ktravula – a travelogue!

Browsing the archives for the Observations category.

Ten Years and the Reflections of A Prodigal

Guest post by Ìbùkún Babárìndé

Congratulations to those of you- young, male, Nigerian, and travelling alone, who were able to reach your destinations with(out) molestations, after flying out of Lagos airport in the wake of that failed underwear bombing of December 25, 2009.?

O ye travellers of hope, I hope you have all found your dreams, did you find home, did you find love, did you find happiness? This is a moment of reflection for us, I am one of you. I think we need to gather somewhere and celebrate a decade of surviving what was to become hostile treatment for young Nigerians travelling in the west.

As I write, I recollect all the fears and apprehension that followed the tragedy of young Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, and the recrimination that was unleashed on innocent young travellers from Nigeria by border forces across the world.  My own maiden flight was slated for the middle of January 2010, just 3 weeks after the near-tragic incident that involved a bomb on a plane. Those who believe that the USA and the western governments took undue advantage of the incident to heighten security vetting and high-handedness towards travellers from a certain part of the world may not be wrong, as we became legitimate targets for extra checks in frontiers across the world.

I was freshly 29, at a turning point in my life, a make or break moment, a moment that I made one of the most difficult choices. I chose to leave my father’s home, and headed out to the foreign land.

H:\Pictures\Ibukun 2009.jpg
Taken in 2009.
(credit: Fèyíṣọlá Babárìndé. Telford, 2010)

I was coming to the UK to start my master’s degree. But the marks of ‘slaves’ were all written on my passport…. ‘no recourse to public funds’, ‘restricted work’, má j’ata, má jẹ iyọ̀, and many other repressive immigration controls on the unsuspecting prodigal son. But unlike the biblical prodigal son, I did not go away with any inheritance to squander, I had less than £100 in my pocket, and owó onírú, owó aláta, owó alájẹṣẹ́kù paid the bulk of the cost… but like the real prodigal son, I went away from home, joyfully.

Before my flight, I had taken all additional precautions, booked a direct flight- avoided ‘Amsterdam’, the bad boy had connected a targeted flight via Schiphol airport. The scheduled landing time at Heathrow must be during the daytime, such that even if I was delayed in London, my onward journey to Wolverhampton would still happen during the day.

I made sure I had ‘no goatee’, no mustache, I identified as a Christian, from the south — it was necessary at the time in order to survive. So I thought I would be no easy target for any overzealous Islamophobic- steroid charged security operative. On the morning of my flight, I was briefly pulled aside to be interviewed by two middle-aged white operatives in Lagos airport before I was allowed to board, that should be it, I have been cleared — I thought, but I was wrong.

The flight itself was safe, and full of anxiety. I was waiting to meet my wife — we had just been married for less than 4 months before the affairs of this world separated us — I became home, she had become exiled. As planned, she was to collect the ‘JJC’ in London, and we would move to the midlands, where we would live for the next decade or so.

I left Lagos around 10am, it was around 33′ C, and London was waiting for me already blanketed by heaps of snow. Snow was something I had only seen in movies. London was in sub-zero temperature, and freezing. So I prayed that our plane would be able to land without diversion, as we were warned that many flights had been cancelled in previous days. 

As the plane was landing, I felt coldness creeping up my spine, clearly all my preparation for the cold had proved unhelpful. I was already wearing two pairs of socks, before I left Lagos. To keep warm, I reached for the fairly used unlined ‘Ògùnpa-gbà-mí-ọyẹ́-dé’ jacket that I bought at Dùgbẹ̀ market. My fine boy shoes, I was told were no use for the wintering London.

We landed safely, and I followed the signs towards the bagging area. In one of my luggage bags was gari, ẹ̀wà, irú woro (which had a tipper load of sea sands in it), èlùbọ́, gala, and other women things that I had bought for Fèyíṣọlá at Alẹ́shinlọ́yẹ́ market in Ibadan.

In the other bag, I had some mainframe movie CDs. ‘They will certainly be reminding me of home,’ I had assured myself. Then in 2009, YouTube was still in its infancy, and had not been populated by Nollywood-advert invested contents. I had copies of some Nigerian books too, there was a feeling that I was going to be gone for a very long time, and I had to prepare for them days. I had some Ọ̀ṣúndáres, Akeem Làsísì’s Ìrèmọ̀jé, some copies of my own ‘failed anthology’, some Fálétí’s works, and some other copyright infringed photocopied books. Amazon and Netflix have reversed all these worries today’s maiden travellers.

So I got my luggage, and I headed out into the hands of my new set of friends.  I had met a party of them in Lagos, but to be faced with another security men in London… I was waived into a little huddle of fellow young travellers, at this point we were not all Nigerians in that holding, but we were all single travellers. I was taken in for checks… of course I was punctuating them with my ‘pardon’, ‘pardon me’, ‘and excuse me please’ (s), which would become part of my hurriedly developed survival phonetics in the Un-queenly many regional-accented spoken English language that I would later be exposed to, particularly in the black countries of the west midlands.

I was left in a room, with no shirt on, the machines came up to my chest- I knew they would find nothing. No powders, no tuberculosis, no typhoid- there was no ebola then (thank goodness), and no bombs. 

Outside the room, I heard chatters, I could hardly understand what was been said, then footsteps fainted away from the door to the room, and everything fell silent for an eternity.

After some 45minutes, it dawned on me that I have been abandoned in the room. I waited for no further instructions, I dressed myself up, and I was posing for what I truly believed was a camera as if to tell them that I was already yielding myself to the 11th commandment (‘do they own will’)… I was no international security threat to nobody, I was just a young Nigerian happening to be travelling alone after a failed bomb attack on a plane. 

I later understood what had happened to me that evening, the poor immigration staff had been understaffed, and I was not properly handed over, I must have arrived mid-shift change. 

I pulled myself and my luggage out into a narrow corridor, I approached a table at the other end of the corridor, and I asked whether I could leave. Yes…yes…yes… someone said to me. And I stepped into the arrival lobby, even within the foyer, the winter breeze was already lapping up my face.

Fèyíṣọla was already waiting for me, and she was wondering and fearing the worst. There was a possibility of being refused entry, the whole process of delay, checks, and the disappearance of the security/immigration staff took almost 3 hours. We had no time for hugs and kisses, I was herded like a sheep towards the car park by the invisible winter-rod, and we headed north. 

The following months were very cold, it was my very first ever winter experience. The days were very short, I was going to bed with the setting of the sun, and over-sleeping, waiting to wake with sunrise that never happened in the morning. I became bitter with the elements, particularly with the sun, I angrily wrote in a poem about the sun… ‘do not rise today,/ if you will not make me warm’… I nearly became clinically depressed. I contemplated going back home.

Every day of the last 10 years, I have remembered the words of Ìyá Àyọ̀ká- as she is fondly called by the name of one of my sisters. ‘Please do not forget home, I hope to see you again’ 

Her words had reverberated in my head as I drove myself from Ibadan to Lagos on the morning of my departure. I have since made several other return flights to and from Nigeria in the last 10 years, the feelings of my first flight and the words of my mum always return to me on each occasion. Though the definition of both home and exile has changed for me, there is a part of me that now (sadly) sees exile in every thought of the place that used to be home, and there is another part of me that sees new home in my exile.

H:\Pictures\Ibukun 2020.jpg
Selfie. (September, 2019)

There is no way I could explain my new philosophies to Ìyá-Àyọ̀ká — It will never help. I have joined myself with foreigners, all in the name of citizenship integration. All the things I should never eat, nor drink have become regulars at every dinner, and I know that I have changed and become different.

My muse left me at the depth of my depression. This is one reason for which I must return. I have failed to see any inspiration in the burgundy of autumn leaves, the white winter fields only depress me, and the sun-shined summer’s meadows would not compare with the poetry of Bẹẹrẹ, or with melodies of Bódìjà market. 

______

Ìbùkún Babárìndé, author of Running Splash of Rust and Gold (poetry; Kraftgriot, 2008), writes this as a reflection to commemorate the 10th anniversary of his ‘exile’ in England.

Ten Years and the Reflections of A Prodigal was published on December 21st, 2019, with the tags , , , , under the Guest Post, Observations, Travelling category. There are currently 3 comments on this article so far.

Two Nights in Paris

Last week, I visited Paris as a guest of UNESCO’s International Conference on Language Technologies (#LT4All). It was a large gathering of language practitioners — from linguists to teachers to tech gurus and other executives — under one roof to share ideas, discuss obstacles, and showcase current activities in the sphere of language technologies. The theme “Enabling Linguistic Diversity and Multilingualism Worldwide” was part of the framework of the 2019 International Year of Indigenous Languages.

It was my first time in the city and in the country (since layovers don’t count).

At the Eiffel Tower during one of the conference breaks.

The conference was co-sponsored by Google (as a Founding Private Sponsor), The Government of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug-Ugra (as a Founding Public Donor), UNESCO, Japan, France, and NSF as public donors, and others like Facebook, Systran, Microsoft, Amazon Alexa, Mozilla, IBM Research AI, etc, as regular sponsors. Team leaders from many of these companies were around to speak and share ideas from their ongoing work. It was a delight to be able to listen to many of them, and make connections. I met, for the first time, Daan van Esch, who leads Google’s GBoard global efforts, and with whom I’ve worked in some capacity on these efforts while I worked at Google on some Nigerian language projects. His presentation was about GBoard and how it has empowered more people to write properly in their languages on mobile devices.

I also made acquaintance with Craig Cornelius who has done some work for the consortium, but now works at Google as a Senior Software Engineer. This was during a panel on Unicode where I mentioned the fact that Yorùbá writing on the internet has suffered greatly because of Unicode’s inscrutable decision not to allow pre-composed characters. Because Yorùbá diacritics are usually both on top of the vowel and beneath it, one usually has to find so many different Unicode characters to match before one properly tone-marked character can be typed. Beyond the fact that this would be a nightmare for someone having to type a whole passage (or a novel — imagine!), it is usually often still impossible to find the right combinations. And when one manages to find the combinations, the difference between how one computer system or word processor codes its software often makes it impossible for the text to remain readable by a second or third party. I encounter this problem every day while working on the catalogue at the British Library where many of the Yorùbá books listed there appear in a variety of fonts in the BL system, some of which make the titles unreadable or with a different intended meaning.

Craig Cornelius (left), Mark E. Karan from SIL (middle), and a guest.

GBoard has mitigated some of these problems. In Yorùbá on the GBoard app, for instance, we now have pre-composed characters like ọ̀ and ọ́ and ọ and ẹ and ẹ́ and ẹ̀, etc, which can be inserted instantly without any secondary combinations. What we need, as I said during the subsequent informal conversation about the subject, is something like that for Unicode so that every new computer user does not have to spend valuable time doing diacritic permutations from the Insert>Symbol field. Or for browsers (Chrome, Explorer, Mozilla, Safari, etc), so we can stop waiting for Unicode to change its ways.

In 2016, through the Yorùbá Names Project that I founded, we created a free tonemarking software for Yorùbá and Igbo, for Mac and Windows, which has been very helpful in writing on the computer — and with which I have typed all the diacritics in this post. It still combines character elements, however, but it is software-keyboard-based, and a lot more intuitive.

The Yorùbá Names Project Keyboard, launched in 2016, can be downloaded at http://blog.yorubaname.com/keyboard

Its limitations show up when a document typed with the software has to be read with another program (like Adobe or Microsoft Word, then the cycle begins again). It would be helpful if the functionality of this nature already came with the computer so there is uniformity. Imagine if every computer sold in Nigeria already suggests to the user to flip the language as I do above so that the keyboard automatically allows for diacritic markings that can transmit across different programs. That would be great, won’t it? The conversation with these gentlemen convinced me that it is doable, but would take time, and different companies coming together to agree that African languages matter on these platforms. It has not always been the case.

Speaking with someone from the Woolaroo team, a Googler, who now lives in Australia and wants me to come visit.

One of the other language products that was showcased there was Woolaroo, created in conjunction with Google Arts & Culture, which is a crowdsourcing visual dictionary for a small Australian language. When publicly launched, users will be able to take photos, and then use that photo to submit words for items in the image, which is then sent to a database and shared with other users. For languages with few speakers, but whose speakers use the tools of technology, it is one way of eliciting lexical items without having to do the physical fieldwork that has characterized most language documentation efforts in the past. There is significance for this type of approach for languages in Nigeria, for instance, where old people who know the name of items are not literate to write, but can perhaps be made to use the visual aid of phones to contribute as much as possible while they are still alive.

How the Woolaroo app works. It will be launched in 2020, and its API will be made available so others can replicate it in many language communities.

There were other Nigerians, and Africans, at the conference. I met Dr. Túndé Adégbọlá of the African Language Technology Initiative (ALT-i), Àbákẹ́ Adénlé of AJA.LA Studios, Professor Chinedu Uchechukwu of the Nnamdi Azikiwe University in Awka, Nigeria, Professor Sunday Òjó, and Adama Samassekou (the founder of the African Academy of Languages), among others. It was a diverse group of people working in different aspects of language revitalization, technology, and documentation. Mark Liberman, whom I was also meeting for the first time, shared my concern about Unicode, having done some work himself in Nigerian languages, and been frustrated by the problem of finding the right diacritics in a simple and accessible way.

Dr. Adégbọlá and Prof. Sunday Òjó

Paris is beautiful at night — perhaps much better looking at night actually. The monuments are lit up, and the beauty of the city shines out from within the glow. The language of the city, naturally, is French, but the tourist who speaks not more than a smattering of the language doesn’t run into much of a problem.

It was cold most of the time, which made walking around a bit of an ordeal. It reminds me a lot of the other global city I once attempted to walk around in 2009. A day before I arrived in Paris, there had been a massive strike that paralysed the entire country and rendered public transportation useless. This could explain why Uber appeared a lot more expensive that I’d experienced elsewhere. Would have been nice to see how different the Metro was from the Tube in England. But the strike also meant that the city was less crowded — at least the usually touristic areas — and the public trash cans seemed always in need of emptying.

The Arc de Triomphe ahead, and a trash bag nearby.

I had got a travel grant of £1,011 to attend the conference — which covered my visa (~£295), hotel (~£270), food (~63), train (~£500), and Ubers (~£81.77) and was helpful and convenient, especially since I had to pay for the highest end of many of these things due to the rushed arrangement. My visa was issued on the 4th, so I was only able to attend the sessions on the 5th and 6th, leaving the city in the evening of the 7th. Still, it was enough to take in the fine city, sample the food, make connections, and make future plans to return for more adventure.

The benefit of the strike is fewer tourists, but more overflowing trashcans.

The train ride on the Eurostar from St. Pancras to Gare du Nord, which took just under three hours, is a story of its own.

Two Nights in Paris was published on December 15th, 2019, with the tags , , , , , , under the Academic, adventures, Observations, Travelling category. There are currently 2 comments on this article so far.

Exploring the Luxor Museum

by Adrienne Chamberlain

 

In a land where the last remaining structures of the ancient world still stand, you might think that modern museums pale in comparison. However, the marvels of Egypt do not stop at the pyramids, tombs, and temples found across the country. In fact, plenty of the nation’s ancient, fascinating history is preserved in its museums, from excavated sarcophagi down to remarkable ancient relics. In fact, the country’s museums tend to be filled to the brim with thousands of these wonders, but such is not the case with Luxor Museum.

Standing on a corniche overlooking the west bank of the Nile River, the Luxor Museum was established in 1975 by the Egyptian Ministry of Culture. The two-story windowless building is only a fraction of the size of the country’s biggest museum in Cairo, but that’s okay — the Luxor Museum takes pride in the quality of its collection, rather than its quantity.

Image Source: EgyptianMuseums.net

Egypt Today notes that some of the best antiquities inside are the preserved mummies of Ramses II and Ahmose I. These are displayed without their wrappings in one of the museum’s newer wings. The first is regarded as the greatest and most celebrated pharaoh of the New Kingdom, while the second was the founder of the Eighteenth Dynasty. Both are located in a section dedicated to the New Kingdom, which marked a great period of imperial power for the country.

Image Source: EgyptianMuseums.net

Another of the museum’s main features, this time located on the upper floor, is a reconstructed wall made up of 283 sandstone blocks from the Karnak temple built for Amenhotep IV. The wall illustrates residential and royal scenes as well as solar Jubilee scenes from the first Sed festival. This is a priceless exhibit, as very little of the actual temple remains in modern times.

Some other of the museum’s highlights are the artifacts that have been gathered from the tomb of King Tutankhamun. Model boats, sandals, arrows, and figures of servants once decorated the area surrounding his resting place. Because ancient pharaohs believed in the afterlife and kept their most prized belongings close to their burial site in preparation, this is a major part of the museum.

Image Source: EgyptianMuseums.net

Indeed, the scale of the burial site was a major factor in the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922, which received worldwide media attention. It sparked a newfound interest in Ancient Egypt, a fascination that has stood the test of time. Egypt’s rich history is reflected in a wide array of modern media across the world. For instance, the fantastical film Gods of Egypt heavily draws inspiration from Ancient Egypt and even deviates from actual history in favor of creative interpretation. A more traditional depiction can be seen in a slew of video games, particularly in a collection of Egyptian-themed titles on Slingo Slots. Games like Cleopatra’s Riches, Temple of Tut, and Temple of Iris are a nod to the actual ancient history of Egypt. Though there are a few creative liberties, the images featured are more or less based on Egypt’s past — much of which resembles the surviving remnants of the ancient world housed in the Luxor Museum.

Recently, the Luxor Museum celebrated the 96th anniversary of the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb, acknowledging the event as a turning point in the country’s tourism and the world’s interest in it.

Fortunately, you don’t have to fly all the way to Egypt to catch a glimpse of its many relics. If you somehow find yourself in Turin, Italy, and are interested to know more about Egypt’s ancient past, you can also pay a visit to the wonderful Museo Egizio.

—-

Adrienne Chamberlain is a history enthusiast who is particularly interested in the mysteries of the ancient world. She mainly travels to see ancient structures (or at least what’s left of them) for herself. She’s already been to Egypt several times.

Exploring the Luxor Museum was published on December 6th, 2018, with the tags , , under the Guest Post, History, Observations category. There are currently no comments on this article so far.

Chapter 11: A Reading Space in Lekki

By Anthony Azekwoh

Perched comfortably on 39A Awudu Ekpegha Boulevard Street is Chapter 11, a workspace, training area and 24-hour library rolled into one.

Walking in, I was immediately greeted by the warm atmosphere such a cosy space promised: air conditioning, brightly coloured furniture and secluded workspaces to allow people do their work in peace and privacy, not to mention the free WiFi. So basically, it was heaven. Getting a membership is also very easy, for three thousand naira (3000) a day you have access to all their facilities or you could opt for the fifteen thousand naira (N15000) a week plan or even the twenty-five thousand naira (N25000) a month plan. Annually, you can also get access for two hundred thousand naira (N200,000).

Met with their friendly staff, I was shown around their space. The largest room was a kind of lounge area where members could eat, drink, talk and basically relax. There were cubical seats arranged with spaces all around with work cubicles too. I was then brought to one of their workspaces equipped with pigeon holes and work areas, everyone with their head down focused on their work. There was also free coffee and other refreshments available so that was also a plus.

Being the only one of its kind around the area, Chapter 11 shines as a versatile and comfortable space for learning, working and resting. Shifting easily between its many roles and managing still to perform perfectly. Definitely, a place to be to get good work done fast.

 

Memahami Platform Slot Online Masa Kini dan Pengalaman Gaming Digital

Industri gaming online terus berkembang dengan sangat cepat aman788.top. Platform slot digital kini semakin mudah ditemukan di berbagai penjuru internet, menawarkan beragam konsep permainan, tampilan antarmuka, metode akses, hingga fitur pendukung yang dirancang untuk memberikan pengalaman hiburan yang praktis. Seiring teknologi makin ayo788.top canggih, platform slot online juga ikut beradaptasi dengan kebutuhan pengguna modern, mulai dari kemudahan akses, kompatibilitas perangkat mobile, variasi permainan, keamanan akun, sampai navigasi yang lebih smooth dan nggak ribet.

Perkembangan Gaming Online di Era Digital

Dunia gaming online saat ini jelas berbeda dibandingkan masa awal hiburan gghoki.top berbasis internet. Kalau dulu pengguna lebih banyak mengandalkan komputer desktop, sekarang smartphone dan tablet justru menjadi perangkat utama untuk berbagai aktivitas digital. Konsep mobile-first membuat pengguna dapat menjelajahi permainan yang tersedia, membaca informasi, mengelola ggtoto.top akun, hingga mengakses berbagai fitur hiburan langsung dari perangkat yang setiap hari mereka gunakan.

Interface yang Cepat dan Mudah Digunakan

Salah satu tren yang paling terasa adalah meningkatnya kebutuhan gokil33.link terhadap tampilan yang cepat, sederhana, dan mudah dipahami. Pengguna tentunya tidak ingin menghabiskan waktu berlama-lama hanya untuk mencari satu permainan karena harus melewati menu yang membingungkan. Karena itu, platform modern biasanya mengutamakan navigasi yang straightforward, desain responsif, kategori yang jelas, serta waktu loading yang lebih optimal. Interface yang rapi bukan cuma bikin tampilan gototo.bz terasa lebih profesional, tetapi juga membantu pengguna memahami posisi dan fungsi berbagai fitur dengan lebih gampang.

Variasi Permainan dalam Ekosistem Slot Modern

Variasi permainan juga menjadi salah satu bagian penting dalam ekosistem haha788.top slot online modern. Platform digital dapat menghadirkan permainan dengan konsep reel klasik maupun tema yang terinspirasi dari mitologi, petualangan, fantasi, budaya populer, hingga konsep futuristik. Para developer terus melakukan eksperimen melalui mekanisme hahagacor.top permainan, animasi, efek suara, fitur bonus, serta desain visual yang berbeda agar setiap judul mempunyai karakter dan pengalaman tersendiri.

Memahami Sistem Permainan Acak

Meski tampilannya semakin menarik, penting untuk memahami bahwa visual hao788.link yang keren tidak mengubah karakter dasar permainan slot. Permainan tersebut pada umumnya menggunakan hasil yang bersifat acak, sehingga putaran sebelumnya tidak menentukan hasil pada putaran berikutnya. Karena itu, berbagai istilah yang sering digunakan di internet untuk menggambarkan permainan atau pola tertentu sebagai sesuatu yang sangat menguntungkan sebaiknya disikapi dengan kritis. Sebuah permainan hwtoto.sbs yang disebut sedang “panas”, “aktif”, atau dianggap berpotensi memberikan pembayaran besar bukan berarti hasil tertentu secara otomatis menjadi lebih mungkin terjadi.

Bahasa Promosi dan Ekspektasi Pengguna

Perbedaan pemahaman ini penting karena konten gaming online istana2000.link sering menggabungkan bahasa hiburan dengan istilah promosi yang cukup berlebihan. Klaim yang seolah-olah menjamin kemenangan dapat membentuk ekspektasi yang tidak realistis. Padahal, hasil permainan acak bukan sesuatu yang dapat diprediksi atau dikendalikan liga2000.top secara konsisten oleh pemain. Memahami konsep probabilitas justru jauh lebih berguna dibandingkan mempercayai klaim yang beredar melalui media sosial, forum, iklan, maupun halaman promosi.

Kemudahan Transaksi Digital

Perkembangan lainnya terlihat dari semakin besarnya perhatian liga5000.sbs terhadap kemudahan transaksi. Layanan digital modern biasanya menyediakan beberapa pilihan metode pembayaran, meskipun opsi yang tersedia dapat berbeda berdasarkan wilayah hukum dan operator yang digunakan. Pengguna mungkin menemukan transfer bank, layanan pembayaran digital, maupun metode lokal lainnya. Sebelum menggunakan fitur finansial apa pun, sebaiknya periksa terlebih dahulu biaya yang berlaku, ketentuan pemrosesan, batas minimum, serta ligatoto.link kebijakan penarikan dana.

Keamanan Platform dan Akun

Aspek keamanan juga wajib menjadi pertimbangan utama. Website mcmtoto.link dengan desain profesional belum tentu secara otomatis dapat dianggap terpercaya. Pengguna sebaiknya memeriksa apakah sebuah layanan memberikan informasi yang jelas mengenai operator, syarat dan ketentuan, kebijakan privasi, batas usia, serta persyaratan lisensi yang berlaku. naga2000.link Koneksi yang aman dan pengelolaan informasi akun secara bertanggung jawab juga menjadi bagian penting dalam menciptakan lingkungan digital yang lebih aman.

Akses Mobile yang Semakin Populer

Kemudahan akses melalui perangkat mobile semakin penting naga5000.cc dalam beberapa tahun terakhir. Banyak aktivitas online sekarang dilakukan langsung melalui smartphone, mulai dari berbelanja, berkomunikasi, bekerja, sampai mencari hiburan. Oleh sebab itu, semakin banyak platform gaming yang menggunakan desain responsif agar tampilannya otomatis https://pptoto.click/ menyesuaikan berbagai ukuran layar. Interface mobile yang dirancang dengan baik seharusnya tetap mudah dibaca dan digunakan tanpa membuat pengguna terus-menerus melakukan zoom, memutar layar, atau menghadapi halaman yang terlalu kompleks.

Desain Gaming untuk Pengguna Smartphone

Popularitas mobile gaming turut memengaruhi cara konten slot online pptoto.link ditampilkan. Alih-alih sekadar mengecilkan tampilan desktop agar masuk ke layar smartphone, layanan modern dapat mendesain ulang menu, tombol, area promosi, serta preview permainan khusus untuk pengguna mobile. Pendekatan tersebut dapat membuat pengalaman terasa pucuk33.sbs lebih nyaman dan praktis. Namun, kemudahan akses tentu tidak boleh dianggap sebagai tanda bahwa risiko finansial menjadi lebih kecil.

Memahami Promosi dan Ketentuannya

Bahasa promosi juga masih menjadi salah satu ciri khas industri gaming online rextoto.link. Website gaming sering menggunakan istilah yang berkaitan dengan bonus, reward, promosi, turnamen, fitur gratis, maupun event tertentu. Penawaran seperti ini memang bisa terlihat menarik, tetapi pengguna tetap perlu membaca seluruh ketentuannya sebelum rrtoto.link ikut serta. Syarat yang berlaku dapat mencakup aturan penggunaan bonus, persyaratan kelayakan, masa berlaku, minimum deposit, batas maksimum penarikan, serta ketentuan lainnya.

Memahami Statistik Pembayaran

Prinsip serupa juga berlaku terhadap klaim mengenai persentase pembayaran atau return to player. Angka teoritis tersebut merupakan ukuran statistik berdasarkan jumlah hasil yang sangat besar, bukan jaminan bahwa seseorang akan memperoleh persentase yang sama dalam satu sesi permainan. Hasil jangka pendek dapat berbeda jauh dari ekspektasi statistik jangka panjang. Memahami konsep ini dapat membantu pengguna menghindari kesalahan dalam menafsirkan data permainan.

Bermain Secara Bertanggung Jawab

Pemain modern juga sebaiknya mempertimbangkan prinsip bermain secara bertanggung jawab sebelum membuat akun atau memasukkan dana. Uang yang digunakan untuk hiburan seharusnya merupakan dana yang memang mampu dikeluarkan, bukan uang yang dibutuhkan untuk kebutuhan utama seperti tempat tinggal, makanan, transportasi, pendidikan, maupun kebutuhan sehari-hari lainnya. Menentukan anggaran sejak awal dapat menjadi batas yang jelas dan membantu seseorang mengenali ketika aktivitas hiburan mulai terasa membebani kondisi finansial.

Manajemen Waktu Saat Bermain

Manajemen waktu juga tidak kalah penting. Platform online dapat diakses hampir sepanjang slot2000.link waktu, sehingga seseorang bisa saja terus bermain lebih lama daripada rencana awal. Menentukan durasi sesi sejak awal dapat membantu menjaga keseimbangan. Memberikan jeda secara berkala serta menghindari keinginan untuk mengejar kerugian sebelumnya juga merupakan langkah yang lebih bijak.

Menghindari Anggapan tentang Pola Kemenangan

Salah satu pola pikir yang cukup berisiko adalah anggapan bahwa kekalahan beruntun berarti kemenangan pasti sudah dekat. Permainan dengan hasil acak tidak bekerja sesederhana itu. Serangkaian hasil yang tidak menguntungkan tidak menciptakan kewajiban bahwa hasil berikutnya harus menjadi kemenangan. Begitu pula sebaliknya, beberapa kemenangan berturut-turut bukan berarti kemenangan berikutnya pasti terjadi. Setiap hasil sebaiknya dipahami berdasarkan mekanisme matematis permainan, bukan semata-mata berdasarkan asumsi tentang keberuntungan atau pola tertentu.

Perkembangan Teknologi Gaming Online

Dari sisi teknologi, industri gaming online juga semakin kompetitif. Developer terus berinvestasi dalam kualitas grafis, performa yang lebih cepat, desain suara yang imersif, fitur bonus interaktif, serta mekanisme permainan yang lebih inovatif. Perkembangan tersebut membuat permainan digital terlihat semakin hidup dibandingkan generasi sebelumnya. Di sisi lain, infrastruktur cloud dan teknologi web modern juga membantu meningkatkan aksesibilitas pada berbagai perangkat.

Pengguna yang Semakin Informatif

Pada saat yang sama, pengguna internet kini semakin kritis dan informatif. Review, diskusi independen, kebijakan platform, serta informasi dari regulator dapat memberikan gambaran tambahan sebelum seseorang menentukan apakah sebuah layanan xxtoto.link sesuai untuk digunakan. Daripada hanya mengandalkan copywriting iklan, konsumen dapat membandingkan informasi yang tersedia secara publik dan melihat apakah sebuah platform menjelaskan kebijakan mereka secara transparan.

Aspek Legal dalam Gaming Online

Aspek hukum juga tidak boleh dilewatkan. Regulasi mengenai gaming online dapat berbeda secara signifikan antara satu negara atau wilayah dengan wilayah lainnya. Layanan yang diperbolehkan di suatu yurisdiksi belum tentu legal di tempat lain. Batas usia, persyaratan lisensi, perpajakan, aturan iklan, serta metode pembayaran yang diperbolehkan dapat mengikuti peraturan lokal masing-masing. Karena itu, pengguna perlu memahami ketentuan hukum yang berlaku di wilayah mereka sebelum mengakses layanan yang berkaitan dengan perjudian online.

Privasi dan Perlindungan Data

Privasi menjadi perhatian penting lainnya. Akun online dapat menyimpan berbagai informasi seperti username, alamat email, riwayat transaksi, serta data lainnya. Sebelum melakukan registrasi, pengguna sebaiknya membaca kebijakan privasi untuk memahami bagaimana data mereka dikumpulkan, disimpan, diproses, maupun dibagikan. Penggunaan password yang kuat dan kebiasaan keamanan akun yang baik juga dapat membantu mengurangi risiko yang sebenarnya bisa dihindari.

Memahami Lingkungan Slot Online Modern

Pada akhirnya, lingkungan slot online modern merupakan perpaduan antara hiburan, teknologi, desain, dan kemudahan digital. Platform saling bersaing melalui tampilan visual, koleksi permainan, pengalaman mobile, pilihan pembayaran, serta berbagai kampanye promosi. Namun, di balik interface yang semakin polished, permainan slot tetap merupakan bentuk hiburan berbasis keberuntungan dengan hasil yang tidak dapat diprediksi secara konsisten.

Pendekatan yang Lebih Informed

Karena itu, pendekatan paling masuk akal adalah menjadi pengguna yang informed. Bedakan antara hiburan dan investasi, antara bahasa promosi dan informasi faktual, serta antara konsep statistik dengan janji mengenai hasil individual. Tidak ada website, strategi, pola, fitur software, maupun klaim promosi yang dapat menjamin hasil tertentu dari sebuah permainan acak.

Masa Depan Gaming Digital

Seiring industri terus berkembang, kesadaran digital dan kebiasaan bermain secara bertanggung jawab https://www.ktravula.com/2019/05/on-the-trending-news-of-my-purported-appointment-as-vice-chancellor-of-dominion-university-ibadan-by-francis-egbokhare/ akan semakin penting. Teknologi baru mungkin mengubah tampilan permainan dan cara sebuah platform beroperasi, tetapi prinsip dasar mengenai probabilitas, disiplin finansial, privasi, serta kepatuhan terhadap hukum tetap relevan.

Kesimpulan

Bagi siapa pun yang sedang mencari informasi mengenai platform slot online, langkah paling cerdas bukanlah mengejar janji kemenangan instan. Awali dengan memahami cara kerja permainan, memeriksa kredibilitas dan legalitas layanan, membaca seluruh ketentuan dengan teliti, menjaga keamanan informasi pribadi, serta menetapkan batas yang jelas. Dengan perspektif seperti ini, pengguna dapat membuat keputusan yang lebih matang mengenai apakah gaming digital memang sesuai dengan cara mereka menikmati hiburan.

Chapter 11: A Reading Space in Lekki was published on August 10th, 2018, with the tags , , under the adventures, Guest Post, Observations category. There are currently no comments on this article so far.

Onward Aké – A Travelogue

by Torinmo Salau

 

I got to Oshodi few minutes past 7am, my plan was to take off from Lagos before 6:30 Am. Rather I found myself panting under the weight of the Khaki travel bag strapped to my back, frantic to get on the next vehicle en route Kuto, Abẹ́òkuta which finally set out few minutes to 8am.

The grey Sienna car was badly dented and its rear windscreen had a slight crack which ran diagonally across its full length. The vehicle moved swiftly, faster than I even envisaged and within 30 minutes, we were approaching the tollgate. With Ma Lo by Twa Savage and Wizkid playing quietly in the car, I tried to go through the Aké Festival program schedule on my Samsung tablet.

“Are you going to Aké too?” the husky voice who sat beside me asked, jolting me out of the thoughts which clouded my mind.

“Yes”. I wondered why he was smiling sheepishly and from the way the words rolled off his tongue, you could guess his name would either be Emeka or Ifeanyi. But I did not guess right, his name was Chike.

After conversing for some minutes, I discover that Chike is a lawyer but he daylights as a freelance writer and editor.

“Shit I forgot my drugs,” he said midway through the conversation, mumbling words I barely understood.

“I forgot my antidepressants, he continued, sounding more distressed with anxiety ripping slowly through his face. His anxiety was palpable as he shifted from left to right in his seat, visibly shaken from the reality which just dawned on him.

“Are you depressed?”

Then I realized that was a dumb question to ask, if he is not suffering from depression, then why is he is shaking like a crinkled leaf which has lost its moist to the parched harmattan wind.

“Yes, I am depressed. But I will be fine without the drugs, he said shrugging his shoulder limply. Then he turned his back towards me, looking out of the window and staring at lush green vegetation which lined the road.

We were way past Mowe-Ibafo and its environs, I knew this because there was no sight of human habitations along the road again, just signposts after signboards and signages which had rusted and were barely legible to read.

“Sorry to hear, you are suffering from depression.”

I said the word ‘Depression’ almost inaudibly, carefully curating every word I spoke like somebody walking on eggshells, eggshells which can crack just by the slightest omission of a letter.

“Please don’t be, Chike said looking away from the window, smiling, I guess he was trying to hide his disappointment.

“I get a little cranky when I miss my medication but I will be fine, it’s just for two days”.

This was the second time he was saying, “I will be fine” within the space of five minutes.

While he sounded fairly reassuring, I still felt worried. Worried by the fall in his countenance and the dark shadow cast over the bubbly persona he exuded at the onset of the journey. Wondering what the resultant effect of missing a pill or two could be, wondering why he had to repeat himself if he would really be fine?

Then the journalist in me kicked in.

“How long have you been feeling depressed?” I asked with my curiosity etched up, hungry to dig down the layers of this story, hoping it is not what I think it is.

“Two years thereabout”.

“Besides antidepressants medication, why didn’t you explore other means of managing this condition?”

“I did. I tried therapy first but it was quite expensive. Then I switched to a psychiatrist, the doctor placed me on drugs which have been more effective than therapy”.

“But contrary to what I am aware of, therapy works best, better than tying your daily existence to a bottle of pills?”

“Yes it does, for some people. But the antidepressants help to balance my moods, keeps me from bouncing from one end to the other.

“Are there any side effects to antidepressants?”

“Yes of course, especially the withdrawal symptoms which varies among individuals, ranging from anxiety, insomnia, nausea, fatigue amongst others. It can either be mild or severe.

Chike turned his back to me again, but this time, he wasn’t looking out of the window. Rather, just staring at the brown threadbare carpet on the floor of the car, which was caked with red sand. By then the song playing in the car was ‘Joromi’ by Simi, with light chatter from fellow passengers, some talking about the Spanish La Liga while others were lamenting the epileptic power supply across the country. But for few seconds, there was a transient suppression of verbal expression. The gulf of space between us was taken up by silence and it stood there for what seemed like an eternity.

Though I pretended to read a book, Chike’s words kept throbbing my mind. His mental health struggles mirrored exactly what I was going through but what I was also denying and the more I looked in, the more I saw a reflection of myself.

On some days, I am just floating through space, watching my life from a distance as my dreams and ambitions vapourize into thin air, without any drive to rescue them.  Though I feel sparks of euphoria and drift to a different time space with my heart clustered with sugary fantasies tickling my taste buds, it is not for too long. Reality always lingers and thoughts of pulling the trigger moonwalk across my mind often. I want to run away, yet I am too scared to die.

I was excited as the car approached the ‘Welcome to Ogun state’ signboard. I could feel its momentum rising to 120KM/H, as the driver drove past the Governor’s Office which was painted in the colours of the national flag, heading into town.

***

While this was my second visit to Abẹ́òkuta, the city of rocky hills within the space of a decade, it was my first time at the Ake Book and Arts Festival, the fifth edition of AKEFEST. An annual literary, art and cultural event which pools authors, creatives, writers, artists, musicians, activists to share their work and ideas. It is no doubt a booklover’s dream as it offers the opportunity to interact with some of the major voices in the contemporary African literary scene.

I found the theme for the 2017 edition of Ake Festival, ‘This F-Word’ really intriguing, this was undeniably a profound time to have this conversation and stanchly confront the issues revolving around it. But the big cherry on the cake was the headliner for the event, Ama Ata Aidoo. Renowned poet, novelist and feminist. My favourite amongst her books is Anowa, a Ghanaian play about a young girl who rejects suitors proposed by her parents and marries a stranger, Kofi Ako. Kofi is angered by Anowa’s attitude of being a modern women and asks her to leave when she could not conceive a child. But Anowa discovers later that her husband had lost his ability to bear children, so the fault was his not hers. This discovery of the truth forces Kofi to shoot himself while Anowa drowns herself.

The trip ended at Kuto, it lasted for about 90 minutes. As luck would have it, the location of the literary festival, Arts, and Cultural centre was situated right beside the bus park, along Ibrahim Babangida Boulevard, Kuto. Chike and I were the last passengers to highlight from the car, I mumbled a short prayer to the heavens, grateful for the miracle of surviving the road.

Though the literary festival was a weeklong event, precisely five days from November 14th – 18th, 2017, I arrived at AkeFest on Day 4, Friday, hoping to still maximize the best of the event within the last two days. Chike and I exchange phone number and parted ways, promising to stay in contact with each other. He wanted to hear Toni Kan speak but I ran off to the current session underway, Book Chat with Alexis Okẹ́owó and Dayọ̀ Ọlọ́pàdé.

Storytelling with Mara Menzies on The illusion of the Truth was an enthralling moment as she told a Kenyan story of how Gikuyu women were not permitted to eat meat. Mara’s undulating body rhythm and the subtle tenor in her voice added more spice to the story. The fork in the road was one woman’s search for the truth and determination to fight the cultural stereotype which beleaguered women in her community. The day ended with a stage play by Yolanda Mercy on Quarter Life Crisis, a monologue which mixes expressions of spoken word and addictive baselines infused with a side dish of comedy. Most individuals go through a quarter-life crisis, but they don’t know it. Just like Alice, the main character in the story, we are swiping from left to right. Young, exuberant yet confused, not knowing what to do with the blank cheque called life, given to us. Though everyone around her thinks they know where they are going in life, the stage play which shows Alice trying to find ways to cheat growing up ends with a hilarious climax. However it doesn’t end without asking the audience with these two questions, ‘What does it mean to be an adult?’ and ‘When do you become one?’

Dusmar Hotel

I retired for the night at Dusmar Hotel, situated next to the Art and Cultural centre which saved me an extra cost of commuting within Abeokuta to the literary event. The hotel’s reception struck me with a major throwback to the mid-90s, refreshing fragments of my memory littered here and there. The furniture and furnishings were quite antique. The windows, still the same old model fitted with louvres reminded me of an incident I did not want to remember and I would rather not talk about it. But I found myself wondering why a hotel bore this type of window fittings even in the year 2017, though mildly nostalgic yet largely traumatizing.

Day 5, Saturday, the event was winding down but more people were still pouring it. As the literary festival teetered towards its climax, everything became fast paced. People frantically buying discounted books and F-Word books from the bookshop. The flashlight of cameras everywhere you turned to, as people tried to seal the memories and friendships formed within the space of five days. There was a book signing spree, authors inking their thoughts on books purchased by readers and their fans which was consummated with the millennials’ trademark autograph, Selfies!

My highlight of the day was the Life and Times session on Ama Ata Aidoo. The renowned author who has been writing for over sixty years spoke liberally about her life, work and feminism. It was an emotionally charged atmosphere for many in the hall as she paid an emotional tribute to Mariama Ba, Flora Nwapa, Buchi Emecheta and other women pioneers of African writing.

“I hope you will extend the love and appreciation, you have shown me to my sister writers – living and past.” But what stuck with is the last line of one of the poems she read, “A girl’s voice doesn’t break, it gets firmer.”

***

I returned to Lagos on Sunday morning with a belly full of feisty aspirations, determined to change my misconceptions about feminism. Also to commit myself to unlearning and relearning, as the words of Mona Elthaway persistently rings in my ears, ‘Fuck the Patriachary’. Part of the main insights gained from the Ake festival is the universality of our experience as women whether black, white, or queer and why it is critical to challenge the elephant in the room, especially peculiar societal norms and beliefs which have repressed us decades.

____________

Torinmo Salau’s work has been published online and offline in literary publications, magazines, and anthologies.

Onward Aké – A Travelogue was published on February 14th, 2018, with the tags , , , under the Observations, Travelling category. There are currently no comments on this article so far.