Dumping dead bodies at work places

African society in general and Malawians in particular must be the people with most respect for the dead. They are showered with all sorts of praise once dead and their coffins are given utmost respect. However this respect gets eroded very quickly when you now take his/her body and dump it at workplace in the hope of forcing the organisation involved to provide coffins, transport and other goods or services. And not only is it disrespectful, it is simply wrong! How would those people who do that like to have their dead body lying at the dusty entrance to some factory or placed on the hard boardroom table of some company? Of course they would claim that they would not know but hey guys...!

The employee has to start to realise that in this day and age where people are dying at an accelerated rate (if I can put it that way), not all organisations can afford to transport spouses, children and members of extended families bodies too far away places simply to have people mourn for an hour or two then bury the person. Why can we simply inter bodies right where the person has died? Why take a four month baby and bury it in the village 400km away? Where is the logic? What is the reason? To sleep next to and chat with it's kinsfolk in the graveyard?

I've drifted off the point but the point it give the dead the respect they so rightly deserve!

Harnessing the Power of the Internets Collaboration Tools

The number of internet users in Malawi has grown tremendously over the past few years especially those using broadband internet services. Having worked for two of the major internet service providers in the country, I noticed that many users main interests lay simply in sending & receiving mail and browsing the net. Yet the internet provides so many other tools for use especially those that make collaboration between peoples and offices in different places all over the world so much easier. In short, these 24/7 wireless connections are grossly underutilised unless of course there are a number of young lads downloading pirated software, music and videos. I will attempt to outline some of these tools most relevant to Malawi internet users.

Skype is a peer-to-peer Voice over IP (VoIP) network that allows users to make free voice and video conferencing calls over the internet. This means you can make free calls to other users, wherever they are in the world, but only to those who have also downloaded and installed the Skype software and have an earphone and microphone (headset) just like you. This means you can keep in constant touch, for free, with those friends in the diaspora or business contacts who will most likely have Skype installed on their pc’s. You can however make calls to traditional numbers and cell phones for a fee using SkypeOut. Quality of service is not guaranteed so expect dropouts and voice delays.

Another great tool is Google Docs & Spreadsheets, a Web-based word processor and spreadsheet application offered by Google. It allows users to upload or create documents and spreadsheets while inviting others to share or edit the documents together in real-time.

Documents can be uploaded or emailed in formats such as plain text or Word and later be exported as HTML, Word or PDF files. Spreadsheets can be uploaded or emailed in CSV, Excel, and OpenDocument formats and later be exported as HTML and PDF in addition to other formats. Docs & Spreadsheets include most word processing and spreadsheet features although other features lack. In addition to exporting your documents to your desktop in the formats above, you can send them by email, publish them online to the world or even post them to your blog. By being able to share the document amongst multiple users at the same time makes Google Docs & Spreadsheets a great collaboration tool.

Another product offered by Google is Google Calendar, a contact- and time-management web application. It allows users to synchronize their Gmail (Google's web e-mail service) contacts with a web-based calendar. The interface of Google Calendar is similar to desktop calendar applications such as Microsoft Outlook. The interface enables users to view, add and even drag-and-drop events from one date to another without reloading the page. It sports a variety of view modes, such as the weekly, monthly and agenda views. Users can set the number of days to show in their custom view mode. All events in a Google Calendar can be commented on by its users.

Events are stored online, so in the case of a user being away from his computer, he can still view the information. The application can import Microsoft Outlook calendar files (.cvs) although at this stage only when the fields are all in U.S. format. Multiple calendars can be added and shared, allowing various levels of permissions for the users. This enables collaboration and sharing of schedules between groups or families. Being integrated with Gmail means that when an e-mail that contains trigger words (such as "meeting", or dates and times) arrives, an "add to calendar" button is automatically displayed alongside it.

Another tool that can be used by Malawian journalists and columnists to get across to those in the diaspora and invite immediate comments is a Blog. This is a user-generated website where entries are made in journal style and displayed in a reverse chronological order. They can focus on a particular subject such as sports, politics and local news or can simply be a personal online diary. The ability for readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important part of many blogs. Some blogs are specialist and focus on photographs (photoblog), videos (vlog), or audio (podcasting) and are part of a wider network of social media. Blogs are free to use and the most common are Blogger, Blogit, LiveJournal and WordPress amongst plenty others.

Another tool widely used in Malawi is Instant messaging. It is a form of real-time communication between two or more people based on typed text. Instant messaging requires the use of a client program, such as Yahoo! Messenger, Windows Live Messenger, Skype or Google Talk, that hooks up an instant messaging service and differs from e-mail in that conversations are then able to happen in real time.

Are you one of those people who flood friends mail boxes every Monday morning with pictures of weddings, engagements and other events that took place over the past weekend? Photo sharing is the publishing or transfer of a user's digital photos online, thus enabling the user to share them with others (whether publicly or privately). This functionality is provided through websites that facilitate the upload and display of images. Sites that offer free photo sharing are Flickr, Fotki, Ringo, Webshots and MyPhotoAlbum amongst many others.

Mangaliso's World is Over!

A good friend and fellow blogger, Mangaliso Jere, left this world today in Mzuzu! I really have no words to describe this brother only that he was a cheerful lad, a hardworking techie and one who loved his motherland. Rest in Peace Dear Brother!

vacancy

By Malawian definition, what is a 'clean driver's license'? very curious to find out.

obsessions

A psychiatrist was conducting a group therapy session with four young mothers and their small children... "You all have obsessions," he observed. To the first mother, Mary, he said, "You are obsessed with eating. You've even named your daughter Candy." He turned to the second Mom, Ann: "Your obsession is with money. Again, it manifests itself in your child's name, Penny." He turns to the third Mom, Joyce: "Your obsession is alcohol. This too manifests itself in your child's name, Brandy." At this point, the fourth mother, Kathy, gets up, takes her little boy by the hand and whispers. "Come on, Dick, we're leaving."

bus breakdowns

Traveling along the M1, the main road between Blantyre and Lilongwe, have ever taken time to note where buses break down? In the middle of nowhere all the time - no tree, no shade, no cell phone network, no grocery, no nothing!!! Not even near a lovely view of a valley or a hill.

What a start

Happy New Years to all you folks out there. It has definitely been an eventful one for me. We are in a new house and have all new staff in our household. I have also come into the new year with a load of brilliant ideas!!!

Last week I had to baby sit my 2 year and 4 month old boys! Boy oh boy, I thought house wives have it easy - give the kids a bath, feed them, send them out to play while the babies sleep then they pour themselves a glass of Gin & Tonic before relaxing in front of the TV watching Oprah and Jerry Springer. I got it all wrong! I had them all over me all day. The 2 year old toddler is hyper active and relatively loud. The younger chap is a very light sleeper. Very bad combination. At midday, i remembered a prayer that my mother had hang on her kitchen wall

Grant me patience Lord, BUT HURRY!!