National Service!

So apparently National Service will be coming back anytime now. Anytime. So while we wait the obligatory decade for this plan to come to fruition, I thought I would play around a bit with the idea. I actually love national service and think it is a shame that it was abolished. I would have gone for it, and if it is revived I might just take a gap year to get fit and cruise around the countryside if they let non-youth volunteers in.

Dar traffic is becoming horrendous. The city is full of young people whose idea of democracy is to complain, agitate for an armed revolt and then suggest that we import Kagame to run us like a boarding school. There is no reasoning with this mix of desperation, misinformation and youthful hubris. Our politicians have lied to us about how much personal agency we have to change our society WITHOUT them. So yes: National Service gets my vote. Why not direct all that frustrated ambition and drive somewhere interesting. Coming to an East African near you:

"National Service is a good idea for one primary reason: it could be the institution that gives Tanzanian youth practical skills as well as that sense of achievement and success that comes from hard, constructive work. Let's face it, the education system is nowhere close to offering them that opportunity. In theory, schools are meritocracies: you play the game right and do well, you get rewarded. You play the game poorly, you get penalized with bad grades and dubious employment prospects. In reality, the Tanzanian public education system is a finely honed machine that is designed to destroy all belief in the relationships between hard work, success and fair play. Too often graduates are cast out into the wilderness of adult life with partial skills, and the dawning horror that these may not be enough to conquer their world."

Besides, I continue to be disenchanted with the culture of complaint so... since 'tis the season and merry and all that, I plan to spend the rest of the year being cheerful online if it kills me. Grinches, you have been warned: offline sessions please for offloading of misanthropic feelings. Sixteen days to Independence and counting...

TEDxDAR 2011: Our Governors, Ourselves

The second sub-theme for this year's TEDxDAR touches on issues of relationships and agency between individuals, society and the institutions we create to govern our lives. The question being: "What are the avenues of finding voice, articulating demands, and taking a stance against and within institutional constraints?"

I smell a political discussion brewing :) This is the good stuff, and I am so glad to see that it is framed so generally as to demand that we actually think a little about the structures of our politics and our own agency within the polity that we have built. From my perch online, it seems to me that Tanzanians have been Finding Voice in a big way in the past few years. It is getting easier and easier to be heard whether it be online, or because some reporter is polling you or interviewing you or a development worker/researcher is trying to turn you into a case study or your politician actually needs your vote and is willing to talk to you...

What are we saying, who are we saying it to, who exactly is saying it, why, and what do they hope to gain from speaking? Thinking of attending on Saturday? Registration is still open.

Coming Soon: Two Tanzanian Movies.

I wish I had more to say about the TZ movie scene to frame this post, but the truth is that I stopped bothering with it when we started taking our cues from the execrable Nollywood tradition of craptastic moviemaking. As usual, the independents* have come to save the day! Check out these two trailers:

CPU is Dar like I've never seen it shot before... dynamic, in saturated colors, with actual actors who are acting and all the good stuff that goes with competent movie making. The execution suggests that maybe this director/producer/writer team should look into making a couple of these until they hit on the Great Dar Crime Thriller. Really digging the subject matter too. Friday 25th November opening: www.cpu.co.tz.

And then there is Mkwawa the movie. A biopic of the great Hehe chief who gave the German colonials proper grief in his hey day. Mkwawa may have been one of the great resistance generals of the early colonial period, warrior extraordinaire and peer to Shaka Zulu**. But... guns. You know? And that was that. This one opens timely on the 10th of December to give a sharp angular flavor to the celebratory energy of Independence Day: www.mkwawa.co.tz

On a personal note: it is simply not easy to get certain kinds of creative projects off the ground in this market. Whenever one comes to fruition, there is cause for celebration. So High Five: keep on trucking you gorgeous movie people! Love the arts, support your local artists.

* Arguably all TZ movies are independent since we don't really have a big studio system. I guess in this case the question is independence of creative vision...i.e. quality.

**It has been forever since Henry Cele and his granite jaw rocked the leopard skins in Shaka Zulu. Clearly we should do a lot more biopics. With historically accurate costuming.

TEDxDAR 2011: Then and Now

The first sub-theme of TEDxDAR 2011 is the tension between the past and the present. This is a subject that just keeps giving in my opinion, and a salient discussion in present-day TZ. By far my favorite question there is: how does modernity differ from development and where do they intersect? I don't think we do enough critical reflection on the distinction between modernity and development, so it will be interesting to see what emerges on Saturday.

My take is that while I can understand anyone who gets exasperated by our habit of glorifying the past- and we can really lay it on thick- we still have to dredge it up to inform our current perspectives and decisions. We also need the past to tell us who we are now and how we got here in the first place. Without that reflection, we simply can't make informed decisions. I see this affecting everything from the production and reproduction of culture to governance and how we understand our leaders' responsibilities towards us. Without that reflection, it does become difficult to distinguish between grand ideas like modernity and development. It is hard to figure out what we mean by them, or why we desire them in the first place...

Not signed up yet? Registration is still open.

Only So Much Hypocrisy, Please.

I've been sitting on a piece about governance seen from the flip side. It wasn't going anywhere for months until fellow writer Peter Muthamia- you read him in The Citizen amongst other places- suggested that I investigate why Tanzanians have so much pent up anger towards the government. That did the trick: I was inspired again. Perhaps not in the way that I suspect Peter meant, but inspired nonetheless.

Why indeed to Tanzanians have so much pent up anger towards the government? Are we really that divisible from our government to begin with? I am obsessing about citizenship and agency more and more over time. I'm thinking less and less about individuals and political personalities. I have become convinced that root of the problem lies elsewhere... so next week in the East African:

"Take the corruption issue for example. The reason we have been circling the drain on the corruption issue is that as a society we happen to endorse it. In Dar es Salaam choosing not to pay bribes to lubricate the gears of life is as radical a lifestyle choice as being a vegan non-drinker. Most of us can't quite muster the moral strength for this and have paid a little something to somebody somewhere to get the land, the car, the license, the tender, the client, the mailing list, the deal, the interview, the job, you name it. What's even worse is that far too many of us have also encouraged our politicians to steal bigger and better so that they can redistribute their wealth to us. We solicit them for church fundraisers and school fees for the orphans, for connections and wedding contributions, for “hela ya soda” and a sackful of rice all the while pretending not to know where the money might be coming from"

Pending Improvements and Other Social Media Stuff

Year's end, doing a bit of work on the blog and thinking about what to improve. I know there's a lot to do: you have been very patient with what is clearly a rather amateurish approach to graphic design and I appreciate that. As is tradition on this blog, you are cordially invited to share your thoughts as 'stakeholders'. Heh. If you have comments or suggestions please inbox me/use the comments section.

There are a few cosmetic changes for now. The Zanzibari balcony was soothing as a header, but it had to go. Now up is one of my favorite pictures of all time, a beautiful mural created by a collective of artists aged between toddlerhood and the very early double digits. I am fairly certain that it is a landscape, and the giraffe is a rather inspired depiction. Enjoy.

I also put up the Tanzania Blog Award badges that I scored this year. The fact that the TZ blog awards socmedian is possibly worse than me at design (imagine!) is an indicator that this is one seriously homegrown initiative. I am very proud of those badges, and thanks for voting if you did.

Dar Es Salaam Bloggers' Circle November Meeting

I mean, it would be stupid not to announce the Dar es Salaam Bloggers Circle on the blog, right? Wednesday November 16th at Cine Club (Mikocheni, oye!) from 6:30 pm. Our convenor is the ever-patient Chick About Town and she keeps us informed and on time with a smile. The beers are cold, we don't bite very often and there is always some support, advice and networking to be had with this crew. Karibu.

TEDxDAR 2011: The Past Is Alive

There are only ten days left until TEDxDAR 2011: "Who Killed Zinjanthropus." I am going to enjoy this one, I think. *Stepping onto soapbox* History, historicity, perspective- these things matter! Finally someone is going to talk about it on purpose. We might even avoid the dreaded "Nyerere" word. But probably not. *Stepping off soapbox.*

The biggest selling point of the TEDxDAR events for me is that they provide a non-partisan (or should I say a pan-partisan?) forum for the discussion of ideas. It's not that Ideas don't get Discussed in Bongo, but of late it has been very hard to keep these efforts from getting sucked into the vortex of partisan political agenda-setting that plagues every attempt at dialogue. So I'll be there, listening and liveblogging (I hope) and generally enjoying the fruits of Tanzanian intellectual exchange. More posts to come as I digest the four themes that have been advertized.

Just a few details for now:

1. If you haven't registered, there's still some time to do so. As free Saturday events go, there's not much better out there for people who like to talk.
2. You can still nominate speakers! I know you know someone really cool who should probably be on that podium. Get them on there.
3. The National Museum has just been through some major overhauling. Aren't you curious to see the new place? I hear there's a theater and everything... how sexy is that, huh? Yeah, you know you want to go the Museum on a Saturday. You know you do. The pickled coelacanth might still be there.