cryptic

"What is this "work" in Nairobi of which you speak?"

- - demands my surreal-babble-buddy in the Bay Area.

"Umm. It's connected to KPTJ (Kenyans for Peace, Truth and Justice). It addresses livelihood and training for grassroots activists. And sustainable movement-building. Along with a crisis safety net. Seeing gaps, connecting resources to needs. But I can't give you specifics."

"Why not?"

"Security. Since the assassinations, we're all being hypervigilant. We assume that everyone's phone is tapped - because most peoples' are. We assume that people are being watched and followed. It's just better to operate under the radar, and not make anything public that doesn't need to go public."

"Are you trying to make yourself sound important?"

"Here's the irony. My personal risk level is mitigated by two factors. One: I'm not important enough to be a target. I'm not producing reports or giving evidence to commissions. I'm not on the ground threatening the interests of the powerful. Two: I'm known in the Kenyan progressive community and hooked up to a range of global artist-activist networks. So I have a degree of visibility and connection that provides safety. Go figure."

"Sigh. To think I knew you back in the days when you performed at Taco Bell for ketchup packets. Did you even tell me you were Kenyan?"

"Yes, I did. I don't think you registered it. We were too busy arguing over US military aggression and Israeli butchery."

"Those were good times. Remember the starlit walks in the Castro hills? That wooden bench with the view out over the city?"

"Bowls of steaming udon at Mifumi. Bass Lake in the summer. That's where I want to die if I can't die in the Indian Ocean."

"Just don't get blood on all my good North Face gear, OK? That stuff was for climbing mountains. "

"Dude, your North Face gear is pretty much worn out. Backpack-to-beat-all-backpacks, cross-trainers, moisture-wicking thermals - all way overdue for replacement. Will you hit the next REI Members sale for me?"

"What am I - your Bay Area personal shopper?"

"You're the only person I trust to pick out technical footgear and sports bras for me. Consider it your contribution to Kenyan democracy."

Ada Lovelace Day

was just brought to my attention by my favourite hipster-geek-programmer, Minjung Kim.

Born in 1815, Ada Lovelace was the first ever computer programmer. She wrote programs for Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine, along with the very first description of a computer and software.

Ada Lovelace Day celebrates women in technology. I've taken the Ada Lovelace Day pledge:

I will publish a blog post on Tuesday 24 March about a woman in technology whom I admire.

Techie women who rock my world:

The above-mentioned Minjung Kim
Ory Okolloh, founder of Ushahidi
My web-angel and hoop mentor, Jan Camp
Everyone I met at the AWID Feminist Tech Exchange in Capetown last November

Thinking about this evokes four hauntingly lovely lines of poetry, by the brilliant Eavan Boland, written for Grace Hopper, another pioneering techie-goddess.

Happy Code Is Poetry (thanks, Minjung!) Day.

Israeli Army Catwalk Favourites

From Israel's Haaretz newspaper, a couple of days ago, by Uri Blau

The office at the Adiv fabric-printing shop in south Tel Aviv handles a constant stream of customers, many of them soldiers in uniform, who come to order custom clothing featuring their unit's insignia, usually accompanied by a slogan and drawing of their choosing. Elsewhere on the premises, the sketches are turned into plates used for imprinting the ordered items, mainly T-shirts and baseball caps, but also hoodies, fleece jackets and pants. A young Arab man from Jaffa supervises the workers who imprint the words and pictures, and afterward hands over the finished product.

Dead babies, mothers weeping on their children's graves, a gun aimed at a child and bombed-out mosques - these are a few examples of the images Israel Defense Forces soldiers design these days to print on shirts they order to mark the end of training, or of field duty. See photos here.

The slogans accompanying the drawings are not exactly anemic either:

A T-shirt for infantry snipers bears the inscription "Better use Durex," next to a picture of a dead Palestinian baby, with his weeping mother and a teddy bear beside him.

A sharpshooter's T-shirt from the Givati Brigade's Shaked battalion shows a pregnant Palestinian woman with a bull's-eye superimposed on her belly, with the slogan, in English, "1 shot, 2 kills."

A "graduation" shirt for those who have completed another snipers course depicts a Palestinian baby, who grows into a combative boy and then an armed adult, with the inscription, "No matter how it begins, we'll put an end to it."

There are also plenty of shirts with blatant sexual messages. For example, the Lavi battalion produced a shirt featuring a drawing of a soldier next to a young woman with bruises, and the slogan, "Bet you got raped!" A few of the images underscore actions whose existence the army officially denies - such as "confirming the kill" (shooting a bullet into an enemy victim's head from close range, to ensure he is dead), or harming religious sites, or female or child non-combatants....

Read the rest of the article on Haaretz

Nairobi nights

smell of dust, of heat, of waiting for the rain.

In this season of dryness and burning, my favourite hours are the ones between sunset and midnight. That's when the hot gusty winds become playful, caressing. That's when we open, carefully, as the stars emerge, the feelings we carry through the day, like lockets around our necks, and show them to each other.

How is the land?

The land is troubled. We are in drought.

I feel so bad for my students. Imagine being an 18-year old at Kenyatta University right now. Knowing there are no jobs, no opportunities.

How do they do it? The ruling class, the politicians? How do they live in oblivion of the rage on the streets?

The way the Israelis do it. The way the AIG bankers do it. Only their own lives are real to them. The rest of us are ants.

It's beyond logic now. The greed is infantile. We're governed by angry, terrified toddlers, trapped in the bodies of seventy-year-old men.

How are things at the hospital? At the paper? At the university?

How is your heart doing?

We talk literature, politics, art. History, mythology, movements, paradox. I tell my friends they all need to feed on BaCoN - biodiversity, cosmology, neuroplasticity - my recipe for hope and delight in these days.

Biodiversity - the extraordinary capacity of nature to adapt and reinvent. All we have to do is get out of the way.

Cosmology - the hugeness of the universe. Hundreds of other planets out there, capable of supporting life. Hundreds of other worlds where they could get it right.

Neuroplasticity - the wonder of the human brain. Each thought is a chance to lay down a fresh neural pathway. To weaken an old one which no longer serves. In every moment, despite everything, we can choose joy.

Last night, we talked until the restaurant closed. Then continued in the carpark, against the backdrop of bougainvillea. Unable to stop, unwilling to part. As if with rivers of talk, we could infuse ourselves into each other, to keep and carry away. We said:

God, we need another six hours. A full day. A week-long retreat just to share ideas.

We told each other:

You have to write about this. Do a piece on it. We have to collaborate on this. We have to document it, capture it, make work about it.

We kept saying:

I'm so glad you're home. Even briefly.

I'm so glad to be home. However short the time is.

I'm so glad, so glad, we carved out this evening.

I'm so grateful for you. Beyond words.