summer east africa fragments

move 2 years of life in boston to a basement, flight to nairobi to conference with ministry of finance, ratty nights in downtown nairobi, lions sleeping fitfully after thrashing a water buffalo in nakuru, 3AM shadows at kenya-uganda border, the emaciated face of a police office is kisumu, a full mouthful of bujagali road dust while mountain biking, tattooed, nervous looking russians playing high stakes poker, sunset glints of the nile after running 20km.

the denouement: 10 days of good books, bad swahili, fishing and photo projects in zanzibar starting tomorrow, hopefully without the tropical illness-laden haze of last time.

When People Die of Hunger

The Elephant in the Room, by Banksy

Its been a dry rainy season in East Africa. Traveling last month in Kisumu, Kenya, I read about a Kenyan women who died of hunger while giving birth to surviving twins. Last week, newspapers in Uganda reported that 35 people died of hunger in northern Uganda. Ken Banks asks us about the elephant in the room of global poverty. To me, this is it.

driving my (temporary) benz in africa

  "Welcome to K'la City, where the food is delicious but the roads are shitty."

Like Chris Blattman, I also recently learned the perils of driving on Africa's mean streets. Unexpectedly, one of our Ugandan friends loaned us his Benz. As I took the keys from him, I immediately had flashbacks of turning into oncoming traffic and driving over medians: the adventures of my first day driving in America as a 16-year-old.

That night in Kampala, I had to adjust to both the perils of driving in Africa, and the challenge of orienting myself, British style, on the left side of the road.  Somehow we made it home, after rocking the chassis with a few deep pot-holes and almost knocking over a cyclist with a wide load of sugar cane.

The best part about driving in Africa?  When you are lost, you just ask a few children playing on the side of the road for directions, and they will jump in the back of the car and drive with you there.

Kenny Rogers, Kenya's VP and Me

The Scene:
Kenya School of Monetary Studies, Central Bank of Kenya, Nairobi
Candle Lit Dinner by the Pool

At the Table:
Kalonzo Musyoka, Vice President of Kenya
Njuguna S. Ndung'u, Governor of the Central Bank of Kenya
Professor Kim Wilson, The Fletcher School
Your Humble Blogger

Professor Wilson, turning to the VP: "Your Excellency. I'm doing some work on the effect of gambling on poverty in Haiti. Is gambling amongst the poor a big problem in Kenya?"

VP: "Do you know Kenny Rogers?"

Professor Wilson: "Yes, I do."

VP: "As Bwana Rogers says, 'You've got to know when to hold them, know when to fold them, know when to walk away, know when to run.."

Me: "Your Excellency, it turns out I sang that very song at a karaoke bar in your country only two nights ago."

VP looks me, pauses, : "...you never count your money, when you're sitting at the table, there will be time enough for counting, when the dealings done.

Timidly at first, then with rising cadence, the I join the VP in song: "Every gambler knows, the secret to survival, is knowing what to throw away and knowing what to keep, because every hands a winner and every hands a loser, and the best you can hope for is to die in your sleep."

Later in the evening, in his public remarks broadcast on national television, the VP remarked on the intelligent conversation he had had with a young American and his professor.

Updated | 36 Hours in Kampala

Back in 2007 I wrote 36 Hours in Kampala, a guide for discerning travelers who found themselves with a weekend to spare in Kampala.  With fresh eyes, my compatriot Rebekah at Jackfruity recently returned to our old stomping grounds to investigate how Kampala has changed in the aftermath of the Beijing-esque sprucing the city received in the lead up to the Commonwealth Heads of Summit event. Her update, 36 Hours in K'la City, points us towards Kampala's new best cup of coffee, bowl of queso and view of the frightening storks that stalk the city. 

Heading to Bogota

Wet Bogota, via Aku Ma's Photostream

Darn, No Kayaking to Inauguration

historic map of Washington D.C., circa 1916

During my senior year of college, an intrepid local entrepreneur asked me start a kayak touring company on the Potomac River. I loved the idea. It combined my dream of being paid to be outside (I had worked at the climbing wall and bike shop at the Outdoor Rec center for several years), with my urge to geek out on political and natural history. A few weeks into my research, my financial backer bailed for unrelated personal reasons, and the project never got off the ground.

If our company were alive and well today, we would be forced to miss out on significant business opportunity. According to DCist, the Coast Guard has banned kayaking as a form of commuting to the inauguration:

Well, so much for the bright idea of utilizing local waterways to break through the Inaugural gridlock on Tuesday. According to WTOP, 40 Coast Guard vessels will be stationed south of the Wilson Bridge, in part to patrol the waters for intrepid paddlers who thought that they could beat the congestion by kayaking to the ceremony.

Preparing for Dystopia

Ben Kunkel has a great article in Dissent about recent dystopian and apocalyptic literature and film.

Money quote:

Now we are forced to admit that our own children's capacity to love and flourish may be undermined by the multiplication of new threats. Through the forty long years of the cold war it seemed that civilization might not be long for this world. Now it can seem to us again that we and the people we love (or would wish to love) will have to live with an anxiety every bit as pervasive as the old fear, though perhaps less acute. With luck some novelists will be able to reveal—and not only by accident—what this atmosphere of dread is doing to us.

In an age when no policy maker can claim to predict the result of changes in our weather system and few economists can claim to understand what is needed to calm a turbulent economy, fiction seems uniquely useful for imagining what might be to come. Some of the novels mentioned in the article include The Possibility of an Island by Michel Houllebecq, Jamestown by Matthew Sharpe and Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro.

Vouyeristic Routines

that summer before we grew up, via Meg Rorison's photostream

In high school, whenever I went to a friend's house, I would find out where they sat when they were on the computer. I always liked to explore where people spent their time and how they organized their days. I was thrilled when I came across the link to Daily Routines, a blog about how "writers, artists and other interesting people organize their days."

Charles Darwin would work in the morning, and then make his wife read to him for several hours a day. Franz Kafka, on the other hand, would start writing at 11PM, after a day of work at the Workers Accident Insurance Institute:

And then "depending on my strength, inclination, and luck, until one, two, or three o'clock, once even till six in the morning." Then "every imaginable effort to go to sleep," as he fitfully rested before leaving to go to the office once more. This routine left him permanently on the verge of collapse.

What's Next

Rod Dreher:

1. The modern conservative movement began with the crushing defeat of Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater in the 1964 presidential race. The modern conservative movement ends with the crushing defeat of Arizona Sen. John McCain -- who took Goldwater's Senate seat upon his retirement -- in the 2008 presidential race.

2. Modern liberalism began its implosion with riots in Chicago's Grant Park at the 1968 Democratic Convention. Tonight, modern liberalism is reborn at Chicago's Grant Park, where a black Chicago Democrat will celebrate winning the presidency.

Closing Argument

Rochester NH, via nhlinux's photostream

“The significant problems we face today cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.”

--Albert Einstein

It's a gorgeous day. I'll be canvassing this afternoon in Rochester (pop: 28,000) on New Hampshire's seacoast region. Know hope.

head of the charles regatta

via cperfetti's photostream

Back in Boston, the crispness of the air and the changing leaves is perfect.

Where I Belong

On the last day of exams last spring, I flew with a buddy and my bike to Amsterdam. With no map or place to stay, we biked south to France. In Paris, we did a day trip by bike to the Loire Valley, and decided to picnic on this farm.

Palo Alto Running

'The Dish-Stanford', via Calvin Lee's photostream

Sunday morning I ran with an old friend. I hadn't run with him since, after a long run through East Jerusalem , he passed out from dehydration during a shabbat service. Today was no such case, as he took me to town on the rolling hills of Stanford's Dish. A happy diversion from a blurry few weeks on both coasts. Overnight flight back to Boston tonight, and back to class in the morning.

Racing Bikes in Wine Country

via Boston.com The Big Picture

The morning had all the makings of a disaster. It was cold and hazy. I got two flats before even leaving the starting area, I got stung by a bee under my jersey, and I accidentally did the first loop an extra time, adding an extra 11 miles to a 100 bike race. By 10AM however, the sun broke out over Sonoma, lighting the vineyards brilliantly as we built up a strong pace. We stopped at farms throughout the route for snacks. Figs are the new Clif bar.

San Francisco 1/2 Marathon

via Dizzy Atmosphere's photostream

We left the house at 4AM. The race started at 5:30AM. I crossed the Golden Gate bridge at dawn. Stunning. I was done by 7AM. Most fun race I've done in a long time.

On California

Serpent Mother's Egg, via Ioupiote's photostream

As the Notorious B.I.G once said, "If I gotsta choose a coast, I gotsta choose the East. I live out there, so don't go there. But that don't mean a brother can't rest in the West."

That's how I feel. While the East Coast is my home, a summer in Cali will do just fine. Take, for example, the Oakland Fire Festival, which recently took place on a warm night a few weekends ago. Dozens of metal workers constructed strange machines that lit the abandoned parking with a noir, Tim Burton-esque light.

I've got a decent line up for my last month in California. A half-marathon in San Francisco, a weekend on a San Diego beach and a 100 mile bike race in Wine Country. And, lots of writing on Africa, technology, and their confluence. More soon on what I've absorbed in this heady summer.

Should I Move To China in Sept?

Yesterday I was offered a Boren Fellowship, in which the Federal government would pay for my to live in China and learn Mandarin in the language program of my choosing for one year. In exchange, after finishing Fletcher, I would promise to work for two years wherever I want in the government.

My original motivation for applying was that at age 24 I should aim for breadth instead of depth. While I am working in a rich new world where int'l development meets tech policy meets political science, expanding that narrative to include the China-Africa connection would be an added feather, and surely a great year of travel and exploration on someone else's dime.

On the flip side, while government service is certainly one good option of many after graduation, an a priori limitation of my options is difficult to accept.

I have to give my answer by Monday. A tough choice.

Homeless World Cup in DC this Weekend

A deep breath after a busy few weeks. Home in DC to go the wedding of a close friend. She is the first of any of my friends from high school or college to get hitched. Weird.

If you are in DC this weekend, check out the Homeless World Cup action. My great friends Jeremy and Pat are very involved in the 'sports for social change' movement in Uganda, and have organized the Ugandan delegation for the past few years, bringing young leaders from Gulu and Pader to Capetown and then Copenhagen.

From Friday, June 27 – Sunday, June 29, the Homeless USA Cup, a program of Street Soccer USA, will take place in Washington, D.C. at the Old Convention Center site at H and 11th Street, NW. More than 100 players representing 11 cities from across the United States will play for a chance to win the Homeless USA Cup, and the opportunity to be selected to the US National Team that will represent the United States at the Homeless World Cup in Melbourne, Australia in December. Admission to the event is free and open to the public.

The Mind on Fire in San Francisco

The only book Thoreau had at Walden Pond was Homer's Iliad. I just bought a copy from a bearded woman for $1.47 in the Mission District in San Francisco.

My mind has been racing lately, but I've been pouring my energy, not into blogging, but into understanding the strange Google universe and the fascinating and murky overlap between the fields of telecommunication policy and international development. More on that soon, but...

In Kigali, Josh Ruxin says Rwanda needs Microsoft's billions and its managers.

In Washington, Nicholas Carr writes that the Internet probably ruins are ability to be literate. I think he is right.

In Nairobi, Hash is geeking out with Barcamp Nairobi.

In New York, Paul Graham explores, in the best article I've read in a while, the unique character of global cities.