Adventures of a Retired Armchair Traveler

sometimes i visit these: Congogirl on Twitter / Bloglines Congogirl link / Congogirl's Links List on My Del.icio.us / Where IS DR Congo, anyway?? / Congo Daily / good summary article on DR Congo / Samantha Power's article, "Bystanders to Genocide" / Dizolele - Eye on Africa / Congo Blog - Ba Leki / Cedric Kalonji's photo blog / Extra Extra / Nayembi / Thirteen Wildlife Blogs from DR Congo / Babycatcher / Global Voices / Helene in RD Congo / ID Land - adventures in international development / John's Blog / Kim Gjerstad in Congo / On Safari with el Jorgito / The Salon of News and Thought / This is Zimbabwe / Bluehaired Mary / African Path / Global Bioethics Blog / Somewhere in Africa / Africa is a Country

December 2009


	1


	2


	3


	4


	5


	6


	7


	8


	9


	10


	11


	12


	13


	14


	15


	16


	17


	18


	19


	20


	21


	22


	23


	24


	25


	26


	27


	28


	29


	30


	31

	Wed, May. 13th, 2009 12:01 pm

Cedric Kalonji's vignettes on religion in Kinshasa and the East

These entries are in French (sorry) but provide interesting observations on religion in present-day DR Congo. Click for photos.

1.Kinshasa : Commerce de prières et des bénédictions divines de plus en plus fructueux

Observations on pastors providing the word of God and benedictions for a donation, but without much success. The more "men of God" selling their word, the fewer buyers will be available.

2. La bible, arme congolaise pour arrêter la guerre

Soldier-Pastor Rams using the word of God to influence citizens to believe and pray, to prepare them for eternal life, and to pave the way for peace.

Cedric Kalonji's comment: "Ils sont déjà nombreux à choisir la prière à la place du travail ou des médicaments lorsqu’ils sont malades. Et lorsqu’un soldat soutient haut et fort qu’il vaut mieux prier plutôt que défendre sa patrie, ça fait froid dans le dos..."

["There are already many that choose prayer in the place of work or medicine when they are sick. And when a soldier argues loudly that it is better to pray rather than defend his homeland, it sends shivers down your spine..."]

ETA: 3. Lutte contre le VIH-SIDA, à chacun sa thérapie.

People turning to prayer and miracle cures for HIV.

"Problème : les discours des pasteurs ont visiblement plus d’écho que les campagnes de sensibilisation et de prévention contre le VIH. La population congolaise ayant perdu foi en ses gouvernants se tourne vers Dieu et la prière. L’utilisation du préservatif étant considérée comme un péché par les églises et le miracle comme solution pour les malades, le sida a encore de beaux jours chez nous."

["Problem: the speech of pastors have visibly more resonance than awareness-raising and HIV prevention campaigns. The Congolese people, having lost faith in their leaders, are turning to God and prayer. With the use of condoms being seen as a sin by the church, and a miracle as the solution for patients, AIDS will still have sunny days with us."]

Tags: africa, blog, dr congo, hivaids, kinshasa, religion

	Wed, Feb. 4th, 2009 05:28 pm

Teaching Jujitsu to Aketi Police

In case you are interested in work to save orphaned chimps, or, perhaps, say, adventures that ensue in between caring for chimps, you should check out Laura and Adam's Tales from the DR Congo blog.

In particular, you might want to see photos of Adam teaching the local police some jujitsu moves!

Also - lots of chimp photos in general.

Tags: blog, dr congo

	Wed, Jan. 7th, 2009 01:54 pm

Blog about DRC

There are reasons that I have not been blogging much about current events in DR Congo beyond posting a few links. Mainly the reasons are not very substantial. I think I got tired after thinking about it so much, too tired to process and write. There has not been any true positive progress that I can tell, which is depressing, and it's really difficult to dwell on disaster all the time.

But you should stop by the Mushaki Pager blog, which I've just discovered through Global Voices, to peruse recent postings / reactions / analysis about the current situation in the east. English and French.

Tags: africa, blog, conflict, dr congo

	Mon, Dec. 15th, 2008 11:48 pm

Barcamp Congo! (Brazzaville)

BarCamp Congo

(Édition Brazzaville) sera le premier BarCamp au Congo (et en afrique centrale). Cet évènement qui durera une soirée est gratuite et ouverte à tous les participant. Ceux-ci y tiendront des présentations, des conférences, des discussions et des rencontres sur des sujets d'intérêt pour la communauté technologique Congolaise.

Cet évènement commun appartient à toute la communauté. Chacun devra contribuer même de façon minimal et aider à son succès. BarCamp Congo (Edition Brazzaville) pourrait être l'évènement techno dont vous aurez toujours rêvé et c'est à vous de le réaliser !

23 Dec 2008 19h - 23h dans l’enceinte du Centre Culturel Français.

Tags: blog, congo, rocongo, technology

	Wed, Sep. 12th, 2007 10:34 am

The BOBs - where are the African blogs?

White African has pointed out the dearth of African blog nominees at the Best of the Blogs awards over here. Just take a look at their map:

Now, go nominate your favorite African blogs. Here are my nominees:

Dizolele/Eye on Africa, a blog by a Congolese journalist. [English/French.]

Cedric Kalonji who takes most of the photos appearing on his blog and describes bits of life and politics in Kinshasa. [French.]

Tags: blog, dr congo

	Tue, Jan. 23rd, 2007 02:35 pm

1. African Path; 2. Clear Channel

1. African Path.

I have just added the site African Path to my links list, which launched on January 1, 2007. It is a clearinghouse of news and blog commentary about Africa, and looks like some of the discussion will be very interesting. In the newsletter that I just received, there are a few interesting opinions that have recently been published on the site.

Dennis Matanda says bring back colonization to Africa.

Elie B. Smith says thanks to George Dubya for increasing foreign aid and bringing down dictatorships in Africa.

Wole Oguntokun reviewed a performance of the Vagina Monologues in Lagos, Nigeria.

They also have an African blogroll on their links list if you are interested in perusing, which is set up regionally. There are several countries that have no bloggers listed, so if you blog from one of those places, you may consider emailing the editor [editor at africanpath dot com]; they are also accepting resumes for people who would like to write for them.

2. Clear Channel.

Clear Channel does not warrant a link on this blog entry. I visited their "About" page when I received a recent email (below) and the photo that represents them is three white men in suits.

( Read the email and my response. )

To me, the last point is the most important. I don't mind requests to blog for other people, although I find that it's difficult enough to keep up the writing here, but in the case above, I could not discern any other reason for the request other than for Clear Channel to make money off the exploitation of violent circumstances - because they were certainly hoping that I was based in Goma or Ituri Province in the east, where violence is still frequent, or perhaps hoping that I had been in downtown Kinshasa last August when the shooting occurred following announcement of preliminary election results.

Suddenly Clear Channel woke up and realized that there has been conflict in DR Congo these past years, and for some reason now it is sexy.

So the answer is no.

Tags: africa, blog, dr congo, mass media, news