Peace
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Taita Cultural Night – Pictures
So I attended the most recent Taita Cultural Night, and I had a wonderful time. I’m going to try and share the night with you by posting some pictures. (Videos later – slow uploading). I took the pictures with my moile phone so they aren’t very clear. Still, I hope you enjoy. 😉
First, some food. I labelled it, so that I could explain: 1. Chapati ; 2.Kimanga ya matoke (mashed plantain); 3. Nduda ; 4. Matumbo (tripe) ; 5. Beef; 6. Pure (mixture of beans and maize taita style); 7. Kimanga ya Sweet Potato (mashed sweet potato).
Next, the Taita traditional drink. Commonly made out of sugar cane, honey or corn. This particular glass was from honey but tasted evil. Its traditional name: Mbangara
Some lovely dancing ladies:
Finally, traditional Taita drummers whipping the crowd into a frenzy. Trust me, the drums were AWESOME!!
Your friends on the News? (Updated)
Yesterday I saw a former classmate on the news, one of the boys killed in the Ziwani massacre of three boys by our very own Police.
Indeed he was not perfect but he was no dangerous repeat well-known criminal as the police described him. What really happened? No one will ever know.
May they rest in peace; may we all rest in peace.
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For those of you who haven’t yet heard, a couple of nights ago….when Man U were being thrashed in Copenhagen, some cops came visiting to a certain house in Ziwani. They knocked the door at around midnight, saying they were the police…..they then asked ‘Vijana wako? Tunataka kuwaona!’ (Are the boys here? We want to see them!)
You can’t and shouldn’t lie to cops so the three boys were called out, they were all related (I think the two 20 year 0lds were brothers-in-law and the younger one was a nephew of theirs).
When cops in Kenya want to see your kids in the middle of the night, something’s really really wrong, so the mother wanted to go with the cops and her boys, asking what was wrong….the boys and some of the cops had already gone out of sight and it is at this time that gunshots pierced the serene night….someone, one of the boys, screamed for help, he got pumped with lead instead. This is the Ziwani massacre.
It doesn’t make sense to me! Even if the boys were hardcore crime kingpins, who decided they were guilty AND sentenced them to death?
It seems our cops are robbers, even if only of life. Some months ago, still in Ziwani, a cop (or cops-I’m not sure) came knocking demanding to see the kijana in the house, he later shot him 7 times in the HEAD, a few metres from the boy’s bedroom.
What’s going on?
The Lecturer’s Strike: A First-Hand Account
Hi my name is Jane. Valedon let me write this on his blog coz I felt it necessary. And yes I do not have a blog of my own, yet. (scandalous, right?)
I want to talk about the university lecturers strike. Needless to say, it affects me directly; I’m a student at JKUAT . Its been coming for months, the guys who teach us started talking about it aroung July….So the government was just waiting for the big day?
So this week they started, literally dancing around the school on Monday. Today, they disobeyed a court order and went on with their strike; 10 Egertion lecturers and 2 KU lecturers were consequently sacked. Here, we woke up t two rival notices on the notice boards: one warned us not to miss ANY lectures and report any missing lecturers., the other declared the strike successful and in full swing countrywide.
Having barely digested this, other notices appeared in the papers and elsewhere: ODM supporting the striking lecturers and of Nick Wanjohi’s (jkuat VC) supposedly milking and looting the university (this was published in the Citizen Weekly). Government types condemn the lecturers-some KU lecturers had to record statements on the Police’s courteous request. Lecturer-types declare their undying commitment to the strike!
Its all political!
What about us? The tension on campus is almost liquid. Huku ni kumoto. Its just a matter of time before a mini hell breaks loose-people right now are all outside, in small groups, with loud chants breaking the silence once in a while. Considering the much more volatile nature of akina KU, I shudder to think what’s gong on there!
I’m only an insignificant fresher but I’m going to throw my two cents worth of advice into the soup-pot…….when people come together to ask for their rights, you have to respect them and engage them in reasonalbe dialogue, not sidetrack them (perhaps illegally-as Kulundu did) into the industrial courts.
But are they clamoring for their rights? Is a 600% increment in salary too much? Think twice. The six VCs in the country earn more than 8 times what their lecturers earn. The VCs earn more than most people, even MPS and who knows who else. Incidentally it is these same VCs who claim that the lecturers are just another pack of hyenas. I bed to differ. Who teaches?
If 600% is too much, then dialogue and work it out. Playing hard ball wont do anyone any good.
It’ll just make the ground where two elephants collide et more and more eroded-its us who get hurt not them in their offices and fancy cars!