Entries Tagged 'Africana' ↓

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Have you heard or read about the immense curiosity we humans have? Have you heard that you just cannot resist the

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I found my new theme! Hope you like it.

Am still tweaking it.

UPDATE: For Champers - There those cheeky San chappies are at top of the sidebar where they belong!!

They have done it! Justin and Mike have come up trumps with Afrigator

Go get Afrigator’d.

Afrigator’d Your Blog Yet?

Extract from Sokwanele’s Sky News Blog

More people die in Zimbabwe every day than in Darfur or Iraq, but we are dying silently and the world doesn’t seem to know how bad it really is.

Zimbabwe’s HIV/AIDs statistics are among the highest in the world and this terrible pandemic, combined with a lack of drugs in our country, corruption by government ministers, food shortages and 1,800% inflation, makes it a swift killer in our society. Life expectancy in Zimbabwe is 34 years for women and 37 years for men.

I would really like you to think about that for a moment. How old are you? How much longer would that leave you to live or have you already exceeded our life expectancy?

End of extract from Sokwanele’s Sky News Blog

Zimbabwe’s HIV/AIDs statistics

How long will Jonga take to upgrade their core? Seems like forever.
Or is there another reason behind the splash screen?

Seems like forever.

Jonga

Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has been arrested in a raid on his MDC offices just days after being severely beaten up in custody by Mugabe’s henchmen and police thugs.

Mugabe is in Tanzania so probably wants Tsvangirai locked up to prevent a coup while he is away. Sikhanyiso Ndlovu told the BBC that the arrest is a police matter, “They are doing their job, we can’t interfere,” he said.

Yeah well, pull the other leg you idiot. Mugabe is attending a meeting of the Southern African Development Community and is expected to receive a very cool reception from the leaders of Southern African countries.

I am hoping he is shown very short shrift by the gathering. But will Mbeki relent and soften toward this evil man?

Zimbabwe’s Tsvangirai Locked Up

Thanks to Champers, below is a video of the recent attack on 4 Zimbabwean officials who were leaving Harare to attend the European Union-African Caribbean Pacific (EU-ACP) meeting in Brussels.

See Sokwanele’s website for Zimbabwe’s Civic Action Support Group

Display this linkbadge on your site too:

Mugabe Must Go

Ever asked yourself why you should fail just so that your boss can be proved right?

Waddya lookin’ at me for? I don’t. I have embarrassing rows with them at meetings. Embarrassing? Yes.

Certain manager personalities are prone to taking any challenge to their ideas as a personal insult. This then dictates the response to me which I in turn do not retreat from. I have the right to an oposing view and like it or not, the boss is not always right. I tell them this which inflames the situation. I keep as calm and cool as ice which is mistaken for being aloof and again also narks the boss(es). If the rest of the meeting participants wanted to, they could support me but I know what spineless chumps they are so go it alone. Everytime. Their silence is deafening.

But lo and behold when the meeting breaks up the backslappers suddenly metamorphise from the spineless beings who a few minutes ago were silent as dormice. Two-faced bastards.

So I go to meetings armed with the salient facts and stats in the hope that a boss will take issue with me. It makes meetings more fun when I can prove that my plan/view is right and it also helps me continuously reset their expectations about if I have at long last turned into a brown-nosing sychophant who will let them be right even when they are blatantly wrong.

Don’t you just love corporate businesslife sometimes? Don’t you just hate toxic and dictatorial bosses?

Why Should I Fail In Order To Prove You Right?

This is hilarious and the best humour I have experienced in days. Click here to visit Lek’s site

Me and Zeke cartoon by Lev Yilmaz

Just in case you get a spare 30 minutes, why don’t you head over to SA Rocks and read what I said in an interview with Max Kaizen.

I tend to get a tad passionate with the verbals when it comes to Africa.

Champers in the Raw

I recently carried out an email interview with Champers who runs a blogsite called ChampagneHeathen. She is renowned as a ‘funloving dronk n dance on tables’ person and graciously found time to respond to my questions.

Question #1
During your last two senior years at high/grammar school, were you already aspiring to go into the career you have now carved out for yourself? If yes – why? If no – why not?

I guess this assumes I have carved a career out for myself!

I knew I wanted a career out of the norm. So in that sense, yes I did aspire to where I am now. I think I was aspiring towards photo journalism for National Geographic. At this stage I was tearing into books by the top SA & National Geographic photo journalists. I also wanted to be involved in what I would later learn is termed “Humanitarian” work. I called it “saving the world, and changing the wrongs”.

Soon however, I realised how much photography equipment costs, and that my brother kept sneaking my mom’s old camera gear out from under me. So I decided to look to print journalism & the benefits of a Bic pen & ‘borrowed’ computer room paper. Then I matriculated. And the idea of being a rich slacker trophy wife suddenly appealed to me and took on a whole new meaning of “glam”. I am still looking for that perfect sugar daddy.

Question #2
What did you begin to study at college and end up receiving a degree in? Explain why if it differed. Explain the rationale behind your final selection.

I started varsity studying BA Information Science, simply because I wanted any old undergrad course to begin with, and to then go onto post-grad journalism. But taking Political Science as my optional subject changed everything.

I also realised quickly that my course was not teaching me hacking skills, but rather how to catalogue a library. So I ditched it at the end of my 1st year to do BA International Relations, with politics as a major, and picked up English and then International Law LLB (Ooooooo!) as random extra subjects. In effect it meant I had ended up adding an extra year onto my undergrad course so I had plenty of spare ‘study’ time available for other pursuits, and one can only drink so much screw-top Tassies.

Question #3
What music genre do you like listening to most? Who or which band influenced your early musical preferences?

Music has never been of much concern to me. I try to listen to as many genres as possible. Each one suits different times and moods. Louis Armstrong can irritate me to an extreme while I am in the office, but it works in the background in the evening with wine. Or some teenage punk band can be fun to bounce to in the car.

My eldest brother’s music (U2, Beatles, Depeche Mode, The Doors) was probably my early preference as I had no clue. So I trusted his taste.

Question #4
Given a choice of vacation, where would you go to experience an ideal holiday? And what is the best bit about a vacation for you, the travel to or the arrival? Why?

Paris. I love the city and France and their culture beyond repair. Until I can work out a way to live there, I will have to stick to holidays. I miss their baguettes, and croissants, and the gorgeous coffees, and walking down their streets even in mid winter, and just feeling like I fit in.

I have visited Paris four times now. My best times have been when I stayed in my friend’s apartment where you could see three quarters of the city, and staying in a cheap hotel in the Latin Quarter, I recommend that hotel only if you can speak French, and can handle one communal shower & one toilet per floor!

It is one of the great dilemmas in my life – loving a decadent city like Paris, where you are able to forget the rest of the world and indulge in all that is good in life, versus the African reality I know and also love. I have yet to work out whether these two worlds can realistically and healthily merge.

Jaaa, the seven hour flight to Paris is nothing to write home about. Neither is the arrival at Charles De Gaulle aeroport, or figuring out how to catch the train into the city with no euro currency.

Question #5
What legacy would you like to be remembered for?

Helping Africa to become a world power.

Question #6
If you were not doing what you do now as a job, what might you have done?

I’d be in the wine industry. I love wine, and even though I have no sense of smell, and my taste sucks wine fascinates me. In my opinion, wine is an artform. Plus the farms rock, and sitting for hours drinking away lazy lunch/ evening hours in those settings would not be a bad way to spend one’s days.

Question #7
Has blogging had a big impact on your personal life and career? ie Has blogging placed extra demands on your time? When are you most creative? Morning or evening? Do you only blog at certain times of the day or night?

Blogging has definitely affected my life. It has made me write regularly again, and so I am proudly watching as I hone my skill. Writing was something I had been trying to do for years, but previously never had the motivation to pursue.

It also has given the ranting, fighting idealist in me the perfect “soap box” from which to voice my thoughts and opinions. I think many a friend I regularly dine with is very happy, because now they don’t have to endure these rants over their fillet or chicken medallions.

In general I will write a post up in the morning before 10am. I usually have an idea bouncing about my head the night before or on the way to work. I can be very creative at night, before passing out in my bed! It’s just that the keys can be difficult to focus on through “2-bottles-of-wine” eyes.

I have a job that allows me to get distracted relatively easily, so I enjoy keeping up with the comment banter, and this has placed demands on my time. Also, having established myself in the blogosphere, it becomes necessary to regularly read and comment on the growing number of friends’ blogs .– It is not easy & can be very time consuming ESPECIALLY with slow internet connectivity, which is a regular feature in my life.

Question #8
What are your 3 all-time favourite PC or electronic games and why?

If those free internet & PC games are allowed under this title. I used to also LOVE Teken III, and KO’ing guys with that chick’s high heels, but I believe that is a PSI game, not a PC game. Is there a difference??? Am I even using the right acronyms??

Question #9
Given that blogging has entered our personal lives and mainstream business, do you find that blogosphere’s ‘elite’ or Blogebrities is dominated by the tekkie/ marketing/advertising/branding clique despite being the minority user group? If yes, is it healthy for blogging’s future? Also, do you subscribe to Web 2.0 or is it a myth?

There are so many marketing blogs trying to figure out all the inner workings of our minds. I think more marketers should rather have gone into psychology. There will soon be more of a demand for people to fix you after all of this media brainwashing, rather than more people doing the brainwashing.

I steer clear of those blogs now. But when I first started, they definitely seemed like the place to be. I guess they just “market” themselves better. Ultimately though, this medium allows you to seek out and gather together the blogs of interest to yourself.

I do not have the first clue what Web 2.0 is. Well, no, that’s a lie, I have seen the word used a few times in the blog context. THAT is all I know.

Question #10
What would you describe as being your ideal night out?

One that is unexpected. That ends at sunrise and involved a thousand contexts of diverse type, a thousand people plus, a thousand laughs, smiles, flirts, crazy dance moves and where I am still sober enough to remember it all & able to recall it the next day with mates over a very hungover late late breakfast somewhere.

Question #11
What was your most interesting encounter in your life to date ?

The children I interacted with regularly in Orange Farm (a township south of Johannesburg). They are bundles of happy, polite, darling, motivational joy. I miss them.

Question #12
What something are you very good at?

I can down a beer faster than most people, male or female. This is my friends’ party trick. I think it is unclassy and I hate to publicise it (Rob, you bring out the truth in me!), but I still impress myself at this most random talent.

My friends, however, often set me up against their mates without me realising it. Hmmm. Actually. I think we should start hustling this skill.

Question #13
What age do you think is best to be?

As a 19 year old blonde chick. THAT was fun. I was in 1st/ 2nd year varsity so I did not have a care in the world. I thought I looked hot. Women wanted to be me, men definitely tried to be with me. And I happily took complete advantage of the situation!!

Honestly – I think you have to find pleasure in every age and stage. Not that you have to have a laugh and thrill a minute,but simply to just roll with the challenges and the opportunities that each stage brings.

Question #14
Are you a political animal? Do you participate? If not - why? If yes – why?

Yes, but more in the sense of international & global politics. I keep losing interest in local politics that is rampant with in-fighting. I vote. I try to keep as up-to-date on the issues I find relevant. I use my blog to test my theories, ideas & responses to the political scene. If my government does not start taking more responsibility, then I will start becoming more active. I think. I hope.

Why? Because I love a good fight of minds and wit. Because I am fascinated by power plays at all levels. And if I want broader change, I have to know full well what and with whom I am fighting. And also to know what tools are at my disposal as well as which are available to my political opponent(s)’.

Question #15
Do you think Africa can be saved by pop and rock concert takings?

No. Instead I think that these publicity stunts wear away at a very serious and complex issue. People soon will become tired of hearing “Help Africa! Help Africa!”. They will stop listening. Or they might fool /quell themselves into thinking, “Well I bought an expensive concert ticket, and I spent a whole afternoon listening to great rock music while thinking about the issues, so I must, therefore have made a difference.”

It is so much more complex than throwing money at Africa.

Plus, there is already a great deal of money in the Aid and Humanitarian world. It is arguably being misused on the salaries of people like me!.

The infrastructures and aid systems needs to be adapted to become more responsive, effective, and cost-efficient. We must ‘Make the Money Work’! When it is proving to do so, then raise more funding. Except this means human power, dedicated hours, creative thinking, power relenting, utilising skills – not just buying a ticket or a pair of jeans.

And people don’t like that.

Question #16
What is your philosophy of life?

“Cause every little things gonna be alright. So don’t you worry about a thing….”
Whenever life is kak, I put that Bob Marley song on, and things might not be better, but that song makes me smile & bounce & remember that I’ll head up soon enough, and be flying high

Question #17
What something can’t you do well at all?

Play sports that involve ball skills. Only my puppies will still play soccer with me, and that’s just because they don’t know what they’re missing out on.

I also find it damn near impossible to write in small writing. Which is maybe why I love the computer so much. Finally more than 20 words can fit onto a page AND be legible!

Question #18
Do you have a gadget that can’t ever do without or be parted from?

Is a coffee machine considered a gadget?!
All my gadgets that I think I rely on (like my phone, my computer, my car, my camera) have taken a break from me for a few days or months, and I actually realised I enjoy the freedom of not relying on them. Although, as soon as I am back in my normal world, I am back to having them all very close at hand. And while I am gradually becoming attached to my iPod, I have yet to struggle to be parted with it.

Interview: Champers in the raw

The excellent Stormhoek campaign conceived by Hugh Macleod has released a term into the world that has now taken on a new significance to us all. It should do and Hugh explains it best here and here.

But before you go wild and start throwing your empty Stormhoek wine bottle corks at me, I have to tell you that you are reading the words of the ultimate ’social object’ - me. Yes, je suis est la grande ‘object sociale’. Why and how can I so modestly claim this? Well you better read on to find out hadn’t you.

Years ago when I was a lot younger I was threatened with excommunication by my father if I did not agree with his most excellent idea to date for me to join the church choir and learn to screech/sing. But far from being miffed and moaning about my soon to be restricted lifestyle, it dawned on me that I had in fact just been handed an opportunity called freedom with a capital F and it was to be grabbed with both hands lest the chance that dad’s foolishness would never occur again.

So like all clever young kids, especially me, I rebelled most appropriately and sufficiently enough to cause dad to go get his slipper. Yeah, I knew even then that there was no gain without some pain. But there was no pain. Just the confrontation I was manipulating to make dad feel his threat of discomfort (he aways pulled the downswing anyway!), had sunk in, and that his spoiled good for nothing obstrepulous son would, after sulking, threats to run away, skin the family cat, stomp on the budgie and pouting so hard it hurt, go to church and learn to sing hymns. Properrrly. Choir practice occured at night.

Understand that here I was, a tender and sensitive responsible young soul, being forced by my father to go out on a schoolnight to have fun with a group of classmates interrupted only for a while by some singing practice. Oh gee shucks you should have seen the Oscar-winning performance every Thursday evening as I tried so hard to summon up the enthusiasm to go out to sing for my supper and dad’s everlasting happiness that he got one up on me! Hee hee!

It was the best of times for me. After practice we got on our bikes and sauntered back home or rushed off to go visit a friend and cause a bit of harmless schoolboy havoc. The warm evenings riding my bike toward the deep red sunsets are forever etched into my memory. It was during this time that I first tasted wine. Communion wine. Padre left a cupboard door open. Shucks. We all had to have a sip of the sweet red wine.

So when I read the technobilge below, I always immediately think of my days as a choirboy.

Remember this from April 2006? What does this mean?:

Deep, opulent orange hue. A nose of caramel, pastry, spiced oranges and apples. There is certainly some botrytis here, both colour and nose confirming this. The palate has quite a savoury structure to it, with firm acidity cutting through the mouthfeel. But there is plenty of flavour too, of burnt toast, stewed apples, caramel and honey. Takes on a greater sweet intensity with time in the glass, and has a good length. More reminiscent of Tokaji than anything else. Just scrapes very good

I’d sooner be munching chocolate.

This incredible machine was built as a collaborative effort between the Robert M. Trammell Music Conservatory and the Sharon Wick School ofEngineering at the University of Iowa. Amazingly, 97% of the machines components came from John Deere Industries and Irrigation Equipment of Bancroft Iowa, yes farm equipment!

It took the team a combined 13,029 hours of set-up, alignment, calibration, and tuning before filming this video but as you can see it was well worth the effort.

It is now on display in the Matthew Gerhard Alumni Hall at the University and is already slated to be donated to the Smithsonian.

Click HERE to hear the Fatastic Music Machine. It is in Windows, (.wav file) Media format

The land is white. Covered in snow. If I could download the snaps I have taken with my mobile I’d do it to let you see how peaceful and chocolate box scenic it looks outside my window. But I cannot download them ‘cos I do not have the software or cables with me.

Snow has an amazing effect on me especially as we rarely see it here in UK. Well it rarely snows and sets around West Berkshire. As a person who grew up with desert sandstorms and the hot dry East wind in Namibia, the complete opposite as experienced here in England and elsewhere in EU, the snow still retains its uniqueness with me. I delight in the snow. Like a kid, I run and play in it with glee!

Most Europeans (err, them wot lives here in Europe), scoff at the snow from a lifetime of living in these cold conditions. I suppose I can equate with a resident of Bergen in Norway, (not Sweden and see picture at left with heavy raincloud looming above the town) because it has the highest rainfall in Europe. It rains for 2 out of every 3 days and I recall it said that 18 tons of water falls on each rooftop each day it rains. Collectively there is enough water dropped on Bergen each day of rain to fill hundreds and hundreds of Olympic-sized swimming pools.

So imagine a Bergen residents’ awe at arriving in Windhoek and driving to Walvis and then to the oasis at Sossusvlei (see photo below). Well, I am awestruck by the snow as they would be by the dryness and barreness of the Namib desert, which was my old backyard.

I hope the snow falls throughout the day. I want to experience a lock-in because it is too damn dangerous to travel!! Which reminds me that Hugh and the Stormhoek guys are on the St Valentine’s Big Love roadshow to a stack of Tesco’s around UK. I hope the cold and snow do not deter people from going to see Hugh and the team at their local Tesco. Hugh, (or rather Colin) is videoing interviews with shoppers, so go along and introduce yourself to Hugh, (see the itinery here), you can’t mistake him, (click here to see a pic of him), and he might video a podcast with you in it! And while you are in Tesco do not forget to buy two bottles of Big Love. One for you and the other for a loved one on St valentines day.

I will update the snow situation here later in the day, workload permitting. I do want the snow to stay for more than a couple of hours.

UPDATE: Friday morning: The freeze from last night has assured the snow that fell yesterday remains in place. Better yet - it has started snowing again and will settle onto yesterdays fall. At least that is what it is doing in my garden!

How time flies.It seems that it was only yesterday that I was preparing to fly to New York. And then it was only last night that I was preparing to fly to France for Christmas. I need a break badly! All that travel and excitement and the return to office has left me exhausted!

We welcome Sister Mary Lisa to the blogroll this week. You can go see what SML has been up to by clicking on her linkbadge in the blogroll.

Meanwhile, maestro please…..

1. Acidic Ice - Rudi and I were planning to get married this year on April 29th, but of course our plans were seriously hampered by ‘My Evil Mother’ and Rudi delaying his big day. Is Glenn Close your mom?. Or is it that Stripe who wears Prada?

2. And Pop Pickers still at #2 this month is Pop The Cork - Seeing white rabbits and a man and his wife dining at a table in a plush restaurant, while the husband keeps staring at a drunken lady who answers to the name of Champers swigging her drink as she sitssalone at a nearby table staring at a set of cutout eyes stuck on a stick thinking about Big Love and another bottle of Stormhoek St valentine’s Rose’

3. Guy Kawasaki - Evangelising Technology Studies

4. Bloute - Gaaning aan about a blik. OK if that is what floats your blik Bloute, gaan maar aan!

5. ChampagneHeathen - Regardless of the piss-takes and debauched partying - Champers does an amazing and much needed job related to HIV and AIDS Today she reports on Basotholand and how HIV and AIDS has impacted this small region. She even converted me into a Frenchman.

6. Cheap Tart - Hellcatting and FlickRing and things beautiful as usual!

7. Cook Sister - Things went wrong at P de la T or that restaurant called Pont de la Tour near Tower Bridge. Oops.

8. Dave Duarte - Garden Route Geeks and Happy Feet are doing a Geek Dinner at Kwelanga, George on February 9th. Be there.

9. Insanely Single - WARNING! Horribly Overdue Holiday Snaps update! Yummy

10. KattBox - Pot Pourrie and Katt Laws with popcorn and coke!

11. Katie Possum - Her teef hurt but wants to spend a fortune on a private dentist to fix it. Please post your dental practice recommendations here.

12. Genilmaa - This week she be mainly recalling vomits. Mmmmm if that floats your carrots n peas and coke and milkshakes with pizza bits then fine by me!

13. John Dodds - Declaring Madison Avenue is dead, and now bereft of life it’s gawn to meet it’s new sponsor at that great big Superbowl this Sunday

14. Ann Michael - Ann is wondering where all her choices are. I think I know where they will be on Sunday - at the Superbowl maybe?

15. Misty - Misty is still facking whining and having a perpetual whinge about - well everything actually!

16. Michelle - After the facking comes the peaceful contemplative Michelle calmly, rationally and gently worrying about her limits!

17. Seth Godin - Taking the easy way out and pointedly making me wish I’d read his list before starting this bloglist!! Darn!

18. Sister Mary Lisa - WELCOME: Hot SML more commonly called Sister Mary Lisa from Montana! SML wants to know what kind of soul you are. So git on over there and tell her.

19. Urban Trash - Jeremy get’s amazing feedback via 365+ comments about his article on Rape.

20. Aquila Online - Still driving dangerously with a handheld camera at 145kpm. I dig it!

21. Bad Language - Oblique marketing Strategies and how to negotiate. Both a reading must!

22. Boer Seun - Good article about minorities.

23. Escape Cubicle Nation - How to survive a failure. A bad one. Not a iddybitty one. A big mother of a failure.

24. Gaping Void - Hugh is in Inverness giving out Big Love

25. La Dolce Vita - Still preggie since January.

26. Marbro - Having a kak week. Again.

27. Jam - She went on her first date. Go read about how it went.

28. OneAfrikan - Are you into mobile? Like ja man. It’s the new pink.

29. ShutterJane - Starting Over. No way babe. I like the photos as they are.

30. White African - African Development Myths. OK. I’ll go with that?

31. Woza Friday - moaning that Pearl Harbour is now in Chicago. Hey bru – everything is fluid man! Nice new interface Dave. Very nice. Me like a lot. Me want one too.

This edition of the Roll-Up is long overdue! Enjoy!

iScatterlings Roundup Jan 2007