...after napping on a long road trip back from the bush, you reach your destination, look in the back of the truck and find your stuff has been joined by two huge sacks of charcoal and two live chickens.
This was from my trip through northern Mozambique last week with the good folks at World Vision. I dozed off on the long, flat road from Morrumbala to Quelimane, and was assured that the roadside poultry was better and cheaper than city chickens.
I was walking out of a Nairobi movie theater last night. (Finally watched "Up." Enchanting.) An American friend saw this poster in the lobby and said: "Hey, a movie about the next Kenyan election!"
In elementary school, I loved playing the "Oregon Trail" computer game, which put you in the shoes of 19th century Americans setting off by covered wagon to settle the wild West. This was meant to be an educational game, providing timeless lessons about class issues (the banker from Boston always set off with the most provisions, although the carpenter and farmer had skills that were more valuable to survive the nasty journey) as well as the importance of good nutrition (this was how most kids of my generation learned to spell "dysentery.")
Video games have come a long way since the eight-bit, Apple IIC days of my youth. But the latest offering from Serious Games Interactive, a Danish maker of educational computer games, is ambitious on several levels.
"Global Conflicts: Child Soldiers" takes you to northern Uganda, with the task of bringing an end to the two-decade insurgency by the Lord’s Resistance Army. Our hero isn't a James Bond-like spy, CIA hitman or South African soldier of fortune -- he's a human rights investigator.
As a player, you will work for the
International Criminal Court and will be sent on an assignment in
Uganda, where you will meet the feared leader of the rebel
Lord’s Resistance Army, Joseph Kony. The game focuses on
topics such as child soldiers, human rights and war-crimes.
Previous games in the series have included "Global Conflicts: Palestine"
and "Global Conflicts: Latin America." When they say "Serious Games," they're not kidding.
Rock, Paper, Shotgun, a blog for PC gamers, has a bit more detail: You're looking for Kony, but along the way you meet people liekMonica Atto, an IDP prepared to forego personal justice in the interests of the
peace process (an idea popular among Acholis, as I and others have written). You also meet Dalson Oyo, who had his hands, ears, nose and lips chopped off by LRA rebels, and wants Kony hunted down and killed.
I was afraid the game would be exploitative or trade on stereotypes. But "Grand Theft Auto: Eastern Congo" this is not. Gamer Tim Stone offers a strong endorsement:
In pure game terms Global Conflicts: Child Soldiers has various
failings. As an educational device however, it’s pretty extraordinary.
Of the hundreds of NPCs I will doubtless meet over the next twelve
months, I can’t imagine any will fix my attention, or burn themselves
into my memory more effectively than Monica or Dalson.
Interestingly, northern Uganda is now also the subject of a comic book and an upcoming film due to star Uma Thurman. This long-running human tragedy, often overshadowed by the horrors in Sudan and Congo, is suddenly getting some serious attention.
America's most dysfunctional cartoon family (OK, second most) is coming to TV screens in Angola, via the South African satellite giant DSTV. How to introduce the Simpsons to a new market? An Angolan ad agency came up with this advertisement:
I love Homer's funky shirt and the cool braids on the girls. Homie's also drinking some unnamed African version of Duff. Looking at the original image, it seems most of the furniture has been replaced with two giant stereo speakers. I've never been to Angola, so I can't vouch for the accuracy of that one, but otherwise I think it's pretty funny.
No idea whether the ad agency, Executive Center, or the Angolan channel Bue got approval from the show's creators. But there's no way an American agency could have got away with the blackface.
Tyler Bridges and our McClatchy colleagues have a roundup of how countries around the world are reacting -- and overreacting -- to the swine flu outbreak. Cuba banned flights to and from Mexico, and Russia has stopped imports of all raw meat from
Mexico, California, Texas and Kansas, even though health officials
say there's no link between eating any kind of meat and
being infected with swine flu..
In East Africa, where even basic diseases like cholera can sometimes befuddle governments, countries appear to be reverting to type.
Here is how some East African countries are responding so far:
SOMALIA: No capacity to deal with such pandemics due to the
prolonged civil war and destruction of medical facilities. "We are not
prepared for anything like the swine flu; we don't have the means to
deal with it," Awad Abdi, adviser to the Somali Health Ministry said.
"God help us if it reaches here."...
RWANDA: Mobile clinics set up for screening visitors at airports and
other entry points; pork imports from European countries suspended;
sale of grilled pork in cafes prohibited; epidemiologists deployed to
work on preparedness in main health facilities and information points
set up in 143 centres. However, according to WHO, there is no risk of
infection from consumption of well-cooked pork and pork products.
It's quickly becoming clear that the global economic downturn isn't going to spare Africa.
Few African countries are heavily exposed to the world banking system, so some experts argued as recently as a month ago that sub-Saharan nations could weather the storm. But as the downturn worsens, African countries are being hit in a variety of ways. World prices of commodities are way down, and a lot of one-horse economies (Angola with oil, for example, and Zambia with copper) are seeing revenues shrink dramatically. Countries that depend on big inflows of foreign cash, such as tourism and remittances, are also seeing those sources dry up as rich countries get clobbered .
This week the IMF warned that "the outlook for economic growth in sub-Saharan Africa in 2009 has worsened in recent months." Economic growth across the continent is expected to slow from 5 percent last year to 3.25 percent this year -- not bad in a global recession, perhaps, but a sharp gut-check for countries with fast growing populations that are struggling to lift themselves out of poverty.
There's bad news even in more diversified economies. Today in Kenya we learned that the government faces a $1.25 billion budget shortfall and has frozen employment, suspended development
projects and slashed those famous civil servant perks. As the Nation newspaper reported, the austerity measures cut deep and wide:
Only staff in a security capacity will be hired, and all
projects are on hold until the next financial year. In a sign that the
government is in financial trouble, the Treasury has also ordered cuts
in spending on training, office and general supplies, purchase of
furniture and other equipment.
Expenses
on board meetings, conferences, seminars, workshops, retreats,
refurbishment of buildings and routine maintenance of assets have also
been cut by 10 per cent of the original budget.
Foreign
trips by ministers and parliamentary committees are to be scaled back
to save money. Finance permanent secretary Joseph Kinyua has asked
accounting officers of all departments to slash spending on transport,
allowances, foreign and local travel by up to 15 per cent.
The shortfall has a lot to do with drought and import prices, but the drop in tourism, remittance income and tax revenues certainly won't help. Neither, of course, is the fact that Kenyan politicians' solution to last year's post-election crisis was to more than double the size of the Cabinet -- with all the attendant costs. Such a move might have seemed politically inclusive then, but it looks downright foolish and profligate now.
Mulosh, a commenter on the Nation website, put it best: "Go for the simple one: cut ministries to 18 from 44, you will have more
money than you need! oh I forgot, politics must come first."
Every foreigner in Kenya is familiar with Kenglish, those terms and turns of phrase that are unique to this country. Most of us come to understand it and a few, me included, occasionally find themselves peppering their speech with choice bits of Kenglish like:
"Nice time!" and "Safe journey!" -- breezy abbreviations to wish you on your way
"Fine" in response to "Hello," because the standard Kiswahili greeting is "How are you?"
"You've added" to tell someone they've gained weight -- Note: This is always said cheerfully
"Me, what I know," as a preface to any declarative sentence -- Example: "Me, what I know, he went to America and he has added"
"Now now," meaning immediately, as opposed to "just now," meaning sometime during the current lunar phase
"Within," a broad locator meaning the place you're currently in -- Example: "Did you go out of town for Christmas?" "No, I was just within"
All the qualifying variations on "OK," as in "very OK," "just OK," "somehow OK" and even "not so very OK" (which I actually heard once).
My favorite, however, is a greeting I've been hearing a lot since I returned to Nairobi after a month away. I'll see someone for the first time since before Christmas and they'll say, "You've been lost!"
The Kiswahili greeting for a long-lost person, or just one who's been out of touch, is Umepotea, which roughly translates to, "You got yourself lost" (please correct my pidgin translation). Naturally, the subject wasn't lost; s/he was away on a trip, or hadn't kept in touch, but always knew exactly where s/he was. And the people who say "you're lost" didn't actually look for you and decide they couldn't find you.
"Lost" can have a pejorative meaning in English, suggesting a mistake. In the Kenyan version it just means you've been away from people who know you. It's a gentle way of tying someone to a place. Kenyans can sometimes go off on a job or a long trip to the city or the village and months could pass before they're seen again. When they finally return it's as if they've been found -- or maybe, and not to get too poetic here, that they've found themselves.
I've often disappeared from Nairobi for weeks unannounced. After I realized that people weren't faulting my sense of direction, I came to like hearing this very Kenyan greeting. I'll probably never use it myself -- it still makes me laugh -- but when I hear it I know I'm home.
Senator beer -- which was popularly renamed "Obama" after Kenya's favorite son was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2004 -- has given itself a promotion to match Obama's. Now you can buy President beer, a special edition lager that the ads say is on sale for a limited time (limited, I believe, to the amount that East African Breweries can bottle and sell).
As far as I can tell, this is just a new label on the same brew. I've never been a huge fan of Senator/Obama beer, but like African Safari, I believe in any alternative to the watery, bitter Tusker, the national brand. The President ads say, "To those who know they can make a difference," and I applaud the restraint of whoever decided not to go with a play on "Yes we can."
A new alcohol tax regime could make this holiday season more expensive for Kenya's big drinkers. But Kenyans don't easily bow to the law when it comes to beer, a national pastime. It was only a couple of years ago, after all, that the introduction of Breathalyzer machines on the roads just before Christmas caused such a public outcry that the police pulled them off the streets. (Read no further than the headline on the alcohol tax story, which says "Treasury spoils the party.")
This email came over from a friend via Facebook. If this is a Nigerian 419er's idea of a joke, I think it's a pretty good one:
Dearest one,
This email may come as a surprise to you, but I need the assistane of
someone with trust and discretion and I know that I can rely on you. I
need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with
a transfer of funds of great magnitude.
I am the head of the Treasury Department of the Republic of America.
Due to a crisis in my country, I have the opportunity to transfer 800
billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would
be most profitable to you. This transactin is 100% safe.
This is a matter of great urgency. We cannot directly transfer these
funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under
surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a
reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the
funds can be transferred.
Please reply with all of your bank accounts, IRA and college fund
account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren so that we
may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive that
information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards
that will be used to protect the funds.
Yours Faithfully, Henry Paulson U.S. Secretary of the Treasury
In an e-mail to the New York Times yesterday from Lagos, Adichie, 31, said she "was thrilled
and grateful" to receive the call informing her of the award:
I like to
say that America is like my distant uncle who doesn’t remember my name
but occasionally gives me pocket money. That phone call filled me with
an enormous affection for my uncle!
A playful comment, to be sure, but is that really how Africans -- even those like Adichie who've spent considerable time in America -- see the United States? As a rich country (albeit somewhat less rich today than a week ago) that doles out gifts and grants but otherwise pays the continent little attention?
Does that also apply to President Bush's huge AIDS and malaria initiatives, as well as the hundreds of millions that the Pentagon spends on training national militaries and conducting anti-piracy operations in Africa? Or to the well intentioned funds that arrive via the Alpha-Bits charities: WFP, UNICEF, IRC, CRS, etc. What about the thousands of university scholarships and other educational and artistic grants?
Yeah, probably.
I'm inclined to take Adichie's view seriously. Born in Nigeria, she attended college in the United States, at Drexel, and her most recent novel, Half of a Yellow Sun, chronicles the impact of the devastating Biafran civil war in her homeland. (I'm a few dozen pages into the book, and the only way I can think of to describe her style so far is Arundhati Roy with harder edges.) She now divides her time between Nigeria and America, one of a new generation of bi-continental citizens whose worldviews are sharper and less sentimental than those of their parents', who, at least in many parts of Africa, tended to view the United States as infallible.
Fat and blinkered for so long, we became that flush relative who substitutes cash for true involvement. But recent events have got me wondering: what happens when we have less cash than we used to?
