Archive for
July 22nd, 2005
Stories
Accra Update
Here's an extended podcast updating my whereabouts in Ghana. Special thanks to Alula Records for allowing me to use music from Ghanaian musician Obo Addy. I'll be featuring Obo's work in future podcasts and videos as well. -andy
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Ghana: Identifying a Murdered Liberian
A photographer circulates photos of a murdered Liberian man found outside the Buduburam Refugee Camp in Ghana. The actual photos are not shown in the video.
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Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Ghana: Life in a Liberian Refugee Camp
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Buduburam Refugee Camp |
We drove along the main road linking Accra to Takoradi and the Cote D'Ivoire border, heading towards the Liberian refugee camp in the town of Buduburam. Traffic was busy, but far from gridlock, and generally we made good time along the way. We'd probably arrive at the camp in about an hour. Much of the second half of the trip left us caught in a cloud of gravel and dust, as the road was being repaved, forcing us to follow a dirt track while construction continued.
Approaching 2pm, we found ourselves in a stretch of road lined with tightly packed stalls selling goods of all imaginable shapes and sizes. Vendors on foot went from car to car, hawking cases of toilet paper, freshly peeled pineapples and a spectrum of snacks. David pulled over for a moment and motioned to one young woman, who was balancing a pyramid of cookie boxes and peanut bags in a wide metal tray on her head. David placed his order, speaking to her in Akan, and she nonchalantly tipped her head, almost as if to make a facial gesture; a single pack of peanuts tumbled from the tray. She didn't even break eye contact with David; the peanuts landed right in her hand, ready to pass it through the window for a couple of crumpled cedi notes.
A few minutes later we arrived at the entrance to the camp. From the outside, it looked almost like we were entering the same neighborhood as my guesthouse. There was a dirt road sloping up a small hill, past several rows of cement huts and shops. Two UN High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) vehicles left the entrance as we pulled in; David parked outside the UNHCR office so we could figure out where to go next.
Ghana: The Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence in ICT
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University students taking a course at the Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence in ICT |
Thursday morning, I got to start my day by taking a private tour of the Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence in ICT, a state-of-the-art technology training centre initiated by the governments of India and Ghana. The centre, in an Accra neighborhood reminiscent of New Delhi's Lodi Road, was surrounded by greenery in every direction, with numerous embassies and NGO headquarters nearby.
Inside, I met with several staff, who were kind enough to lead me around the facility for about an hour. Opened two years ago, the Kofi Annan Centre is home to a variety of high-tech training facilities, including a Cisco Networking Academy. By sheer coincidence, the Cisco Academy was full of young Liberians from the Buduburam refugee camp, which I visited the previous day.
We walked from classroom to classroom, most of which were engaged with groups of students working in small groups, huddling around laptops and workstations. I managed to hover in the background in a couple of classes, snapping pictures and getting completely over my head in the technical discussions on networks, routers and switches.
Upstairs, we entered a room that needed to be unlocked with a smart card. Inside we found a Padma supercomputer from India. The most powerful computer in Ghana, it runs on an open source operating system; access to it is made available to any Ghanaian researcher starving for hard-core processing power.
I'd wanted to check out the centre's main conference room, but it was busy with some official event; someone told me that several government ministers were participating. Only later in the day did I discover that it was a high-level meeting on Ghana's new national ICT policy. Boy, I'd wish I'd been able to get through the door for a few minutes…. -andy
Links for Fri, 2005-07
Blogrel has a pretty comprehensive update on the Georgian Grenadier.
Central Asia blog Registan.net points to an article that takes another look at the political Islam.
Daniel of Venezuela News and Views compares Chavez's persecution of opposition group SUMATE with Rome's ancient persecution of Carthage.
Congo Girl reflects on the cultural adjustments she had to make when she came to Kinshasa.
Venezuelan Politics discusses a new law which places greater regulation on currency trading in Venezuela and offers some possible consequences.
The English blog perfect.co.uk has spent the last two days live-blogging on-going developments in the London terror case. (via a fistful of euros)
Sergio on Overcaffeinated explains why it is completely normal for one to move out of their parents' house at 28.
India Uncut is flabbergasted that the state of Gujarat requires parental consent in writing for marriages to become official.
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