Phodiso Dintwe. Photo / Diana Simumpande
Phodiso Dintwe is a musician, actor, poet, film-maker and dancer. Born in Botswana, he moved to Aotearoa with his mum in his early teens and today is a powerhouse creative based in Auckland. His most recent musical release is the EP Act III, described by the artist as 'one to bop your head to', a work that emerged 'out of insomnia and a great sense of hope'.
My mum's name is Kgomotso and it means "comfort". She was born three years after her brother, my uncle Seleke, who died as a baby. After his passing, my grandparents had my mum and named her for the comfort she brought them following the loss of their son. When I was born, my mum was very ill, and she hoped my birth would bring healing, which is why I am named Phodiso because it means "healing". All of my family, my cousins, aunts and uncles, our names bear some reference to the experiences of their parents or our community when they were born.
When I was 2, my mum went to the UK to study civil engineering. Even though education is free all the way to tertiary in Botswana, it was normal for people of my parent's generation to study abroad if they got a scholarship. It not only offered greater opportunities, it looked good on their resumes. Mum came back when I was 5, so I spent a lot of time with my grandmother and my great aunt in the village of Lentswelemoriti. In Tswana culture, it is customary to be raised by your extended family so even though mum was gone it didn't feel bad, because as long as I had my grandmother, I felt safe.
Watch music video Talk Too Much here:
My cousins didn't exactly come out of the womb singing, but many of them are very good at poetry and writing in multiple languages. It comes naturally to them, yet for me, I might have ideas in my head, but I have to work really hard to externalise them.
For my cousins, they have an idea, they express it and it's easy, whereas I have an idea, then I have to imagine how to express it.
When I was younger I'd see my cousins dancing, singing and drumming, but I was nowhere near as good so I'd practise by myself, or I'd watch and try to follow but I was always a step behind. The only person who encouraged me was my grandmother. Even if I was terrible, she'd say I was great, which made me keep going. Because my grandmother was also the most amazing, smartest person I knew, I decided if she said I was great, it had to be true and other people just hadn't caught on to it yet.
I played around with a bunch of stuff before I became serious about art and writing, music and performance. Later in my journey, I came to understand that for me, to be good at creative things, most of my learning came from observing. I'm also grateful to my grandmother for explaining to me that some people take longer to get good at things than other people.
After Mum finished her studies, we spent some time living in Botswana and the UK. Then she heard that the cost of living and raising kids was cheaper in New Zealand, at that time at least, and she thought it would be cool to move here. We came for the first time when I was 13 for six months, and we settled here when I was 15. But being 15, it was a big change, and there was a lot of culture shock for me.
My first proper job was at Vector Arena. I worked for one of the food concessions, so I saw all the concerts, and that fuelled my passion for music. When you see someone living the life you want to live, or they're performing their whole album with a band and the crowd is singing along, that accelerated whatever was inside me to start working towards that goal. Back then I listened to a lot of folk, so Mumford and Sons were a highlight. I also saw Ed Sheeran setting up, by himself with his guitar and the sound check guy and I was mesmerised.
Seeing those shows made me want to perform. Not necessarily to do an arena show, but they made me want to perform in bars and cafes. Once I finished high school that became a regular thing and I used to try things, like poetry and rap, at open mic nights on K Rd and in Ponsonby.
By then I was working at Q Theatre, and slowly I started becoming a performer who acts and makes music because I need to do multiple things to keep things exciting. I also run music and theatre workshops and I teach in schools. When there are no creative options available for me to make a living, I fall back on landscaping.
I speak Setswana, English, Pedi and Sotho, and I'm currently learning te reo Māori and I'm soon to start learning French, which I can understand if you speak it slowly. When you learn another language, there's this thing that happens, because you also learn the world view that language comes from. So, in a way, if you speak two languages there are two versions of yourself. When you speak language B, you're also feeling and acting within that culture, then you step into language A and you start thinking feeling and acting in that culture. It's called code switching.
When I asked my mum how she processes conservations in English, even though she's fluent, she said that when she speaks English she takes the words in, then translates to Setswana, then she embodies them and reorganises them back into English having gone through a loop. But that's not what I do. I have a side of my brain with input and output that works solely in English, and there's a side of my brain for speaking in Setswana. How I relate to people in Botswana compared to how I relate to people in New Zealand is also very different.
New Zealand is not home. I don't mean that as a bad thing or a criticism, but it took me a while to realise that. The sense of home to me is about feeling connected even when you're having a hard time.
One of my cousins has this view that you can't live in a place and not be so unchanged that you don't become part of that new place. He made a huge case for me being more of a westerner than I am African. Because he's been living in South Africa, when he moved there, so much of who he was reliant on how he spoke and pronounced words. Even though there are similarities between Botswana and South Africa, he believes a lot of what a person does is filtered back to them by the people around them. That people or society dictate who you have to be in order to fit in, and you have to mirror what they're doing back to them. He declared he could not move to another country and live there for years and come back the same. My response was, when I go back to Botswana, to the village, and I spend time with my grandmother, I couldn't show up to her house and behave like I would in New Zealand. I couldn't hang out with my extended family and be like a foreigner. So my perspective, when you go to a place that is vastly different to your home, you almost invent a new version of yourself to exist there, but you return to your home self when you go home. I have a New Zealand self, and a Botswana self, yet they are both authentic sides of me.
Who we are is so broad. I think of Botswana as my mother and New Zealand as a close friend, and there are some things I reserve for my mother and some things I feel more comfortable communicating with a close friend. Although I am sure it is different for each person that is how it is for me.
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