Archive for December, 2011
Top Ten 2011 Africa Stories
Posted by jimheck in "Modern" Africa, African Awakening, Arts and Culture, Big Game, Botswana, Congo, Culture, Economy, Egypt, Environment, Nairobi, Perceptions of Africa, Poaching, Politics, Poverty, Refugees, Safety, Serengeti, South Africa, Sudan, Terrorism, Tourism Trends, Twevolution, Uganda, War, Weather, Wildlife Management, Zimbabwe on December 31, 2011
Twevolution, the Arab Spring [by Twitter] is universally considered the most important story of the year, much less just in Africa. But I believe the Kenyan invasion of Somalia will have as lasting an effect on Africa, so I’ve considered them both Number One. 1A: KENYA INVADES SOMALIA On October 18 Kenya invaded Somalia, where [...]
Save Trees Make Bricks!
Rapid deforestation threatening African development has a notable South African remedy gaining wider recognition and use, compressed soil bricks. The process which has been known since the late 80s is only now gaining traction and some economic viability. Fairly expensive but remarkably mobile machines that operate on diesel or electricity compress soil and other ingredients [...]
Vicious Village Visit
Posted by jimheck in "Modern" Africa, Culture, Stereotypes, Tourism Trends on December 29, 2011
Why do so many safari travelers want to “see a village?” A Paris exhibition may help explain the ugly urge of many travelers to witness depravity. The market for village visits is so strong that even today, when traditional villages just don’t exist, they are being reconstructed, and thousands of visitors return from Africa every [...]
Africa’s Biggest Street Party
Posted by jimheck in "Modern" Africa, Culture, Music on December 27, 2011
If you thought Rio’s Carnival or New Orleans’ Mardi Gras were big parties, take two: Nigeria’s Calabar festival’s climax is tonight and is the biggest music/costume/dance festival in Africa! Calabar Carnival is the biggest gigantic collection of visual and sound culture in Africa. The scheduled events are so many that it takes 32 days of [...]
Maple Leaf is Oxidizing
Posted by jimheck in Corruption, Economy, Politics on December 23, 2011
If you thought everything Canada is green and good, think again. Canadian mining is destroying Africa. And maybe destroying Canada. The Canadian “extractive industry” as our Canadian cuzzes obliquely call it, is exploding. Literally, as GDP for Canada and as dynamite and gunfire in Africa. Numerous human rights violations across the continent have been documented [...]
Trucking to Nowhere
Posted by jimheck in "Modern" Africa, Culture, Economy, Uganda on December 22, 2011
With Africa youth unemployment as high as 50% should African governments replace funding universities teaching liberal arts with those exclusively teaching employable skills like accounting? With the Florida State budget in a nosedive, should Florida tax payers redirect support for liberal arts universities to vocational colleges? Voice of America reported recently that Uganda’s president, Yoweri [...]
Kenya or America Most Corrupt?
Posted by jimheck in Corruption on December 20, 2011
Tables turned: America winning the bribes game while Kenya streaks ahead in the anti-corruption game. It’s all a matter of bribes. Some bribes are paid with dollar bills. Some bribes are paid with false promises. Many bribes are paid with lies. What all these versions of bribes have in common — what makes a bribe [...]
Egypt Will Ultimately Pay for Bullies
Posted by jimheck in Egypt, Twevolution on December 19, 2011
The Egyptian military’s unwarranted, brutal response in Tahrir Square is specifically because there aren’t enough protestors, there, anymore. The bully always pounces when his adversaries thin out. The Tahrir Square protests right now are extremely small but extremely violent, contained almost exclusively to a ten-square block area in central Cairo. The vast majority of Egypt [...]
AirZim AirGone
Posted by jimheck in Corruption, Politics, Zimbabwe on December 16, 2011
How I wish the end of Air Zimbabwe would be Mugabe’s nail in the coffin. But this vampire gives no impression of leaving before he’s melted by sunlight. Yesterday Zimbabwe’s diaspora media broke the story: Air Zimbabwe’s one and only 767 had been impounded by the maintenance company owed $1.2 million dollars. Then, with typical [...]
Bribed Enough To Die
Posted by jimheck in Environment, Weather on December 15, 2011
In the shorter runs Africa’s got a lot more to lose faster from global warming than us, but Africa leaders are hailing the specious agreement made in Durban this week. Why? Because they get more money. There’s nothing wrong with that, per se. As far as I’m concerned anything that redistributes global wealth is healthy [...]
First Steps Baby!
Another breakthrough discovery credited to my forlorn African creature, the lungfish! Apparently it was you, not that obdurate Tiktaalik, that moved life out of the sea onto land! Go buddy! Yesterday, scientists at the University of Chicago announced a study soon be formally published, proving that the itty bitty fins of the African lungfish even [...]
Heri kufa macho kuliko kufa moyo
Posted by jimheck in Mara, Perceptions of Africa, Safari Lodges on December 12, 2011
Great circus barkers are so accomplished that they spur the tiger through the blazing ring so effortlessly it creates joy from daring. That was Ari Grammaticus. In this case, the cheetah on the roofhatch. Ari Grammaticus died last month. His memorial service is tomorrow in Nairobi. With him goes the personal daredevil thrill that was [...]
Weary World Not Rejoicing
Posted by jimheck in Culture, Environment on December 9, 2011
Nigeria thumbs its nose at the U.S. and U.K. on gay rights, Japan uses nuclear clean-up funding to hunt whales, 4 more rhinos killed in the lowveld and Durban’s in the bottom of the dirty coal tank. Oh, did I forget that Europe’s coming apart? The weight of organic and inorganic problems on this, man’s [...]
Bachmann or Else!
Posted by jimheck in Culture, Wildlife Management on December 8, 2011
From India frustrated T-Partyers unable to maneuver the legislative process to eliminate civilization have just discovered a powerful new tactic. Release deadly snakes into IRS offices, guaranteeing at the very least a temporary pause in tax collections. I have not taken the event more out of context than most T-Party dialogues. The perpetrator was actually [...]
Animals are Not People
Posted by jimheck in Animal Attacks, Big Game, Culture on December 6, 2011
Time and again men and women unable to foster human relationships create them with animals whose only ability to resist is to kill them in return. I love animals and always have. I expect someone watching me play with my lab/hound mix would ascribe all sorts of human characteristics to the relationship, and undoubtedly while [...]