Afromusing

• Milking The Rhino: Conservation, Community and Empowerment

  Posted: October 30, 2008, 3:27 am by AfroMusing

  Last month, I was very fortunate to attend the premiere of the film ‘Milking The Rhino’ at the Gene Siskel Film center in Chicago.

  This film left an big impression on me. Long time readers of this blog know that I do have granola-head, green thumb, renewable-energy obsession, tree-huggery tendencies, so no surprise there eh.
  Without giving too much away…the film opened my eyes to the link between Kenya’s history and our attitudes towards conservation. Before the British came, Kenyan communities had traditions around hunting wild animals (These traditions and folklore still persist - I visited Samburu in 2006 and learned a wee bit about this). I would posit that it was sustainable, because there was some balance between the hunting that was done and the populations of wildlife. When laws were enacted to forbid Kenyans from hunting…something they had been doing for millennia, that relationship with the natural world was broken. Why would one want to protect something that they are not benefitting from? Wildlife started to be seen as a nuisance. Granted that there is demand for ‘exotic’ skins, tusks, and bone from wild animals particularly in Asia; one of the factors behind poaching in the parks, there are instances of communities killing wildlife because their crops were destroyed by animals such as Elephants. Still, our attitudes towards conservation and environment bear some reflection.

  The film profiles two communities, one in Kenya, at the Il Ngwesi lodge and the Lewa Conservancy, and another in Namibia. The narration is brilliantly voiced by a Kenyan Munyikombo Bukusi, a very talented guy. This film had me making plans to visit Il Ngwesi Group Ranch, if you need a place to get away and relax your cares away…Il Ngwesi lodge looks like just the place to go.

  The blurb from the film’s site gives you a glimpse into the documentary…

  A ferocious kill on the Serengeti… warnings about endangered species…
  These clichés of nature documentaries ignore a key landscape feature: villagers just off-camera, who navigate the dangers and costs of living with wildlife.
  The Maasai of Kenya and Namibia’s Himba – two of Earth’s oldest cattle cultures – are in the midst of upheaval. After a century of “white man conservation,” which displaced them and fueled resentment towards wildlife, they are vying to share the wildlife-tourism pie.
  Community-based conservation, which tries to balance the needs of wildlife and people, has been touted by environmentalists as “win-win.” The reality is more complex. Charting the collision of ancient ways with Western expectations, MILKING THE RHINO tells intimate, hopeful and heartbreaking stories of people facing deep cultural change.

  The film will premiere on PBS Spring 2009, hosted by Terence Howard (the famous actor - Crash, Hustle & Flow etc)
  Till then, the following festivals and screenings are your best chance of watching it. If you cannot wait, you can purchase the DVD for $25.00 from Kartemquin films, just contact Xan. I would highly recommend the DVD.

  Screenings:

  November 2nd 2008 3pm: Chicago Humanities FestivalChicago Cultural Center

  International Premiere
  International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA)
  November 2008

  Washington, D.C. Premiere : D.C. Environmental Film Festival
  March 11 - 22, 2009

  *I will update this post if there will be screenings in Kenya. (I am asking about this and hoping we can arrange one soon)

• Geo-Engineering - A Big Ridiculous Idea?

  Posted: October 27, 2008, 1:27 am by AfroMusing

  In the September 10th 2008 issue of the Economist, there was an article about Geo-engineering, describing the ‘Transactional Analysis’ document from the Royal scientists…
  In the paper, the idea of planting trees was was ‘alluded to but not discussed’.

  A second idea for scrubbing excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, alluded to in the Transactions but not much discussed, is to plant more trees. In principle, any old trees would do—although they die and rot, more forest cover would lock up more carbon dioxide. However, genetically modified trees might grow faster. Such trees are being developed to help the lumber, pulp and biofuel industries. But fast-growing forests could also be planted in order to capture carbon dioxide quickly.

  Funny, this is the idea that seems doable yet it is not given much attention. Amongst other benefits, trees would help reclaim water catchment areas that are dwindling as we speak, and while we are at, why not encourage planting indigenous trees to enhance plant diversity?

  It warms my heart when right wingers like Pat Robertson can sit with Al Sharpton on a setee by the beach, and proclaim that they see eye to eye on the climate crisis. The ads just point people to visit wecansolveit.org. A website will not a crisis avert. Granted they are are trying to create a community/movement, but that wont do much in my opinion. The ads would have been more effective if they pointed out one demonstrable action that people can take (I’d suggest urging people to plant trees) AND visit wecansolveit.org. Al, I love you, but please find a more practical way, or change ad agencies.

  Planting trees; though quite obvious seems to make much more sense to me than giant rotating cylinders that create the ‘magnus effect’. It makes more sense that putting sulphur in jet fuel, flying in high altitudes and polluting the atmosphere so the sulphur crystals can reflect the sun’s rays off the earth. Don’t get me wrong, I would really like to believe that I am open-minded the big ideas put forth in the transactional paper. I do agree that the climate crisis is one big ginormous problem that threatens the future stability of the world, heck my grandma told me climate change is real. What is being done NOW to adapt to climate change? What are we doing to reclaim our rapidly deforested areas? Big questions. Yet, we can start with simple, yet obvious actions like planting trees.

  In the quest to make it a cool thing to do (Gardeners and tree huggers are hardly rock stars) perhaps borrowing an idea from Joi Ito, he tags photos on his flickr stream with ‘freesouls’ How about we begin a tag ‘greensouls’ where you take a picture of someone/yourself planting a tree, upload to flickr, tag it and if you can, geo-tag it as ‘greensoul’?

  Oh, if you can find a trader who can help monetize the tree planting to carbon credits, I would very much like to assuage my carbon guilt. I seem to have added it to my catholic guilt so now I have much more guilt than I know what to do with. It does not help that some friends keep chiding me about my carbon footprint.

• Nairobi Hilton Hotel: Before and After

  Posted: October 24, 2008, 3:26 am by AfroMusing

  Hilton Hotel Nairobi Under Construction 1968?
  The first picture was originally uploaded by ART NAHPRO, and submitted to the Nairobi Architecture flickr group. The ‘after’ pic is one I took January 2007.

  Update: Here is another picture from January 18th 2008 - Gives you another view.

• Of Redesign & Afrigator 45 best in Africa

  Posted: October 20, 2008, 6:01 pm by AfroMusing

  You might notice the snazzy new design, and the realignment of things on my blog, I just completed the redirection of the RSS feeds on Feedburner, so please note the new RSS feed link. The old feed link should redirect to the new one, but in case it does not, please just re-subscribe.

  If you ever need to redirect feed links, check out this post for the short instructions.

  The theme of the blog is based on Firebug, it was customized and given the ‘Mweshi treatment’ by the talented designer Mulumba.

  I switched hosting companies from Locomotive Media, which was actually powered by wind, to Dreamhost. I racked my brain quite a bit about this, but the fact that Dreamhost offsets its carbon emissions made my decision easier. Granted I would prefer to use a data center that actually uses renewable energy like I did before, Dreamhost offers a very good deal and gobs of space for further growth.

  It is quite an honor for me that my blog is on the list of Top 45 Female African bloggers, I am so excited! The email Lester sent had a really cool picture that captures my excitement. Yay! to blogging, and here’s to a relaunch of Afromusing. Thanks for the honor AfriGator, and thanks to Mweshi for helping me switch hosts. Cheers!

• Connecting Green Dots in Capetown SA

  Posted: October 19, 2008, 4:22 am by AfroMusing

  Last Saturday I had the privilege of meeting with the green bloggers in South Africa. Rafiq Phillips was the best guide anyone could ask for, a TEDster, blogger and twitterer extraordinaire I am thankful to him for showing me around Cape Town.

  Blogging about the environment is a multi-faceted endeavor, because it is such a broad topic. This was reflected in the concerns brought to the table by bloggers, and when you visit their blogs, you will see that each of them writes about the environment with a different style, and that they have varying concerns. From Green building techniques and green-tech on Carbon Smart, to reviews of eateries and films on Relax with Dax…The South African bloggers have passion for the environment and are part of the ‘green movement’ happening world wide. The question I was asked was, how come the bloggers in South Africa are the most active African writing about the environment? Part of the reason is the digital divide. The internet penetration rate in South Africa is relatively higher compared to other Sub Saharan countries. We have not seen more ‘green bloggers’ emerge in other parts of Africa in as big a way as they have in South Africa (particularly Cape town) I am no social scientist, but I do hope that as internet penetration rates increase in Africa, that we have more people writing about issues relating to the environment.

  We discussed the business of blogging briefly, particularly whether to accept advertising on your site, particularly whether you can do this effectively without compromising your ‘voice’. For example if you do not condone the actions of a multinational company, yet when you have google ads, their ad could appear on your site. How do you manage that effectively? This remained an open question, though Wanda of UrbanSprout suggested having control over which ads can appear on your site with whichever method of ad service you pick.

  Another issue was brought up by Rafaela of greenflavour, about using blogs for environmental activism. The resulting actions such as cease and desist letters from companies that try to sue you for stating an opinion. I did mention Eff.org as a resource, and checking the Berkman Center for Internet and Society on guidance in terms of law and free speech online.

  Rory of Carbonsmart challenged all of us that we need to show transformation, to show that the environmental movement is happening, and that people are thinking about their impact on the environment and doing something about it. To this end, Rory has began a mapping project called ‘Greening Africa’. The map was mentioned on an earlier post on GV enviro.

  Glen of Urbansprout is considering creating a map of the information contained in the exhaustive directory of green businesses. He and Wanda created the directory from scratch and it is currently part of the Urbansprout site. It is a good resource for the many football fans flocking to South Africa in 2010 for the the world cup. Do bookmark Greenstay.co.za, as he gets this project together.

  There were so many other great conversations, but the consensus was that this was the first of many such gatherings for bloggers who share a concern for the environment to meet, exchange ideas and collaborate on various initiatives. I would like to thank each and every one of the bloggers who attended. I hope that this is but the beginning of many more meetups. I left encouraged, and inspired by the environment bloggers of the Mother City.

  Links to their blogs are listed here (in no particular order).

  Rory Carbon Smart

  Dax Relax with Dax

  Glen urbansprout

  Wanda Urbansprout

  Cecile Dream in Green

  Candice Aspirant Locavore

  Raffaella Green Flavour

  Tracy Capetown Oracle and EcoStreet

  Update: One more link…Ian ‘GreenMan’, I have been reading his blog for years and can’t believe I forgot to include a link.

  The wiki is available for future meetups and as always if there is a blogger interested in joining the Global voices team for enviro-bloggers, please let me know.

  Pictures of Capetown are posted on the flickr set ‘I love Capetown’. Thanks again to the enviro-bloggers in South Africa for their time and for their hospitality.

• Remote Mobile Hack for Water Pumps

  Posted: October 13, 2008, 1:22 pm by AfroMusing

  Via Jan Chipchase

  Farmers were tired of waking up at odd hours to irrigate their farms, so one of them created a mobile app that allows remote control of water pumps
  Jan notes that there is a commercial version, called Nano Ganesh.

  The impact of this, particularly when combined with cheap and reliable services like Village Connection should not be underestimated.

  Indeed. This hack reminded me of the brilliant Morris Mbetsa from Kenya who made an anti theft device that is controlled remotely via mobile phone. When the technology platform allows for people to write localized applications, amazing things happen. This is another reason I like the Nokia S60, because it allows for anyone to create hacks such as this. Now that is transformative technology.

  I am currently reading Jonathan Zittrain’s book ‘The future of the Internet and how to stop it’ In the first few chapters he mentions ‘generativity’ and how it is part of the internet. To paraphrase, it is the ability for 3rd parties to create and innovate on top of a platform. In light of the S60 Nokia platform and the open source nature of the Symbian and Android…perhaps the mobile world is set to have platforms that encourage innovation around the world. Just like the story from India and Kenya are interesting, I think there is definitely more to come.

  PS: I am currently at Mobile Active 08 ; a conference bringing together many of the people using mobiles for social change. You can follow the proceedings on http://twitter.com/mobileactive

Blah blah blah

Fish cakes

Alas a fish cake.

Yet more fish cakes

Guess what ... yeah ... fish cakes.

The end of the fish cakes