Marimba Man

A few weeks ago Willie and I rode down to the biggest shopping mall in Gaborone, "Game City". As we walked past a hardware store, Willie spotted some guitars - he can spot a obscure musical instrument from over 100 meters - and launched into an all-out emotional assault on the purchasing lobe of my brain. After repeating for the fifth time that we could not carry a guitar home on the airplane, we moved on.

But his instrument envy clearly had not subsided, so we chatted about the possibilities on the way home. I explained that I really wanted a marimba and Africa was a much better place to buy a marimba than a guitar. Elliot had also been learning to play the marimba and even played in a school concert with virtually no preparation.

Low and behold, just as we reached the street in front of our apartment, we passed a man on foot selling small hand-made marimbas. We hailed him and he stopped to show us his collection of cute little 8-key marimbas. He played us a song and five minutes and 50 pula later we were the proud owners of a marimba.

Like most of the people we meet in Botswana, the marimba man is from Zimbabwe. His name is Tapiwa ("we shall be given" in Shona) and, along with making marimbas, he is actually quite a good marimba player. He has subsequently played a number of songs for me, which I have recorded and turned into a playlist on my phone. I played a few for the music teacher at Elliot and Mitchell's school and he was impressed, explaining that Tapiwa plays in a traditional Zimbabwean style.

Half serious, I inquired about whether he could make full sized marimbas and he said yes. How hypocritical would that be to reject outright Willie's guitar request and then lug a mammoth marimba home on the plane! This just wouldn't fly, but after processing this whim for a few days, I came up with a solution: I would just have Tapiwa make me the keys and build the frame back in Seattle. The keys are the hard part; they are made from wood found in these parts, need to be cut to the correct size, and then tuned by hollowing out the underside of each key just the right amount.

Tapiwa proceeded to show me a sample key and put together a mock frame to demonstrate how to assemble the frame when I get back home. This morning, in a cold Seattle-like drizzle, he delivered the full set of keys for a 17 key tenor. He brought a bigger temporary frame, laid all of the keys out without securing them, and played a few more songs even though the keys were jumping around, sliding together, and inching off the frame. I paid about $60 for the set, a fraction of what a full marimba would cost in the US. He explained that the money will keep his family afloat for about 40 days back in Zimbabwe.