...and some other stuff that's crossed my radar this weekend

Tanzania is at the Pan African Film Festival this month! Weakness, written (yup, his script!) and co-produced by Abdu Simba and directed by Wanjiru Kairu will be screened on Friday 12th February and Saturday 13th February at the Culver Plaza Theatres in LA. If you go, tell all about it.

So, remember back in 2007 when the prestigious Technology, Entertainment, Design (TED) Global Conference came to Arusha bringing together thinkers and innovators from around the world and (ahem) Tanzania? Oh, you didn't go either? Well, the good news is that a band of Bongolanders are organizing a TEDxDar event that will take place on May 22nd. Link to the website coming soon. In the meantime, the TED website is an excellent place to procrastinate. It beats forwarding odious Cute Kitten/Prayer Chain/Health Scare /My Cause emails to your exasperated friends, although that can be fun too...

My favorite purveyors of shiny electronic toys, Apple, has finally fallen off the edge of the product-naming cliff. Just a month ago, they were so cool and smart and soulful (yes, and businessminded) that I could condescend to my PC friends with confidence. This year they give us...the iPad. Thanks Steve, its going to be fun carrying one of those around the office.

The flimsy arrest of an intrepid reporter...

We all have favorites. When Jerry Muro was just a fresh-faced newbie on the ITV evening news, it was apparent that he had a energy and confidence (even impishness) that put him a cut above the other field reporters. His Bunge coverage was particularly fun as he and his cameraman pursued any politician of the day who could be cowed or cajoled into a live interview. Like Ze Comedy, he was coralled into the 'greener pastures' of TBC where he seems to be thriving as an investigative reporter and host of the evening news magazine program.

So naturally he got himself arrested over the weekend. According to The Citizen*, Jerry (unnamed in the article) was caught doing a little blackmailing of an unnamed businessman at Sea Cliff Hotel. According to the government paper Habari Leo, Jerry (who was named) was accused of blackmailing Karol Wage (former Bagamoyo District Treasurer before Mizengo Pinda fired her last year for loss of public monies and incompetence). This happened at the City Garden Restaurant in center city. As long as we are playing Cluedo, maybe Jerry was caught by Colonel Mustard about to do in Ms. Wage in the Library with a Candlestick.

The most cynical interpretation is that Jerry is quite guilty of blackmailing Miss Wage/Unnamed Businessman with exposure on his show. I think you'd have to be a stupid investigative reporter to solicit such paltry, easily-confiscated amounts of cash in a place like Sea Cliff or City Garden when there are plenty of dimly-lit neighborhood bars scattered throughout the city. Jerry doesn't seem that stupid, but you just never know.

I'm putting my money on simple intimidation. Plain-clothes policemen+investigative journalist+dubious charges= banana republic behavior. Mwananchi's piece offers a nice, if brief, run-down of other journalists who have recently suffered similar difficulties. I guess gone are the days when the establishment would 'discover' that its least-favorite journalists were in fact nefarious Rwandese/Congolese/Arab/Whatever working in Tanzania to destabilize the government, that old chestnut.

*The Clueless, sorry, The Citizen didn't bother putting this story up on their website so you have to catch today's digital edition for an online look.

Arm Chair Politics: the aid question.

"If you had to choose between getting rid of all the Development Partners in say five years time, or keeping the relationship as it is and continuing to receive aid, what would you do?" I was asked this last night, after a long and candid conversation about aid, development, politics and personal agendas. I was a few glasses into my membership in the Red Wine Political Party (In Vino Veritas), so the question triggered a powerful fantasy- you know the one about having a real chance to bring change?

I said that I would choose the first option, if in those five years I was able to make up the aid deficit through bi and multi-lateral trade agreements that favored Tanzania, increased foreign direct investment, internal trade green industrialization, smart agriculture, a booming services sector, a small but solid base of mining/oil. And high-quality low-volume tourism.

What would you have said?

Know your Em-Pee!

There is a general election coming up and if I can get my act together, I might just get to vote for the first time in my life. I am excited- for the past two elections the establishment has told overseas Tanzanians that it doesn't have enough money to help meet their democratic right to vote. The same government that orders fleets of Toyota Land Cruisers as often as I get a haircut. Whatever. I have been casting around for a party to support at the ballot (this is not going well) and I am keeping an ear out for news that independent candidates will be allowed (this is not going well either)>.

As part of my preparation, I skimmed the intertubes for news of my MP. A little late in the game, but like many I find that my legislator is of no discernible use to me outside of election years. Also, I live in Kawe which is full of disinterested middle class folks- too busy running businesses, "paying" taxes and creating employment, too suspicious of politicians, too few of us anyways. Since 'rich' constituencies are practically self-running, I can keep my opinion of Ms. Mlaki to myself. For the upcoming elections, it is going to be tough hitting the right note: a) support a female or feminist candidate without strengthening the CCM stranglehold, b) don't sell the vote for a bag of rice or t-shirt or pair of khanga either, but negotiate for a park/public school library/regular road maintenance, c) back an intelligent, committed and outspoken leader who shows up to Bunge sessions and reads Bills before they get discussed. We're all entitled to dream.

Every five years the constitutional landscape seems to change, I guess in keeping with the population growth and urbanization trends. Dar es Salaam is about to become an even bigger political presence in Bunge> than it already is, which is fine considering we are roughly 10% of the population. I can't wait to see what the political parties are going to cough up for Kawe in particular and greater Dar es Salaam in general. What's your voting plan*?

*Yeah, and good luck to the diaspora. Your government might just let you vote, but I wouldn't hold my breath... too many VXs to buy for the campaign trail this year.

A few new links

I have finally gotten around to updating the Blog Tanzania! blogroll, with an emphasis on the female bloggers. Don't worry, its not all estrogen up in there, but having toured the male bloggers' blogrolls I did notice that gender-based selectivity is the norm. Who am I to disagree?

There is some mild food porn, plenty of media/political commentary and one blogger who has a visual narrative thing going on. Sarah Markes' newborn Dar Sketches is the right link for you writers living in Dar es Salaam- mentioned her book project in this post. The blogsearch continues.

The obvious fate of unattended cookies

I got some awesome, home-made cookies yesterday. They were baked by a budding Independent Womyn who charged me TShs 8400 for the pleasure, and hand-delivered in homely tupperware with a hand-written thank-you note taped to the lid. Now that's what I call customer service. Sweet, chocolate chip cookies with the fragrant brown-sugar smell of freshly baked goodness. You know, heart-felt cookies? Nothing in the world tastes like heart-felt cookies. I am not good at maths but: I got twelve cookies and resold two (300 TShs mark-up) for beer money. I gave away one cookie willingly, and one cookie unwillingly and ate one. Twelve minus five is seven, but I got home with only four freshly-baked cookies...

When I was Alma's age, I was three years away from selling cigarettes in the dormitories at my high -school to make enough money to afford the toasted sandwiches and hot chocolate that the boys sold us illegally from downstairs. Alma's cookies are not that kind of contraband, they are nice-girl cookies, everything-I-wish-I-could-have-been cookies, and one of my (perpetually hungry) colleagues stole three of them. On the other hand, it took over six months for someone to help themselves to the lonely peppermint teabag that used to live on the corner of my desk. Mxiiiiii!

Instant classic: the erro alla plobrem strikes again...

Some timely political humor. I can only hope that this is how the election observers are going to be greeted at the airport when the time comes. The only valid response, really, is a very firm "Yes." Heh.

M. G. Vassanji was in Dar es Salaam, and he said the same thing as Yoda

I was lucky enough to meet and chat with the award-winning author M G Vassanji over the weekend during an event organized by the Soma Book Cafe. It is always fascinating to meet successful artists and get a sense of the individual behind the creative work. I found Dr. Vassanji to be quiet, thoughtful and sensitive- and very patient with some of our clumsier questions such as "Is this your first visit to Tanzania?" And although I have heard this sentiment before, Dr. Vassanji's advice to aspiring writers resonated: just do it. That's the achievement worth working towards.

Flying back from Zanzibar to Dar es Salaam yesterday was an experience. As we sat on the tarmac in the Coastal Aviation puddle jumper- barebones conveyance, no air conditioning in a sardine can with about fifteen passengers- we were delayed for nearly an hour because a Boeing that was meant to take off before us couldn't leave due to debris on the runway. The Zanzibar airport authorities were supposed to have taken care of the problem two hours ago. Instead, we got treated to the French accents of the Boeing pilot declaring: "Welcome to Zanzibaaarrr, welcome to 'ell" over the radio. Its official: Hell is a gorgeous tropical island.

As my boss had said earlier on during the day, it was surprising and perhaps instructive that Zanzibaris had come out en mass in support of Maridhiano had not once protested the lack of power on the island. This is the second month running since the undersea cable from the mainland snapped and here we were waiting for someone to clear pebbles off the runway so that a Boeing could take off, while hundreds of stranded tourists- the red blood cells of the Zanzibari economy- sweated out their bottled water in the airport lounge behind us. This island wants economic autonomy. Really?

"Do or do not...there is no try." Yoda said it, a nuclear physicist-turned-author-said it, sometimes that's just the way it is.