Excerpt : "One significant thing during the Top-Ten Show competition is that Varda Arts were the only band who had no instruments of their own. . But they still managed to make history with what inferior equipment they had managed to hire and that is a landmark. . To have come up all the way as self-made artists, without asking any assistance from the government, donors or the Asian community, in itself is praiseworthy feat which should be emulated by others of their likes. ."
The writer mentioned this as there were other bands that refused to participate in the competition as it did not possess proper instruments. However, one should not forget that those days, even a string of 'Guitar' was not available in the country! To add here, only two days had remained for the competition and our main Key-Board player Rafik Farook became seriously ill! Instead of withdrawing ourselves from the competition, we decided to train Yunus Senior over Key-Board who had never played that instrument before. He practiced for 8 hours a day continuously for those two days and he did fairly well and we won against all odds averse to the seasoned artistes and well equipped bands!
The song was 'Tazama Tanzania' which was adjudged 8th out of 10 'Top-Ten Songs.' In 1989, the following year, Varda Arts's Song, 'Watoto' was also awarded for its merit and both songs have become timeless as they are still played over radios even after 30 years!
Thank you TANZANIA for the love showered upon us for all these years!
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