information is power

I recently stumbled upon a twitter account operated by the Government of Kenya, specifically the Ministry of Finance. Okay, maybe it’s not the Government itself that tweets, but it’s a really interesting account, called the Kenya Economic Stimulus Programme. Basically it’s a bailout by the Government of Kenya, trying to get money to the people that need it most, to build infrastructure and get things like healthcare and markets established so that the ‘common mwananchi’ (one of those buzzwords I hate…) can get involved in the development of their regions.
It may not be much, but it’s something.
There’s an option within the site that allows you to see how far the projects in your area have been completed, along with amounts of money that have been disbursed and where the money is going. There’s a lot that the program is doing, like building schools, planting trees and building markets in every constituency.
Visit, and see what the programme is doing where you are. You deserve to know.
It’s an interesting plan. I wonder how effective it’s going to be in the long run, but for now, it seems that the Government may have gotten one thing right. You need to spend some money (in the right places, of course…) to make the economy grow.

one percent

Think about it… Giving one percent of what you have. Your time, your energy, your resources, to a worthwhile cause…
A week has 168 hours. That’s one hour a week.
There’s a lot you can do in an hour.
There’s a lot of time I waste, I realize, doing things that are otherwise trivial and unimportant.
I could give that time to something worthwhile…
I spend so much of my energy on making myself happy.
I could use that to make others happy, and still be happy in the end.
The one percent will barely scratch the surface of what I have, but it will make a massive impact on someone else’s life…
Friday last week was an interesting day for me. Totally random invite to this event that was guaranteed to change my life, or at the very least, change my outlook. I’ve become rather skeptical of late, the hardening that results from taking everything too seriously. And here was a change to go meet people that have a rather fascinating outlook. Thinking like the candle lighting another candle: giving won’t leave it any less bright, but with all the candles that it lights, the room gets that much brighter…
Somewhere in there, technology (my second love, after @sweetestshaboo… Oh yes I did) comes in. Tech can be a force for good. It opens doors and leaves people much more enlightened than before. It makes the world a lot easier to live in and it brings up individuals with such brilliance to the fore that would otherwise have been lost to the background.
The whole event, the 1% Club Event Nairobi, ran the whole day on Friday, and all sorts of people came… NGOs that deal with technology and the youth (Nairobits), coders that are building the social networks of tomorrow (geekmates), endeavours to take the net to rural areas and create employment through teaching IT (Crystal Kigoni and Intersat, Nairobi’s leading twitterfolk, (@kahenya and @whiteafrican), the wickedest MC anywhere (@toneendungu of the iLab), Joanna Bayley of The Turning Point, a charity in Kibera, all sorts of coders, the web designer for NARC Kenya (they do have several by the way), and all sorts of people, all under one roof. Everything and everyone was there.
It was not easy to feel out-of-place, with such a mixed and diverse crowd…
And it was crazy. The good kind of crazy.
Where else can you find so many people with such massive ideas together under one roof?
‘This is the age of social activism’, a wise fellow once said, ‘and the question will not be who has what, but rather who knows what, and how they are using this information.’
This information has the capacity to push humankind that much further forward. The wind in our sails is all ones and zeros now.
And we are all part of this, this grand story of our time. That man can look beyond his situation and get to solving the collective problem.
And we all have our parts to play.
What’s your one percent?

Deux Milles Neuf

The end of a year, and the (supposed) end of a decade…
It has had its fair share of ups and downs, this year. And thankfully it’s been more up than down.
It has been the year of responsibilities stumbled upon, relationships consolidated, the blog, the internship (with the awesome sandwiches), the ulcer, the failure, the identity carved out, the new laptop, the .1 child (*wink* at @sweetestshaboo), the criminal record, the broken phone, tech support, TWITTER!!! (including the super awesome tweeps, mnajijua), the drought, the rain, Hurricane Wanjiku, Zain and free calls, the census, Coast twice in one year, AIESEC, hashtags, road trips, respect… I could go on and on…
It has been a good year.
All indicators are that 2010 will be teh awesome.
Happy new year, world.