'Rock with Akon' Concert

On Friday night we ‘Rocked with Akon.’ The American-Senegalese singer was two weeks late, but he eventually arrived, and rocked he did.

After he managed to skip two of the cel-tel sponsored performances in Kampala, I didn’t have a lot of respect, but he forced me to gain it back and more. Not only did he perform for at least an hour and a half, he crowd surfed, battled random fans that made it to the stage (past some scary looking security), and he was talented.

At one point while crawling over fans hands during something he called Unity, he was pulled down, and disappeared. The spotlights were looking for him, the music stopped, and the security could be heard yelling.

That’s it – I thought when they found him again – show’s over. But he got right back on stage and kept performing, then went into the crowd and did it again.

The whole night was like that – the Nigerian brothers P-Square sent the crowds screaming and cheering for more, Ugandan Bobbi Wine asked for a minute of silence to remember 20 kids that died in a school fire two weeks ago, and Uganda’s Chameleon climbed the rigging.

As Chameleon swung from the rafters and danced high above the stage, I managed to get out “they’d never be allowed to do that in North America” between my cheering.

It was a night to remember