That was my first reaction on seeing the Google Doodle for today - Who or what the heck is Miriam Makeba? Luckily clicking on the Google Doodle for Miriam Makeba’s 81st birth anniversary went right to the search page. With the help of Wikipedia, I could expand my scant knowledge of Africa - and really learn, exciting, new things about the dark continent.
To cut the story short, Miriam Makeba or Mama Africa as she was nicknamed is a singer of African music. She became a worldwide sensation, and had the honour of singing at the birthday party of President John F Kennedy in 1962.
She was also a leading civil right campaigner and was a lifelong advocate of equal rights to all sections of the society. Makeba’s personal life is much of tragedy, the epitome being the death of her daughter, whom she gave birth when she was 17.
Miriam Makeba was also well decorated, from Grammy’s to Otto Hahn Peace Medal to Polar Music Prize. She achieved all that in the midst of frequent domestic upheavals that included 5 marriages.
An acknowledged anti-Apartheid campaigner, she was the recipient of the Dag Hammarskjöld Peace Prize in 1986, but had to suffer exile from her motherland, South Africa from 1960 till the release of Nelson Mandela in 1990. During her lifetime, she held 9 different passports.
Really a wonderful, inspiring, but tragic life history.
To cut the story short, Miriam Makeba or Mama Africa as she was nicknamed is a singer of African music. She became a worldwide sensation, and had the honour of singing at the birthday party of President John F Kennedy in 1962.
She was also a leading civil right campaigner and was a lifelong advocate of equal rights to all sections of the society. Makeba’s personal life is much of tragedy, the epitome being the death of her daughter, whom she gave birth when she was 17.
Miriam Makeba was also well decorated, from Grammy’s to Otto Hahn Peace Medal to Polar Music Prize. She achieved all that in the midst of frequent domestic upheavals that included 5 marriages.
An acknowledged anti-Apartheid campaigner, she was the recipient of the Dag Hammarskjöld Peace Prize in 1986, but had to suffer exile from her motherland, South Africa from 1960 till the release of Nelson Mandela in 1990. During her lifetime, she held 9 different passports.
Really a wonderful, inspiring, but tragic life history.
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