ktravula - a travelogue!

Here’s the Winner

Kola — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 06:43:00 +0000

The Nokia C3 competition on this blog has come and gone. And the winner is none other than…

Anthony Ogboye

who not only got all the answers right, but sent it in on time sometime late in the afternoon.

You will be contacted by Nokia representatives in Lagos as soon as possible. I will also give you a call as soon as I can. Thank you for reading the blog and for participating. I hope you enjoy the Nokia experience.

CONGRATULATIONS!

Save Foreign Language Departments!

Kola — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 04:07:50 +0000

“22 staff in Modern Languages at Swansea University are threatened with compulsory redundancy. A proposed restructuring announced by the University on August 6, with no prior consultation, would delete 40 academic jobs in all, in 9 departments, over the next three years. 95 people have been told that their jobs are at risk. Of the 40 redundancies, 11.8 are planned in Modern Languages, with effect from summer 2011. The department has 22 lecturing staff. Just 10 will remain. Its the swiftest, most savage cut proposed. Its also very bad news for education in Wales.”

This is an excerpt from the news of a horrible trend now sweeping through Universities around the world where departments of foreign languages are taking the brunt of a global economic instability. Swansea University in Wales is only one. We don’t know how many more will follow if this horrible experiment goes through, and we’re calling all lovers of language and the academia to take a stand and make noise about this, and write letters of protest to protect the jobs of these professors and the whole idea of foreign language literacy at large. Foreign Language departments are not useless, nor are they just decorative appendages of art faculties. They contribute to knowledge, the economy, and understanding across nations. Please lend your voice. Send a strongly worded letter to the Vice Chancellor at Swansea. It will go a long way in influencing their decision.

Read more about this unfortunate case and how you can help at Clarissa’s blog.

The Text Part of Growing

Kola — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 07:31:26 +0000

The evolution from picture books to text-only materials was gradual, but memorable. There seemed to have been an unwritten disdain for picture books that manifested after each birthday, each disposed oversized pyjamas and each replaced tooth. It wasn’t self-wrought however, but acquired, either from older peers with fancier stories of intimate relations with the written word resulting in inspiring encounters, or jealousy of even fancier ones with fantastic tales of their reading prowess. Something gave, however, for sure, little by little, and the young reader emerged, ready to take on the reading world without accompanying images.

The most memorable of such recollection could be the singular, but eventually impossible task of reading the first chapter of The Tiger by the Tail during a bus ride from home to school. It didn’t matter to him in the least that he couldn’t make any sense of it yet, never having even applied himself to more than just a few words on each page he flipped. It matter though that people saw him with a book that was bigger than a storybook, had no pictures in it, and moved from page to page as if passing through the patient and critical eyes of an avid reader. “Hey, nice book. How’re you finding it?” Someone would ask sometimes during the day, and he would respond: “Oh, very nice. Chase is such an exquisite writer”, and move on before the probing went far beyond the familiar. Oh the days.

The blog, now splattered with colours and images, flesh and blood, of ordinary and extraordinary people of various places, beliefs and convictions, could only remind of such trivialties; of days when colour meant ordinariness, and a lack of sophistication needed for the rites of adulthood. Now only a smile remains, and a longing for such a not so distant past of innocence and silliness.

Welcome September, and the year of birth.

Two-Thirds Gone

Kola — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 15:27:36 +0000

By midnight today, the second third of this year will be gone for good and again we’ll wonder where all the time went. Just four months more and we’ll be in another year, making new resolutions and running after new goals. In some parts of the world, the harmattan season is beginning to gather and will gain force in a few weeks. In some other place like around my yard, trees will be crying their leaves into the river – to rephrase the line in Chris de Burg’s song.

In my case, I will be buried in books, research, (maybe) movies, and a series of other activities that may or may not take me away from this page. (I’ve always wanted to be able to take one month off this blog in order to do a few other things. I tried it in July but it didn’t quite work. Wonder if this might be a good time, especially at this beginning of serious classwork and other personal endeavours around the city. Hmm.

The Nokia competition is still on. The second question is already up where I promised it’d be. There will be another one tomorrow, and the last two on Thursday. The email address will be provided before noon on Thursday and you may send in your answers. You could be a lucky winner. The winner will be contacted via email on Thursday and announced on the blog either on the same day, or on Friday.

See ya around.

Summer People (III)

Kola — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 08:33:42 +0000

In response to a memory of faces and places, here is the (I hope) last installment of my summer people posts. Or not.

There’s Ayo, Prof. Banjo, Benson, Aunt Grace, Nikola, Niyi, Dr. Oha, Rahman, Sola, Yemi, and Yomi .

Of Beliefs and Denials

Kola — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 18:38:08 +0000

Living in the America of today, it is unlikely that anyone is oblivious of the raging debate about a religious centre close to the former World Trade Centre buildings. Even those who didn’t believe in anything seem to have something to say about the project. It is like the issue of belief, tyranny and spirituality always manages to bring us together if only to disagree. Last week, I heard a news story of a New York cabbie getting stabbed by a passenger who said or thought he was Moslem, and nearly got him killed.

A few days ago, I heard that a friend of mine had told other people that I was moslem, maybe in jest, or maybe because she was confused after seeing me praise the architecture of the Abuja National Mosque on my blog. Eitherway, it was my response to this discovery that has made my question even my own liberal mindedness. I really won’t mind if anyone thought I was Hindu or Buddhist as long as I am sure that I am not. That’s what I thought, but I found myself vehemently denying the charge on the spot, and later asking a few others if they have harboured the same thought for a while or heard the same rumours. A few days later, after an amount of thinking, I’m wondering why there shouldn’t be a reason for me to have said “Oh, screw it. So what?” It should even have been possible to make stickers saying “I’m not moslem, but I could be if you wanted me to.” and put it all around my living space. The only problem with that would be the ignorant folks, like the New York stabber, who might consider me a good target practise for his bigoted rage.

So I’m thinking, if intolerance and fanaticism are vices, what about a kind of bigotry that might manifest as immediate and loud denials of claims as simple as a mismatching of religious belief? For – as I’ve found out – there is usually more to explain whenever someone in a conversation looks at the other in denial and screams, “Oh me? No never. I’m not a _________”.

Just thinking. It should make for interesting discussion.

Summer People (II)

Kola — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 14:32:42 +0000

More.

Here we have, in alphabetical order, Adunni, Ayo, Bimbo, Bukkie, Damilola, Nikita, Olga, Olo, Peter, Rayo, Shaban, and Zainab.

Best of luck matching the names to the photos .

And what is it with the hands under the chin? There must be something on my face that elicits this kind of “wondering” reaction. Hmm.

More Photos from the Festival

Kola — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 02:38:28 +0000

The Festival of Nations St. Louis is organized yearly by the International Institute.

Other attractions at this event includes henna booths, Chinese and Greek calligraphy stands and stands for African Hair braiding.

The Festival of Nations

Kola — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 02:03:31 +0000

The annual International Festival of Nations took place yesterday and today at the Tower Grove Park, St. Louis.

It featured pavilions from all over the world with food, drinks, artworks, fashion items and souvenirs from those places being available for purchase. There were also live performances by artists and dancers from all over the world.

The food booths were from Afghanistan, Argentina, India, Bosnia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Burma, Canada, China, Eritrea, Ethiopia, the Philippines, Germany, Haiti, Isreal, Jamaica, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, Poland, Puerto Rico, Romania, Scotland, Selegal, Thailand, Turkey, Vietnam, among many others.

Here are a few pictures from the event. I had just discovered that most of the pictures I’d taken were those of the African stands. I don’t know how that happened.

Summer People (I)

Kola — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 14:28:25 +0000

Random images of people I met and interacted with during the summer.

Includes Anja, Rotji, Yun Hsin, Nneoma, Laitan, Ron, Jolaade, Papa Rudy, Chiedu, and Elizabeth in no particular order. One of those light-skinned beautiful women is my sister. Go figure.

ktravula - a travelogue!

Here’s the Winner

Anthony Ogboye

Related Posts

Save Foreign Language Departments!

Related Posts

The Text Part of Growing

Related Posts

Two-Thirds Gone

Related Posts

Summer People (III)

Related Posts

Of Beliefs and Denials

Related Posts

Summer People (II)

Related Posts

More Photos from the Festival

Related Posts

The Festival of Nations

Related Posts

Summer People (I)

Related Posts