THE YUMMY SOUND SOUND BITE:
(Community Radio for Social Change)
- Don't miss this podcast Hmmmmm...! It was done in Paris on Radio Taboo last month - Bon Appétit!

http://en.rfi.fr/culture/20171007-Radio-Taboo-voice-voiceless

MY WORK IS HAVING IMPACT BACK IN AFRICA:
(My Brain Is a Lab for Projects To Impact In Africa.)

Students of Master's 2 at the Institute of Fine Arts in Foumban - Cameroon.

Whether it is the Art, Human Rights or Mediation to free many from prison for demanding Equal Justice, wild ideas I started in my studios or in my wild mind alone are paying off.

Moir Walita the community organizer in Malawi talking to the students of the schools he supervises.

This week, in the small Republic of Malawi, one of the few countries in Africa to have elected a female president, my philosophy and vison is being taught this semester... The documentary films portraying my artistic endeavors and social justice project are the main topic in 7 Girls' Schools and 1400 students in the Rhumpi District in the north of Malawi.

Issa talking to the crowd in his village, Nditam before a football match

Brother Moir Walita, the community leader who supervises the schools, was invited to New Mexico in 2016 to bring awareness and collect funds for his cause - "building girls bathrooms in schools" to avoid early marriages and premature pregnancies. Moir believes girls should have education first.

One of the Issa's projects (Water for Social Peace) won the 2012 Global Rotary Peace Award in Berlin- Germany.

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY

I'm that little worm she carried in her belly, then on he back.

For me, the relationship to a Mother is Sacred. I grew up in this rural village in Africa with no birthday celebration. Even though my mother Adjimi had my birth certificate, she can't read and writ - so I missed this kind of fun a child can have. .. That's okay.
We're currently building a community radio station in the village, so that the next generation of women and girls can access Knowledge and Education.
***THIS SUNDAY, DONATE TO http://www.hitip.org/ ON THE NAME OF YOUR LOVED MAMA! Usoko/Thank You ;-)

Retrieved from:
http://www.maasai-association.org/maasai.html

The Maasai people of East Africa live in southern Kenya and northern Tanzania along the Great Rift Valley on semi-arid and arid lands. The Maasai occupy a total land area of 160,000 square kilometers with a population of approximately one half million people. However, many Maasai see the national census as government meddling and often miscount their numbers to census takers.

The Maasai society is comprised of sixteen sections (known in Maasai as Iloshon): Ildamat, Ilpurko, Ilkeekonyokie, Iloitai, Ilkaputiei, Ilkankere, Isiria, Ilmoitanik, Iloodokilani, Iloitokitoki, Ilarusa, Ilmatatapato, Ilwuasinkishu, Kore, Parakuyu, and Ilkisonko, also known as Isikirari (Tanzania's Maasai). There was also once Iltorobo section but was assimilated by other sections. A majority of the Maasai population lives in Kenya. Sections such as Isikirari, Parakuyu, Kore and Ilarusa lives in Tanganyika.

Homestead and labor

The Maasai live in Kraals arranged in a circular fashion. The fence around the kraal is made of acacia thorns, which prevent lions from attacking the cattle. It is a man's responsibility to fence the kraal. While women construct the houses. Traditionally, kraals are shared by an extended family. However, due to the new land management system in the Maasai region, it is not uncommon to see a kraal occupied by a single family.

The Inkajijik (maasai word for a house) are loaf-shaped and made of mud, sticks, grass, cow dung and cow's urine. Women are responsible for making the houses as well as supplying water, collecting firewood, milking cattle and cooking for the family. Warriors are in charge security while boys are responsible for herding livestock. During the drought season, both warriors and boys assume the responsibility for herding livestock. The elders are directors and advisors for day-to-day activities. Every morning before livestock leave to graze, an elder who is the head of the inkang sits on his chair and announces the schedule for everyone to follow.

The Maasai are a semi-nomadic people who lived under a communal land management system. The movement of livestock is based on seasonal rotation. Contrary to many claims made by outsiders, particularly the Hardinian school of thought, this communal land management system allows us to utilize resources in a sustainable manner. Each section manages its own territory. Under normal conditions, reserve pastures are fallowed and guarded by the warriors. However, if the dry season becomes especially harsh, sections boundaries are ignored and people graze animals throughout the land until the rainy season arrives. According to Maasai traditional land agreement, no one should be denied access to natural resources such as water and land.

Subsistence economy

Livestock such as cattle, goats and sheep are the primary source of income for the Maasai. Livestock serves as a social utility and plays an important role in the Maasai economy. Livestock are traded for other livestock, cash or livestock products such as milk and siege. Individual, families, and clans established close ties through giving or exchange of cattle. "Meishoo iyiook enkai inkishu o-nkera"- so goes a Maasai prayer. The English translation of this praye is: "May Creator give us cattle and children. Cattle and children are the most important aspect of the Maasai people.

Maasai economy with outsiders

The Maasai economy is increasingly dependent on the market economy. Livestock products are sold to other groups in Kenya for the purchase of beads, clothing and grains. Cows and goats are also sold for uniform and school fees for children. It is now common to see young Maasai men and women in major towns and cities of Kenya selling, not just goats and cows, but also beads, cell phones, chacoal, grain among other items. The entrepreneurial spirit is something new in our society.

It was not until the early 1980s with the Group Ranch project that we became much more entrenched in a market economy and, hence, more impoverished generally speaking.

Maasai diet

Traditionally, the Maasai rely on meat, milk and blood from cattle for protein and caloric needs. People drink blood on special occasions. It is given to a circumcised person (o/esipolioi), a woman who has given birth (entomononi) and the sick (oltamueyiai). Also, on a regular basis drunk elders, ilamerak, use the blood to alleviate intoxication and hangovers. Blood is very rich in protein and is good for the immune system. However, its use in the traditional diet is waning due to the reduction of livestock numbers.

More recently, the Maasai have grown dependent on food produced in other areas such as maize meal (unga wa mahindi), rice, potatoes, cabbage (known to the Maasai as goat leaves), etc. The Maasai who live near crop farmers have engaged in cultivation as their primary mode of subsistence. In these areas, plot sizes are generally not large enough to accommodate herds of animals; thus the Maasai are forced to farm. Our people traditionally frown upon this. Maasai believe that tilizing the land for crop farming is a crime against nature. Once you cultivate the land, it is no longer suitable for grazing.

Private ownership

The concept of private ownership was, until recently, a foreign concept to the Maasai. However, in the 1960s and 1980s, a program of commercializing livestock and land was forced on us initially by the British and later by the government of Kenya. Since then, our land has been subdivided into group and individual ranches. In other parts of Maasailand people subdivided their individual ranches into small plots, which are sold to private developers.

The new land management system of individual ranches has economically polarized our people; some Maasais, as well as outside wealthy individuals, have substantially increased their wealth at the expense of others. The largest loss of land, however, has been to national parks and reserves, in which the Maasai people are restricted from accessing critical water sources, pasture, and salt lick. Subdivision of Maasailand reduced land size for cattle herding, reduced the number of cows per household, and reduced food production. As a result, the Maasai society, which once was a proud and self-sufficient society, is now facing many social-economic and political challenges. The level of poverty among the Maasai people is beyond conceivable height. It is sad to see a society that had a long tradition of pride being a beggar for relief food because of imposed foreign concepts of development.

The future of the Maasai is uncertain at this point. One thing, however, is certain that the Maasai culture is quickly eroding at the expense of civilization.

TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE MASSAI AND TO HELP THEIR CAUSE PLEASE VISIT:

http://www.maasai-association.org/maasai.html

ALL DAY ON MOTORBIKE:

- Yeah! It was to go to the city yesterday. This landscape is greener now. And because of the bumps, I still can't feel my butt

On the fourth floor of the Heinz History Center, there engraved in color are some pictures revealing transitions of the black struggle, liberation, love, unity and power, the Black History and the African migration into the greater Pittsburgh area and also the modern rich social, culture, education and the economic impact that we have brought with us into the region. I am proud to be a part of this historic wall side by side with Barack Obama, John Jack, rufus Idris, Mama Kadiatu, Albert Duroue, Robert Agbede and others that you might recognize as I proudly wave my Nigerian Flag and lift Africa high.

Club 9516/The Sound Kitchen - Cartoonist, artist, philanthropist Issa Nyaphaga

Rebroadcast:
This week on the Club 9516/Sound Kitchen, meet Cameroonian political cartoonist, painter, philanthropist and political exile, Issa Nyaphaga. There’s lots of good music ... and of course, the quiz ...

http://www.english.rfi.fr/africa/20100314-club-9516the-sound-kitchen-cartoonist-artist-philanthropist-issa-nyaphaga

Ibrahim Abdoulaye –

Since ever he was a child, Ibrahim barely remembers the last time he stood up and walked. Ibrahim was victim of Polio disease at the age of one and half year old in his village in N’ditam. Because of the lack of information in his family, his parents were not able to provide Ibrahim with Polio vaccination. But Ibrahim showing that even sitting the wheelchair you can accomplish your dream.

Mobility with dignity

The physical condition of Ibrahim has made him resilient to the challenge he faces in his every day’s life. From the age of three to nine years old, the young boy crawled down most of his childhood. In a rural African village, taboo is rampant in the communities. Fortunately, Ibrahim has less prejudice in Nditam and also the support of his entire village. In 2002, Ibrahim was granted with his ever first tricycle donated by HITIP (Hope International For Tikar People) a community-based organization working to improve the quality of life of the marginalized, indigenous people in Mbam and Kim region, where Ibrahim is from. The wheelchair has helped the young boy to gain his dignity – he couldn’t any longer be carried to run little errands such as going to the toilet, getting himself around the village and with his friends. The same tricycle helped Ibrahim to complete his primary education. Almost a decade after Ibrahim received his first wheelchair; he has become a strong young leader and a man with a vision for his life.

A gifted soul

In Nditam, a lost village in the middle of the equatorial rainforest, with no infrastructure – no running water, no electricity and medical center, Ibrahim has developed skills of a technician – he is the tech repair guy of the village. He fixes flashlights, radios, wheelchairs, bicycles and even generators. The villagers are amazed how the talent of a young individual with disabilities has become a tremendous support to the community.
Beside his passion as technician, Ibrahim is a great fan of soccer/football game. In Cameroon, Soccer/football is not only a game as we would think, it is a religion, and everybody is involved; children, adolescents, women, adults and elders. And for those who are not naturally granted with two legs, they can go play with braces or crutches. Ibrahim knows early in his life that he wouldn’t play the ball himself, and for a while he cheered the teams sitting on a wheelchair and one day he felt like not only waiting next to the stadium, he wanted to be in the game and field on the grass under the wheels of his tricycle, since he cannot stand and run.

Fair winner

In the Summer 2009, HITIP, the same local organization launched the soccer/football championship among the villages. And the event took place in Nditam his home-based village; it was the perfect opportunity for Ibrahim to show how much he could contribute to the championship. Quickly, Ibrahim formed a team of young soccer players and started training them three times a week. And he baptized his team; Meliti Football Club of N’ditam. Meliti is the name of the most famous tikar gods, symbolized as a character of a mask, which are the spirits of Tikar ancestors. The mythology of Meliti is known as the son who committed a matricide – the murder of his mother. With his oval and flat back head, Meliti has an impressive appearance, and has a single red feather on the top of his forehead, that gives him a particular look. Meliti has one extraordinary affect on the Tikar people; they adore and hate him in the same time, mostly women and young females. However, this name brought luck to the team of coach Ibrahim who has won the first soccer/football tournament. Since then, Meliti Football Club has doubled final cup winner of the Championship in N’ditam.
Along with his exciting hobby as soccer lover, Ibrahim has been a fellow for the computer and solar provided by Linux Friends Solar. The young coach on the wheelchair is now preparing to complete the secondary education.

The movie star in rural African

In the countryside of Africa where superstitious beliefs are rooted in the culture, taboo and prejudice are the daily challenge of women, poor or the disabled. Ibrahim’s achievements were brought to the attention of Narcisse Sandjon; a Cameroonian filmmaker based in the city of Yaoundé. Early in the summer 2015, a local Narcisse Sandjon came to interview and follow Ibrahim for documentary film project on his life. Narcisse said he was interested to film him because Ibrahim is one the rare person with disability who doesn’t beg. Then I thought maybe the coach on the wheelchair is kind of cool story.

While filming Ibrahim in N’ditam, the young man said: “Then years ago, my dream was to stand and walk. Today my dream is to leave this village to go beyond the borders of my country to receive knowledge and come back to make significant changes.”

At Blupela, our answer is: Why not! If you were able to change things in the daily of your village and give two victories to your village, you can inspire the world.

Good luck Ibrahim!

To connect with Ibrahim Abdoulaye, contact:
Issa N. Nyaphaga
Artist, Cartoonist & Human Rights Activist
Professor of Contemporary African Art, Social Justice & Cultural Diversity
Santa Fe, New Mexico – USA - January 25, 2015.
connect@hitip.org

www.hitip.org
All photos by O. Mebouack©