Jean-Pierre wasn’t there to check email. He was on a mission.
He stared at the bulky monitor. He had heard of a new way to get music: the MP3. Jean-Pierre wasn’t there to check email
A year prior, the Congolese soukous group had released the album Obus Kanga Bissaka . It had detonated like a rhythmic bomb across Central Africa. You couldn't walk ten feet without hearing the sebene—the fast-paced guitar breakdown—shaking the windows of a taxi or a local nganda (bar). But Jean-Pierre’s cassette tape had been "borrowed" by a cousin and never returned. Jean-Pierre wasn’t there to check email