African postwar stories stellar

African postwar stories stellar

Written in the aftermath of the civil war in Mozambique, Rain and Other Stories is author Mia Couto’s magnificent response to how the barbarity of war is overcome by, as he puts it, “the rain of hope,” tenuous as that may be, and the dream of renewal.

A Booker Prize-shortlisted author of Portuguese-Mozambiquean descent, Couto has fashioned 26 very short stories in the form of prose poems encompassing fable, allegory, legend and a cross between magic realism and Kafkaesque mystery.

The wonder of the collection, indeed its grip on the reader, is that such seemingly disparate tales come together to ultimately present how the land is remade with the “water of ‘benedreamtion,’” a lovely word and indicative of the way Couto renews language as well throughout the stories.

Many are tales of transformation. In Beyond the River Bend, a hippopotamus crashes through a town and is eventually shot. It is revealed that, in fact, the creature was an old man who had died in the neighbourhood, and had returned to proclaim key prophesies concerning drought and plague. The creature is so large it really should be called “a hyper-potamus.” No matter.

Rollins becomes fifth councillor to bow out of fall election

Sherri Rollins says she’s withdrawing her bid to keep her city hall seat after eight years, citing her concerns about the “gradual erosion of the role played by council” and the struggle to work co-operatively with the mayor’s office.

Downtown Keg closes… to reopen nearby

Downtown Winnipeg is without a Keg restaurant — for a couple of months, anyways.

The Keg Steakhouse and Bar vacated 115 Garry St. on Wednesday, after more than five decades at the location. It will open in a new Donald Street apartment tower this fall.

Its move comes after years of waiting. The DSM, at 185 Donald St., sat as a partially started apartment block after its developer stopped operating and sought creditor protection in April 2023. The developer began the project in 2019.

Carrington Real Estate took over in 2024. Part of the 14-storey site’s initial plans — pre-Carrington — was for the Keg to occupy the main floor.

Crop storage headaches loom on horizon

A sense of calm descends over Prairie fields this time of year — at least on the surface.

Activities become more limited in the weeks leading up to harvest. There’s not much farmers can do now to support this year’s crop, other than monitor and protect it from diseases such as sclerotinia in canola and leaf stripe and fusarium head blight in wheat and barley.

July is when you might see farmers wading into a thick stand of canola, conducting a so-called “wet pants test” to get a low-tech read on how much disease-inducing moisture is lurking in the canopy.

Disease pressure is high in a humid, hot summer like this one and it’s kept aerial applicators busy applying fungicides. Sclerotinia spores live on plant residues in the soil and blossom into a mould that destroys the canola stem, starving the maturing pods.

On eve of Folklorama, Ghana pavilion scrambles to replace stolen outfits

Volunteers from Folklorama’s Ghana pavilion scrambled to replace cultural costumes for about 40 young dancers after the outfits were stolen in Winnipeg days before the annual festival begins.

Two plastic storage bins containing the costumes, to be worn by children and teenagers, were taken from the trunk of a parked car on Banning Street, near Notre Dame Avenue in the West End, likely late Wednesday or early Thursday.

“I felt sad that this has happened. I felt completely devastated for the mother who had them in her car,” said pavilion co-ordinator Abigail Larson. “The initial feeling of sadness changed to, ‘OK, how do we make this a positive?’”

The costumes belong to the Ghana Union of Manitoba Dancers, whose members have rehearsed for months for Folklorama, which begins Sunday.