Let’s Talk About Tiwa Savage’s Water & Garri, and Kayode Kasum's All's Fair in Love
July 06, 2024 |
| Loooooved Water & Garri - the scene between Aisha and Kay after the party ❤️❤️❤️ (plus Kay is FINE). |
Hi beautiful people,
Hope you are enjoying your Summer and staying hydrated. I am literally living under the air conditioner with my unlimited supply of water - this insane Summer heat and my apartment’s brick walls are on a mission to bake me alive…and they won’t succeed.
Other than trying to defy nature, I spent the day working on the 3 part series on African Women Theologians that I will be teaching at my church (will share videos when they are ready). After going through my presentation a couple of times, I decided to browse through Prime Video for something to watch. Think it’s an algorithm thing from all the research I have been doing for my presentation that pulled out a couple of African movie suggestions.
First I saw Tiwa Savage (Queen of Afrobeats) on a poster with the words water and garri (one of Nigeria's staple foods). I know she has an EP by that title, if you have heard Somebody's Son (is going to find me one day) featuring Brandy, then you have heard at least one song from that EP (also can we have a moment of silence for all the beautiful men on that video - I literally stopped typing this to love on them for the millionth time)…Where was I? Ok… so when I saw Tiwa Savage’s face and those words, I thought it was one of those behind the scene type documentaries highlighting the why and how of the her Water & Garri EP...but alas, it was not...if was actually a film…with a FINE Ghanaian man (can we have another moment of silence…I should be doing things to reduce the heat, but instead I am here looking at FINE MEN and rising the temperature 🤒).
The film is one of those Americanah /returnee types. Tiwa Savage acts as Aisha, a Naija girl who moves to the US to be a fashion designer. She eventually comes back home after 10 years, following the death of a family member. The film follows her journey reconnecting with her home and Kay, aka the one (love) she left behind aka Mr FINE MAN!!! This man is FINE shaaa...he is lucky I am not on social media because I would have been shooting shots in his DM, in the name of a men and mental health advocacy project proposal 😉.
On the real though, all Americanah types (living away from home) can attest to having (or having had) a Kay of some sort back home...the love we left 'behind', or decided that we need an ocean between us because we were going to destroy each other (may or may not be speaking from experience).
Before I continue talking about Kay - sorry the film - I want to give a shout out to the location scouts as well as the set designers.
I loved the house Aisha lived in, and as the movie was going on, I kept wondering what part of Nigeria it was shot in, only to Google and see it was shot in Ghana.
I LOOOOOOOOVE GHANA!!!
Naija is a gem too but y’all know my love for art runs deep and Accra, the whole city, is like an African Art Museum/Gallery...I ate my first and last snails there (I did not know what the delicious thing was - yes they were delicious - until we were told what we had just eaten). Without counting Uganda and Tanzania, it is the first African country I flew to (there are buses from Nairobi to both Uganda and Tanzania - and those trips rarely felt like leaving Kenya - not to say that those countries are not amazing as well).
Ghana was also where I had my first proper paid speaking engagement during my mental health advocacy days…it is so special in many other ways…including this FINE man.
I smile just thinking about the time I had there, all the jewelry I got at the market and as gifts…and all the fine memories (and people 😊) I connected with… plus my first ever penpal back in the day- yes I am old like that - was a nice Ghanaian boy…someone invite me to speak there soon.
I got home sick just watching the scenes and even more home sick as I watched Aisha and Kay reconnecting (something about that African love/end of date moment).
As an aside something about the party they went to reminded me of Rihanna’s Work Work video (please let me know if you felt those vibes). The movie ends (yep, it just ends) when Kay drops Aisha home, they share something steamy, then he is killed on his way home (a Karma like thing that you will get if you watch the film). Instead of the many music video type scenes, I wish they would have developed the reconnection between Aisha and Kay a little bit more, maybe showed us what happens the next day after their steamy evening. The ending felt rushed…and the movie ends with Aisha saying she will not rush back to the US but stay a little longer. I guess this not one of those ‘and they lived happily ever after’ types but still that ending still felt rushed.
Still on FINE African things on Prime Video, let’s talk about Kayode Kasum's All's Fair in Love (watched this a couple of days ago).
First and foremost, LOCATION aka the Africa they need to show more of. Then they had a South African actress who did a splendid job - love it when we get all Pan African…plus the fashion house angle was another amazing selling point for the continent.
The film follows two guys in the Fashion industry trying to break into the international market (just hit me that both films have a fashion angle - but have you seen our clothes, FINE THINGS!!!). The two guys/partners need money to go international but don’t want to take the funds being offered by one of the guy’s dad - they want it to be on their own terms. This is where the SA lady comes in, she is hired as a consultant to help them get investors. Little do they know that she is part of a money laundering operation, and she is dating both of them. They end up working with the police to catch the kingpin and everyone involved. Besides the cliche ‘bad boy’ characteristics, this was another win for the continent.
Now that I have let the whole world know that I saw a FINE guy today (discount the fact that he was on TV), let me go to bed. Need to be well rested before my first teaching/presentation in almost five years.
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Sending love and light as you sleep next to (or dream of) someone’s FINE son,
Sitawa
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