Sunday Morning Blues

Sure we keep winning and there have been a lot of injuries but something needs to change either on offense or defense. Auburn this year is not good. Against us they looked good. 

D played better, but Auburn’s offense is awful. AWFUL.

Bobo or Martinez or other?

Maybe it is just the injuries but something has to change. We have the talent. Injuries suck but something is wrong in the lockerroom. Look at the quotes on David Hale’s blog. Change needs to happen.

Thank God though we have Mark Richt. Just look at Tenn or Aub ot Clemson or whomever with a coaching problem. It didnt happen this year for us but we have the right guy at the helm. No matter what we cant forget that.

Not sure what level of coverage the crisis in the Congo is getting back in the states but I am sure that it isnt much. Basically the country went to war in 1997 and it hasnt stopped since, at least in parts of the country. Formal accords were signed in 2003 “ending” a conflict that has been termed Africa’s World War as a large number of other African countries sent troops to fight with the Congolese Army during the war.

Since the end of the war tensions and violence have remained high in the eastern half of the country, especially along the boarder with Rwanda. This is fuelled mostly by tribal hatred between Tutsis and Hutus which most of you will probably remember from the genocide in Rwanda in 1994. The main fighting now is between a rebel group led by a former Congolese General who claims that they are fighting to protect Tutsi minorities from Hutu militants.

Regardless of why or who or any of that what you have is increased violence in a conflict that has been waged in one form or another for over 11 years now. A conflict that has killed over an estimated 5.4 million people. What is clear is that this is not going away anytime soon and has the potential to spiral out of control yet again unless the AU/UN/the West can muster the political will to do something about it. But with a recession in most of the developed world it is all too easy to ignore a conflict that is so remote from the west, especially when even with intervention little seems to change.

So one can expect that the sexual violence and violence that was described last year as “Beyond Rape” and will continue in the foreseeable future. It is also important to note that it is not just the rebel groups that are instigating the violence but the “regular” Congolese army as well.

Talking to a friend about the conflict he made a good and infinitely sad point that there is little chance of any sort of resolution to this conflict in the near term, regardless of political will from outside, as there seems to be little desire by either the Congolese Army or the Rebels to end the conflict. Both sides seem perfectly happy to continue to destroy each other and anyone caught between them.

Some new pictures from the Early Intervention Program Trust are up over at Picasa. The EIP Trust for those of you who dont know is a project that seeks to break the cycle of poverty that traps many kids forced to live on the streets and beg to survive here in Gobabis. Most of the kids have some sort of nominal home but their families cant support them so they are forced to fend for themselves. This makes them incredibly vulnerable to exploitation as well as having major impacts on their behavior. As a result many of them are in and out of jail, have very little formal schooling and about the only person they will really listen to or follow is the program founder and coordinator Ben. Things are getting a little better and the program is moving towards a little more stability and that will certainly help. I’ll have a few more thoughts about the program up here next week. For now here are some pictures:

From EIP Oct 2008

This is the house we are looking to purchase to house the program and give us a stable base

From EIP Oct 2008

This is the property that has been purchased to house most of the income generating projects and currently serves as a temporary home base. The property is only marginally suitable for housing the boys as there is no toilet or running water on the site.

From EIP Oct 2008

Part of the garden next to the current site. We have partnered with the man who lives here to have him assist us with our garden to supplement the boys diet as he already grows a very successful garden

As I said above, a few more pictures are up over at Picasa and I hope to have a better site up for the project itself next week. If you have any questions about the pictures or the project leave them in the comments or shoot me an email.

So I finally got a chance to watch the Alabama debacle and came up with a few thoughts about the importance of that game as it relates to the Florida game and some enduring issues from that game. I know it is kinda like beating a dead horse at this point, but I think most of what I have picked put is still somehow relevant beyond the 27th of September.

Thoughts on Alabama and going forward from there after I watched the first half.

1. Losing Ellerbee on the third play of the game was a huge blow not just because he is such a good player but also because we lost a real field leader. This has been solved by now but especially with the stories that came out after the game about the lack of real vocal leadership in the locker room, especially on defense, I dont think this can be underestimated.

2. Two big momentum plays that could have change a lot of the game were the fumble negated by roughing the passer and AJ’s fumble, either of those goes the other way or especially if both do you are looking at probably at least a 14 point swing.

3. I really think a lot of the game plan in the first quarter/half was based on lack of trust in the Oline against the Alabama front and I think you see that as well with some of the passes that Stafford threw. Part of this is Terrence Cody is a beast on the inside.

4. Pretty clear we just came out way too “up” and then things just started bouncing the wrong way and we just pressed too much. I think being too “up” is a direct cause for the two big roughing the passer penalties in the first half. Also think it effected Mimbs as well.

5. Not pressuring JPW was huge, but that pass to Julio Jones for the touchdown toward the end of the 1st half, he could throw that 100 more times and he makes it probably say 5-10?

6. Team didnt quit. Granted it seems like Bama kinda called off the dogs on D a little in the 2nd half but they kept going, and in the next few games they really began to put it together, especially on the Oline

7. Watching closely could see R. Jones really going for the big hit rather than a fundemental tackle a number of times. Didnt hurt us here, from what I read was a little more evident against LSU. Hopefully he’s been working on that this week.

Florida game:

Maybe we will all be wrong and this will be a low scoring slug fest but that is hard to believe. I think that UF prob comes out a little too up and as long as we can force them into one early mistake or get a favorable bounce early on could allow us to go up 2 touchdowns quick.

Ball control will be important. Those long 10+ play drives. Goal should really be one a quarter and while you want TDs if it is a drive over 6 min a FG is fine. We get one of these a quarter we win. Part and parcel of this would be Knowshon (or king/samuel) has to go over 100 yards, and as a team we need 150+

Third, must finish at least even on turnovers.

Cant give up more than 1 <2:30 scoring drives per half. Big play prevention.

Cant fall behind by more than 21 in the first half, 14 in the second. This is more an overall fact given the clock rules this year. Just too easy to run lots of time off the clock if you want to.

Final note: people not leaving the stadium and keeping somewhat positive inside the stadium was great to see and I know Richt has talked about not ragging on your own team, not booing, staying with them even when losing makes a real impression on recruits and doing the opposite makes a massive negative impression.

The hate is strong over at the Georgia Sports Blog, Dawg Sports, and Hey Jenny Slater, be sure to check them out if you get a chance. And also, while he is a gator and is doing his level best to make fun of the Dawgs this week, Orson at EDSBS has some classics this week and really if you cant laugh at yourself from time to time there is probably something wrong.

Over the past couple of weeks I spent a pretty significant time in the capital getting some of the final checks finished before I head home (countdown is 34 days left in Namibia, 53 until Im back in the USA). Last weekend especially there were a lot of PCVs in town for various reasons and a great time was had by all. We even got to meet a new transfer from the recently closed Peace Corps Bolivia program. 

One sad thing to note though was that the Putt Putt center in Windhoek has closed and is in the process of demolition:

From Windhoek - COS Med and VAC

From Windhoek - COS Med and VAC

 This is certainly an unfortunate loss not only for those of us who like putt putt but for Namibia in general.

Besides putt putt being closed it was also a sad trip in someways since it would mark the last time that I will see a number of friends for anywhere between few months (Adam):

to as much as a year an a half (Carly):

But that’s life.

You can view the whole album, as well as all my other pictures by clicking on the links below the pictures above or by clicking here

Sorry for the lack of updates over the past few weeks. I have a good bit of stuff that I will be getting up here as soon as I can, but the internet at work is down and that limits me to not uploading pictures at the moment and a lot of what I want to update includes a number of pictures and also a video.

The internet at work was taken out by the thing that is making us all happy here in Namibia, namely that the rains have returned.

In Namibia the rains are seasonal and generally from Mid April till Mid October there is no rain, at least nothing beyond a few five min sprinkles in May. So most of us in Namibia spent the past six months waiting on the rains to return and over the past week we have not been disappointed. Of course with a power grid that is less than reliable and subject to surges and such the rain can cause quite a few problems and a recent surge seems to have taken out the DSL modem at work. As I understand it a new one is on order and hopefully will arrive before the weekend. When that happens I’ll have a number of updates of PCV life as well as progress with the EIP Trust.

Listening to last night’s game gave me three thoughts:

1. If Penn Wagers never officiates another game for Georgia that will be fine with me. Defensive holding is an auto first down and that blown call cost us 4 points.

2. Tennessee is very lucky that we had some problems punching it in last night because that game probably should have been more like  41-7 if not worse.

3. Are we going to finish the season with a LT?

Also I tried my hand at putting together a top 15 this morning and I have to say after #3 or 4 I think you can take the next 7 or 8 teams and put them in any order. The next couple of weeks probably wont make the picture any clearer either.

1. Texas

2. Bama

3. Penn St.

4. Oklahoma St.

5. Georgia, Florida, USC

8. LSU

9. Oklahoma

10. Texas Tech

11. BYU

12. Ohio St.

13. Missouri

14. Virginia Tech

15. Kansas

Florida, Georgia and USC are virtually indistinguishable to me at the moment. Florida and USC have bigger wins than Georgia but their loses are also much worse than Georgia’s.

Hopefully the picture will be a little clearer by the end of the month. What is clear is that with the exception of Virgina Tech and BYU pretty much anyone else in the top 15 controls their own destiny, win out and you will be in Miami.

Recently I was down in Epako checking out the new place that the Early Intervention Program Trust (the street kids I work with) is moving to.

It is next to the garden that we are working on. At this garden is also one of the few water taps for the people living in the informal settlement or squatters as it is referred to. In southern Namibia (and South Africa) during apartheid blacks were forced to live in “townships” or “locations” that were separated from the main town where the whites live. Here you can see an good example of this arrangement here in Gobabis:

View Larger Map

On the left you see town, then in the upper right side Epako, the black location.
View Larger Map

Here we zoom into Epako and can see the difference between the formal location with the houses the government built and the tin shacks that form the informal settlement. These “houses” are not serviced with power water or sewage, at least not in a formal sense, and so people rely on jerry cans that they fill at a few taps. To fill the water they can either use a card that they buy from the municipality to activate the tap or pay the people that live on the plot with the tap. Water is around .10 USD for 25 Litres.

Yet the municipality in their infinite wisdom is now closing all the taps essentially forcing people to buy cards to get water. The problem is that these cards cost roughly 20 USD. While this isnt much, it represents a huge amount of money for many of the people who would be using the system. Thus, when I was down in Epako a few days ago this was the scene:

Nothing too crazy but people were just getting the news and there was a pretty steady stream coming and filling up all they could and a few arguments were brewing under the surface and could have easily boiled over. Just thought people should know that no matter how dumb you think your government is there is always one out there that is worse.

More pictures of Epako, the boys, water lines and the garden may be found here

Bonus picture after the jump

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Today has been an interesting day as my desire to no longer be here has been pretty high. I think I have mentioned it before that I have been feeling a lot more schizophrenic at least in terms of my feelings towards being here. It’s not that I am unhappy with being here or hating being here or even homesick, really I cant say exactly what it is. I think that it has to do with the finish being so close and most of my projects being relatively finished.

Im sure that being anxious about what I am going to be doing after is playing into this as well, and sadly nothing about that anxiety will change until later in the spring. And I guess that planning for the future and having a bit of an idea, an idea that is in no way really served by anything that I will be doing between now and the third of December when I get out of here plays into it as well.

What is confusing is that I really feel that if the end wasnt imminent then I wouldnt mind all that much staying here, especially if I actually had a decent job that would allow me to live a tad bit different lifestyle. More specifically, having a car and being able to buy a $10 bottle of wine and not feel like I was really breaking the bank or doing something special.

Something that I am going to try to start doing here is posting a weekly roundup of stories I have found online that I think may be of interest to people. Slow start this week but hopefully it will ramp up with the weeks to come.

New pictures are up at Picasa more coming later this week.

Technology

Gmail comes out with Google Goggles for mail. Essentially you can set up your email to ask you to solve some simple math problems before you can send and email. Default settings are for between 10pm and 5am Friday and Saturday nights. Personally I dont see what the big deal is. I know I always send my best emails between those hours.

OObject has the best Apple Concepts and lots of other fun pictures up.

Georgia Stuff

Paul at the Georgia Sports Blog looks at our injury situations and points out it is no wonder we dont look like the #1 team in the nation

David Hale keeps up the good work over at his blog. If you are a Georgia Fan and you arent reading it regularly you are missing out. (David Hale is the Georgia Beat writer for the Macon Telegraph)