Abubilla Music

11.12.06 Travels with the Bone – Africa

Written by Jimmy

Part One:  The Bone Guitar:  My wife got this for me for X-mas 2010 to travel the world and learn guitar.   It folds out to look sort of like a guitar.  But it also packs up to look like picture below:

Part Two:  The Global Journey: We’ll  just keep one blog on the Bone’s global travels this year.

1.   January 2011:   Asia Trip: As indicated in Jimmy’s musical Journey, Blog 2,  Jimmy is in the open chord phase of his guitar lessons.  Spend most of Asian trip trying to master chord changes between C and G.  So not exactly Jimmy Page yet, but at least the Bone got a nice little trip out of it.

2.  February 2011:   South America Trip: The trip to South America was all about Samba Drums,  but Jimmy did manage to continue his musical journey, spending mornings in Sao Paolo struggling with the F Chord.  Never remotely mastered, but he will persevere…

From Sao Paolo trip, I  realised that these pictures are exceedingly boring given that they are just a bunch of shots of hotel rooms.  In upcoming trips I committed to be braver and start taking shots in front of famous landmarks!

3. March 2011:  Paris Trip.   The Bone and I stayed at a ‘under construction’ Le Maison Champs-Elysees, Room 222 with views of construction.  Braved the real world and took a picture of the boner against a fine landmark.  Also, a friend borrowed the guitar to play some Nickleback (thankfully to himself thru headphones… we were spared).

4. March 2011:  Nairobi, Fairview Hotel: We’ve arrived in Nairobi as part of the Singing Wells Project (See separate blogs at Abubilla Music and Singing Wells.    First night, made friends with the Tusker Family.   On Sunday morning, we had time off by the pool before heading into Ketebul Music Studio’s to line up all the gear for tomorrow’s trip.   The Bone took advantage of the sunshine.  This picture is even featured on a website (click here):

5. March 27 Afternoon 2011,  Travels round Nairobi, to Ketebul Music and Being Played by Winyo at Sippers: A big day for the Swiss Bone Guitar.  Plus, the Guitar travelled all through Malindi — see full report back here.

6. April 17-18, Moscow Russia, Marriot Courtyard.  Arrived on Saturday, played in hotel with a view of a very Western Looking church.   Tried multiple times to get a shot of Guitar at Red Square, but too much traffic.  Oh Well.

7.  May 13-19 Prague, Czech Republic, Hilton Hotel, Rm 6011.  Having failed utterly to take the Bone out and about in Moscow, I was determined to do so in Prague.  Together with St Kathy, we hit the town!

9.  9-19 June, Marbella, Spain.  Home villa.   Not a hotel this time, just a nice villa.  Here for Spanish Jam, with lots of Abubilla musicians, so lots of lessons (click here for full report back).  Martyn started teaching me the standard blues riffs.   I will work hard on these before seeing my brother in Alaska.

10.  June 28, Washington DC, Four Seasons Hotel, Room 533 (plus weekend in Virginia):   Warm and Sunny – actually held a set of work meetings on the road as we posed for various pictures.  Massive negotiation with Samy, our driver, but at end all parties were happy – although he made clear he still would have rather had a trip to Dulles airport.   But we managed to see all the sites:

11.  July 6-8 Conrad Hotel, Room 707.   A one night stay (two nights on planes!).    This is a ‘Fountain view room’, so we show the bone overlooking the fountain.

12.  June 21-28 Anchorage Alaska, Crown Point:  The bone was there for trips to see ice, bears, whales, otters and eagles.  Sadly, we only took one actual photograph – the Bone in front of the private plane, flown by Dan, and taken on a little tour of a bunch of beautiful glaciers around Anchorage:

13.  Williamsburg Virginia:  Williamsburg Lodge, room 4041.  Too hot. Stayed inside. Except for short trip to take photos with the bone.

14.  Southern Shores, Outer Banks North Carolina, House 201A.   Family vacation continued with huge family reunion on the Outer Banks (OBX).  Decided to take pictures with family…

15.  New York City, New York Grand Park Hyatt, Room 2133:   We then drove up to NYC from NC and Hunter and Jimmy walked around NYC, while the girls went shopping.   The bone went with the boys, naturally.  It’s not a shopper.  It’s a roamer … a rolling stone that gathers no moss.16.  August 8-15, Greensboro Vermont, ‘Big House’:   We ended our time in the States with a visit to Kathy’s family in Greensboro Vermont, where they’ve had a family property for over 100 years, and pencil marks on the measuring wall, going back to Kathy’s grandparents as young adults.

17.  August 23-24th, Saxon Hotel, Villas 2, Pres Suite:   I won the lottery on this trip; through a combination of local office contacts, the fact we were hosting an event there, and their love of the ‘Bone Guitar’, I was able to stay at the Saxon hotel.  This was originally a private residence, and is one of the most beautiful hotels I’ve stayed in.  My room had a bigger footprint than my house… too bad I only stayed there 9 hours, 7 of which I was sleeping.

18.  September 9-14 Sydney Australia, Interncontental Hotel:  Had a wonderul stay in Sydney on business, saw an amazing spray artist over the weekend, and after some ‘photo’s from the hotel, handed the bone over to Edwina and Joanne to take a little trip with it to Bondi beach.  Ended up with photos of Andrew Reid from TV show Bondi Rescue.  This is becoming a celebrity blog.  Because there are so many photos, I’ve created a separate blog to see Bondi Beach.  Click here.19.  September 15-16, Melbourne, Westin Hotel.   Flyin and flyout of Melbourne, but a good day with lots of speeches and meetings.   The bone got a quick walk around:

20.  September 20-21 San Fran, Le Meridian Hotel, Rm 2601:   No time for sightseeing, so Rubbish Photos from my room:

21.  September 22-23 Marina Del Ray,  Ritz Carlton:  Lots of time to play guitar, and wonderful foggy views over the marina from my room:

22.  October 3-4 New York City, Waldorm Astoria Hotel, Working at 3 Times Square:   Fly in and fly out for speech.  No views from hotel, but next day Jen captured a couple shots from the 25th floor of 3 Times Square looking down (we have summer shots of Hunter looking up at 25th floor):23.  11.10.10-12 Mumbai, Room 1164, Oberoi Hotel:  Very short stay at the Oberoi (one of two hotels to be destroyed during the Mumbai attacks and only just re-opened).   Lots of business meeting all over down, but did manage to take one ‘tourist’ shot, of the  Haji Ali Dargah, the so called ‘island mosque’ which was built in 1431 and technically is neither a mosque or an island. Go figutre:

24. 19-21 October, Barcelona, W Hotel, Room 1418.   Staying at the W which is on the main beach on newly claimed land.  Not a big W fan in general, but these rooms and views are stunning, so rethinking my views.

25.  2011, November 5-8, Westin Hotel, Room 1126, Tokyo.   Very odd.  Hotel is completely made over for Christmas.  Hundreds of Japanese fill the lobby taking photos of their little kids in front of the ‘gold’ fake trees.  I went to local super-market, with Muzak pumping Silent Night over the loudspeakers.   I jumped on line to figure this out – turns out that most Japanese do not claim any one religious affiliation (although Shinto and Japanese Buddism dominate) and in fact up to 70% say they are agnostic or atheist.  Instead, they adopt lots of traditions that they particularly like – so they might not be Christian, but my goodness they do love Christmas.   I wonder what they would think of Annie’s view of Santa Clause down under.   Oh well, it is too crowded to get a picture of the Guitar in front of all those trees – sadly I just took another sad hotel room photo: