Africa's hangout: A MAN ON A MISSION:

Africa's hangout: A MAN ON A MISSION: 

http://www.bringzackbackhome.com/

ONLY IN AFRICA: THE SHOCKING DETAILS OF ANNUAL KENYAN YOUTH SPENDING

ONLY IN AFRICA: THE SHOCKING DETAILS OF ANNUAL KENYAN YOUTH SPENDING

RESEARCH COMPANY: Youth Dynamix.

TARGET GROUP: 16-24 years.

STUDY AREAS: urban areas across Kenya.

FINDINGS:

1.      airtime spending- sh. 24 billion

2.      clothes and accessories- sh. 64 billion

3.      entertainment/ fun outings- sh. 65 billion

INSIGHTS:

•       Marketers cannot ignore this set of group that has in the past been dismissed as cash strapped and instead corporates have targeted the older and moneyed generation in their marketing campaigns.
•       This is a potential future market and a huge customer base for any company once these young people get into the job market.
•       “The youth dictate trends in the market… they are usually the first to sample a product before it trickles down to the rest of the population.”- Research and insights manager, Alice Gathoni.
•       “If your product is accepted by this group, it is likely to be accepted across the entire market.”
•       The study covered the full spectrum of the youth market and was based on the 5 pillars of youth culture- entertainment, sports, fashion, relationships and technology.
•       “The key influence of the youth culture includes media and marketing, family, peers, 
• society, fashion, brands and celebrities.”- Youth Dynamix managing director Ciru Ngigi.

ONLY IN AFRICA: THE WORLD OF ADVERTS GONE WRONG:

ONLY IN AFRICA: THE WORLD OF ADVERTS GONE WRONG:

Last week saw the social media sites abuzz when a web advert by Korean Air labeled Kenyans as a people with “primitive energy.”

The ad read; “fly Korean Air and enjoy the grand African savanna, the safari tour, and the indigenous people full of primitive energy.”

As usual, Kenyans raised salvo reactions and demanded an apology from Koreans. But you know Kenyans with their Kenyan styles-T.I.K ( This Is Kenya), many went on to tweet and facebook that indeed instances like “uprooting rail tracks” are forms of primitive energy.

But if advertising is the science of arresting the human intelligence long enough to get money from it, then Korean Air ended up apologizing to the same intelligence they are meant to reap from! In their statement, they blamed the mistake made on their part in translating from Korean to English.

It is indeed, the crazy world of adverts gone sour only in Africa!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALEX:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALEX:

Born in 1912 when a group of blacks bought land from a white farmer who failed to find white buyer, Alexandra will be turning 100 this year (2012) with very little to celebrate or party about.

This year (2012), one of Johannesburg’s most notorious townships, Alexandra, known popularly as “Alex”, marks its 100^th anniversary. Many are still hoping the government will embark on revitalizing this slum that has become nothing less than a symbol of inequality in South Africa.

Despite its ramshackle history, it is a township that is credited with being former president Nelson Mandela’s first home in Jo’burg.

The pride of its over 400, 000 residents, mostly migrant workers and a third of whom are unemployed is that Alex became and is still one of the very few places where people of color can own property. This is what has over the years cultivated its culture of resistance and one that saw Alex survive the apartheid rule.

It is a township whose accident of history, in line with her boycotts helped inspire Mandela’s fight for freedom.

With the ambitious renovation project launched back in 2001, set to revitalize Alex with building of thousands of houses, tarred roads and putting up of street lights, it is yet to be seen whether Alex will survive the bulldozers of modernization, of trying to bring equality and attract investment.

- Additional reporting by AFP

Last Day of a Life sentence

Last Day of a Life sentence

THE AFRICAN WATCHDOG: WHERE DID THE RAINS ACTUALLY START BEATING US?

THE AFRICAN WATCHDOG: WHERE DID THE RAINS ACTUALLY START BEATING US?

We are all guilty! We all have failed and come short of grace, I included. What is wrong with our society? My question exactly is what happened to the morals we once cherished?

The media, whether electronic or print, is there to inform, educate and entertain. However, we the users continue to be shaped by its content, and in these, and many other factors, that help to mould and shape our behaviors, define our interactions and inform our consumption habits.

Do you remember the old days of watching the Foresters on their famous TV- show, “The Bold and the Beautiful?” I never really had a chance to watch it due to my strict parents. They always knew the time when it was schedule and they made sure everything was done before that time, some few minutes before it started they tucked us in.

I will never forget the whack my brother got trying to peep and catch a glimpse of the romantic action. Unlike today, where soap operas are family galore. But those who follow these programs get angry by the day, as they cannot stand the fact that a father can actually date a daughter-in-law. That’s absurd in the African culture.

“A fan is the unseen disciple of a team”, so goes a saying among football enthusiast. However, that’s the depiction of how low as a society we have sunk. We uncomprehendingly watch boring cheap TV- programs, rejects of Europe and America, imported to fill our African vacuity.

What make a movie- an Oscar or a great movie, I should ask? Is it only when it has a spice of romance, passion, deceit, sex and nudity? But then again, isn’t this what is shaping our ideas, thoughts, actions and behaviors. The whole idea about such a program is to say to you- lower your status quo. Affairs are part of life.

Somebody once told me that, “if you compromise any situation, you compromise the devil.” And once the devil is compromised, he invites his legion. When our young girls started dressing skimpily and indecently, we compromised and never said a word. Now, we are reaping what we sowed- unplanned pregnancies, broken marriages, under-age gang rapes and all those societal ills.

I stop, pause and ponder again, where did the rains actually start beating us? As a society and a continent corporately, we ought to sit down and reflect hard on this. About the good old teachings of our fore fathers and mothers. Of our spiritual vocation. Because if we don’t, history will judge us harshly but what will hurt us the most will be that the coming generation will not forgive us!

THE UNSUNG HEROES!

THE UNSUNG HEROES!

Are you guys heroes?

I hear you ask

Unsung heroes

We answer

Our lives is one big disaster

An endless tragedy

Or in another term-fate

In another time

And in another country

We’d be sir Francis Drake, Cortes or sir walter Raleigh

We’d have made empires

And carned national honours

But here in Africa,

Heroism is not our star

We are millipedes

Crawling on the floor of a dark, wet forest

And so we will die unsung!