Archive for May, 2006
I received a suspicious package in my mail this morning.
I quickly called the KBW bomb detection squad who arrived promptly with their top equipment (and mobile phones tucked into their belts).
I carefully looked at the package; I did not want to set anything off. I checked the postage.
I decided to open it. After what is life without a little risk? It was a card!
I asked the Bomb Disposal Unit to stand down. I could handle this one on my own. I opened the card slowly? What secrets would it reveal? What questions would it answer?
Ahh! It’s the infamous KBW Card that is flying across blogosphere, a GuessaShizzle ProdaFizzle! I read what the funny (yet slightly mad – I mean who else would come up with something like this?) woman had written. Let me say right now that Guess unleashes one very hot secret in this card. Keeping in the spirit of the event I seriously added one of my own secrets*.
The card is now signed and has been resealed and is currently flying to its next top secret location.
Oh what secrets will it reveal at its next stop?
*Of course I can not tell you the secrets. You have to wait to read them for yourself. I know some of you bored people with no lives will try to Photoshop the image to read the secrets which is why I put the white dots!
| 
Email This Post
|
Friday, May 12th, 2006 at 12:24 PM
Despite me openly and loudly predicting an Arsenal victory in this year’s Champions’ League final against Barcelona, many upset goooners feel ati I was being patronising ati condescending. That’s the problem with these teams that rarely reach finals, their supporters do not know who how to behave. They are so used to being good losers; they forget how to be good winners! Anyway in another attempt to calm the nerves of Arsenal fans I have searched the great google cache in the sky for signs of divine intervention that Arsenal will win. I have a good track record when it comes to this. Last year I gave you signs that Liverpool (WWI5T) would spank AC Milan, now here we go with The Arsenal.
Sign 1
Arsenal qualified for the European Cup final
Middlesbrough qualified for the UEFA Cup final
There have only been two other occasions when English teams made both finals in European competition. In 1981 and in 1984. In both those years both English teams won their respective trophies. (No prizes for guessing which team from England won the Big One in both those previous finals). OK so Middlesbrough were spanked yesterday but still karma is on your side.
Sign 2
Umm … ok that’s all I’ve got so far (but to be fair you guys did not give me much to work with seeing as you never reached this final before). If you have any other signs please let me know.
| Email This Post
|
Thursday, May 11th, 2006 at 2:43 PM
Despite my pro bono work for the Cricket World Cup organisers, despite them taking on the changes I recommended, I have not had even a scent of a free ticket to any games in the Caribbean next year. The indefatigable Nick Deverell who blogs over at Kenya Cricket has the price list for tickets for Kenyan fans who want to follow Kenya. Where the blazes am I going to get USD $1050.00 to watch us lift that trophy?
| Email This Post
|
Thursday, May 11th, 2006 at 1:23 PM
[rant]
It took me three times before I could sit through the whole of The Constant Gardner. The first two times I stopped watching about half way through the movie. That movie irritated me like I have not been irritated in a long while. The movie to me is a clear example of the intellectual laziness excused by good intentions that seems to be ascendant in dealings with Africa.
You can get away with peddling all sorts of intellectual crap these days so long as you wrap it all up in nice flowery good intentions. Parts of this movie came across as nonsense to me. For example, there was a guy who had refused to take an AIDS test. The British woman tells him to take one, suddenly the next day he agrees to take one, “why did he change his mind” she asks? “Because you told him”, her black side kick replies gazing into her eyes. Then there is that silly scene where she goes to have her baby in a run down and dirty hospital in Kiberia because the, “women of Kiberia have no choice but to have their babies there.” How the hell was that meant to be sweet? She drove there in a Land Rover, she left in Land Rover, she is a wife of top British diplomat, once she delivers her baby she will go back to her massive house complete with servants, and we are meant to feel moved for her solidarity with the women of Kiberia, nonsense. And this movie was meant to be a picture of reality in Kenya? Nonsense. To me she came across as full of tokenism. But hey, they are putting Africa on the map right? They are raising money for charity right? So it’s all ok. They can peddle any crap they want so long as they have good intentions right?
I was listening to an interview on the radio a while ago on the BBC where an African music promoter was complaining about the lack of access African artists and African promoters have to the UK. He complained that governments and venues would fall over each other to host concerts like Live8 where they are raising money for us, but those same governments and venues will never assist African promoters in generating wealth for Africa through bringing African artist to the perform in the west. If the artists do manage to get a work/entertainment permit to enter the UK (in itself a nightmare - many artists come in on tourist visas which forbid you from working) to perform, then venues are reluctant to book them. Or increase their fees 500%. These promoters also said that they approached the Live8 organisers and offered to bring African artist to the London concert. They would have covered their own costs. They did not ask for a penny, but they were turned down by the organisers. But since those organisers had good intentions, since they were part of Live8 its all good right? I mean their intentions are good right?
The examples are endless and to be fair a lot of the nonsense comes from within. Until last week the main UN human rights body was the UN Human Rights Commission (it has since been replaced by the Human Rights Council of the UN). Which countries did other African nations choose as their representatives on the now disbanded commission? Zimbabwe, Libya and Sudan. But they have good intentions right? They stick up against the colonialists, right? They are showing Africa will not be pushed around right?
Argh!
[/rant]
| Email This Post
|
Thursday, May 11th, 2006 at 12:55 PM
One cherished memory from my youth was sitting with my cousins singing an old African-American spiritual, ” When Israel was in Egypt’s land” which retells the events in the Old Testament of the Bible (Exodus, chapters 3-12), in which God commands Moses to demand the release of the Israelites being held in Egypt. The song was made famous by Paul Robeson whose voice, deep and resonant as it was, conveyed the authority of the voice of God before Moses in Egypt.
This is how the song goes:
When Israel was in Egypt’s land
Let my people go
Oppressed so hard they could not stand
Let my people go
Go down, Moses, way down in Egypt’s land
Tell old Pharaoh, Let my people go
So Moses went to Egypt’s land
Let my people go
To make old Pharaoh understand
Let my people go
Thus spake the Lord, bold Moses said,
“Let my people go,
If not, I’ll strike your first born dead
Let my people go”
Perhaps someone could re write the song for the 21st century. I’m thinking something along the lines of:
When bloggers were in Egypt’s prisons
Let our people go
Oppressed so hard they could not stand
Let our people go
Stand up bloggers; stand up for Egypt’s scribes
Tell old Pharaoh, Let our people go
A Google bomb dropped on Egypt’s land
Let our people go
To make old Pharaoh understand
Let our people go
Thus spake the bloggers, bold google said,
“Let our people go,
If not, we’ll strike your google ranking
Let our people go”
Something like that, yeah I know the lyrics are not that good, in my defence however, it is early on a Tuesday morning. For some proper lyrics you should head over to mshairi’s.
Join the campaign
technorati tag: googlebombingforalaa
| Email This Post
|
Wednesday, May 10th, 2006 at 10:23 AM
Elijah Zarwan writes on Global Voices about the arrest of Egyptian human rights activists amongst them Egyptian bloggers. According to an eye witness Aida Seif El-Dawla, the Assistant Interior Minister Sami Sedhom told the protesters, “You bitc***. You sons of bitc***. This is how it is going to be from now on if you do not behave and know your limits. If you do not behave you’ll have the bottom of my old shoes all over you.” Her full email is posted at Arabist.net.
We have a responsibility to raise the profile of illegal actions like these wherever they occur. Blogs played their part in turning the raids on the East African Standard into a global story. We can do the same with this story.
This Sami Sedhom, Assistant Interior Minister of Egypt, reminds me of Kenya’s National Security minister, John Michuki and his threat that, “when you rattle a snake you must be prepared to be bitten by it.” What is it with our ministers in charge of security attacking their own people, the very people they are meant to be protecting?
Eight people are still in custody
- Ahmed Abd al-Gawad
- Ahmed Abd al-Ghaffar
- Alaa Ahmed Seif al-Islam
- Asmaa Ali
- Fadi Iskandar
- Karim El-Shaer
- Nada al-Qassas
- Rasha Azab
Join the “I Blog for Human Rights” campaign. Get Involved, Spread the Word.
| Email This Post
|
Tuesday, May 9th, 2006 at 1:21 PM
The Sopranos
In an episode of The Sopranos, Tony Soprano gave Paulie Walnuts an endorsement he would rather not get after an accident took place on a ride at an Italian festival that Paulie was running using cheap substandard equipment as usual. Possible lawsuits and negative press followed.
Paulie: Hey, T.
Tony: “You’re doing a heckuva job there Brownie!”
[Via Crooks and Liars]
GWB has been keeping busy. Fishing.
BERLIN (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush told a German newspaper his best moment in more than five years in office was catching a big perch in his own lake.
Was he joking? Peter Daou has a look.
Condi and her friends
If Condoleezza Rice suddenly starts calling you her best friend, you better take a number.
[Via Thought Mechanics]
Double standards or not?
Schwarzenegger says the United States needs to “close the borders“. Yes the same guy who immigrated to the United States from Austria as a young man to make his fortune.
| Email This Post
|
Tuesday, May 9th, 2006 at 11:02 AM
The trailer for the new Superman movie, Superman Returns, is available online. Unfortunately it looks like it is going to be a soppy love story. Nothing wrong with a soppy love story but come on this is meant to be a Superman movie. I always thought the guy was a bit of a wimp. Unlike the cool, dark, slightly manic Batman! Now there’s a superhero! (And by Batman I mean proper Batman like in Batman Begins, not those silly stories where he was running around chasing the future Govanator.)
| Email This Post
|
Friday, May 5th, 2006 at 12:55 PM
This morning at two minutes and three seconds after 1:00am the full time and date was:
01:02:03 04/05/06
Of course if you tell time backwards that is you put the month before the day (i.e. you are an American) this momentous event happened for you last month.
Yes I am easily amused and do make it my business to know things like this!
[Via Dr Bacchus' Journal]
| Email This Post
|
Thursday, May 4th, 2006 at 12:34 PM
I can’t decide which is funnier. The video clip on Mutumia’s or the audio clip on Jay’s Eye View (hat tip Afromusing!). The best of Kenya and the best of Uganda. You decide!
| Email This Post
|
Thursday, May 4th, 2006 at 4:10 AM
I promised I would post pictures and videos of the spanking Liverpool (WWI5T) handed out to the Manchester Buccaneers.
Well here they are.
(Some of you are will wonder why I do not post pictures and clips from the spanking we dished out to Chelski to which I respond, I only deal with big clubs.) The clips are in MP4 format, if you have trouble viewing them grab VLC, the brilliant open source media player which seems to play anything in this world. As before the photos and clips were taken on my brand new Nokia N70 (BDIS)!
In the picture above the banner is directed at the Buccaneer fans across the ground. It reads, “We achieve your dreams.”
LFC first clip [MP4 file]
In this clip we remind the Buccaneer fans that “we won it five times”. We also hold up five fingers because most of them are too slow to understand what we are talking about. In the second half of the clip the teams are announced to the crowd. During the Buccaneer announcement the crowds boos and jeers. During the LFC (WWI5T) players announcement the crowd cheers to salute their conquering heroes.
LFC second clip clip [MP4 file]
Second clip is all about “when the reds go marching in” an oldie but a classic.
LFC third clip [MP4 file]
Third clip is after the game and is all about us informing Buccaneer fans that they are not singing anymore. But since we are good guys we also sing, “Always look on the bright side of life” to cheer them up. Hehehe!
LFC fourth clip [MP4 file]
The final clip has “You Never Walk Alone” at the end of the game with a picture of the scoreboard. (I didn’t take the “You Never Walk Alone” at the beginning of the game because I was too busy singing my lungs out.)
| Email This Post
|
Wednesday, May 3rd, 2006 at 1:54 PM
I do not blog about my personal life. For me there has always been a line I will not cross. I do not blog about my family, my relationships, I mention my workplace only in the most general of terms and I even find it hard to blog about my previous schools. Many of you have advised me not to write this post, thank you for your concern but I feel I need to write this. This may also be seen by some as a classic example of closing the door once the horse has bolted. It may be too little to late, the damage is all ready done. However I still need to write this. Over the last two months there have been series of attacks and allegations made about me to which I can only respond to in a personal capacity. So I am breaking my own rules here. That is how seriously I was taking this. Hopefully I will only have to deal with this once in public on this blog.
The first sets of attacks were based around the ridiculous idea that I had rigged the Kaybees and had a “list of winners” before voting even took place. The person who was making these allegations went from blog to blog leaving comments full of slurs against my character and my integrity. In some places they painted me a megalomaniac in others I was an agent of the Kenyan government; in others I was an agent of the Kenyan opposition. It quickly became obvious to many people that this person was lying and had a silly vendetta which was know only to him. He would leave comments and later delete them. He would put up posts on his blog and delete them. He would make accusations and then retract them before restating them yet again. He announced to the world he would stop blogging and a couple of days later returned. Many of you came to correct conclusion that he was a mischief maker and came to my defence and I am grateful for that.
The next set of allegations is harder to deal with. In fact when I read the allegations I was shocked like many of you were. I wanted to get to the bottom of it. I was one of the first people to leave a comment on the blog and I attempted to contact the blogger to find out what was going on. It was only later on the following afternoon that they informed me that the allegation was being made at me. It is hard to describe what I felt at that time. It was a mixture of disbelief and shock which was slowly turning to anger.
The very idea that someone who I have never met, who I do not interact with as much as I do with other bloggers, a blogger whose name I do not even know, could come out and say this almost knocked me off my feet.
When I call my family it takes a couple of sentences before they are sure they are talking to me, and yet she thinks that in 2 or 3 words she can be sure it was me on the other end of the line because “SHE KNOWS MY VOICE”? You do not know me. It really is as simple as that. As for the other allegations including calling her at work, every company I have worked for have a system of monitoring incoming calls, I would feel that her company have a similar system I would suggest that she contacts her manager at work and tell them that she is being harassed on company phones. They will have to investigate it and you will be informed of the number that called you.
I can not prove what I have not done. What I can show is the limited interaction between the blogger who is making these allegations and myself using the medium I use to interact with all of you, my blog. As recently as two weeks ago this blogger was leaving positive and warm comments on my blog. I have produced a series of links going back to the beginning of the year. Each of these posts has a warm and positive comment from the blogger making these allegations. I urge you to click on those links and read the comments. Then ask yourselves these questions:
- If I was harassing her why did she visit my blog?
- If I was harassing her, why did she leave comments on my blog?
- If I was harassing her, why did she leave positive comments on blog?
Here are the posts:
Perhaps now you can start to understand why I was shocked by her allegations. I have never received an email from the blogger making these allegations. Why did she not email me to tell me to stop bothering her? In fact there has been next to no communication between us at all. Yet she claims it has been me who has been harassing her because “SHE KNOWS MY VOICE”.
I should point out that once I got over the shock of her accusations I suggested to her that she repeat the allegations with some details to someone we both trust, she declined. I suggested she email me her proof, she declined. I suggested she email me exactly what she was accusing me of, she declined. I asked her if there was anyone she trusted who she could tell the allegations who would then be able to tell me, she declined. I asked her to explain to me what was going on, she declined. In a bizarre twist I am the one running around looking for the evidence that could be used to hang me. Well not anymore.
Well there you have it. To all the people who have emailed me and called me to offer their support thank you from the bottom of my heart. To my friends who were honest and direct with me, thank you. I know I drove some of you crazy, well this whole thing was driving me crazy as well. It is these unexpected crises that allow true friends to show their true colours. Thank you again. Thank you especially to the person who stayed up to talk to me last night; you are very special to me, one of a kind.
Well there it is my response to the allegations. I will not be drawn into a game of attack and counter attack. This is it from me for now. Now back to regular programming.
| Email This Post
|
Wednesday, May 3rd, 2006 at 1:52 PM
Whenever you mention English football fans many people automatically think: hooligans. Every time there is an international tournament in which England are involved a lot of attention is focused on the mayhem English fans have caused. Many times when English clubs play in Europe the police use the fans of the English clubs as target practice.
England has strict laws covering all forms of hooliganism, and to a large extent it works. (Of course there will always be some violence related to football on this side of the world.) As regular readers of this blog would know I regularly go to matches at Anfield and I also worked at MCFC on match days for four very entertaining years. I have never ever heard any racist abuse at Anfield. I am not saying there are no racists. But if you are caught at Anfield or any other club in England, you are banned from the club. FOR LIFE. On top of that you get dragged in front of a court of law and you will get a criminal record. If you are caught engaging in hooligan activity you are banned from your club FOR LIFE, you get a criminal record, and you have to report to a police station and hand in your passport every time your club or the national team plays abroad to ensure you do not travel to foreign games. In fact one way to spot a group of hooligans on match days is that none of them will be wearing anything with club colours. No replica kits, not even a scarf. If they caught they do not want the police to know which club to ban them from. So if you want to avoid trouble wear your club’s brightest replica kit, no self respecting thug will touch you.
Now compare this with other parts of Europe where the far right groups not only control many clubs’ fan base, but actually control access to certain areas of the stadium and have the power to stop matches.
Italy: At Lazio thugs were able to put up a 50 foot banner that had written on it an insult to the opposing team that said “team of niggers, terraces of Jews” (link opens a pdf doc).
Earlier this season in a match between Messina and Inter in Sicily, Marc Zoro picked up the ball and walked off the pitch in protest at the monkey chants spewed at him by savage Inter fans. “I was fed up with it,” explained the 21-year-old Ivorian. “It was the classic treatment of black players in Italy - it happens all over the country, Lazio fans being the worst,” he continued, many of his team mates supporter him and apologised on behalf of the club one team mate Materazzi shouted ’stop that, Zoro, you’re just trying to make a name for yourself’.” Zoro’s response, “I didn’t even argue with him, I’ve no intention of lowering myself to that level.”
Spain: On Sunday Barcelona’s Cameroon striker Samuel Eto’o was subjected to racist abuse from Racing Santander fans again. In February Eto’o tried to leave the pitch after being racially abused by Real Zaragoza fans but was convinced by his team-mates to play on.
Bulgaria: Levski Sofia fans booed and whistled visiting Ghanaian born German player Gerald Asamoah before and during their game which FC Schalke.
There are many many examples of racism in football and the fines the European federations and UEFA hand out are ridiculous. Racing Santander and Real Zaragoza were fined 9,000 Euros and 6,000 Euros respectively by the Spanish Football Federation. This in an era where clubs pay many players 60,000 Euros a week.
So when The Africa Council, a group of African immigrants based in Berlin, announced plans to publish a guide warning about areas where there have been racist attacks you can not dismiss them lightly. “Dark-skinned Africans are attacked and insulted every day in Germany,” said Moctar Kamara, head of the “Africa Council”. The pamphlet warns of zones to avoid.
| Email This Post
|
Tuesday, May 2nd, 2006 at 7:07 PM
Next Posts