Kids in Mozambique and Zimbabwe
Want the same thing as those in my neighborhood
The giraffes of their ancestors the crocodiles the elephants
Are confined to tourist reservations
Guys in my neighborhood don’t care about the Eiffel Tower
Just as those in townships don’t give a damn about antelopes
It’s smokes and cokes
From Joburg to Harare, from Lusaka to Antananarivo
Their coffee’s weak but when the sun comes up
It’s the same broken bottles as in my project
A fifty-cent record burned on a PC
Passes from hand to hand along with a joint
At 6 a.m. the sun goes up on the easy life
Giving everyone a shadow and the same old routine
Kids in Zimbabwe know that the tango’s dead
That the airport is named after money instead
They’re tired of haggling to make a buck
The kids in my ‘hood and those of Zimbabwe
Play prince charming for the local girls
Not on a white horse but in brand-new Nikes
Victoria Falls or the Cote d’Azur
We’ll go there on our honeymoon for sure
They wanna be stars, attain quick fame
Win championships and Oscars, hang out on the avenue
Single mothers with divorced parents
The same sisters and brothers as we’ve got here
The wheel turns slightly with the exchange rate
From Soweto to Paris the same rules apply
It’s the same message through the same earphones
On the same chessboard, with the same pieces
When I grow up Mama I wanna be alive
And not bored all the time I have no other plans
The kids in Zimbabwe and those in my neighborhood
Pay rent for the entire world
They know rock music and the electric fairy
From Harare to Lagos, from Rome to Helsinki
Protecting culture has nothing to do with politics
So that next to the concerns of Eurocentrics
Kids in Zimbabwe and in my neighborhood
Speak the same language and wear the same clothes
The slang’s the same throughout the globe
They’ve got the same PIN codes, almost the same money
I don’t want my words to be just a travelog
Vienna can have its waltzes and Paris its Pigalle
Welcome in Shona in Swahili and in our own slang
Now that money talks I’m proud to come from the ‘hood
Now that money talks I’m proud to come from the ‘hood
Recent Comments