On a beach in Bosaso, north-east Somalia, near the tip of the Horn of Africa, dozens of Somali and Ethiopian refugees perch on rocks or squat in the sand, peering across the Gulf of Aden to the promised land. They are waiting for boats to carry them to Yemen and away from a life of miserable poverty, persecution and a war in Somalia.
While the likes of 50 Cent spin gangsta fantasies, rapper K’Naan has the brutal realities of life in war-torn Mogadishu to draw on. Robin Denselow meets Somalia’s hip-hop traveller