Dreams Coming True

Part of my dreams have come true. First I got to hear the Captain’s words even though it was not as dramatic as I used to think it would be. You know those things of saying ‘Fasten your seat belts…’

Secondly, I finally met Carsozy and Ernest Wasake on Wednesday.

Still flabberwhelmed about it.

Nice weekend.

Nev, get well soon.

Lulu, I missed seeing you and hoping you are fine.

Malooo...Kyalooo - Part Two

Apart from taking me to her children's school and Buckingham Palace where I saw two foot guards from the Household Division marching around (the ones that wear scarlet tunics and tall black fur caps known as bearskins), the Victoria Memorial sculpture in front of the palace, my former boss’ wife walked me through the Piccadilly Circus, Oxford Street (where I saw many famous shops and restaurants), Regent Street, St. James park and then we entered St James' Palace to visit her friend whose husband is a chef at Buckingham Palace. Her friend also used to work there as one of Princess Diana’s maids or something.

We had met her friend at their children’s school then she invited us to her place for tea. She had to inform the guards at the gate about our coming or else they would not have let us in.

St. James is still a working palace though the monarchy has not lived there in quite some time. I got to see where Prince Charles and his sons live. I hear the palace is also home to Princess Alexandra and housed the Queen Mother until her death just a few years ago. I also saw two guards from the Household Division in front of one of the gates at St. James Palace. Then just as we were getting out of her friend's house, my former boss’ wife said, “Samali, look behind you.” What I saw was quite a sight. There was a large group of foot guards standing outside. They were all clad in their scarlet tunics but without their bearskins and they were staring at us. They are responsible for the safety and protection of the Sovereign at the Buckingham and St James' Palaces.

From there we visited the church where her husband works. It is next to BBC World Service. She bought me an Oyster card and explained how it works but I wonder if I will have the courage to do so on my own. I am supposed to have visited some art gallery this afternoon but instead I ended up at an internet cafe where I put up this post yet I could have done this free of charge at their house.

Malooooo...Kyalo!

Just arrived today at 4p.m.

It's 9 p.m now.

I am flabberwhelmed. It's beautiful this place.

Is Africa Blessed or Cursed?

Is it really true that the U.S.A, India, China, Europe, Argentina, New Zealand can fit into Africa? And that Zambia, Zimbabwe and the DRC have the potential to feed the world?

Someone saw the River Congo for the first time and took long to realize it was a river because of its massive width. I want to see it. And the Niger. And Zambezi. At least I’ve seen the Nile.

Is it true that the DRC has 90% of the world’s cobalt? Is there any country in Africa which has no mineral?

Is it true that Asia and Africa were the first homelands of Judeo-Christianity?

My Favourite Radio Ad Voices

I love these Radio Ad Voices:

1. Hakeem the Dream, Capital FM
Hakeem has a melodious and lively voice that is pleasant to the ears.

2. Dr. Mitch Egwang (Uncle Mitch)
Uncle Mitch has a fast talking and humorous voice. (By the way, even when he is speaking French, Luo and Luganda. Not that he has done adverts in these languages.)

3. DJ Ronnie, Capital FM
DJ Ronnie’s mellow, smooth, deep and powerful baritone voice makes you feel safe.

4. Ernest Wasake, Vision Voice
Ernest (Dennis and Esquire’s brother) has a clear, cultured and silver-tongued voice that grabs your attention and makes you picture a man whose looks would turn heads. If you asked me, he sounds more like Dennis than Esquire because the latter’s voice has some tranquillity in it similar to that of a modest man.

5. Hussein Lumumba
Hussein’s voice is slightly nasal. Like someone with a cold and yet at the same time, it’s with clear pronunciation. He still sounds smooth when he speaks French, Swahili and Lingala in normal conversation.

6. Roger Mugisha, KFM
Roger has a bright and breezy voice that lifts up your spirits on a gloomy day.

7. "Are you ready?" voice behind the Wyclef Jean concert advert if it is not no.4's

8. The voice behind the MTN kwata cash advert is like no.1’s

The 'Obama Times'

Imagine me as a radio news reader, a news tale before me on paper, complex words in teensy-weensy print for the Obama Times.

Create mentally a picture of my face book friend whom I have never met and who owns the Obama Times, turning over pages where I should read since I seem to use so much effort in reading the long sentences. Then I stumble on the word Tsvangirai and pronounce it like I have heard it on the news chang-girr-IGH (-ch as in church; -ng-g as in finger; -irr as in mirror; -igh as in high). The pronunciation of this word has stirred up public and media interest, inside and outside the BBC because of different opinions of how the Shona -tsv cluster should be pronounced in English.

Then I awake.

I send a text message to my friends about the dream and one of them responds, 'Maybe there is something to the dream. Email your face book friend about it and see.'

However, after flipping my mind through the dream, I realised that dreams can be a sham.

There should have been a teleprompter so that I would not need to look down at the print. At least a teleprompter would have helped me appear to have memorized the speech and so speak spontaneously, smoothly, without any hesitation or mistakes.

It should have been a simple, brief and easy to read news report with short sentences that could easily be read with a single breath.

The font should have been average sized and the words written in the present tense since it was broadcast news. This would give the report more of an "action" feel and add more drama.

Names should have been in phonetic spelling so that they are pronounced correctly. For example pronunciation would be pruh-nun-si-AY-shuhn.

There was nothing to this dream. Besides, I am sure there is no newspaper called the Obama times.

Why Dogs are Amazing

Yesterday, at the Wandegeya traffic lights crossing, I noticed a stray dog beside me. I was amused at the way it stopped patiently with the rest of the pedestrians and crossed the road together with them at the right time.

That left me thinking, ‘Was the dog just copying what the pedestrians were doing or was it aware of the dangers of crossing the road while vehicles were still moving?’

According to research by Friederike Range and Ludwig Huber, of the University of Vienna, and Zsofia Viranyi, of the Eötvös University in Budapest, dogs like human infants, do not simply copy an action they observe, but adjust the extent to which they imitate to the circumstances of the action.

Normally, dogs prefer to use the mouth when faced with a task of opening a container by pulling a rod. However, in the study, a female dog was trained to open the box with her paw. When the other dogs observed the female's action, they imitated it in order to get the food. However, the dogs imitated selectively. They used their mouths instead of their paws for manipulating the rod when they had seen the demonstrating dog using her paw while holding a ball in her mouth. However, when the demonstrating dog's mouth was free, the dogs imitated her action completely and used the paw themselves.

The dogs sensed that the female dog was unable to use her mouth because she had a ball in it so they chose the easier, more preferred way to achieve the goal. But when the mouth was free, there seemed to be a reason for the demonstrating dog not to use her mouth, and so the dogs imitate the action.

Do you have anything to share about what dogs can do?

I saw a documentary yesterday on NTV on many amazing things about dogs especially their sense of smell. I remember my late father narrating to my mother and I a story he had heard on BBC about this dog that kept sniffing, snuffling and becoming agitated whenever he sat at his master’s leg or something. Indeed, when she checked with her doctor, it turned out she had cancer.

ScienceDaily 27 April 2007. 22 May 2008 http://www.sciencedaily.com­ /releases/2007/04/070426145103.htm

Photo by www.petplanet.co.uk/.../news_story13_old2.htm