I have several photography blogs in my rss reader, but one of the best ones is surprisingly by MSF Canada who also has a bunch of really interesting field blogs. And I say surprisingly not only because it's the Canada section, but because I'm typically not a big fan of humanitarian organisations' promotional photos. This photo blog, though, doesn't fall into the expected clichés (or not too much, at least), and shows much more than poor people receiving medical assistance. Every day they publish a picture from a different country where they work, every day by a different photographer. And they have worked with some of the best news photographers in the world

The reason why they're one of the few NGOs with a photo blog is:

Words can tell a story, describe emotions, and explain the facts, but they can never replace a powerful moment captured in a photograph. Compelling images offer a window into people’s lives, often depicting their reality with a unique perspective.

Although the blog is not only focused on Africa, it features pictures from African countries quite often - and, of course, those are my favorites. Especially the ones that show unexpected beauty, like this one below of a muddy road in Northern Uganda taken by Chris de Bode.

Since this is after all an MSF blog it does have many pictures of people in conflict zones, of refugees, of hospitals, and of aid recipients in general. But these pictures are often beautiful, intimate portraits showing a thoughtful person, or focus on an interesting detail or angle of the scene. Some of them even show people laughing, or playing, trying to carry on with their lives in spite of their surrounding. Or wearing funky sunglasses in a completely destroyed town in Somalia, as shown in this photograph by Petterick Wiggers:

And last but not least, I also enjoy the pictures they post every so often from the DRC - which is still my main country of interest in Africa for good or for worse. Like this one taken by Carl De Keyzer in Boende, in the Equateur province:

Check out the whole MSF Canada Photo Blog here.

Thanks to a tweet from Madatsara, I discovered the Ulysse database of the Centre des Archives d’outre-mer of the French National Archive in Aix-en-Provence. This database is an online treasure of scanned old photographs (as well as a few posters and maps) of French colonies, including over 4,500 of black and white images from Africa. Although I only browsed through a small portion of the collection after spending two hours enthralled with the website, it seems that the majority of them are from the first half of the 20th century. Some of them are of buildings, landscapes or of groups of people posing for the camera, but there are also a great many of them capturing scenes of daily life, such as shopping in the market, a class at school, handcraft production, hunting, rural activies, ritual dances or ceremonies, chiefs meetings, etc. etc.

Even when no white people are pictured, and there are many of those, in amusing dignified poses, light-colored shorts, tall socks and the inevitable pith helmets or long missionary robes and beards, they all seem to have a certain colonial quality to them. In spite of the diversity and the often seemingly casual local scenes, it's as if the bewilderment in the eyes of the photographers reflected on the images, showing their fascination with things that they were unable to understand and which appeared so incredibly foreign and exotic to them.

I recommend anyone interested in the history of Africa to spend some time digging into the database, which contains some truly unexpected gems. As a sample, here's a small selection of the images of the French posing with the natives that I found amusing, but there are many other types of pictures in the Ulysse, and believe it or not most of them don't even include ungraceful Indiana Jones look-alikes wearing pith helmest or suspicious moustaches in them. You'll see if you look for yourself.

The explorer Binger buying karité butter at the market in a village in the Haute Volta region (nowadays Burkina Faso) between 1900 and 1936.

Soldiers of the Forces Françaises Libres near Bangui in the Oubangui-Chari region (nowadays the Central African Republic) in 1940

Missionaries and their students in front of a school in Fada Tikondi in the Haute Volta region (nowadays Burkina Faso) in 1957.

[Poster above of "Visitez le Congo Belge", meaning "Visit Belgian Congo", displaying the Niragongo volcano and an okapi, from 1930]

The first time I went to Congo, I remember noticing a couple of gentlemen wearing extremely elegant and expensive-looking suits on the flight from Paris to Kinshasa. Both the colors and the cut were old-fashioned, and they were wearing long-sleeve shirts, vests, jackets, hats and all despite the sticky heat awaiting us as soon as we landed. Back then I had no idea they were probably sapeurs, or members of the famous society of well-dressed people called Sape.

Although the origin of the word and of the movement is somewhat unclear, it seems that it originated in Congo Brazzaville quite a long time ago as a result of French colonisation.

This is how Héctor Mediavilla Sabaté, a Spanish photographer that has been photographing sapeurs in both Congos since 2003, explains these origins:

The arrival of the French to the Congo, at the beginning of the 20th Century, brought along the myth of Parisian elegance among the Congolese youth working for the colonialists. Many considered the white man to be superior because of their technology, sophistication and elegance. In 1922, G.A. Matsoua was the first–ever Congolese to return from Paris fully clad as an authentic French gentleman, which caused great uproar and much admiration amongst his fellow countrymen. He was the first Grand Sapeur.

Respected and admired in their communities, today’s sapeurs see themselves as artists. Their refined manners and impeccable style in their attire bring a little glamour to their humble surroundings.

The famous musician Papa Wemba, who often visited Brazzaville, became fascinated by the sapeurs and their ways. It was him who made popular and gave an international dimension to the Sape phenomenon in the 60’s with his songs. This was probably a reaction to Mobutu's authenticité efforts, which culminated in the Zairianisation between 1972 and the 1990's which involved imposing more traditional outfits and therefore banning the Western suit (instead men were expected to wear the abacost).

Although I didn't see very many sapeurs on the streets of Kinshasa, I have to concede that like many articles on the sapeurs point out, Congolese are proud to be among the most elegant people in Africa (and abroad, I might add). I suspect the sapeurs are really a dying breed, at least in the way described in this article that started Western media's fascination with the sape, or on Mediavilla's photo statement. I guess that's why there's now a whole book to enjoy more pictures of sapeurs titled Gentlemen of Bacongo by Italian photographer Daniele Tamagni [H/T Mister Crew]. And also an exhibition on the book at the London Newcastle Project Space, London, as part of Photomonth from 19-29th November 2009.

One of Papa Wemba's musicians, King Kester Emeneya, is quoted as saying "The white man may have invented clothes, but we turned it into an art" and looking at sapeurs we can only agree with him.

All photos by Daniele Tagni, from the book Gentlemen of Bacongo

[Previous Afrilinks can be found here]

1

Nadytch, who writes a blog about advertising and communication in Côte d'Ivoire [in French], asks Is black awful? after observing the everlasting presence of skin-lightening commercials. Her post has sparked quite an interesting debate [in French, hello Google Translate] on why these products remain popular in African society.

2

On the topic of skin whitening products, A Bombastic Element posted a video by AFP about their popularity in France among African diaspora communities although their sale is banned.

3

Since I linked to a post in French and one in English on that topic, here's are a couple more in Spanish written here over a year ago: Ser blanco es tan ideal and Requisito: blanquitud which has a video in English about skin whitening in India.

4

While skin bleaching creams are still popular among some African women and commercials tell women that lighter skin is more desirable, at the same time albinos are murdered for their body parts. What a paradox.

5

Speaking of ignorance, Ghetto Radio collected a couple of videos on Stupid questions people ask about Africa. It's funny but sad at the same time because it's so true.

6

On a lighter note, here's a cool photoset of Malian hairdos at Journal du Mali.

Via the blog A Bombastic Element (which I've been really enjoying lately), I found this wonderful story about Liberian cooking. It's an audio slideshows from the NYT's "One in 8 Million" series, chronicling the heroic and quirky in the lives of everyday New Yorkers.

It features Eliza Smith, 62, a Liberian who immigrated to the US in 1969 who cooks traditional food from her country in her Queens apartment. According to the story intro, her husband, who was from South Carolina and died in 1986, loved her traditional Liberian recipes. So did their friends, and in the mid-1990's, one asked if he could pay her to cook for him weekly. Soon, neighbors and friends of friends were calling, asking if they could come by and eat in her kitchen or take meals home. She also catered weddings, graduations and other parties. She charges $15 to $20 a meal, and sends most of her profits to a Liberian elementary school.

Although the photos by Todd Heisler are in black and white and I would have liked to see the colours of Ms Smith's food - especially the combination of meat and the fish that she says makes Liberian food different and "funky", the story is lovely and well worth checking out. And I loved this quote by Ms Smith which I think can be applied to African cooking in general:

I just can't cook enough for me, I don't know how to do that. I come from a large family, we were 12 kids and when we cook, we cook a lot of food for everyone to have.

Via the fabulous Ghetto Radio blog I found this video about Mamadou Tall Diedhiou, Senegal's most renowned "trash" artist. He started out as a poet in his village on the Southern coast, and has now become one of the most original sculptors in his country.

It seems that after writing his first poem, Mamadou wanted a painting of the girl that he sang about in it. Then he went to see an artist and asked him to paint the girl for him but the artist charged too much. Since he could not find the money, he decided to do it himself. A Ghanian named Eric who had his workshop next to that of Diedhiou helped him with his painting, giving tips as to how to use color and light or shapes in an optimal way. Little by little, he improved his painting, combining it with the intelligent use of old objects like tins or cans that he picked up from the streets. This was totally new in the Senegalese artistic environment.

Nowadays, he makes birds out of recycled materials - including the most unexpected ones. Watch the whole process in the video below:

Ujima is a Swahili word that means cooperation or collaborative work. But Ujima is also the name of a very interesting new project that was unveiled just a few days ago at the Highway Africa in Grahamstown. Their founders - veteran New York Times journalists Ron Nixon and Stephen Miller, and the former photo editor at the Associated Press, Sally Stapleton - presented it in several sessions, and I had the chance to attend one of them almost by accident. You see, since the project was described in the programme as "investigative reporting for Africa" I thought it would be one of those projects by Western organizations around specialized trainings for African journalists and media capacity building. But although the Ujima Project is part of the Great Lakes Media Institute which does some of that, Ujima turned out to be something completely different from what I had expected. And I must admit that it blew my mind.

This is how they define themselves on their website:

The Ujima Project is a new experiment in journalistic transparency. The Web site offers African journalists, nongovernmental organizations and others seeking factual data access to information that is not readily available in many African countries. The project operates on the premise of reverse transparency, taking database, documents and other information from donor countries -- The United States, European Union, for example -- and providing it in an easily seachable manner. Want to know what NGOs are doing in your country? The Ujima Project can provide some of the answers. Want to know how much your government is spending to influence policy in the United States or to promote its image abroad? The Ujima Project can assist with that as well.

So it's basically an invaluable treasure chest of data on the flow of money to and from Africa, mostly related to aid but not only. The idea is to make relevant information that is not readily available in Africa more accessible to the people it affects - its own citizens. During the presentation in Grahamstown Nixon quoted the example of Burundi's budget, half of which comes from external aid, yet most Burundians don't know anything about this money, such as the total amount, how it's supposed to be used, etc. Which is a frequent paradox in Africa. However, this kind of data can often be accessed in donor countries mostly due to open record laws. If you know how, that is, and most people don't.

Being journalists themselves, the hope of the founders of Ujima when they created the database was so that African journalists could use it as a starting point to write about corruption in the in their countries and to hold their governments more accountable. Or since the database is open for anyone to access, it can be used by whoever else is interested in it. In this manner, it is similar to WikiLeaks, but it is initially based upon records that are already public (albeit quite buried) knowledge.

Since the Ujima database was just launched, right now it contains only records from the US, but during their presentation we were told that very soon they'll offer information from other countries as well -such as the UK (DFID) and other EU countries. In fact, they're hoping to receive contributions from all over the world to greatly expand their sources giving a more complete and nuanced picture of the money trail in Africa.

It's quite important to emphasize that it also tracks contributions from Africa. For example, right now they're focusing mostly on Western donors to Africa or on African countries spending money with Western PR companies, but they said it would be great to have information on the flow of money within Africa. That's why they called the project Ujima, because it's everybody's responsibility to increase transparency and accountability by working together.

The database currently has four main sections: Lobbying, Global Fund, USAID, Weapons Sales and other miscellaneous documents. Each section in turn has a list of all the African countries, and honestly, they are all extremely enlightening to browse. For example, in the Global Fund section (an organization that has spent more than $11.4 billion in only 6 years) can be searched by disease - HIV/Aids, malaria or tuberculosis. After browsing those for a while one has to wonder why the progress in fighting these diseases has been so meager looking at the piles of money thrown at them.

But probably my favorite section is 'Lobbying', covering information about lobbyists hired by foreign governments and organizations to influence U.S. policy on issues such as trade, taxation, foreign aid, appropriations, human rights and national security. Looking at the records in this section closely we immediately find suspicious things such as this one from Congo Brazzaville:

In case it's too small to read, the services of the 3rd company listed were contracted by the Office of the President of the Republic of Congo through the first company on the list, supposedly for an amount of $0.00 (the intermediary company did get $830,000 though). Similarly, looking at the records of Gabon, we can see that most of the companies hired by President Omar Bongo seem to have worked for him for free. One of them in particular caught my attention, Barron-Birrell Inc., since they appear to have done work not only for Gabon but also for other reputable governments, including the two Congos and Zimbabwe. And always for free, of course. What an altruistic group. Also, a quick Google search reveals that one of the founders of that firm, David Barron, is a Republican (shocking, I know) and that he "has led many Congressional tours to Africa" and "has also played an important role in establishing the new national park system in Gabon (West Africa)".

Pulling a thread on the Ujima database can take you to the most unexpected dark places, where dirty secrets are kept, and show you the most unlikely bed partners. And that's what's so fascinating about it, and so outrageous at the same time. I truly hope that many journalists will feel the same way and make good use of all that info.

Update 18/09

Today, looking for mentions of Project Ujima, I've come accross two articles about it by other people who were at Highway Africa. Check them out:

• Want SA info? Try the US by Guy Berger who heads the School of Journalism & Media Studies at Rhodes University in Grahamstown that hosted the Highway Africa conference.
• Database to help track African project corruption by my friend Rebecca Wanjiku.

Update 19/09

Today Jon Gosier of Appfrica has posted an audio interview with Ujima founder Ron Nixon as part of his Appfricast series.

In the past I've come accross some of Miriam Makeba's songs here and there (especially the ultra-popular Pata Pata and Qongqothwane aka the Click song), but I have to admit that I never paid too much attention to her music - even when she died last year. Probably it's a generational thing, as I haven't paid much attention to political American music from the 1960s either. In South Africa, though, everybody adores Miriam Makeba and she's part of everybody's lives - even people of my age and younger. Nelson Mandela has streets, buildings and even geographic landmarks (like a whole Bay!) named after him all over South Africa, but Miriam Makeba has quite a few of her own too. In Johannesburg (where she was born), for example, I saw a street bearing her name in the artsy district of Newtown, including a mural of her (that you can see here).

Now thanks to the farewell gift from a new South African friend - a double CD collecting some of the best songs of her career - I had the opportunity to get to know Miriam Makeba better. And, like whole generations before me, I fell in love with this woman. How couldn't I? You just have to hear her sing. Like in this footage from the 1959 film Come back, Africa shot clandestinely in Johannesburg by Lionel Rogosin:

As a side note, it looks like the dress she's wearing on the film is the same one as on the CD cover photo taken by Jürgen Schadeberg (check out his whole series on the 1950s in Black and White in South Africa).

But it's not only her music that turned Miriam Makeba into such a South African icon, and into Mama Africa, but obviously it was also her political and civil rights activism. That brought her to exile for 30 years, only returning to South Africa in 1990 after the end of Apartheid (I read somewhere she had 9 passports throughout her life). During those years in exile her records were banned, while she toured the world with great success. She also addressed the UN General Assembly twice, always speaking out against the evils of Apartheid, and she received many awards for her outspoken opposition to that regime.

Here's an interview with her from a Swedish tv show in 1966:

And if after all this you're not feeling the urge to listen to some Miriam Makeba music right now, you should check out her page on Last.fm. Enjoy!

About two weeks ago, as I was about to travel to South Africa for the first time, a strange story broke that a white South African had been granted refugee status in Canada because of the "clear and convincing proof of the state's inability or unwillingness to protect him". At the time I found it ridiculous, and obviously so did most people in South Africa including government officials that I saw repeatedly on TV criticizing the decision. But even after a brief visit to the country, it is obvious that there are still some unresolved issues, and that race is one of them.

Cartoon by Zapiro from The Times website

David Smith, a British journalist currently based in Johannesburg, explains it much better than anyone in a recent article published in the Mail & Guardian under the title "In the rainbow nation, colour and class still count". He starts by wondering if maybe he is, for the first time in his life, part of an oppressed minority in South Africa like the guy who got asylum in Canada seemed to think. And he says something very interesting, similar to what I've felt before in the US:

I never used to be so conscious of race, but maybe that's the birth privilege of growing up white in Britain. It's similarly easy to pretend you are neutral and objective about class, gender and sexuality when you're middle-class, male and heterosexual. To be part of what history has defined as dominant, as opposed to "other", is to be like an Old Etonian, wearing self-confidence and a sense of entitlement wherever you go.

But the most terrifying line in the article is the last, that says:

The whites are pretending it didn't happen; the blacks are pretending to forgive.

And while denial is unfortunately all too common in countries that have suffered traumatic events, I do hope that South Africa doesn't try to bury its painful past too deep like Spain did after Franco and doesn't end up paying its consequences for over 60 years like it happened in my country.

Update

Coincidentally this morning I found this interesting SABC commercial in a great post on Ghetto Radio, showing a race role reversal scenario in South Africa. It's very relevant to the quote from David Smith about the unawareness of white privilege, as it shows "what it's like to see society through the eyes of the 'oppressed' group, something which the 'oppressing' group tend to have difficulty imagining". The article also quotes the the Brown Eyes, Blue Eyes Exercise, which I didn't know of but it's hardly surprising.

Update 2

And I keep finding interesting videos about race role reversal in South Africa, like these two by the British Journeyman Pictures. They are basically a shorter and longer version of the same thesis: in South Africa white privilege has now become black privilege, or like one of the white interviewees says "it's still apartheid no matter how you look at it. Yes we were in the good position, that was Apartheid. Now it's the opposite, but it's still Apartheid". Although I don't have enough knowledge of South Africa to judge them, I find these videos to be sensationalist and highly questionable. But also extremely interesting in what they represent, in what to me looks like a process of re-writing history and re-inventing the past.

The first video doesn't allow embedding, but the the second video conveys essentially the same message but in 15 minutes instead of 6. Although at times it's a bit repetitive showing the contrast between lower class whites and middle-upper class blacks, it has a few memorable moments. Such as an interview with cabinet member Essop Pahad defending afirmative action and then loosing his temper at the interviewer insisting on asking about the fate of the whites in present day South Africa. And it also contains what I found to be a brilliant quote by a businessman named Kabelo Sekoati:

[white people] look at themselves as a different class as a whole, whereas in a normal society class would be defined by income and education. But in South Africa your class is defined by the color of your skin.

Here's a translation of Nadine Tchaptchet-Kouamouo's interview by Go du Camer [originally in French]:

Blogging is her passion. Nadine Kouamouo has just received the "Best woman ICT reporter" award for West Africa at , a conference that gathers in South Africa every year the best communicators in Africa. A nice reward for this Cameroonian whose blog Babiwatch has grown quite significant in the media scene in Côte d'Ivoire, where she's been based for only 3 years.

Goducamer: You just received the award for "Best woman ICT reporter" at the annual Highway Africa conference in Grahamstown, South Africa. Could you tell us a bit more?

I had applied to the award with all the content from my blog Babiwatch, that I started in April 2007. In it I talk about communication and advertising campaigns in Côte d'Ivoire. The award that I received has greatly encouraged me and boosted my drive. I have other projects cooking at the moment and I'm more motivated than ever to go even further.

GdC : You are the founder and promoter, with your husband, of the blog platform Ivoire-blog. Have blogs become inevitable nowadays? What approach to communication do you think will bridge the digital divide in Africa?

I think internet is the new media and that the blog is the best tool to say what we think in a quick, free and efficient way. With the blog communication is interactive and participative, and so in fact it allows for a real connection with the world.

GdC : How is the typical daily routine of a blogger like you? Do you have a particular position as a woman? (especially in terms of gathering, treating and distributing information)

The typical routine of a blogger is nothing out the ordinary, it's my outlook that I have and the feelings that I share. I always have my digital camera and my little camcorder. I take note of what catches my attention and I comment on it according to my own perception while allowing others, all readers, to also give their opinion on the issue so that a true exchange of ideas take place amongst us. I work alone on my blog, once or twice I've published articles by other authors. I often have to publish my articles very late at night or very early in the morning while my 2 year-old daugher is sleeping... (laughs) to have some quiet.

GdC : We are noticing, however, that the majority of bloggers are men. What is the reason for that, in your opinion? Are women perhaps somewhat reluctant to blog?

I think, as I recently said on RFI (Radio France Iternational) that this comes from a bad prejudice from women. They think that anything that has to do with new technologies, html language and such things are too complicated and so they belong to men. I think they prefer just spending a few minutes checking out emails or some friends' photos on Hi5 or Facebook than reading a blog. They simply consider other things more important.

GdC : Regarding your studies on advertising, media and communication campaigns in Côte d’Ivoire, could you make a brief comparison with Cameroon? Are we moving forward or lagging behind?

I really can't compare them, I will simply say that popular trends and the communication frequency in each country are adapted to the lifestyle and behavior of the consumears in those countries.

GdC : You define yourself as "an indoors woman, an expert in communication and an eulogist of the Eternal". Is this the winning formula?

So far it has been for me! (laughs), but in fact it's just a brief description of my passions.