Adeline Makundi: one year on, our memories are still fresh

One year ago, on 20 July 2010, in the small hours of morning, my sisterAde left us. Inevitable, as every living person must follow that path at one time or other, all we have to do is not to squat and lament and pray for impossible, but celebrate her life. Remember happy times with her.
I was perhaps the person most touched by Ade's demise as we two last of siblings grew up together at Komakundi village. Ade was my tutor, by the time I started schooling I was already conversant with some of the subjects being taught two classes ahead.
In this photo of 2007, Ade (in sleeveless blowse) is seated with her nieces Lilian and Naima.
Yes, she is still fresh in our memories.

New nation of South Sudan born: the way it should be for all troubled regions

Sudan people were given a chance to express their collective opinion by ballot what would be best for them: overwhelmingly, they voted to split south and north into two different nations. Granted under chaperonship of the United Nations, we now have a new nation, South Sudan, and everyone is happy.
There are other regions with long-running internal strife most of which lead to bloodshed. Sri lanka, a tiny island nation at the tip of the India subcontinent is one example where the minority Tamil had wanted to split and form an independent nation, but were defeated by the largely-Sinhalese government in power. Although humbled at present, such is adversity and mistrust for each other that some trouble might erupt in future. Referendum might reveal what the people of Sri Lanka, a coconut republic, may want. Rwanda, Burundi are other examples that should be allowed to say what they want through a ballot box.
Kurdish community is being fought in more than one country-Iran, Turkey, Syria, Iraq. These nations might rid themselves of headaches by carving out portions of their lands to create a new nation called Kurdia or something.

My China phone

Mobile phones (or cellular phones, or just plain simple cellphones are nowadays usually multi-functon gadgets. From digital cameras to position locator, it is unfair to refer to them as just phones. I'd rather call it something to the effect "multi-function, pocket-fitting device. A stylish name might sound like mufpod.

My rather low-cost china phone, apart from cellphone and texting that are standard, includes many interesting features. I particularly like-

• capability of fitting two simm cards, meaning supporting two network service providers simultaneously;
• it has an FM radio, and is equipped with telescopic antenna enabling users to rid themselves having to use cumbersome headphones that act as antenna-this feature puts to shame the more costly so-called genuine Nokia sets
• Flashlight, a white-LED that can be quite handy
• a memory card. I have fitted a 2 gigabyte micro-SD card that is capable of holding many mp3s (the set also plays mp3-pro tracks). The information such as calendar and alarms is held on the memory card, so the internal memory remains for important things such as phonebook entries.
• bluetooth capability, a handy feature for exchanging pictures and files with other bluetooth-capable devices
• A micro-usb ports lets users plug into computers using the standard usb cable.
• Nokia BL-4L is a standard battery for most Nokia phones. The vendors of china phones sometimes fit low-costing look-alike battery that does not have much life between charges, likely cheapy NiMH. When this is replaced with genuine Li-ion battery, the life between charges improves dramatically.
• MP3 player that, combining with large memory card capability and shuffling feature, is quite a gift for us lovers of diverse music. It can play back video clips but not recording. Not bad.
• Sound recorder: again, tapping the potential of the storage capacity, it is possible to record stuff of interest to you: sermons, radio program, read in some stuff from a notice on the wall, bark of a cat, meowing of a dog, laugh of a baby, anything.
• Camera-the quality of photos is a far cry from a standard digicam, but good enough where there is no alternative at hand
• Standard "narrow-pin" nokia charger port, replacement of which can be easily obtained if it gets damaged, car lighter-socket chargers are also easily obtainable.
• UDX is a means of backing up your entire phonebook, where the app writes an xml file onto the SD memory card. When phone is corrupted or lost, the backup can be downloaded back into the restored or replacement set, or any UDX-capable cellphone. I like this feature. The xml file is all-text with html-like tags, therefore copying it somewhere as a security feature. I promptly sent it to myself as an attachment, so that the email containing the attachment remains stored into my email archive for retrieval anytime anywhere if needed: It can also be opened by a text editor where it displays showing xml tags, with no difficulty of picking out the info such as name, cellphone number, home number, email etc.
• Internet capability: the set is internet-capable. Although it comes hard-coded for china service providers, local cellphone companies are capable of configuring chinaphones for their network. The Pollex browser is not exactly OperaMini, but you can't get everything always, can you.
• Alarms, calculator, reminders and such features are all there. Plus, it has Flight mode that will enable you to play included games even in places where phones should turned off due to microwave interferences precautions.

For a mere fifty dollars, it was a good buy, I'll say it was a fine buy, and if something happens to it, I would go for the same set anytime. I love my cellphone.

Email stuff to yourself

It happens many times that you may require some information to complete some form or attach to some documents for mailing or submitting somewhere. If it is at home or office, well and good, you'll retrieve it from the computer, make a print. However if you are nowhere near the place, it may mean having to take a taxi ride to get it. It may also mean to miss a deadline.

We all use email, webmail. A personal mailbox is a secure storage location that will keep your info, locked in with your password.  We can access our mailbox at any place with internet connection. Therefore all you have to do to keep the information that you are likely to need often, send it to yourself as an email attachment.

Some stuff you can send yourself:

• Photocopies of passport pages (required to obtain visas etc)
• Debit card and similar plastic cards (bank account number, card number, expiry month and year, cvv code)
• Certificates and licences (academic, professional, registration).
• Curriculum Vitae (What your professional self is made up of)

Hard disks may crash, DVDs may break, but commercial webservers shall be there all the time 24/7 with impressive availability of 99.99%.

When you have turned your email into a valuable vault, I needn't say that you need to be double-precarious: don't allow computers to remember your email password, even your personal notebook--have it remember others such as e-zine registration. You should also not use obvious giveaway names like "My Standard Chartered Debit Card.jpg", just in case: I might use "SC-plastic.jpg".

Share this information widely, generously.

Facebook claims a US politician's carreer: About time

He clung for a long time to his lawmaker position after his lewd-photos-on-Facebook were exposed. Finally, though, the news headlines indicate he has tendered his resignation.
Ignorance? Fact that he may have not physically met his Facebook "friends" did not make him any cleaner. Bamboozling that it were a mere chat, I, you and him knew well where it would lead to, given chance. Would Anthony Weiner like it if he were to learn that some grumpy old men were undressing for his daughters to see? Think, too, of wife. Kids. Co-workers. This slime is the last thing the injured Dem party needs at these times.
Reminds me of the buffoonery of military leader during Okinawa military base scandal a while back--said something to the effect They shouldn't have raped the school girl, Okinawa is full of cheap prostitutes, they could have picked those ...

Computer viruses: could be scam

Kaspersky pop-up informed me today I have two more days before it would expire. I got thinking, this is some sort of blackmail, something malicious. Why would there be new viruses all the time so as to make it necessary to update the antivirus software all the time? And how come the antichr--ooops--antivirus companies snap up new viruses really quick, prepare the antivirus on the fly? It is quite possible this group of seemingly do-good guys may also be writing some of the virus code. I guess I am not the first to figure this out.

The move by Microsoft to provide 'lifelong' protection to its customers having legitimate copies is all we need to have antivirus bubble burst. Even if they were to be contracted by Microsoft and other OS developers, they wouldn't be selling nearly that many licences as they are doing now. And I can see this coming real soon, the antivirus folk better looking for something else to do.

There are also ways to sidestep antivirusists: running linux and its family is one. Working offline is another. Installing older versions e.g. Windows-98 is yet another - newer viruses are not backward-compatible, they would be thrown into confusion when they find themselves attempting to rough up the older OS.

Let us give them some break, though. Antivirus companies have also assumed a role of educating mankind about the many hoaxes circulating in the internet; and they have been equipped to detect adware.

Russia, China, Rescue Libya

Driving drones in a sovereign state, running stealth sorties at night, implementing military finest arsenal against a third-world nation. That is what is apparent in this Nato-against-Libya warfare.
With the west claiming to be the sole superpower, I was much relieved when I heard in the news that Russia does not approve this ongoing sending a posse after Muammar Qadafi (for what wrong? How many are doing worse??). Africa, the aid-dependent domain, has been humbled into silence, with little effort to dissolve the west-borne crisis. I'd like to hear more rebuke to Nato action in Libya from Russia, ah, and China, the forthcoming superpower.