TMNT4000
Superstar
Wrong post lol.
Essential The Africa the Media Doesn't Tell You About
- Thread starter TommyHilltrigga
- Start date
TMNT4000
Superstar
Do any of the Africa countries have Science & Engineering Education?
Do anyone has info on that?
Do anyone has info on that?
Nigerians in Space: Book Review
06/23/2014
“Our dependence must evolve into independence. Oil has ruined us, smeared our Deltas with smog, poisoned our creeks and marshes, lined the pockets of the few. For us to leap, we must find another source, clean of the blood of our ancestors. It is not more oil that we need. Not gold, not diamonds. We can’t swap blood for blood. What we need are minds.”
– Nurudeen Bello, Special Adjunct to the Minister of the Environment
Deji Bryce Olukotun’s debut novel has all the makings of a classic international spy thriller and takes the reader on an action-packed adventure spanning three continents and twenty years of history. At the heart of the story is Wale Olufunmi’s lifelong dream of becoming an astronaut, an unlikely aspiration for a Nigerian technician working a dead-end job in a NASA laboratory. This dream is altogether given a new lease when he is contacted by the mysterious Nurudeen Bello, the silver-tongued politician behind “Brain Gain,” a top-secret project to create a Nigerian space program by harnessing the talents of their best and brightest compatriots around the world.
However, this grand dream inevitably collides with the stark realities of corruption at the heart of African politics, leaving a trail of dead bodies where good intentions dared to tread, and transforming Wale from a law-abiding immigrant into an international fugitive. At once inspiring and heartbreaking, the unfolding plot of “Nigerians in Space” paints a complex picture of an epic struggle between hopeful idealism and the forces of darkness on a continent grappling with a long-running leadership crisis.
The story simultaneously delves into the life of Thursday Malaysius, an abalone smuggler in South Africa struggling to appease his manipulative best friend Leon while avoiding the scrutiny of police and the wrath of ruthless Chinese gangsters. Also intertwined in this layered narrative is the story of Melissa Tebogo, the daughter of a South African freedom-fighter living in Zimbabwe with a skin condition known as vitiligo. In her desperation for a cure, she unwittingly finds herself at the mercy of a network of conspirators who will stop at nothing to protect their political interests.
Deji’s writing is very clear and conscise, but also waxes lyrical at times. One fine example of this sees Wale envisioning the culimination of his dreams in particularly exquisite prose:
He wouldn’t hit golf balls like the American astronauts. He would squeeze out rhythms from a talking drum into the blackness between the stars. These were the drums of war and death, of celebration, the drums that had bonded the towns of his homeland over centuries in tonal communication… He would bind the stars with the drums. There would be dancing.
Such beautifully rendered visions of a possible future are what most captured my imagination while reading this book and kept me hoping against all hope as Bello’s elaborate house of cards began tumbling down. I was slightly let down by the ending of the story not for lack of action or intrigue, but because the eventual joining of the two mostly distinct subplots felt somewhat contrived, from my point of view. But overall, reading this book was a captivating experience which kept me hooked from the first few pages all the way to the end.
I would definitely recommend ‘Nigerians in Space’ to anyone with an interest in afrofuturist literature or mystery novels in general. It deals superbly with the nature of the idealists who harbor grand visions of Africa’s future and the dangers that often lie along the path to their realization. Perhaps, the fact that the story opens in 1993 on the verge of South Africa’s liberation is meant to symbolize the notion that positive change in the face of entrenched injustice might not seem very likely at first, but ultimately has the force of history on its side. This is only my take on one possible message underlying this story, and I encourage you to read the book and decide for yourself.
You can find more reviews and information about ‘Nigerians in Space’ on Amazon.
Mr Bubbles
Superstar
Yeah forreal. This is my favorite thread on the coli and all black posters should be required to read it. This is beautiful.
Subs. @Gifted one could you add me to the group please?
This thread is kind of inspiring. I've been recently throwing around the idea of heading back to Africa at some time.
I was in Nigeria for a month during 2010 and it was certainly a life changing experience. Some fantastic looking parts, some that were pretty rough but THE PEOPLE! If I can reiterate anything else that's been said in this thread it is GO TO AFRICA! It's one of those things that sticks with you for a long while. As soon as you leave, you miss it. No problem for you to be called a ****** down the street from your house and you head halfway across the world and they treat you like family.
Definitely looking to get into the African investment game. I was trying to start something up with the folks I met on my trip but.... well reliability was a concern. And thanks for the posts about the cell phones and computers. I'll be looking at getting one.
This is what The Coli was made for folks. Props
This thread is kind of inspiring. I've been recently throwing around the idea of heading back to Africa at some time.
I was in Nigeria for a month during 2010 and it was certainly a life changing experience. Some fantastic looking parts, some that were pretty rough but THE PEOPLE! If I can reiterate anything else that's been said in this thread it is GO TO AFRICA! It's one of those things that sticks with you for a long while. As soon as you leave, you miss it. No problem for you to be called a ****** down the street from your house and you head halfway across the world and they treat you like family.
Definitely looking to get into the African investment game. I was trying to start something up with the folks I met on my trip but.... well reliability was a concern. And thanks for the posts about the cell phones and computers. I'll be looking at getting one.
This is what The Coli was made for folks. Props
Lucky_Lefty
Dreams Are Colder Than Death...
Great thread breh. I'll add some pics when I stop in Abuja on my way to Pretoria. Can't fukkin wait. I may never come back
@Handsback I got you in the group breh 
OCCAMS_RAZOR
Pro
woah. thanks for the drop bro.
Looking for peace? Then here are the best--and worst-- African nations you might consider living in
01 JUL 2014 18:40M&G AFRICA REPORTER
Region dominates in sharpest declines in Global Peace Index, even as study asserts these are among the most peaceful times in human history.
Once again the Global Peace Index is out, but far from being a blanket of doom and gloom as it often is for Africa, there have been a few pleasant surprises.
Of the three countries that made the biggest improvements in peace since last year were a couple of African nations: Cote d’Ivoire and Libya. A common characteristic is that they’ve made considerable improvement in political stability in the wake of their previous conflict.
In fact, on the whole the index says that “we are currently living in the most peaceful century in human history”.
It ranks 162 countries covering 99.6% of the world’s population, and gauges global peace with the use of three themes: the level of safety and security in society, the extent of domestic or international conflict, and the degree of militarisation. Some 22 indicators of peace are used.
There have been improvements in certain indicators including in; political terror, the number of armed service personnel, number of homicides and the number of deaths from organised external conflicts.
But a change in the nature of conflict, and intensity, has seen a steady decline in peace over the past year. As the report states, “trends in peace are shifting from hostility between states, to a rise in the number and intensity of internal conflicts”.
There have been a small number of severe crises in key hotspots across the continent. In sub-Saharan Africa there were outbreaks of warfare in South Sudan, Central African Republic and Mali. Though these were all internal in origin, sub-Saharan Africa saw the second sharpest deterioration in the regional scores.
Sharpest scores
In fact, four out of the ten countries with the sharpest negative score changes came from this region, topped by South Sudan and the Central African Republic.
Over the past year, the fall in global peace was primarily driven by the deterioration in four indicators: terrorist activity, number of internal and external conflicts fought, deaths from internal conflicts and number of displaced persons as a percentage of population.
In northern Africa, Egypt is a clear example of this. The ousting of president Mohammed Morsi and the violence that preceded and followed it resulted in Egypt dragging down the region’s scores significantly.
North Africa was one of the regions in the world that did not see an improvement in at least one of the five of the indicators that comprise the domestic and international conflict dimension, actually worsening in four.
On the whole, the coverage of conflict may be reducing as less independent nations are involved in conflict, however this is not translating as a lessening of intensity or economic cost of violence.
If you’re looking for peace, here are the best, and the worst, African nations that you should consider moving to:
http://mgafrica.com/article/2014-07...20-african-nations-you-might-consider-leaving
BRCK could bring a reliable internet connection to some of the most remote parts of Africa
1
COMMENT
TOM JACKSON
4 days ago
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Kenyan firm BRCK has closed a $1.2 million seed funding round in order to launch its modem-cum-router device aimed at solving last-mile connectivity issues in Africa.
The company is a spinout from Kenyan crowdmapping firm Ushahidi, and claims its device will bring a seamless internet connection to remote areas, a “critical innovation for a variety of sectors across Africa”.
East African Community (EAC) figures suggest 90 percent of schools and 30 percent of hospitals in the region are off-grid, while only 24 percent of the developing world is connected to the internet. The BRCK device seeks to tackle these problems through caching and distributing content to remote locations over mobile networks and setting up reliable Wi-Fi hotspots.
“The BRCK taps into the unique market characteristic of emerging market internet subscribers: 65 percent of whom access the internet wirelessly,” the company said. “The BRCK allows users to leverage the nearly ubiquitous mobile broadband and turn it into a connection designed for productivity, rather than solely consumption.
According to the company, the BRCK was designed to provide redundancy where power and internet infrastructure are poor, automatically switching to inbuilt batteries of the power goes down and to its own 3G connectivity when any SIM you’ve inserted can’t get a signal.
“Power spikes and outages are everyday occurrences in Nairobi and across Sub-Saharan Africa, no matter your income level,” BRCK said. “In Nigeria for example, you can expect up to 300 outages each year for 5-8 hours at a time. Power spikes are even more unpredictable.” The device was successfully tested in the Lake Turkana region last year.
The investment round was led by early stage investor Invested Development, along with Omvestments, Urban.us, Cheryl Heller and Gary Scheft of CommonWise LLC and Synergy Growth.
Invested Development founder and managing director Miguel Granier said: “Building a hardware company in Africa will have tremendous impact for the region if successful… well beyond the very useful product being developed. The potential impact and scale of this company made it an easy investment decision. BRCK uses technology to solve problems where there is a significant market gap.”
http://thenextweb.com/gadgets/2014/07/16/brck-africa-funding/