PS: I’ve spent the last two hours deleting old pictures from my laptop since I discovered how much space occupied without need. It was an agonizing effort, I tell you. And for all the effort, I have only managed to free up to 14GB. I can’t say that I won’t do some more deleting later today. The photo above was taken at the Lake Michigan in Chicago. The combination of colours in the shot makes it one of my favourites, and it looks even better on paper. I think I’ll present it to Papa Rudy as a gift.

PPS: The guy in the picture is a paid model.

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ACCESS BANK PLC

ACCOUNT NAME: NIG. REDCROSS SOCIETY – JOS CRISIS RELIEF FUND

ACCOUNT NAME: 0430010005230

SORT CODE: 044080439

BRANCH: ADETOKUNBO ADEMOLA BRANCH, ABUJA

However, if you are an American and you do not have any Nigerian to send the money to, please leave me a comment here publicly, and send me a mail to let me know, and I will send you an my account number to send it to. Then I can send it home via Western Union and have someone pay it on your behalf.

So far, here is the breakdown of how much we have raised:

$145 from an anonymous in Illinois, who actually planned to donate $100, but due to bank wire charges, she ended up parting with $145 at the Bank of America. The money should be in Jos by now.

$80 from Clarissa my wonderful colleague at Edwardsville.

$50 from Tayo in Lagos for whom I may have to bring her artwork by hand when my time eventually runs out in this charming little town.

And finally, LaurensOnline.com, a shoe and bag-selling outfit in Lagos Nigeria has volunteered to sell all items from now till the end of stock at 20% off if you show proof of donation of any amount to the relief effort in Jos Nigeria. All you need to do is show such proof, and you get 20% off of your purchases. Without such proof, you still get a 10% off. So what are you waiting for? If you live in Lagos, find them for your Valentine purchases of shoes, bags and beads. My now famous boots are courtesy of them, so I know they sell quality.

This brings us to a gross total of $275 and a net of $230 so far raised. To all contributors, we say a big THANK YOU.

However, this offer to give free KTravularts will end with the month of February. If you are interested in the offer still, please hurry and make your donations now. Read details here.

Related Posts

• 10 Reasons to Buy KTravulart To Help Haiti Sat 30 Jan 2010
• 10 Reasons To Buy KTravulart To Help Jos Sat 30 Jan 2010
• Let The Bidding Begin! Tue 26 Jan 2010

9. Haiti does not have the required infrastructure to deal with the destruction of their homeland by the earthquake that hit them in January, and foreign volunteers can only do so much before they return to their own homes. They need help. They need money, badly.

8. You will get a precious artwork from and lovely postcards from ktravula.com. Yea, that’s worth repeating.

7. You will be saving lives.

6. This offer to buy beautiful soon-to-be-famous artworks for less doesn’t come all the time, and will definitely not be open forever.

5. Singer Wyclef Jean might send you a “Thank you” email or hand-written letter for helping his country. Don’t doubt it!

4. The city of Chicago, Illinois was founded by a man called Jean Baptiste Pointe du Sable, a Haitian. He was also the first known non-indigenous settler and the first Haitian-American and person of color in the area which is now Chicago, Illinois. A support for Haiti is a support for Chicago, and by extension a support for the State of Illinois – if we want to take it that far. Don’t forget that President Obama is also from the state. Help Haiti and help us, somewhat.  :)

3. Many of the survivors need so much medical attention which only money can buy.

2. It’s a drop in the ocean, but it can still make an impact.

1. The photos are beautiful, and worth every penny spent.

Alrighty, let’s do this and let’s move on. I’m sure I almost can hear someone say “enough already.” Well, the travelogue continues without fail, just after this commercial break… “Haiti I can see your Halo” by Beyonce. “911 Remake” by Twista, and “Redemption Song” by Rihanna.

To participate, go to this page for more information. The travelogue resumes its schedule in the month of February.

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• 10 Reasons To Buy KTravulart To Help Jos Sat 30 Jan 2010
• Update on KTravulAID for Jos/Haiti Thu 04 Feb 2010
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9. It is a tourist destination for expatriates living in Nigeria maybe because of its altitude. If there is peace, stability and vitality in Jos, there is peace, stability and vitality for all who visit the place. And it’s a good place to visit if you are ever in Nigeria.

8. It is the site of a very advanced Nok culture and civilization who lived there from around 3000BC and disappeared in the late first millenium.

7. Its National Museum is one of the best in the country, and it boasts of some fine specimens of Nok terracotta heads and artifacts dating from between 500 BC to AD 200. It also incorporates the Museum of Traditional Nigerian Architecture with life-size replicas of a variety of buildings, from the walls of Kano and the Mosque at Zaria to a Tiv village. (Source Wikipedia)

6. The state has over forty ethno-linguistic groups, some of the largest in the country as far as linguistic diversity is concerned.

5. It has the potential to be – as it has always been – one of the best places to live in Nigeria.

4. You will have a beautiful photographic artwork hanging in your living room, signed by KTravula, all the way from the Midwest of the United States.

3. You will have something to show for it beyond the beautiful photograph hanging in your living room: a peace of mind that comes from giving.

2. For Nigerians, you will have done your little part to contribute to the progress of the country Nigeria, without having to occupy a government office, and be sure that your money is making an impact, and not going to a corrupt pocket.

1. I said so. And you love me, don’t you?

PS: That photo above is of the famous Riyom Rocks. It is located in Riyom, the local government in which I spent twelve months in 2005/2006 on the National Youth Service programme. (Picture Source: Paramino.)

PSS: I got an $80 cheque from Clarissa today, as donation to Jos. She had mistakenly addressed it to Access Bank Nigeria instead of to me, but that’s fine. I can’t post the cheque to Nigeria because no Nigerian bank will cash an American cheque. On Monday therefore, I will make her re-write it, address it to me, I’ll cash it and transfer it to the Access Bank Account of the Nigerian Red Cross for Jos Relief or send by Western Union to them, or to someone who will pay it into the Access Bank Account and provide me with proof. It shouldn’t be so hard jare!

Related Posts

• 10 Reasons to Buy KTravulart To Help Haiti Sat 30 Jan 2010
• Update on KTravulAID for Jos/Haiti Thu 04 Feb 2010
• Jos, Plateau Thu 22 Jul 2010

I honestly, honestly have nothing to blog about today. Ask me, I can’t wait for January to be over with. It’s the longest month of the year, especially because it follows an already long festive one of December. February however is the shortest month, which is nice, except you are a compulsive blogger who has to write up to fourty-six interesting articles in a month.

What I intend to do in this short post then is to tell you the response to my so called “Charity Work”. It is interesting to see the responses so far, which is to me quite encouraging. We already have $100 pledged to Jos, Nigeria; I think. And today, Thursday, I will be making out the said photograph to send to the said donor who lives in Dolton, Illinois but wants to remain anonymous as soon as I receive the proof of said donation. There are two other pledges from contributors to this blog, and I thank them, Yemi and Tayo. Needless to say, it’s not sufficient. It is not the best we can do.

In a similar vein, I wrote a letter to the Fulbright Organization yesterday informing them of the project, and to the coordinator of the Haiti relief effort at my University. I haven’t received a response from either of them. What I hope to do in the next week is to hold an exhibition, if possible, of some of these photographs on campus. What I’m afraid of is that students may not have that much money to spare, adults who can spare may have already donated to Haiti. So for all its worth, if that ever happens, it will be more of my opportunity to showcase my work rather than to raise money. In any case, I’d be glad to explore the opportunity. Day by day, the pictures look better and better to me. I didn’t know that I’d taken so many shots in this little period of time.

If you’re interested in buying the works in this effort to raise money for Jos, Nigeria; and the country of Haiti, please head here for more information. I will try to keep the offer open until the end of my Fulbright Programme in May, if I can. From then on, you will have to pay heavily to buy them, by which time they would have become a collector’s item, even if I say so myself

SOMETHING ELSE: I heard that Apple has finally come out with it’s new tablet, and they have chosen no other name to call it than the iPad. The obviously flawed marketing strategy has now spurned so many spoofs and parodies on twitter since yesterday. The product was actually called the iTampon by pranksters in the extreme of it. What worried me the most why Mr Jobs hadn’t considered the fact that the iPad uses the very same sound patterns as the iPod, at least in Americans English. How will listeners be able to tell them apart? This may as well be a failure of language sensitivity as it is a failure of marketing. My two cents.

Related Posts

• Let The Bidding Begin! Tue 26 Jan 2010
• Update on KTravulAID for Jos/Haiti Thu 04 Feb 2010
• 10 Reasons to Buy KTravulart To Help Haiti Sat 30 Jan 2010

1.  Choose one of my photographs that you want to receive on a 20×16 inches high quality photoprint paper (frame is optional, depending on where you live). It comes with a postcard and an autograph from ktravula.com. (You can tell me which of the photos you want by going to the page where the photos are posted, and starting your bid in the comment section. See the bottom of this post for a list.)

2.  Make an offer in cash that you’ll like to pay for the said artwork. Bidding starts at $50, and has no upper limit. All you have to do is write something like this in the comment box on said page: “I want pic number 4, and I’m bidding to pay $80 for it.” or “I want the pic with the filename IMG_0114 for $500″. As soon as you do, your comment will show up on the comment bar on the right side of this blog, and anyone who has a higher bid will see it. In 24hours, and in the absence of a higher bid, you will be confirmed winner of the said artwork which will be sent to you by post as soon as you make the donation promised to the either of the following sources.

3.  Donate 50% of the amount (or whatever percentage suits you) to facilitate relief for the homeless victims of the Jos crisis through this link, and ask for a proof of said donation either through email or through a written letter. (Read more about the Jos crises here on Jerremy’s Blog).

4.  Donate the rest % via Yele Haiti,the American Red Cross, UNICEF or PlanUSA to the relief efforts in Haiti. When you do, you will be sent a confirmation email. Keep the email safe.

NOTE: You can make all your payments to either of these two causes, Jos or Haiti. You don’t necessarily have to split your donation, except you want to.

5.  Send said proof of donation to me via JosHaiti@ktravula.com, with your name and postal address. You may also need to pay $50 for handling and postage of said artwork to you wherever you are all over the world. Residents of the United States will get their artwork within one week. For those overseas, it might take a few days later.

Now, here are the pages where you can find my photos all taken since August in locations in the United States. (Note: photo quality is better in print than on the computer screen):

In actual fact, you can ask for any photo on this blog, as long as it is the one I took myself.

Alright, let the bidding begin. I hope it’s simple enough. If not, please let me know.

I heard that singer Lionel Richie is assembling a new cast to remake the 1984 hit We Are The World to raise money for Haiti. Actor Leonardo DiCaprio was praised today by the President Bush/Clinton Haiti relief funds for his personal donations. Singers Beyonce, Twista, Rihanna and Wyclef Jean are doing all they could in their capacities as musicians. I can’t sing, unfortunately. This is all I have. I hope that you find the pictures good enough for you to spend your money on, especially with the aim of saving lives in some other part of the world. Cheers.

NOTE: This is totally not-for-profit!

Related Posts

• Update on KTravulAID for Jos/Haiti Thu 04 Feb 2010
• Blank Head Rants Thu 28 Jan 2010
• 10 Reasons to Buy KTravulart To Help Haiti Sat 30 Jan 2010

In other news, the Winter season here has proven not to be Winter at all, but a winker one. I just don’t understand the darned weather at all. One day it’s freezing cold, and the other day, it’s hot. In the evening, it rains. I brought it to the attention of my students in class today and they gave me this wonderful nugget peculiar to Illinois, particularly Edwardsville: “You don’t like the weather? Just wait a few minutes!” I mean seriously, I’m depressed by its inconsistency. It just never stays too long to be defined. The ktravulake has refused to stay frozen long enough for me to play on it. It started de-freezing on the very first day of my planned play, and it has not frozen again since then, thanks to the weather. Well, it snowed today, but only for a little while. Let’s see for how long it stays cold before it warms up again.

I heard there was Harmattan in Nigeria. It was funny because I first heard it from a friend on gmail chat who had just gone to heat water for a shower. I was curious about how cold it could have been to necessitate boiling water, so I went to weather.com to see for myself. It was 28 degrees Celcious (82.4 degrees F). What? If we get that kind of temperature here, it will be called summer! I guess that explains why the first time I got off the plane, I was wearing three thick shirts and an overcoat. And that was in August. 28 degrees Celcius looks more like a very hot day to me right now, and Lagos and Ibadan people have absolutely no reason to take showers with hot water. Trust me If you doubt me, just take a look at the blog temperature on the upper right hand corner.

PS: I’m still waiting for the first bid on my KTravulartworks, seen on the wall of my apartment – without a frame – in that photo. The offer is still good to donate all profits to victims of disaster in Jos and in Haiti, so send me an email at ktravulart@ktravula.com to make an offer. It is your chance to get a beautiful artwork in your living room while donating money to a worthy cause. There’s nothing as fulfilling as killing two beasts with one shot. Is there?

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