Mashada Blogs » May 11, 2009

You Missed This: The Big Boys Are Watching Us

Sam Okello — Mon, 11 May 2009 16:35:00 -0400

It was the big boys impersonating me.

Two days ago I dropped a post here about a contemptuous Kikuyu Kingdom. Many bloggers responded with fire, called me the juiciest names they could recall from their days before they got saved. Obviously there were others who attempted a rational discussion and I appreciated that very much. The free flow of thought is always a good thing.

Today I'm writing to confirm what my good friend Chris has always claimed here. The Big Boys are indeed watching this space. My folks who always track down cyber threats to my work and words carried out a check on who had successfully broken into my profile. When they gave me the report, it brought a chill at first, then another smile, just like the one I had at the Kenya National Library. It occurred to me that The Big Boys are watching us here at KK.

By impersonating me and using a string of anonymous, they wanted to derail the healthy discussion that should have followed my post. They failed. In between the noise, you found men and women who saw my post for what it was...a provocative piece that called on us to look around and see what was going on.

It makes me feel pretty good that through the tireless efforts of Chris and other sharp bloggers on KK, this space has been molded into an authoritative voice for the millions of Kenyan at home and abroad. For those who have friends and relatives who don't read us yet, call them today and let them know what they are missing.

Seriously, if the big boys are reading us, why wouldn't every Kenyan want to know what we are saying? Forget the Daily Nation commentators, read Chris and Taabu and Sayra and Kalamari and Urlnx and our other great minds. The only guy you may want to avoid reading like a plague is my friend Phil...at least until he honors his pledge to buy me that lunch at Kosewe.

Oh, and avoid reading Sam Okello by all means. That guy, like one blogger said, is bure kabisa.

On this sweet morning in Nairobi, I wish on each of you a cool breeze.Kumekucha

the-undergraduate: Politrics

Mon, 11 May 2009 15:13:00 -0400

I dont like commenting on politics cos i got tired of the grown men and women who shamelessly feed us crap every other day!!Am particularly tired of the brother pauls of this nation who seem to have discouvered a new way to hog the limelight by getting saved and baptized by the earthquake man on sundays!!
It could be theyre attempting to redefine bathing suits who knows when they can be seen taking the plunge in their white suits.
Am also sick of the maize stealers,all of them right from the cereal board to those offloading contaminated maize from the ports.There's also the crop creating jobs for their survey cronnies,spending hundreds of millions claiming theyre investigating migingo island and the boarders yet there's maps showing who owns the land!maybe if i ever meet them they might be in a better position to explain to me how its even possible for the boundaries to have changed,perhaps the geographical plates shifted!!
I dont even know where i should classify the military aircrafts that keep developing mechanical problems.We've been told theyre russian built and were recently serviced.Just like we were told the military cargo on mv faina was meant for the kenyan military,and bury is what we quickly did to that vibe about a southern sudan transist!wasnt the maize sold to them too or what did i hear some dude shout abt?Anyway,the latest is the missing 9.6 billion!Am sure somebody somewhere knows whats happening but they just want to keep the media busy.

For some reason it kinda reminds me of this dude who worked at a parastatal but didnt have the qualifications to get promoted!he found the easiest way in when he learnt that the shortlisting was down to him and another dude who worked in the accounts department and had the papers to back him up.He started going to work earlier than everyone else just so he'd get the opportunity to 'fix' the accounting reports.Most figures were usually done in pencil and he'd change them right before the boss got to look at them leaving the accountant in trouble.The accountant should have known better and started delivering the report personally but some people can never be bothered!Anyway the dude finally got busted cos he'd rework the figures in his own handwritting but he did also get the promotion since the accountant was too laid back to be a manager!

AfriGadget: What Do You See?

Erik Hersman — Mon, 11 May 2009 14:16:07 -0400

I have a talk that I give when people ask me to speak on AfriGadget at conferences that is called, “What do you see?”. It’s a visual and interactive quiz where I take the audience through different images of AfriGadget and ask them what they’re looking at. It’s a lot of fun, and it proves to everyone why it’s so hard for people in the West to come up with contextually relevant life hacks in Africa.

Below are some images from an old family friend who has spent his life working in rural Southern Sudan and Kenya. Under each image you’ll see why it’s interesting. By the way, I too missed the relevance of the flip flops at first glance…

Making use of available resources for a hinge. I really like the way that Ben has used these old slippers and shoe for the hinge of his small kiosk/shop at Butere.

This old chair at Mahanga in Western Province shows the ingenuity of the local carpenters in making use of available resources, with the carton and stuffing from sisal and wood shavings.

Using available containers in a nursery for medicinal plants in Asembo area of Western Kenya.

Making use of a Fanta bottle to channel water from the rainwater downpipe to a storage container in Nairobi.

A special thanks to Roger Sharland of REAP East Africa for sending in the pictures.

In Excess: Ready, set but cant GO

Xs — Mon, 11 May 2009 09:34:07 -0400

He stumbles in reaching for his onstensibly heavy artillery ready to unload & fire, not so much concerned about aiming. All he needed was a target…. He could actually visualize & feel the relief to follow shortly…. He is still humming ‘one man can’t satisfy her, she needs more wood for the fire, sex price getting higher.…… [...]

What An African Woman Thinks: From Idea to Implementation: Let There Be A Do-Pipe

Mon, 11 May 2009 07:24:00 -0400

Last week, while watching the Citizen TV Louis Otieno-moderated debate between government officials and a panel drawn from Strathmore University about the state of the nation, I tweeted that it was clear that there was no shortage of thinkers or of good ideas for that matter, in this country.

I was struck by the exchange between Kwame Owino, of the Institute of Economic Affairs, one of the Strathmore University affiliated panellists and Cecily Mbarire, MP and Assistant Minister for Health, for prime example. In the course of making a particular contribution to the debate, Owino mentioned that he sits on a non-governmental think tank whose responsibility it is to think through the issues that ail Kenya and how best to solve them. Mbarire remarked that he had some excellent ideas but he needed to talk to her and other members of parliament who could push these ideas and influence their implementation. Or something like it.

The whole debate in general revealed high calibre thinking on the part of the panellists on both sides. By the end of it, however, I was furrowing my brow, wondering why none of this thinking had been converted into measurable progress on a broad, scalable basis and why as a nation, we were not feeling the positive effects of these sometimes excellent, and always at least good, ideas.

This is why I come to propose a solution to Caesar:

We need to construct an effective Do-Pipe (©Rombo 2009) that connects the best ideas and solutions with the problems and issues they address as a matter of urgency. The Do-Pipe should serve as the essential infrastructure that connects resources with markets, potential buyers with sellers. As it stands at present, we have a glut of ideas on the one hand, and a dearth of action on the other, and ne’er the twain shall meet.

This is simply unacceptable.

Let there be a Do-Pipe.

The Do-Pipe should be a brutally pragmatic, highly efficient channel that:

Skims the best of the best ideas from the expansive think tank industry, packages them appropriately and palatably, refines them if necessary, and feeds them directly to those who would benefit most from them;
Identifies and/or creates what incentives (or even penalties for non-action) are necessary to compel those who would benefit from these best of the best ideas to at least attempt to implement them in a reasonable way within a reasonable time frame as well as to incentives for those who create the ideas to come up with ideas that work;
Measures the efficacy of these ideas as they are implemented to see which ones fall apart and which ones hold together at the execution, developing an understanding of why this is so and feeding this information back to the think tanks to complete the solutions circle and in so doing, developing solid best –practices and best-thinking expertise as well as ensuring reasonable turnaround speeds;
Becomes the ultimate measure of the value of any think tank initiative for any would-be funders. Those think tanks whose ideas are not flowing down these Do-Pipes to the Implementation Centres would need to justify their continued existence with the caveat that not all ideas generated by a specific think tank must work for it to be feasible but some at least must be able to rise to the top as cream.

So there.

Let there be a Do-Pipe.

Goodness me: I want to run the Do-Pipe.It's my window, but I don't own the view.

Kenyanpoet: Photo Gallery: Mstari Wa Nne at Dass and Soulive at Toona Tree

N.W — Mon, 11 May 2009 04:11:00 -0400

This art events thing has become like a drug coz am getting hooked. I could not miss Rhythm & Spoken at Dass on Friday. Being part of Mstari Wa Nne, we had promised to be there and believe you me, we were felt. Had a real blast with Monique and Stan singing the night into life.
My highlight for the evening was Dennis Inkwa! his Jamaican accented piece on 'tings ave eard'.
You have to come to the Numetro Junction tomorrow (12th May) for the poetry club to hear him.

DJ Zack of Ghetto Radio was also in the house but despite alot of coercion, he wasn't upto spinning that evening. Jirongi of ukoo fulani was also around with a fly jungu mamacita! wa I have dreadz too and am artist, how come I don't get Jungu men! (apparently, this is a common thing in the arts circles, artists getting jungu partners ie. Can someone do some research on this and let me know why this happens.)

The DJ at Dass(sorry didn't get his name) really knew his stuff! too bad I had to leave early. See all photos here

The next day, Soulive was on. The first soul event of its kind that will now be a monthly thing.
Organised by Waweru of Penya together with Muthoni Music and ESL, the event was at the Blue times, Toona tree restaurant.

I was there by 8.30 though the event didn't start till 9.30pm. The venue was great although they were quite mean with their seats!, Something that I couldn't get. I mean, why host an event that you know will attract more than 100 people(they had only set tables for 100pple) and then force patron to go to the other rooms looking for seats! what was the idea behing it, someone enlighten me.

Then their prices for drinks(esp non-alcoholic) made one want to be a drunkard all together. An alvaro that goes for 25bob was selling at ks150. I was pissed off! I don't think Norfolk even charges that much and even if they do, atleast the ambience justifies the cost. 15obob and no seat to settle on and atleast enjoy the expensive drink. No wonder most of those I saw were settling on only one drink for the night. The management at Toona should re-think their strategy. Kenyans like affordable (almost cheap) things, this entices them to buy more.
Anyway, enuff about the drinks, atleast it didn't spoil the entertainment.

I'd never watched Muthoni do Live performance and I must say I was not dissapointed, that woman can sing. Muthoni, Ni wega(as one of your songs said, it is well).

Jaqee however stole the show albeit her music being all reggae. Wawesh shared his earlier mis-givings on introducing a reggae artist to a soul liking crowd, it turns out, soulful people enjoy some reggeat sans the jamaican pidgin(patois) and Jaqee had that combination. It made guys skank on the dancefloor like there was a weed supply nearby(maybe there was!...lol)

Unfortunately, I missed the Sauti Soul performance as I was busy trying to locate my bag which had gotten misplaced while I was busy taking these photos(ok ok, I got carried away and started skanking as well.... it was the trance that Jaqee's music put one in).

I mentioned to Emukule of MTV that I was amazed at the turnout for a first event and his sentiments were, Nairobians are looking for something fresh and Soulive was that fresh air!

Some familiar faces that I saw were Buddha Blaze, Naliaka, Betty Kang'ong'oi, Nynka as well as some fans who had watched me perform at Kwani on Tue 5th. It seems like the Digital Hearts Poem is getting people's attention, I was called a facebook hater by a certain fan, but she loved it nontheless.

I am trying to upload the videos on youtube(this Picasa is acting up) See photos here

the-undergraduate: I feel sick to my stomach!Sometimes ...

Mon, 11 May 2009 03:16:00 -0400

I feel sick to my stomach!
Sometimes i wish i could trade this year for the last one cos there was a time i felt so loved,happy and my life felt like it was so perfect i had to keep reminding myself it wasnt just but a dream.

Today i struggle to believe any of that actually happened,atleast not in the world ive been living in.