Cat Stevens visits tsunami-hit region
The singer once known as Cat Stevens visited Indonesia’s tsunami-devastated Aceh province today, handing out money to orphaned children and praying at a mosque.
The musician, now a peace activist known as Yusuf Islam, plans to open a branch of his charity, Small Kindness, in Aceh to aid children who lost their parents.
He travelled on a United Nations helicopter to the west Sumatran village of Lamno and then visited tent camps and a Muslim university in the provincial capital Banda Aceh.
In Lamno and at the camps, he handed money to the children, giving them about 200,000 rupiah (£10) each.
“What do you need most right now?” he asked them through a translator.
“Schools,” they said.
Later he spoke at the Islamic University of Ar-Raniry and prayed at Banda Aceh’s central mosque.
Islam has written a new song, Indian Ocean, in response to the disaster and recently recorded it with musicians including A.R. Rahman, the prolific Indian composer, Magne Furuholmen of the pop band A-Ha, and Travis drummer Neil Primrose. It will be released in February to raise money for Small Kindness’s tsunami aid efforts.
He said it tells the story of a British family who are holidaying in Asia when the tsunami hits and who help a young girl orphaned by the waves.
The track includes the use of instruments, which the singer – whose folksy hits included Peace Train and Wild World – has avoided since embracing Islam in 1977.
“To come as close to perfection for a song, you have to use whatever instruments are necessary to fulfil the needs of that song,” he said in an interview. “My position on that issue has changed, especially when it’s for a very good cause.”
Music, he said “touches the conscience of a society and it makes (a problem) more vivid and approachable”.
He said he had never taken a position on arguments among Muslim scholars on whether musical instruments violate the religion, but simply removed himself from the debate.
Islam, who is British, said his group would help educate orphaned children in Aceh, as it has done in Bosnia, Iraq, Kosovo and Albania.
“You can see in some of the faces of the children that they’re very confused and traumatised,” he said. “I don’t think it’ll be easy for them without receiving good support to rebuild their lives again.”
Islam plans to headline a concert in Jakarta Monday to raise money for a Banda Aceh hospital.
He was removed from a London-to-Washington flight in September because of suspected links to terrorists, a charge he vehemently denies. He said the US government has still not told him what the accusation was based on.
“There’s been no coherent answer from them, they apparently don’t feel as if they have to answer any questions these days,” he said. “Their messages have been complete mumbo-jumbo.”
