. "Let it be a holiday. That's it. War is war. there will always be hard times," he said.
He showed AFP the goodies in his khaki bag -- macaroons oozing with chocolate sent to him by his spouse, who knew they were his favourite treat.
He and his comrades had sent back flowers and sweets by post or courier.
Yaroslav has not seen his wife for three months, and would probably have to wait another three.
"I feel sad to leave her. It is sad to come back here," he said quietly, lowering his bright blue eyes.
If they had been together on Valentine's Day, "I think we wouldn't talk. We would just be hugging."
A little way off, Olga Volodiuk, a florist, waited for the lovers who did not turn up.
"The market is empty," Volodiuk said, wrapping herself tightly in her pink puffer jacket.
She blamed the increasing attacks on Kramatorsk, a major army base near one of the few remaining cities in the east under Ukrainian control.
The shops were full of cuddly bears and coloured decorations for Valentine's Day but this year there were fewer customers, Volodiuk said.
"There were explosions today," she said. "There is no line to buy bread so to buy flowers, even less so."


First astronaut with a disability cleared for space station mission

First astronaut with a disability cleared for space station mission
Updated 14 February 2025
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First astronaut with a disability cleared for space station mission

First astronaut with a disability cleared for space station mission
  • The first-ever astronaut with a physical disability has been cleared for a mission onboard the International Space Station, the European Space Agency announced on Friday

PARIS:The first-ever astronaut with a physical disability has been cleared for a mission onboard the International Space Station, the European Space Agency announced on Friday.
John McFall, a 43-year-old British surgeon and former Paralympian who lost a leg in a motorbike accident when he was 19, said he was “hugely proud” of clearing the hurdle.
Since announcing McFall as a member of its astronaut reserve in 2022, the European Space Agency (ESA) has been assessing the feasibility of someone with a prosthesis becoming a crew member on a space mission.
On Friday, the ESA announced that McFall had received medical clearance for a long-duration mission onboard the International Space Station (ISS).
McFall emphasized that he was “relatively passive” in the process, and just had to be medically healthy and carry out the required tasks.
“This is way bigger than me — this is a cultural shift,” he told an online press conference.
There is no date yet for when McFall will get his chance to become what the ESA has dubbed the first “parastronaut.”
“Now he’s an astronaut like everybody else who wants to fly to the space station, waiting for a mission assignment,” the ESA’s director of human and robotic exploration Daniel Neuenschwander said.
The ESA’s announcement comes as diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives have come under attack from the new US administration of Donald Trump.
“We are now entering a world which is changing a bit from a DEI perspective from one of our partners of the International Space Station,” Neuenschwander said.
“We will continue with our European values,” he emphasized, adding that all ISS partners — which includes the United States — had given McFall medical clearance.
The next phase of the feasibility study will look at some of the hardware needed, including prosthetics, so that McFall can best overcome any additional challenges in space.
McFall said that technologies they are working on “are going to trickle down and have benefits for prosthetic users in wider society as well.”