December 13

Slept in 'til 6 this morning. Got up just in time to accompany Mengistu on his daily 60-minute walk around the island. It was pouring down buckets of rain, but it felt delightful to go through a complete rinse cycle!! Mengistu comes from a very serious work ethic and is having a bit of an adjustment problem to the rather laid back island ethic. For now it seems that he and the island are meant for each other. At 9:30 had an in-depth radio interview that I thought went very well!! The interviewer let me go on and on about the Faith, but I tried not to be too obnoxious. After that we went to the home for the aged. Mona is especially loved by the elders and I did my best to project my flute music. One of the interesting acoustic obstacles here is the necessity of always having fans going - besides stealing from the flute aesthetics, they're just plain noisy, so I always feel, and quite justifiably that the flute isn't reaching the audience. Oh well. I looked out at the faces of the elders and saw some genuinely appreciative countenances thus making it all abundantly worthwhile!! After that there was a plan to have me do some performances in the middle of the street downtown to draw a crowd for tonight. I tried to tactfully disabuse them of this idea on several grounds, especially the one of preserving my dignity. Tonight is the final performance here at a great venue downtown. We'll do the same type of teamwork as last night and pray that Baha'u'llah will bless our efforts!!