Sunday, August 3, 2014
Monday, July 28, 2014
And as a child, I longed to be part of the higher class individuals that people fell over themselves to speak to; the high class individuals who had their noses stuck in the air everytime and only managed to respond to the greetings of those beneath them with a tiny wave of the hand.
As I grew up however, experiences taught me to long for humility. Life is not about class and human-imposed social stratification. Like patience, humility is a virtue we must all possess! I recently read the story of a man who worked at a giant butchery. One fateful day, he accidentally locked himself in the walk-in freezer. It was after hours and no one could hear him banging against the door or his muffled screams.
As the hours went by, he accepted fate, convinced he'll be a frozen body, beyond resuscitation by the next day. Suddenly, the door opened and this butcher looked up to see the company's security guard. "How did you know I was here?" He asked. The security guard responded "You are the only one that greets me in the morning and wishes me a good evening at the end of each day. Today, I heard you say 'morning' but I didn't hear a greeting in the evening. I decided to look around the butchery to check if you were still busy".
Humility is key, no matter how successful you are, or how higher up in ranks you are compared to others. There are situations and circumstances that your achievements, wealth or class cannot save you from. Sometimes you need the help of someone that is way at the bottom of the 'food chain'. God knows why he created everyone differently and put them in different positions. Society wouldn't function without the so-called 'rustics' many of us look down on. The cleaner at the office, creates a clean environment for you to work, the tea lady, the receptionist....whoever it may be, relate humbly. Remember, no matter how successful and wealthy you are, it's God's air you're breathing.
Xoxo
Demi Fayemiwo
Convenant Relationships
Saturday, July 26, 2014
The court also struck down three of the four capital murder convictions each against Jonathan and Reginald Carr, citing procedural problems at the brothers' joint trial for its decisions. It upheld one capital murder conviction for each of them.
Prosecutors said the brothers broke into a Wichita home in December 2000 and forced the five people there to have sex with each other and later to withdraw money from ATMs.
Two women were raped repeatedly before all five were taken to a soccer field and shot while they were kneeling. Four of them — 29-year-old Aaron Sander, 27-year-old Brad Heyka, 26-year-old Jason Befort and 25-year-old Heather Muller — died.
The killings ended a series of crimes that authorities alleged the Carr brothers committed over nine days in December 2000.
In overturning most of their capital murder convictions, the majority said the instructions to jurors had been flawed because the judge tied those charges to the rape of the surviving victim, not the deceased ones.
The brothers' cases will return to Sedgwick County District Court for further proceedings
Republican Gov. Sam Brownback and several GOP legislators were immediately critical of the decisions, which involved crimes that were among the most notorious in the state since the 1959 slayings of a western Kansas family that inspired the book In Cold Blood.
The legislators said the ruling shows the court's unwillingness to uphold a death sentence, and the governor said he was stunned.
'They were convicted by a jury of their peers in front of an elected local judge,' Brownback said in a statement.
'Today's ruling unnecessarily reopens wounds of a tragic moment in Wichita's history.'
'Hopefully going forward, we will all understand what these rulings really mean,' said Heyka, who is from Council Grove.
Attorneys for the brothers did not return telephone messages seeking comment.
Sedgwick County District Attorney Marc Bennett said he's not sure whether his office will appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, but he promised to continue pursuing death sentences.
Jonathan Carr, now 34, and Reginald Carr, 36, were in their early 20s when the crimes occurred.
Together, they were convicted of 93 counts, including rape, aggravated kidnapping and aggravated robbery.
The state Supreme Court upheld a total of 57 convictions against them.
Most of the overturned convictions involved the allegations of forcing their victims to engage in sex acts.
Five other convicted killers remain on death row in Kansas. The state Supreme Court last week overturned the death sentence of Sidney Gleason in the killings of a Great Bend couple in 2004.
Kansas last executed someone in 1965, by hanging. The current capital punishment law was enacted in 1994, but the state's highest court has yet to approve any death sentences.
Source: Mail Online
Their daughter was born yesterday at a hospital in the UK.
Few weeks ago, I got a call from a friend asking me out for a drink, but I was already at the Lagos airport. “I’m not going to be around for the next few days,” I told him. “I’m going to Abuja.” His immediate reaction was – “Why? What’s wrong?
Do you want to bore yourself to death?” That’s the typical response I get whenever I tell someone I am travelling to Abuja. Abuja is a beautiful city with a terrible reputation for boredom. I have heard people in other cities speak of Lagos as a noisy, dirty and dangerous city filled with crazy people. In truth, everyone in Lagos is crazy. What else do you expect in a state crammed with 22 million people?
It must be a hell of a job for the governor and his officials keeping everyone under law and order daily. Lagos has a peculiar vibe that can’t be found anywhere in the world, so much that “Lagos Hustle” is a commonly used phrase among Nigerians. I would rather go crazy living in Lagos than be bored to death in Abuja, Ibadan or Enugu. Abuja leaves you chewing your finger nails out of boredom. If you doubt me, whenever you have a visitor from Abuja, check his/her finger nails. They are always short and well chewed. Even the Hausa local nail trimmers have all migrated elsewhere due to the nail scarcity. It is said that people in Lagos argue for at least two hours daily. It is true; we love to generate arguments out of everything.
We argue everywhere, in buses and even during church services. Now Telemundo has become a cause for more argument among the girls here. So why are they surprised that we are crazy in this city? How many people can stay sane for long with the screams of Telemundo girls and the wailing sirens of police and government officials constantly beating their eardrums? Even the supposedly rugged Lagos rats can’t bear it too, that’s why they are always scampering from one gutter to another. If only we can understand what those rats would be saying to themselves about the cars with wailing sirens and flashing blue lights which have now become the city’s official ride for big boys. Don’t they know that it is by far the easiest way to advertise their arrivals to all the criminals in the city? Let’s add all the roaring vehicle engines, blaring horns, the arguments of the association of free newspaper readers at every bus stop, the street preachers with megaphones every morning, the open trucks filled with dancing skimpy dressed models selling almost expired products, or the rickety tortoise cars with dead PA system selling gbogbonise and the CD/DVD sellers blasting latest naija vibes.
Anybody expecting to find a sane person in Lagos must be crazy indeed. It is like looking for a virgin in Nollywood. It is a city with an official soundtrack emanating from millions of generators rumbling constantly all through the day and night. But as crazy as it is in Lagos, I love it. I love the fact that it is like the city is divided in two halves, for non smokers and smokers. Or how can anyone explain to me why Apapa is always covered in thick smoke? Call it trailer exhaust fumes or smoke from burning tyres, what I know is that whenever I am passing through Apapa, it is as If I have suddenly walked into the smokers section of a night club.
I love the fact that this city doesn’t discriminate. And that all the money of the rich offers no protection from the most trying aspect of life here. Aggression is imperative and timidity on the road is seized upon by everyone even pedestrians.
When driving, you are caught up, over-taken and honked at all at once. All drivers seem to be afflicted with honk sickness. You get in a taxi late at night when there isn’t a single other car on the road, and the driver is still blasting his horn at five seconds intervals for the entire journey. It is even worse when the traffic is gridlocked. Ask the millions who experience this bottleneck from the mainland to the commercial districts on the Island daily.
A guy dropped his friend at Lagos airport to catch a flight to South Africa. When he received his text message saying he had landed safely at Joburg airport, he was still in traffic on the way back to Victoria Island.
We don’t have much of a tourist industry in Lagos at the moment but thank God for Makoko, an extraordinary floating slum, where everyone travels round in boats. It is our own version of Venice. Thanks to the governor, the dividends of democracy can now be felt in some places in the city. Let’s take the Ojota dump site for example, it has become symbolic of everything that past governments have tried to achieve. What used to look at first sight a rough, lawless, dangerous place has become a well-organised place where good money is earned by local street boys who now prefer a life of grime to a life of crime. Some of them are university graduates.
Lagos is a shining example of democracy. Even the area boys and those scavengers on the streets for things to re-sell have their own democratically elected chairmen, who sort out any arguments or disagreements.
Don’t you love the look of today’s Oshodi, especially when you are standing on the bridge feeding your eyes with the wonderful mosaic of human beings like a colourful artwork? The traders are constantly feeding energy into the atmosphere with their hilarious but innovative marketing methods, giving visitors from various parts of the world a first hand view of how lucrative and conducive this city is for their businesses. But it is imperative to have lots of patience and a good sense of humour to survive here.
Planning is crucial if you want to get things done. You must make contingencies because most of the time things don’t go according to plan, whether you are caught in argument or in traffic. For tourists, it is important to note that there are no up-to-date visitors’ guide on sale anywhere. And the few guidebooks available do not pretend to over-sell the city’s destinations. But one thing you won’t need guidebook to notice are the mechanic workshops littered all over the city. The good thing about this is that whenever you go hungry, just walk into the nearest one and you are sure to find a mama-put (restaurant).
Lagos is noisy, polluted, corrupt, lawless and ungovernable, but beneath these stereotypes are some of the most hardworking, passionate and big thinkers on earth. Thousands of people make their living by selling all kinds of stuff in traffic jams: household provisions, mobile phones, electrical appliances, wrist watches, books, clothes, popcorn, machetes, soup ingredients, wheel chairs, rat poison, CDs, DVDs, pets, you can even buy a brand new car in traffic. It is quite innovative and convenient because most Lagos residents prefer to do their shopping on the go.
I love Lagos because this is the only city in the world where you can leave home for work stark naked and be sure to buy everything you want to wear in traffic. They’ve got ironing boards too in case you want your clothes starched and properly ironed. Eko o ni baje oo.
The 17 Year Old Nigerian weightlifter won the gold medal yesterday after pulling a total of 196 points in snatch and clean and jerk in the 53kg class to beat her competitors from New Guinea andIndia who picked the silver and bronze medals.
Friday, July 25, 2014
There was global condemnation when she was sentenced to hang for apostasy by a Sudanese court.
Mrs Ibrahim's father is Muslim so according to Sudan's version of Islamic law she is also Muslim and cannot convert.
She was raised by her Christian mother and says she has never been Muslim.
Welcoming her at the airport, Italy's Prime Minister Matteo Renzi said: "Today is a day of celebration."
Mrs Ibrahim met Pope Francis at his Santa Marta residence at the Vatican soon after her arrival.
"The Pope thanked her for her witness to faith," Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi was quoted as saying.
The BBC's Alan Johnston in Rome says there was no prior indication of Italy's involvement in the case.
Lapo Pistelli, Italy's vice-minister for foreign affairs, accompanied her on the flight from Khartoum and posted a photo of himself with Mrs Ibrahim and her children on his Facebook account as they were about to land in Rome.
"Mission accomplished," he wrote.
A senior Sudanese official told Reuters news agency that the government in Khartoum had approved her departure in advance.
Mrs Ibrahim's lawyer Mohamed Mostafa Nour told BBC Focus on Africa that she travelled on a Sudanese passport she received at the last minute.
"She is unhappy to leave Sudan. She loves Sudan very much. It's the country she was born and grew up in," he said.
Mrs Ibrahim's husband, Daniel Wani, also a Christian, is from South Sudan and has US nationality.
Their daughter Maya was born in prison in May, shortly after Mrs Ibrahim was sentenced to hang for apostasy - renouncing one's faith.
Under intense international pressure, her conviction was quashed and she was freed in June.
In June, Meriam spoke to the BBC as she entered the US embassy, as Reeta Chakrabarti reports
She was given South Sudanese travel documents but was arrested at Khartoum airport, with Sudanese officials saying the travel documents were fake.
These new charges meant she was not allowed to leave the country but she was released into the custody of the US embassy in Khartoum.
Last week, her father's family filed a lawsuit trying to have her marriage annulled, on the basis that a Muslim woman is not allowed to marry a non-Muslim.
Source: BBC News
Thursday, July 24, 2014
No survivors were found, according to Burkina Faso Gen. Gilbert Diendere.
Flight 5017 was carrying at least 116 people when it departed for Algeria. It disappeared from radar after diverting from its planned course due to bad weather, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told reporters.
At least 50 of the passengers aboard the MD-83 were French. Mali will lead the investigation into the crash.
French forces, including two fighter jets, helped search for the aircraft, along with Algerian and U.N. personnel in the region, Fabius said.
Ouagadougou airport in Burkina Faso, where the Air Algérie plane took off. Photograph: Ahmed Ouoba/AFP/Getty Images
The plane was carrying 110 passengers and six crew members, Air Algerie sales manager Zoheir Houaoui told reporters.
Among the passengers, he said, were 50 people from France; 24 from Burkina Faso; eight Lebanese; six Algerians; five Canadians; four Germans; two from Luxembourg; one from Mali; one Cameroonian; one Belgian; one Ukrainian; one Romanian; one Swiss; one Nigerian; and one Egyptian.
The plane's six crew members were Spanish, Houaoui said. The plane belongs to a private Spanish company, Swiftair, but it appears to have been operated by Air Algerie.
A U.S. State Department official said the department was not aware of any Americans on the flight.
Ouagadougou Airport said in a statement that Mariela Castro, daughter of Cuban President Raul Castro, was among those on board. However, the National Center for Sexual Education in Havana, Cuba, which Mariela Castro runs, denied the reports and told CNN she was at an event in Havana.
Castro subsequently told a Telesur anchor who interviewed her by phone, "I'm alive, kicking, happy and healthy!"
The flight path went through a turbulent area, so it is likely that if the plane was diverted because of weather, it was to avoid a bumpy flight. Thunderstorms are a very common occurrence at this time of year in the area.
The MD-83 is part of the McDonnell Douglas MD-80 family of twin-engine, single-aisle jets.
Air Algerie is Algeria's national airline, with flights to 28 countries.
The deadliest incident in the airline's history occurred in March 2003 when a domestic flight crashed after takeoff, killing 102 people on board. One person survived.
In February, a Hercules C-130 military aircraft crashed in the mountains of eastern Algeria, killing 77 of the 78 people on board.
Flight 5017's disappearance comes exactly a week after a Malaysia Airlines plane was brought down in Ukraine with 298 people on board.
Source: CNN
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