Wedding Bells?

One of my neighbors has a certain fondness for his MP3 player and seemingly humongous speaker system.  I say seemingly because I haven’t actually seen them, but I can most definitely hear the mixture of American and Mozambican pop music that’s being spewed from them at all hours of the day.  From across the street.  With curtains pulled.  And my doors and windows shut. And locked (not that it would really help dampen sound, but it’s more for dramatic effect…).

He blasts his music all day, every day from 6am to usually about 9pm or 10pm at night. When I say “his music” I am of course referring to the collection of 7 or 8 songs he actually has on his USB flash drive, which he then plays on repeat.  It was maddening at first, and I just couldn’t understand how anyone could put up with it.  The same songs.  On repeat.  All. The. Time.

A few weeks ago, I came up with an idea to try and solve the problem.  “I know,” I said to myself, “I’ll fill one of my other neighbor’s flash drives with music – music that both he and I like – and then he’ll inevitably pass it along to the neighboring playing DJ who will then at least have a little aural diversity to play with.”  I thought it was a great plan, and just when it seemed to be working, the Mozambican’s decided they didn’t like the combination of Rock and Roll Power Ballads, American Rap and Pop I had given them and went back to their old seven or eight songs.  Or maybe they lost the USB stick I had put music on.  Or it was stolen.  Probably a combination of all three.  And then, as my plan quickly fell apart, I learned a harsh lesson about what happens when you give someone something in Mozambique: Everyone else wants something too.  Adding salt to the wound still festering from my failed plane was every single teenager with an USB coming over and asking me to put music on their flash drives too.  Dumb move Will.

But, I’ve started becoming desensitized to the shitty soundtrack  at this point and can usually go about my day toning the music out.  But I was just caught off guard by something…a new song.  And what is that new song he’s apparently added to his collection?  Well, it’s wedding bells of course.  Why?  I don’t know.  Probably because it’s Mozambique.