ktravula – a travelogue!

Browsing ktravula – a travelogue! blog archives for September, 2011.

The Blood Bank: Two Years After…

I’m happy to inform you that two years after I reported a discriminatory practice in blood donation by the Red Cross on our campus, the situation has been remedied, at least on campus. I walked up there with a friend today, as I’ve done for the last two years, to check their list of exemptions. Nothing in there mentions “Nigeria”, or “sexual contact” as it did the last time, although – now more understandably – people who have travelled to “malaria-prone” zones of the world are required to wait for about three years before donating blood. The science and the common sense are now finally catching up with the other.

Update: On the other hand, the Red Cross website still has the following under its eligibility criteria, under the topic of HIV:

You are at risk for getting infected if you: … were born in, or lived in, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Equatorial Guinea,Gabon, Niger, or Nigeria, since 1977… had sex with anyone who, since 1977, was born in or lived in any of these countries… (http://www.redcrossblood.org/donating-blood/eligibility-requirements/eligibility-criteria-alphabetical-listing).

Could someone please inform the Red Cross that you are at risk of getting HIV if you live anywhere on the surface of the earth today and you do things that put you at risk?

 

The Blood Bank: Two Years After… was published on September 28th, 2011, with the tags , , , , under the Observations category. There are currently 1 comment on this article so far.

With Love from Toto

With Love from my Toto*

 

Did they not chook** me with their cacti

and fill me with bilious waste – those

whose scrota should be jaundiced with

stings from wayward bees?

 

Did they not claw me with callous talons

and grip my vexing veins – those

whose hands will remain guests

to rheumatoid rust?

 

Did they not mock my wailings

and cause my teeth to gnash – those

whose nights should witness

harmonies of terrors and bitterness?

 

Did they not defile my thighs

and maul my breasts – those

whose paths will forever

quake with anguish?

 

Did they not tear me apart

and watch my navel suffocate – those

who should be bobittised with blunt scalpels?

 

Some pricks should be snacks for hungry hyenas.

poem by Chris Ogunlowo ***

_____________________

 *          Nigerian Pidgin for vagina.

* *        The equivalent of fuck in Nigerian Pidgin English, usually used to exaggerate coital thrust.

***       Written in response to the recent infamous rape case that went viral in Nigeria last week. Chris is a Nigerian blogger and copywriter.

With Love from Toto was published on September 26th, 2011, with the tags , , , , under the Uncategorized category. There are currently no comments on this article so far.

Call for Projects in the Visual Arts

Dear friends,

We would like to let you know of the Urban Transcripts 2011 call for projects in the visual arts, theory and research, architecture and urban design. Registrations of interest to participate with project work in the Urban Transcripts 2011 exhibition and conference close on 30.09.2011.

We would be much grateful if you could forward this information to anyone you think it might be of interest.

Best Regards,

the Urban Transcripts 2011 organising team,

—

“Urban Transcripts 2011, Rome, the accidental city” is an Urban Transcripts initiative in partnership with:  Provincia di Roma  /  Facoltà di Architettura dell’Università degli Studi Roma Tre  /  Dipartimento di Studi Urbani dell’Università degli Studi Roma Tre  /  ESC Atelier

—

ENGLISH

call for projects in the visual arts, theory and research, architecture and urban design.

deadline for registrations of interest: 30.09.2011

deadline for project submissions (preview material): 07.10.2011

deadline for the submission of finalised projects: 05.12.2011

Urban Transcripts 2011, Rome, the accidental city

We invite you to explore the accident(al) in the city of Rome: the accident(al) which happens over time and transforms the ‘essence’ of the city that would otherwise remain unchanged, the accident(al) which adds surprise and complexity to our reality and challenges our understanding of the city, the accident(al) which generates the energy to recreate and reshape the city.

Interested participants are invited to register by 30.09.2011 and submit their project’s preview material by 07.10.2011. The Project Review Committee will select projects based on the preview material submitted. Selected participants have until the beginning of December to finalise their projects.

registration form:

http://www.urbantranscripts.org/documents/UT2011_02_registration_form.pdf

for more information:

http://www.urbantranscripts.org

info@urbantranscripts.org

—

ITALIANO

Avviso per la presentazione di paper e progetti  inerenti l’architettura,  il progetto urbano e  visual art.

scadenza per la manifestazione di interesse: 30 settembre 2011

scadenza per la presentazione dei progetti (anteprima dei materiali): 7 ottobre 2011

scadenza per la consegna dei materiali definitivi: 5 dicembre 2011

Urban Transcripts 2011, Rome, the accidental city

Vi invitiamo all’esplorazione dell’accidentale che Roma nasconde: l’accidentale che ha luogo in ogni tempo e che trasforma l’”essenza” della città, senza la quale essa rimarrebbe sempre uguale a sé stessa; l’accidentale che regala imprevedibilità e complessità alla nostra realtà, sfidando la nostra capacità di comprensione dell’urbano; l’accidentale da cui sprigiona l’energia per ri-creare e ri-configurare la città.

Gli interessati sono invitati a registrarsi entro il 30 settembre e ad inoltrare una anteprima del proprio progetto entro il 7 ottobre 2011. Un Comitato di Valutazione selezionerà i progetti sulla base dei materiali provvisori inviati. I partecipanti selezionati avranno tempo sino agli inizi di dicembre per ultimare i propri progetti.

registration form:

http://www.urbantranscripts.org/documents/UT2011_02_registration_form.pdf

per informazione:

http://www.urbantranscripts.org

info@urbantranscripts.org

Call for Projects in the Visual Arts was published on September 22nd, 2011, with the tags , , , , under the Art, News category. There are currently no comments on this article so far.

Halfway to Sixty

Seeking time comes often to a rote around edges of reason, my friend,

when tomorrow moves away from reach into the lengths of a near past.

It is not just the distance of time and space, or memory, but what portends

In-between the fast changing chords of our once rhyming flat bombasts.

Look at it here: movements, shapes, forms, people, hope, desires, and lusts,

And pleasing exuberance circling within one spot of deferred dreams.

So we wonder restlessly where all the time went. We trade masks that must

Hold fears within claypots of growth. We howl our tears into the stream.

We don’t own then, it seems, balms that soothe with scents of silent mimesis,

Else we would sway with wine bags in reclined poses, seconds spent to please,

Which held us then when time favoured the pockets of our scant playfulnesses.

We would not wonder where they went, days spent sprawled in the shades of ease.

It could be only relief that mischief remains, and love’s comfort in the end,

To sew a new tapestry, and to daily, patiently mend. It was never ours to rend.

___________________________

Being too lazy to write a new pre-birthday poem, this will have to do it for the last day of my twenties.

Edited, from Dec 2009.

Halfway to Sixty was published on September 21st, 2011, with the tags , , , under the Literature, Poetry, Soliloquy category. There are currently 2 comments on this article so far.

Will the World End this Week?

There are a flurry of diplomatic activities in Washington this week in an attempt to prevent the Palestinian authorities from seeking recognition at the United Nations later in the week, or to deal with the fall-out that must surely come therefrom. It is one of the major issues on television and the internet these days. However, as Greg Gutfeld said on last week on The Five, if you turned on the television today and you didn’t know what year it is, you would still not feel any sense of disorientation. The issue of the middle eastern conflict seems to follow us wherever we turn. Has been so for centuries. Will remain so till the end of time. Or so Greg says.

I’m mostly worried about how the United States managed to get itself into a position where it would have to veto the genuine aspiration to statehood of a victimized people. Under Nobel Peace Laureate Obama’s leadership, no less.

Will the World End this Week? was published on September 19th, 2011, with the tags , , , , under the Uncategorized category. There are currently no comments on this article so far.