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The AIH Transcript for January 1, 2019

Hosts: Carol Off and Jeff Douglas

HELEN MANN: Hello, I’m Helen Mann. Sitting in for Carol Off.

JEFF DOUGLAS: Good evening, I'm Jeff Douglas. This is “As It Happens”.

[Music: Theme]

Prologue

JD: Tonight:

HM: Texting his patience. Last year, Constable Norm Deneault issued his 5,000th ticket for distracted driving — so he hopes Ontario's tough new penalties will capture motorists' attention.

JD: Spooked. Russia says the American was arrested because he's a spy — but the man's Canadian brother insists he was just in Moscow for a wedding.

HM: Tourist de force. The late Anthony Bourdain loved to travel, and was generous enough to invite us along — and tonight, we'll remember him, and some of the other luminaries who died in 2018.

JD: Rock musician. Overwhelmed by new images of the distant, frigid space boulder Ultima Thule, astrophysicist — and Queen guitarist — Brian May composes a song in its honour.

HM: A love-in, then a 15-love-in. Roger Federer and Serena Williams face off in a mixed-doubles match — and trade volleys of compliments after trading actual volleys.

JD: And..."let's get snake-ed." Our guest says ten cane toads who climbed aboard a 3-point-5 metre python in Australia didn't just get on to get on — they got on to get off, if you know what I mean.

JD: "As It Happens", the Tuesday edition. Radio that knows the thing about a python is: baby got back.

[Music: Theme]

Part one: Distracted driving, Russia arrest, Python-mounting cane toads

Distracted driving

Guest: Norm Deneault

JD: It's a new day — and it is a new year for distracted drivers who think they can just sneak in a few selfies at the wheel on the roads of Ontario. Today, new rules came into effect, imposing some of the harshest penalties for distracted driving in the country. Drivers in Ontario caught texting, talking, or scrolling on their handheld devices could be fined thousands of dollars, and face up to a month's suspension of their licence. Constable Norm Denault is with the Halton Regional Police Service. Last year, he reached a grim milestone — issuing his five-thousandth ticket for distracted driving. We reached Constable Deneault in Burlington, Ontario.

HM: Constable Deneault, how likely do you think it is that these new penalties are going to make Ontario drivers think twice about reaching for their phones while they are behind the wheel?

NORM DENEULT: Well, we've seen in the past the fines start a 155 dollars, go up into the 200 dollar range, and then up to 490 dollars. There was between the last increase and up to the 490 that I've noticed a decrease in the number of people using. But what ended up transpiring was that they would just try hiding their phones down in their laps. What's nice about the new legislation is for those repeat offenders, we’re starting to be able to take away their driver's licenses from anywhere from three, seven, up to 30 days. This I think we'll get to a lot of those drivers. If they realize that they're going to lose their license because the phones in their hand, they might think twice.

HM: Can you outline for us just how much things have changed in the last 24 hours in Ontario?

ND: Yes, if you received a ticket yesterday, it would have been a total of 490 dollars. And that's for your first, second, third, fourth offence — unless we ended up issuing a summons to you because you were a repeat offender, and then the judge could actually impose it and had a 1,000 dollar ceiling. As of today, when you're pulled over and given a ticket, it's 615 dollars. And what happens is you lose your driver's license upon paying the ticket or being found guilty. The ministry sends you a notice that your license is suspended for three days. When you go to get your driver's license reinstated, there's a reinstatement fee. So all of a sudden you are now looking at 800 dollars total — and that's if you pay that ticket out of court. If you decide you're going to fight that ticket and you lose, the judge has the option on your first offence of a 1,000 dollar fine.

HM: And that's as you say first offence, it's much higher if it's second or third offence.

ND: Yes, on your second offence the judge can issue it up to $2,000 and your third is $3,000.

HM: How did these penalties compare to those imposed in other parts of Canada or other parts of North America?

ND: In Canada itself, we have some of the highest dollar value fines — we have to. The number of rear-end collisions and accidents causing death in this province have gone through the roof — even surpassing impaired driving deaths on the roads. Mind you we're still behind some places in the States. Some places in the States they're very lenient. But I just had the occasion of speaking to somebody from Seattle. They mentioned to me that in Seattle distracted driving means anything in your hand at all. That's anything from brushing your hair, putting on makeup, holding a bottle or a coffee cup. It all falls under distracted driving.

HM: Wow!

ND: Both hands have to be totally free on the steering wheel — at least one hand on the steering wheel — but the other has to be free of any obstruction at all. I can see us following what Seattle is doing.

HM: You've handed out thousands of tickets for distracted driving. What tips you off that someone is got their cell phone in use?

ND: The fact that their eyes aren't on the road; a lot of people staring down at their laps. And, of course, the head bobbing; when the head goes up to the road, down to their laps, up back and forth numerous times. Usually though if I'm following a vehicle, I've seen cars where I could have sworn the driver was impaired to the extreme just because the car's been drifting from one lane to the other. I've had some that have actually hit curbs and then recovered from that. Only to get up beside them and find that yes, they are using a cell phone.

HM: What's the worst case you've seen in all the years you've been doing this?

ND: Well, I had one lady who actually had a cup of coffee in her hand, with a cigarette in between two of her fingers, holding the steering wheel with that hand, while the her other hand was holding the cell phone up to her ear. And that's not an isolated incident. I've seen that a couple of times.

HM: So when you stop people, what kind of excuses do you hear?

ND: The school phoning because their is their child is ill. I didn't realize we had so many ill children out there because that excuse is used so often. Doctors — the doctor's office phoned and I had to answer it. Problems at home with family members that are ill at home. But I always come back to the same thing when I do pull them over: why didn't you pull over to the curb? You've been on the phone for 200-300 meters.

HM: And what do they say to you?

ND: Didn't think of it, or was only gonna be a second, or the excuses to just keep going on and on. But it all boils down to you're on a live lane of traffic, you're holding a phone, and you are distracted. And whether it's in your lap or to your ear, you're concentrating on that and not on the road.

HM: We hear this message from police like you. We see ads on television. There's print warnings. And yet, people keep on doing it. Why do you think that is?

ND: I think we've. We have a culture now, and they've just become addicted or habitual phone holders. A moving vehicle you look at the weight of a vehicle and the distraction. I have neighbours that have been off work for months, and even one gentleman who's been off for almost a year because he was rear-ended by two separate distracted drivers. And he has back, leg, neck injuries. You know these used to be rare occasions. But now it seems to be almost commonplace.

HM: Well, we can only hope that these new fines are going to make a difference. I appreciate you telling us about it.

ND: Oh, I appreciate their time to try to relate. You know what? Pull over to the side a road.

HM: Constable, thank you very much. And Happy New Year.

ND: Yeah, Happy New Year to you. Bye for now.

HM: Bye-bye

JD: That was Constable Norm Deneault, from the Halton Regional Police Service. We reached Constable Deneault in Burlington, Ontario.

[Music: Ambient]

Federer-Williams compliments

JD: They've won a combined 43 Grand Slam singles titles. But Serena Williams and Roger Federer had never met on court — until yesterday. The tennis giants faced off in Perth, Australia in a mixed-doubles contest — and Roger Federer, who teamed up with Belinda Bencic, ended up beating Serena Williams and Frances Tiafoe. It was one of the most anticipated matches of the year. And when it was over, Ms. Williams told the crowd she wanted more.

SOUNDCLIP

SERENA WILLIAMS: Well, it was a great experience. I'm kind of sad it's over. You know I was just warming up.

SPEAKER: I'm sure the folks here will let us come back and play some more.

[Sound: Applause]

SW: No, it was so fun. And I like I said before, it's something that as growing up… and we grew up together really just watching and having an opportunity after all these years. We've actually never done this. So this is super cool that we get to do it at such a pinnacle point in both our careers. And, for me, it was super cool. Like I literally like I wanted to take pictures. And I want to bring my baby out. I’m like way too excited. But it was really fun.

SPEAKER: Roger, what stood out for you about coming up against Serena in her game?

ROGER FEDERER: Well, I was nervous returning because you just don't know. People talk about her serve so much, and I see why it is such a wonderful serve because you just can read it. You don't see until the very…

SW: I can’t read yours either.

RF: Which we have the same qualities, you know? But yours is a bit better. But it's true. But for me it was a bit nerve-wracking too, to be honest, because all of a sudden you're serving especially the last serve at three all I'm like I got to win this point. But it's Serena Williams I was telling myself. And I was telling myself this is maybe what I've always wanted maybe — a big time moment like this. And I made the serve, but I actually totally missed the target. Thank you for missing the ball. But it was great, great fun. And great champion, you see how focused and determined she is and I love that about her.

JD: Serena Williams and Roger Federer, speaking after their first-ever match from Perth, Australia, yesterday.

[Music: Ambient]

Russia arrest

Guest: David Whelan

JD: Russia's security service says that Paul Whelan is a spy. The news agency Tass is quoting Russian officials as saying that the American was in the midst of, quote, "an espionage operation" on Friday when he was detained. U.S. observers have a different take. They suggest that Mr. Whelan's arrest may be retaliation for the U.S. prosecution of a Russian woman who admitted to trying manipulate Republican politics, as an unregistered Russian agent. Paul Whelan's twin brother in Canada says his brother was just in Moscow to attend a friend's wedding. We reached David Whelan in Newmarket, Ontario.

HM: Mr. Whelan, just how worried are you right now for your brother, Paul?

DAVID WHELAN: I think we're as concerned as you might expect. We haven't heard about Paul since December 28^th — on the Friday — and so we're looking forward. It's our understanding that by tomorrow he should have consular access to staff from the U.S. embassy. And so, hopefully, we’ll at least get a check on what his health is like, and maybe some more details as to what actually happened.

HM: How did you find out that your brother had been detained?

DW: Well, we knew that something had gone awry over the weekend. We knew that he was out of contact, which is unusual. And one of his friends in Moscow filed a missing report and let us know that he was worried about Paul. But it wasn't really until yesterday morning — Monday morning — that we had just been searching on the Internet and found newswires that pointed towards the Russian Ministry announcing that Paul Whelan had been detained for espionage.

HM: What have you been doing since you heard that news?

DW: Well, we've been doing what we can to contact the U.S. government. And we have been in contact with people in the State Department and with the embassy in Moscow. And the reality is that there's a bit of a blackout window with a detention. So there isn't much information for them to share with us. But we have maintained those connections so that when there is information we'll hear about it. And we've been trying to make sure that people understand or know about Paul's detention and that we don't think that it's a likely story that he is a spy.

HM: You know as you point out I mean the allegation is from Russia that he was involved in what they're calling an espionage operation. What went through your mind when you heard that?

DW: it just seemed like such a stretch from the person that we know. From a person with his sort of background in law enforcement and being in the Marines, he doesn't have the personality or the history of being a person who would go to a foreign country and take risks to break any law let alone a law like the Espionage Act.

HM: But you point out he is a former U.S. Marine. He works for what's been called global security and investigations firms. Is it possible that he might have been in Moscow for something other than just a wedding?

DW: No. And I think that that's a mischaracterization of his employers. The two companies that he's worked for recently, and certainly since his Marine time where Kelly Services, which does temporary placements and subcontract placements of employees around the world. And Borg Warner who does auto manufacturing if I understand correctly. So while his role in those firms was to do corporate security and help out with internal investigations, or in the case of BorgWarner, checking out fiscal plants, it wasn't a bodyguard or security of that type.

HM: I understand, at least from what I'm reading, that he's spent some time in Russia. Do you know why he's been there in the past?

DW: No, as far as I know, it's just been for either for travel, which he likes to do. And he travels widely when he can or for work. His employees had operations in Russia, as well as many other countries. And so he was frequently out of the country visiting one of those sites. But I don't believe that he was in Russia any more than he was in any of the other countries.

HM: A number of observers in the U.S. are speaking publicly. They include some former CIA analysts who accused Russia of arresting your brother in retaliation for the prosecution of Maria Butina, the woman who pled guilty to trying to influence Republican politics as an unregistered Russian agent. What do you think of that possibility that this is a retaliatory arrest?

DW: I think it's very hard to know without more information from Paul or from the embassy. I think we live in a very complicated world and there may be connections and there could be just an arbitrary or have a different sort of explanation. So I've tended to avoid trying to talk about those connections because I don't think that they're useful in getting Paul to come home.

HM: How exhausting have the last few days been for you and the people around you?

DW: I think it's been a challenge because we're trying to deal with a system that we don't normally interact with. We don't normally have to worry about people's safety in foreign countries and access to them and the ability for people to be able to move around and trying to find things like local lawyers for Paul. And we'll be relying on a list from the embassy when the embassy staff meet with Paul. I mean you can't really check the competence over there; we don't speak the language. So I think that's been trying because there are limits — very fixed limits — to what we are able to do and to have any impact on Paul's situation. And it's doubly concerning that we don't actually know what has happened to him or what condition he's in.

HM: Paul faces the possibility of 20 years in prison at a time when Vladimir Putin has been saying things like the law of retaliation states an eye for an eye or a tooth for a tooth. What goes through your mind when you hear that?

DW: I don't think anybody would want a family member to be incarcerated, regardless of the circumstances. And it's unfortunate that Paul's detention is happening at a time when there is such conflict in the geopolitical world that it's almost immaterial what the facts are about the allegations made about Paul in Moscow. So I mean it's really hard. Obviously, we wouldn't want Paul to be imprisoned in any country for 20 years, but it really is very difficult when you can't picture him doing something that would have engendered that sort of sense in the first place.

HM: Mr. Whelan, this is a terrible way to start the new year for you and all of your family I'm sure. Thank you very much for speaking with us at a time that's got to be difficult for you.

DW: Thanks so much for having me on the show.

HM: Bye-bye.

DW: Bye-bye.

JD: David Whelan's twin brother Paul has been detained in Moscow on espionage charges. We reached David Whelan in Newmarket, Ontario.

[Music: Ambient]

Python-mounting cane toads

Guest: Jodi Rowley

JD: You've likely watched it, wished you hadn't, and then watched it again. In a video posted to Twitter that has been viewed thousands of times, at least ten cane toads are seen hitching a ride on the back of a 3-point-5-metre snake, as it slithers across the grass in Australia. Recent torrential rainfall in the country's far north-west forced the cane toads out of a dam, and, apparently, onto the back of an olive python. Now, for a lot of people online, it was a heartwarming parable of one stranger helping ten others, despite their obvious differences. Sadly, according to one amphibian expert, the toads were really just in it for themselves. Jodi Rowley is a frog biologist at the Australian Museum and the University of New South Wales. We reached Ms. Rowley in Sydney, Australia.

HM: Jodi Rowley, before you tell us what is going on here. For those who have not seen it, can you describe what we're looking at in this video — what we would see when we take a glance?

JODI ROWLEY: It is nighttime, and there is a very, very long snake. And on top of the snake somewhat sort of riding it, like it you know a train are all these cane toads. It's quite a bizarre sight. It looks like all these cane toads are riding the snake as it moves along.

HM: Now when you saw it, did you know right away what was actually happening?

JR: I did. I'm a frog biologist, so I spend a lot of time hanging out with frogs and seeing snakes and frogs at night. And immediately I knew that it was actually male cane toads that were a little bit keen to mate. But the males were a little bit too keen in this instance, and they’re all grabbing onto the snake hoping that it is a female cane toad.

HM: So they're trying to mate with the snake. And you can tell because of their position?

JR: Yeah, so they're in a position that we call amplexus, which is sort of the male frog sort of mating position, where males actually just jump on top of the female and grab her with their strong forearms. And you can see all of these male cane toads lined up along with the snake sort of grabbing it hoping — desperately hoping — that it is a female frog, but they've got it wrong.

HM: They're getting it wrong. Is it because they are just so eager to mate they don't care, or because they're not very bright?

JR: It's all about instinct. So what you get in these pools and ponds that they want to breed in as soon as it rains, you get big ponds. The males start hanging out around the pond. Females usually don't show up all at once. And they only show up infrequently compared to how many males they are. So they really just want to make sure that as soon as that female shows up, they're the one that gets it. So they have such a reflex, and they will accidentally grab onto another male then realize oh whoops, that's not what I'm after either. They'll grab on to sometimes just random objects maybe a different species of frog. And this is the only time I have ever seen them just be so cane that they've just all grabbed onto the snake desperately hoping that they'll get lucky.

HM: It appears on the video that the snake is kind of tolerating this. Is that what the response you would expect?

JR: I don't think that the snake gets much of a choice. They don't have any limbs to be able to sort of get rid of it. There's no real way. How do you get rid of a frog? And actually when they amplex, when they're in this sort of position, males have really strong forearms. So they're really grabbing. And I've actually picked up a frog before, and they've been so keen that they've tried to mate with my hand. So in a sort of correct circumstance, the male will grab onto the female frog, and he has to hang on because she will take him then to where she wants to breed. And so it makes sense that they've got a bit of a grip. But in this case, they've a bit of a grip on that poor snake, and there's nothing that snake can do except for wait until they realize they error and get off on their own accord.

HM: And maybe they better hop off pretty quickly before the python exerts its appetite.

JR: Well, actually that's one of the things about cane toads is that they're actually poisonous to a lot of the native animals at eat them. So cane toads were introduced into Australia in the 1930s, and in Australia, we don't have any native toads, so all of our wildlife is not used to having something that looks like a frog that is actually toxic. But often they'll get halfway down the snake's throat and the animal will die because it's not used to having this poisonous animal. So I'm hoping he just kept on moving, but I think he's not interested in them.

HM: In terms of people's reactions to the video, some people you know look at this and I think well isn't that interesting. The toads are using this python to try and get away from these rising waters. That is a misinterpretation. So I gather that kind of assumption sometimes travels pretty far, and you know these misinterpretations do they bother you?

JR: They don't bother me I guess, but it's really nice when the story changes. So at the beginning, it was that these toads were you know riding on the back of a snake, which is a lovely story. But when I saw it you know obviously I sort of first and said oh no, they're not. They’re trying to mate with it and it's even better I think. So it's good to have things corrected. It's good to have the scientific facts the explanations about what is actually happening because the truth is often just as cool, if not cooler, than the fiction. But yeah, there's a lot of other instances like the bear and her cub that were being chased by a drone. And for a while it was this sort of lovely story, and then you realize oh no there's an edge to it. There's you know kangaroos that are having that sort of a touching moment. But in fact you know the male kangaroos chased her down and made her pass out. So yeah there's all sorts of different explanations to things that you can sort of realise when you consult the scientists that often spend their life with these animals.

HM: All right. Look, really interesting to hear this rather odd story. Thank you very much, Ms Rowley.

JR: Thank you.

HM: Okay, bye-bye.

JR: Bye.

JD: Jodi Rowley is a frog biologist at the Australian Museum and the University of New South Wales. We reached Ms. Rowley in Sydney, Australia. And if you'd like to treat yourself and watch the video in full, and learn more about this story, head to our website: www.cbc.ca/aih.

[Music: Ambient]

Ultima Thule

SOUNDCLIP

[Sound: A launch]

JD: That's the sound from the New Horizons mission operations center this morning — when the team got confirmation its spacecraft had done what it was supposed to, and lived to tell the tale. And in the wee hours of this morning, New Horizons flew past Ultima Thule, gathering photographs and data as it went. And now, with a NASA radio dish locked onto New Horizons' signal, billions of kilometres away, the spacecraft can begin transmitting back what it learned.

[Music: Ambient]

Part two: “As It Happens” obits 2018, part one

Anthony Bourdain

CO: How did you meet? How did you become friends?

JR: I had a little, crazy literary magazine on the Lower East Side in the early 1980s. And then one day, I got a comic book submission in the mail. And the art was less than a great, but the writing was really good. So I wrote a little note to the guy. And the next thing I know, about a week, later somebody rang the buzzer in my apartment downstairs. And I went down to let him in, and it was Bourdain. And we’ve just been friends ever since. It’s 30 years ago already. He was always asked me to do a comic book with him because I'd worked at DC Comics for a while. He was like oh you know we have to do a graphic novel together, I want to do it, he sort of pitched me on it, and I said OK. And it's turned into “Get Jiro” — this thing we did. I mean we've been working ever since doing this because it's just been so much fun for both of us, and sort of pain-free.

CO: When did he realize, or when did you both realize that he has this way with words. I mean look at “Kitchen Confidential”, which came out. It was an extraordinary hit. What made him into the writer he was?

JR: “Kitchen Confidential” came out of an email he sent me from Japan. He was cooking at Les Halles, and they were opening a place in Japan. And he went there first time. And he was in his hotel room overlooking some super parkway — whatever they are in Japan. And he wrote me this incredible, funny email. My wife's publisher and editor, and I came in, and I said you have to read this; this is so funny. Finally I got her to read it, and she called his agent, and she asked me does Tony have more stories? And yeah, he’s got lots and lots of stories. And she's called his agent and that became “Kitchen Confidential”.

CO: Wow!

JR: I knew right away that he was a really good writer. I knew it just in my heart and soul, and you know just over our kitchen table. The problem was that he was terrified about writing. But he could write and access that genuine voice of his. He just needed to have some confidence in himself because he was a real person. He wasn't trying to be anyone but who he was. And you know all those feelings that you see when he's so inquisitive on the television set, that’s all genuine. He would he would rather go to your mom's house and have dinner with her you know if she made a meat loaf. He would rather eat there than at the finest restaurant in Toronto, you know? Or anywhere.

CO: It's so astonishing when you say that he was shy about this because everyone who has ever seen him, it's like you're dining with him. He's just got all this energy and confidence, and you feel like you're sitting on a plastic stool with him in a market, eating something you've never seen before, and he's taking you there.

JR: That’s his great gift. But I mean you know who knows whatever you know darkness we all keep inside of us you know he had some of that as well.

CO: You must have shared a lot of meals together. I just wonder if there's any meal that you just remember you savour of having had with Tony Bourdain?

JR: The funniest remembrance that I have is just in our backyard down in New Jersey on the Jersey Shore. And he went and got clams one day, and he made it, and a bunch of people were over, and everything was great. And one person had a bad clam and got really, really sick. Tony was really apologetic, and the guy was like no need to apologize; it was like the best day of his life. You know he got sick from a clam that Tony Bourdain had made.

CO: Joel, how will you remember your friend?

JR: I don't even know right now. You know just with sadness right now. I'm confused and shocked, and so saddened. He was a good guy. He was an important person. He reached a lot of people. His politics were on the side of people. And that is a rare person. And he did not allow ego to blind him to anything. He understood that. He worked hard. But he understood he reached a lot of people. And he wanted to tell stories that brought us closer together in the world. He wanted us to understand people who might have been forgotten or just swept under the rug. And I totally loved and respect him, and I will miss him with all my heart and all my soul and all my might.

CO: Joel, I want to thank you for bringing us close to Tony Bourdain. You have taken this into his life, and I really appreciate that. Thank you so much.

JR: Thank you.

CO: Bye.

JR: Goodbye.

JD: Joel Rose, a longtime friend of Anthony Bourdain — speaking to us on June 8th of lthis past year.

Dorcas Reilly obit

Everyone knew Anthony Bourdain, it seems. Dorcas Reilly was much less well-known. But she was also a significant figure in the culinary world. And she made a lasting impact. Largely — well, completely — because of one, simple guilty-pleasure staple of holiday tables: "green bean casserole". In October, after Ms. Reilly's death, guest host Megan Williams spoke with food folklorist Lucy Long.

SOUNDCLIP

MW: Professor Long, how did Dorcas Reilly come to invent the green bean casserole?

LUCY LONG: Dorcas Reilly was trying to come up with suggestions for how people could use the products that Campbell's Soup was already producing. So she came up with the idea of using the soup as a white sauce. People were already making casserole types of things so it was just a matter of using the canned soup instead of making it from scratch.

MW: And was it always intended to be a Thanksgiving dish?

LL: You know, I don't think so. In the Midwest it’s frequently used for everyday meals as well potlucks and family gatherings in general, so it’s not only for Thanksgiving here.

MW: Now, as a kid I had a lot of frozen green beans and cream of mushroom soup — but never together. What does the green bean casserole taste like?

LL: It taste like green beans mixed in with that soup.

[LAUGHTER]

LL: I think if people don't call it a casserole they’d just think of it as green beans with white sauce.

MW: Do you like it?

LL: In small quantities. There are variations, we make a vegan variation and you can do it very upscale.

MW: Someone described the original recipe on Twitter as tasting like wet cigarettes. Would you agree?

LL: No, it's not that bad.

[LAUGHTER]

LL: If people don't like their food mixed together they're not going to like casseroles of any type. Casseroles are kind of stereotyped as being something that housewives in the Midwest make, they became very popular in the 1950s through women's magazines, but there are all sorts of stereotypes and jokes about casseroles in general.

MW: Right, now the dish only has a handful of ingredients and it involves less cooking and more combining of these ingredients. How did this recipe get to be considered iconic when really it's not much of a recipe?

LL: It doesn't require any culinary training at all, which is part of the reason many people dismiss it as not being real cooking. But it's also part of the reason that it became so popular. It's something that anyone can make and you're guaranteed to have an edible outcome, it might not be as tasty as some people like. But for people who don't have a lot of money to experiment or to have expensive ingredients where you take risk with making something very elaborate and then it doesn't work. And then they have to throw it out. Green bean casserole always works.

MW: Right. It's hard to think that a recipe like this would be a hit today with all of these food programs and sort of a culinary obsession. Why do you think the green bean casserole was such a hit in mid-century America?

LL: If you keep in mind that the 1950s was following on in the wake of World War II, there was a sense that everyone wanted to be unified. They didn't want to have exotics or things that were too expensive or too foreign. This was a dish that cut across all socioeconomic levels. So if you wanted to make it and things that were very expensive you could but the basic ingredients were very inexpensive. So this is a very democratic type of dish and it's very conformist, which is what people in the 1950s wanted.

MW: And it became a tradition and one that is still popular today, particularly around Thanksgiving. Is it mainly nostalgia, do you think?

LL: I would say in some places it is nostalgia because it’s something that mothers and grandmothers in the 1950s were making and then it just became part of family tradition. I think in the Midwest and it represents the industrialization, the industrialized agriculture that characterizes the region. A lot of the food processing factories are in this area. So people say ‘eat local’ the Campbell's Soup factory, there’s one that's about 35 minutes away from me — that's local. You know, it is part of the local scenery and it's part of people's occupations. It's part of their landscape.

JD: Food folklorist Lucy Long, speaking about the late Dorcas Reilly — and her immortal creation, the green bean casserole.

Ntozake Shange obit

JD: Now, when Ms. Reilly invented the green bean casserole in 1955, people were familiar with the term "casserole". But no one was familiar with the term "choreopoem" until Ntozake Shange invented it. Ms. Shange used that term to describe her powerful, pioneering feminist work "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When The Rainbow Is Enuf" — which became a huge hit in New York in 1976. It was her first play. It would change her life -- and the lives of those who saw it. Ntozake Shange died last October, at the age of 70. On October 30th, Carol spoke with her friend and collaborator, Thulani Davis.

SOUNDCLIP

CO: How did you come to meet Ntozake Shange.

TD: We met at some black student's mixer freshman year of college -- Barnard College in New York. We were both going to go to law school and be Thurgood Marshall. So we spent a lot of time taking the same classes and just being friends. But I started writing poetry and got published in one of the college publications so she showed up at my dorm room one day with five poems and I was pretty astounded. They were great. After that we published a magazine our senior year called ‘Phat Mama’ way ahead of our times I think, of work done by ourselves -- Sonia Sanchez who was kind enough to mentor us a bit and give us some poems and also writing by our classmates. So we just decided well we were going to have our own black woman's magazine of literature.

CO: It's a long way to go from having your own magazine to having the play produced on Broadway -- For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow is Enuf, nominated for a Tony Award and was just the sensation when people saw it. Can you remember the kind of reception the play received in 1976 when it opened?

TD: When the first production was done at the new Federal Theater -- it was on weekends and after the first three or four weekends it was about to close. And women appeared there having heard about it primarily by word of mouth and literally there would be 40-50 women banging on the door just as the doors closed before the show started -- banging on the door to be admitted. It was extraordinary. And I've never seen anything like it since either. It certainly took all of us by surprise. And it's one of the reasons she ended up at the New York Shakespeare Festival with the show. And its appearance there had a similar kind of very abate response. But once it really got to Broadway, began to tour, there was also this backlash from men. Men would come to Q and A sessions and accuse her really of defaming black men. So there was this resentment that women were airing the dirty laundry inside black communities in this broader public platform. So there was this feeling that women should put race first and women second.

CO: Can you for those who don't know the play or didn't see it and perhaps have very little familiarity with it. Can you describe it for our listeners?

TD: Well it's a series of little more than a dozen poems. Each woman is identified by the color she's wearing woman in Orange. Woman in red. And they're kind of having a conversation about personal experiences. And one of the most repeated lines I've heard in the past two days was 'can somebody, anybody, sing a black girl song.' This is something that has stuck with people for 40 years and it's been as though it filled a need. And then there were moments of laughter when she would talk about a lover who had caused a lot of misery and she would say, 'I got sorrys falling out of my closet or somebody almost ran off with all my stuff, not her stuff stuff, but the stuff that keeps her together her confidence her self-possession.' And so it was very intimate and yet it also shared trauma --traumas perhaps that people in the audience had not shared with other people and suddenly they were in an audience sharing something that they could feel in the room they now were not experiencing alone.

CO: And she inspired a generation of black female playwrights didn't she?

TD: Oh certainly. We had grown up without being taught the work of black playwrights because of the schools that we went to. We began to study black literature in college not in class but -- because black students formed study groups -- we're self-taught in African-American literature. But we went to see tons of plays in New York and I think she in turn inspired several generations of women, some who performed in local versions of For Colored Girls when they were either in college or in school somewhere. And those playwrights even having been in the play and embody the characters -- how could that not you know just leave a strong impression because they suddenly were doing the work of somebody who was describing their experience.

CO: Just finally -- as a person, as a human being, as your friend, what will you miss about Ntozake Shange?

TD: Well in the present moment talking on the phone, being able to pick up the phone or see her in person and talk about anything after 50 years there's nothing we couldn't hear. And that's not something that is replaced. And I miss being inspired by her. She was an incredibly inventive person and she demanded your attention and she continued to show this incredible courage. She did two performances last week. She had bipolar syndrome. She was in a wheelchair and she had a neuropathy that hit different parts of her body at different times. And she was very determined to remain engaged. And so going forward I tried to keep that in mind. I think that would be an inspiration I would not have taken from her 40 years ago but what she gave to me in recent years.

JD: That was Thulani Davis — playwright, novelist, and professor of Afro-American Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She was talking about her friend and collaborator, the multi-disciplinary artist Ntozake Shange, who died last October. Ms. Shange was always defined by her first play — and that moment people first heard her powerful voice as a playwright. France Gall's voice was not what you'd call "powerful". But she was always defined by it, and by the cultural moment she arrived. Although she refused to be defined by the guy who introduced her. That guy was the French legend Serge Gainsbourg. He wrote a lot of songs for her — including the one that won France Gall the Eurovision Song Contest in 1965, when she was 17 years old: "Poupee de Cire, Poupee de Son". "Poupee" means "doll", or "puppet", which describes how some people saw Ms. Gall's relationship with Mr. Gainsbourg — which is probably how Mr. Gainsbourg wanted it. In France, even after she stopped collaborating with him, the media defined her by the men she dated. And after she died this past January, at the age of 70, obituaries listed all her romances. But even though Allmusic dismissively refers to her as, quote, "The Britney Spears of the '60s French pop scene", even her early hits have a kind of sweet, irresistible breeziness. Like this one: from 1964, this is France Gall, with "Pense A Moi".

[Music: Pense A Moi as sung by France Gall]

Part three: “As It Happens” 2018 obits, part two

Linda brown

SOUNDCLIP

LINMDA BROWN: Time stood still as the highest court in the land pondered over Brown vs. Board of Education. Until an afternoon in May of 1954, when I was in school, my father at work, and my mother at home doing the family ironing and listening to the radio.

JD: The voice of Linda Brown, speaking in 2004 — on the fiftieth anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court decision that would change history. The one with her surname in it: Brown vs. Board of Education.

SOUNDCLIP

LB: At 12:52 p.m. The announcement came. The court's decision on ending segregation was unanimous. My mother was overwhelmed. On returning from school, I learned of the decision — which at that time it only to me that my sisters wouldn't have to walk so far to school the next fall. That evening in our home was much rejoicing. I remember seeing tears of joy in the eyes of my father, as he embraced us repeating thanks be onto God.

JD: Linda Brown was nine years old when her father tried to enroll her at the public school near her home, Sumner Elementary School in Topeka, Kansas. But the school wouldn't allow her to enroll. Sumner Elementary was an all-white school. And Linda Brown was black. That was in 1951. It would be four years before the Supreme Court handed down its decision: that racial segregation of public schools violated the U.S. Constitution. Linda Brown died last March. She was 75 years old. Carol spoke with her childhood friend, Carolyn Wims-Campbell — who went on to become a member of the Kansas Board of Education.

SOUNDCLIP

00:49:15 - SPEAKER: F16

CO: How are you remembering Linda Brown — your friend — today?

CWC: I am remembering her as somewhat of a quiet young lady. And still, as we matured, she's always been a very quiet, spiritual person. You know she can voice her opinion on something, but she wasn't a loud person at all; very ladylike.

CO: And yet, she became the face of desegregation in Kansas and the world, didn't she? With Brown vs. the Board of Education.

CWC: That’s so true.

CO: Can you tell us the story? Why did her father decide he's going to try to enroll her at Sumner Elementary School that day?

CWC: Well, first of all, in her neighbourhood it was integrated, and she's playing with her white friends. But she has to go to an all-black elementary school, which was about two miles away. And the NAACP was working on the suit, and they asked him to take her to the closest school next to their home. And that was Sumner Elementary. And so he took her that day to enroll her. And, of course, they were denied enrollment.

CO: And she's described — Linda has described — in other interviews what it was like to be a child with her father, holding his hand, going to that school, and being turned away. Did she ever describe to you how she felt that day?

CWC: I don't think we ever talked about that other than you know when she presented it to you know other programs. And I've been lucky enough to sit through some of them. And that each time, it seems like you get something else from a presentation that she would give. And that she just couldn't understand why she couldn't go to school with her friends.

CO: Her father, Oliver, was really the backbone of this, wasn't he? He sounds like a very strong man. Did you know him?

CWC: Oh yes, he was the pastor of Historic St. Mark's African Methodist Episcopal Church. And so he was our pastor there when the decision was made from the Supreme Court in 1954. And he was a strong, spiritual, kind, big man.

CO: But very determined obviously.

CWC: Yes, I think you're right. That would be a good way to describe him. I'm wondering I never saw him upset or anything. But I imagine there were times with something like this when they were turned away I'm sure he was upset, and then was determined to work to get things changed.

CO: In one interview Linda Brown describes when they were walking to the school that day to register and then turned away. He was holding her hand, and so much more tightly holding it she could feel the frustration through him. But I guess beyond that, he didn't communicate how difficult it was to her. He just he just carried on relentlessly, didn't he?

CWC: That's right. And you know I think that’s the way in those days with a strong black man you know and that's how she picked up on it was that grip. Because they protected us — they were so protective of us and nurturing that he would not have wanted her to know how upset he was. But I guess she determined that through that hand being held so tightly.

CO: And so Brown Versus the Board of Education, the Browns were not the only plaintiffs in this. There were others from other states, and it all ended up in the Supreme Court as you mentioned. And that's where this this idea of separate but equal — this doctrine that had allowed for this racial segregation it was tossed out. But was that really the end?

CWC: The decision I guess said something like with all deliberate speed. And if interpret that, I'm told that all deliberate speed means you can take as long as you want to accomplish what you're supposed to be doing. So they were devious enough to do that; to sort of stretch it out as long as they could.

CO: Even though there were other plaintiffs, Linda Brown's name will always live eternally, as it's been said, as Brown versus the Board. And the Reverend Jesse Jackson had said that — this is a quote — that, “God has a way of taking ordinary people in sub ordinary positions and exalting them to extraordinary heights.” And that they become a frame of reference.

CWC: You know there’s a gospel song that we sing. I've read that, and I smiled and I thought OK, God uses ordinary people. That's the name of the song. They do extraordinary things. And he does; God does.

JD: That was Carol in conversation with Carolyn Wims-Campbell about her friend Linda Brown — who became a symbol of school desegregation in the United States, thanks to the landmark case Brown versus Board of Education. Linda Brown died on March 25 last year.

Ursula K. Le Guin obit

JD: Ms. Brown's life was defined by that one event. Whereas Ursula K. Le Guin's life was defined by the books she wrote. And wrote, and wrote. Ms. Le Guin was one of the most prolific science-fiction writers of the 20th and 21st centuries. She won dozens and dozens of awards — including two Hugos, four Nebula awards, and the National Book Award for Young People's Literature. But more important than the number of books and prizes was the incalculable impact of her work. Because she wasn't just a woman writing in a genre dominated by men — she was a feminist writing in a field that tended toward lunkheaded sexism. Ursula K. Le Guin died on January 22nd of 2018. She was 88 years old. Carol spoke with her friend and fellow writer, Molly Gloss

SOUNDCLIP

CO: And of her own writing, what was your first introduction? What was your first book?

MG: The first book of hers I read was “The Left Hand of Darkness”. I had come to science fiction kind of late in my life; I was in my 30s. And I was trying to catch up by reading all the Golden Age stuff, of which you know it was almost all white males, and then I read “The Left Hand of Darkness”, and it was wow! Wow, you can do this? This is what you can do in science fiction? But more than that, from a personal level, because I was already beginning to be a writer, I thought why should I even bother? I mean I truly thought that. This book is so deep, so rich, so full of thought and wisdom, and imagination. The world does not need one more mediocre novelist. And if I can't write like this, then why would I want to bother? But then you know the next book of hers that I read was “Rocannon’s World”, which was one of her very, very early works. And then I thought oh, this is where she started. And I've told her that; she’s laughed about it.

CO: Because you told her that there was hope for you?

MG: Yes, indeed. I mean not be able to ever aspire to right “The Left Hand of Darkness”, but I could aspire to eventually work up to “Rocannon’s World”.

CO: “The Left Hand of Darkness” is extraordinary, isn't it? 1969, and this set in Gethen. Tell us about the Gethenians?

MG: Well, they’re a people who are un-gendered I guess I would say, except during brief periods of rather frantic kemmer when they assume one sexual behaviour or the other. But mostly, they are un-gendered. It was a thought experiment as she said in what is gender? Who would we be if we were not male or female?

CO: But she was on the cutting-edge of so many things, especially in terms of gender in science fiction. I mean way ahead of everybody. And I just want to play a clip of Ursula Le Guin in a CBC Radio program called “Ideas”. This is from 2004.

SOUNDCLIP

URSULA LE GUIN: Once you get the F word written on your forehead in red, apparently, you have to talk only about men and what men do to avoid being accused of talking always about women. I have aroused a level of suspicion among my critics that it simply is not going to go away. And I have no intention of trying to make it go away. I'm going to write what I damned please about both men and women. And refuse stupid notions. Really, it’s very annoying.

CO: And, of course, the F word being “Feminism”.

MG: Feminism, yes.

CO: Or feminist. And so what did she say to you about that? What was her view on herself as a feminist?

MG: Oh, I think she was a very strong feminist, but her opinions were her own. And she was not going to be pushed into any sort of box of belief around that. She's a very fierce and opinionated person, and not afraid to express those opinions. And not afraid to change her opinion if she was led down to understand it differently.

CO: In the past twenty-four hours since we learned the news, there's been such an outpouring of remarks and gratitude from writers like yourself, saying what an influence — what an effect — she had on their work. What do you think made her science fiction so important to you and other writers?

MG: Well, she, first of all, made it possible for us to understand that the science in science fiction didn't have to be robots and laser guns and physics. It could be archaeology, anthropology, sociology, psychology; it could be the social sciences. And for a lot of us, that was opening a door really wide. It could be work centering on women. That was new as well. I think there are many things about her work that make those of us writers who admire her make us want to please her in a way. She's always been my first reader in a metaphorical sense. I'm always thinking about her as I'm working on something. Imagining is this something Ursula would be pleased by? And I think that's true for a lot of writers — a lot of us. And I think it would have been true for me whether I had ever met her because I so admired her work and my goal was to try to write as well as I could for her in a sense.

CO: And you stayed friends with her for all these decades.

MG: Thirty-five years.

CO: What's your memory? What are you thinking about her today?

MG: I think about trips we took together. We took a long trip to the southwest. And we took a trip to Steens Mountain, and the Northern Cascades — long car trips where we were laughing and talking in the car for hours. Having a glass of whisky in the evening in the motels — those are really strong memories for me.

JD: That was Portland, Oregon writer Molly Gloss, speaking with Carol last January after the death of the great Ursula K. Le Guin.

Stephen Hawking obit

SOUNDCLIP

STEPHEN HAWKING: One of the great revelations of the space age has been the perspective it has given humanity on ourselves. When we see the Earth from space, we see ourselves as a whole. We see the unity and not the divisions. It is such a simple image with a compelling message: one planet, one human race.

JD: The late Stephen Hawking, giving a speech in 2015. Professor Hawking died last March, at the age of 76 — having accomplished more than most people can dream of. And having learned, discovered, and explained things most of us didn't know existed — and can barely comprehend. In the 'sixties, when he was 21 years old, he was diagnosed with ALS — and given just a few years to live. Instead, he went on to become the world's pre-eminent theoretical physicist — using a wheelchair to get around, and an electronic voice synthesizer to communicate. And to teach students at Cambridge University, including Ray Laflamme. Mr. Laflamme a professor at the Institute for Quantum Computing in Waterloo, Ontario. Carol spoke with him the day Professor Hawking died.

SOUNDCLIP

CO: Ray, I'm sorry to learn of Stephen Hawking's death. How are you remembering your old Cambridge professor today?

RAY LAFLAMME: It's a sad day, but one where I think and second thought we should celebrate and reflect on an incredible life. He was somebody with a brilliant mind, somebody who was inspiring, who inspired many, not only the scientific community, but of public in general and somebody with an incredible amount of stamina and a good sense of humour.

CO: And you know that because you knew him at Cambridge, you were just a young lad studying there when you first met Stephen Hawking. Do you remember your first impressions of him?

RL: Yes. I finished a course and then I got selected to be one of his Ph.D. students. And to me it was quite a surprise. So I had to go from the third floor to the first floor where his office was and I never thought that going down two step of stairs would be that hard. And I came in front of his office and I had to pinch myself to ensure myself that I was awake and there was not a dream. And I started to talk to him and I don't think I could put too many syllables together but he was very gracious very kind. He asked me what I was going to do during the summer, I was going to go back and see my parents in Quebec City and then I would come back. And he says ‘Here take these papers, read them when you have time and we'll talk science when you come back in October.’

CO: Wow. And so how do you think he picked you out? Did you think when you were called down that you were going to be told to get out of here you're no?

[LAUGHTER]

RL: I had no clue. I've never asked him the question of how and why he picked me instead of others. And from time to time I say to my friends ‘Oh probably they had a pile of files together, somebody tripped and my file ended at the top” — the importance of some randomness in life sometimes.

CO: Now this is before he became quite ill with ALS?

RL: No, after. He became very ill with ALS in the mid-1960s and he slowly got affected more and more and more. I met him first in 1984 and in the summer of ‘85 we were on a trip together with some other support staff in Geneva where he got really sick and he needed to have a tracheostomy and lost the ability to speak and moved from speaking with very distorted voice to using the computer to communicate.

CO: Because what you know of him was that not only was he incredibly intelligent and but he was also very funny and witty and loved to talk. What was it like for him and for all the people around him when he wasn't able to use that voice?

RL: We all needed a lot more patience. The computer was useful in one way, but it took a lot longer. He had only a switch on one hand which was choosing columns and rows on the computer to go and pick up a word in a dictionary, so it took a lot of time. So the humour took longer to come out but it always came out. A couple of summers ago, maybe three or four years ago, he came to Waterloo and went to visits SNOLAB in Sudbury, and when he came back the nurse who was with them said it was very scary to go down and see this SNOLAB which was like two miles down a mine and Stephen says, ‘I felt great. This was like freefall.’

[CHUCKLING]

RL: With a big grin on his face.

CO: And this relationship began in Cambridge when you were a young student, and you were actually, as I understand it, you challenged one of his theories. Tell us about that?

RL: He gave me a problem to solve and he had an idea about the arrow of time in the universe that it would reverse at some point, and my job was to take the math and prove that this was the correct idea. I tried to make it work and I couldn't make it work. Then I went to see him and he says the questions are a bit complicated, not to say the least, and he would say have you done the approximation correctly, or are you sure you've kind of followed the path the right way? And that would explain all of them and he would come back and criticize my work and then we'd go back and forth. Only after six to eight months we finally we convinced him that he had made a mistake and then that's when he realized. He said ‘Yeah, you guys are absolutely right, I made a mistake.’ And he was very gracious about it. And then you would write letters of recommendation for me saying “This Laflamme guy has proven me wrong.” Which was always a good thing.

CO: How did he affect you. What lasting effect did he have, that your encounters with him, working with him, how did that affect you?

RL: There's a part of his brilliant mind and this kind of scientific creativity which kind of has inspired me. But also somebody with stamina and his ability to go beyond being imprisoned by his body and keep going and making and wanting to communicate with people, he wanted to share his discoveries with people — somebody who will really enjoyed life, which when you first meet Stephen and see him in his wheelchair you would never imagine that somebody can enjoy life so much — and that is what is being left to me, this joy of life and enjoying every day.

JD: Ray Laflamme is a physicist, and professor at the Institute for Quantum Computing. He spoke with Carol last March, after the death of the man who taught him at Cambridge University: Stephen Hawking.

[Music: Bring Him Back Home by Hugh Masekela]

Hugh Masekela obit

JD: This is "Bring Him Back Home" by Hugh Masekela. The "him" was Nelson Mandela. And Mr. Masekela wasn't just someone making a song out of a cause. For him, the two were inextricable. He was a musician first: a trumpeter, and a singer. But he was also an activist, who was exiled from his native South Africa for 30 years — and who used his talent and his platform to attack the apartheid regime from abroad. When Hugh Masekela died in January of last year, Carol spoke with Nduduzo Makhathini — a jazz pianist, and a friend of the late legendary musician.

SOUNDCLIP

CO: And how is the news of his death, how was it greeted in South Africa? Can you describe how people reacted?

NM: Most of the people are shocked and this is partly because of somehow the energy that he had, in terms of, he was a lively person. So it’s difficult to believe that someone like him, as portrayed by most people, they’re saying it's hard to believe that someone as strong as he is gave up.

CO: When you heard the news that Hugh Masekela had died, what went through your mind? What were your thoughts and memories of him?

NM: First of all, you know, I just wanted to pay tribute to him in a way that was possible. So when I got to work the students were talking about it, the staff, you know, everyone was talking about this. Also at the same time, trying to talk about life and a gift life was and and it's these kind of moments that remind us how special certain, you know, human beings are. But also what I want to celebrate now going forward, is sort of the devotion that Masakela portrayed throughout his career, and commitment as well in terms of like just being there for his people, you know. He came out in the 50s 60s, you know they were in exile, you know, because at that time black people had been moved from the cities.

CO: He was performing underground because you couldn't have a gathering of more than 10 black people, so he couldn't do the concerts, the performances he was doing.

NM: So as a result then he went to exile, you know. But for me what really comes through is sort of the courage that he continued to have. If there was one thing that was important to him, it was his people, their cultures and traditions. And this is what I think he represents.

CO: People may not even know that they were fans of Hugh Masekela’s music. I mean, tunes like Grazing In The Grass and Up, Up and Away just were such happy tunes. But at the same time the songs, the pieces that maybe people in South Africa knew better Soweto Blues and Bring Him Back Home, about Nelson Mandela. Was it the political songs that people connected to more in South Africa?

NM: Yeah it was all the songs. But the political songs were just relevant at the time. So, you know, people needed hiding place, so to speak. You know, so the music became our hiding place. This is the space where people could be themselves and rejoice within that music. And also remember that a lot of the songs were banned on radio, so some songs might sound not so political, but it was just like you know sort of using codes because there's a lot of political messages that were put in songs that didn't even sound — some of them sound sounded a bit comical, but, you know, it was just their way of getting your message through. And the black people in South Africa at the time could understand even songs that didn't sound quality were still political, because it was really about the liberation of the people and the emancipation of our people. And this was the key thing, you know.

CO: Can you tell us a bit about his decision? He went into exile, self-imposed, for 30 years he left South Africa. How difficult was that for him to do so?

NM: He speaks about being in exile and starting to dream in English, you know, because he had not spoken his native tongue for a long time. And that just goes to show the damage that was done by apartheid, you know, andexile as well. And he says he was once in New York and he was really almost going crazy, and he was walking and speaking in his native tongue just to himself, almost going crazy. But just because he felt there was there was a need for him to connect with his people, to connect with home. So the issue of your geographic location becomes such an important thing. So if you are disconnected from there, you know, it is something that is spiritually and culturally seen to be quite a disturbing phenomenon.

CO: Just on a personal level, playing with him, knowing him, just being around him, what was it like?

NM: First of all, I was playing with a great master. I was playing with the mentor, someone that I had always looked up to and wanted to play music with. And I sort of had my preconceived ideas about how he would be as an older musician that came from a particular generation, and to my amazement he was one of sort of the most progressive musicians. So I would be playing certain things that I thought were modern and he will be just right there, you know. And he would be excited to be playing music like that, you know. And I think there's a deeper part within himself that was always a child, that was willing to evolve and that was always open and just excited about the very idea of living life and the very idea of existence. You know, up till he passed away, Hugh could still dance on stage. I mean, at 78, I mean, you don't see every other day. So this child in him was something that really came through.

JD: Carol's conversation last January with Nduduzo Makhathini — jazz pianist, and friend of the late South African legend Hugh Masekela. Mr. Masekela died last January. He was 78

Jaunuary 1, 2019 episode transcript

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