When the mad bears demand honey
Advertising and hyperbole-Kigali style:
-GREATEST LANGUAGES SCHOOL- Apparently this exists somewhere in Kigali although quite which awards it has won to take on such a grand name have sadly not been revealed. Or is it more of a tribute to the languages rather than the School itself?It captures an interesting dilemma. If you want to start up a Languages school in Kigali, what do you do
a) Give it a generic name like KIGALI LANGUAGE SCHOOL and put out posters telling people they can learn English or whatever.
b) Call it GREATEST LANGUAGES SCHOOL and make it sound like a cross between the Oracle of Delphi and a MENSA get-together.
This is Kigali- you go for (b)
-ABC TOILET PAPER- FOR YOUR BEST CHOOSE- Crimes against the English language are legion here, but this still takes the biscuit. For starters, its embazoned on the back of a truck in huge letters and driven by a man who may very well be named Smug MrSmugg on the basis of the oh-so smug grin on his face. He wouldnt be so smug if he knew what we knew.
-KIGALI BOOK CENTER- I saw this sign sometime ago and I dashed in, excited that a new book store had opened. Turns out that there were no books there- computers and stationery yes, but books? None in sight. A bookstore without books struck me as an almost zen idea-You could achieve enlightenment just contemplating that notion.
-LAS VEGAS!- I like to think I'm pretty good at Geography which is why I'm baffled by the fact that there are taxis in this city heading to Las Vegas- at least if the conductor's words are anything to go by (And he's not subtle by any means- 'LAS VEGAS! LAS VEGAS!' is about as subtle as he gets while he calls for passengers) It sounds like a long trip to me. I'd recommend plenty of supplies.
-BUSINESSMEN WHO WIELD THE SWORD OF RIGHTEOUSNESS AND TRUTH- A recent Sunday Times Interview provided an interview with one of Kigali's leading Businessmen. There were too many delights in the interview so a summary wouldnt begin to do it justice, but the introduction alone was worth the price of the paper- the interviewee had apparently been voted 'best truthful Businessman' in the world which-we were informed- came with a trophy. I'm seriously stumped here- language violations aside, does this trophy actually exist? Whats the criteria for winning and being nominated? There's some Alice-in-Wonderland stuff going down there and I for one want to know what it is. Oh and we've also got a Grammy-award winning singer in this country according to the same paper. Now I know Miss Jojo is pretty good, but when the hell did she win a frickin Grammy Award and why wasnt the rest of the country informed? Are we just giving our own artists Grammy Awards without any of them actually receiving any?
-GREATEST LANGUAGES SCHOOL- Apparently this exists somewhere in Kigali although quite which awards it has won to take on such a grand name have sadly not been revealed. Or is it more of a tribute to the languages rather than the School itself?It captures an interesting dilemma. If you want to start up a Languages school in Kigali, what do you do
a) Give it a generic name like KIGALI LANGUAGE SCHOOL and put out posters telling people they can learn English or whatever.
b) Call it GREATEST LANGUAGES SCHOOL and make it sound like a cross between the Oracle of Delphi and a MENSA get-together.
This is Kigali- you go for (b)
-ABC TOILET PAPER- FOR YOUR BEST CHOOSE- Crimes against the English language are legion here, but this still takes the biscuit. For starters, its embazoned on the back of a truck in huge letters and driven by a man who may very well be named Smug MrSmugg on the basis of the oh-so smug grin on his face. He wouldnt be so smug if he knew what we knew.
-KIGALI BOOK CENTER- I saw this sign sometime ago and I dashed in, excited that a new book store had opened. Turns out that there were no books there- computers and stationery yes, but books? None in sight. A bookstore without books struck me as an almost zen idea-You could achieve enlightenment just contemplating that notion.
-LAS VEGAS!- I like to think I'm pretty good at Geography which is why I'm baffled by the fact that there are taxis in this city heading to Las Vegas- at least if the conductor's words are anything to go by (And he's not subtle by any means- 'LAS VEGAS! LAS VEGAS!' is about as subtle as he gets while he calls for passengers) It sounds like a long trip to me. I'd recommend plenty of supplies.
-BUSINESSMEN WHO WIELD THE SWORD OF RIGHTEOUSNESS AND TRUTH- A recent Sunday Times Interview provided an interview with one of Kigali's leading Businessmen. There were too many delights in the interview so a summary wouldnt begin to do it justice, but the introduction alone was worth the price of the paper- the interviewee had apparently been voted 'best truthful Businessman' in the world which-we were informed- came with a trophy. I'm seriously stumped here- language violations aside, does this trophy actually exist? Whats the criteria for winning and being nominated? There's some Alice-in-Wonderland stuff going down there and I for one want to know what it is. Oh and we've also got a Grammy-award winning singer in this country according to the same paper. Now I know Miss Jojo is pretty good, but when the hell did she win a frickin Grammy Award and why wasnt the rest of the country informed? Are we just giving our own artists Grammy Awards without any of them actually receiving any?
posted by Minzo at 4:20 AM
3 Comments:
best truthful businessman int he world, bwahahahahaha! ja, i got a load of that drivel and got to wondering if they hooked the entrants up to lie-detector machines and had each of them walk around all year chained to one!
as for the las vegas matatu... eishness. have you seen that matatu that wonders around town - it has a yellow background and is emblazoned with "T-PAIN" in red, lol! oh, and also "kiss kiss", "buy you a drank" (sic) and other such graffiti.
oh, then there's the wedding procession i saw on saturday with the bridal couple in a convertible... and they had an open van of well-wishers drive ahead of them and drown them in a shower of fake snow. so all this snowflake confetti just everywhere!
man, i love this city. but sometimes i can't help but look around for the hidden candid camera crew...
The world runs on Alice-In-Wonderland stuff.
eh...favourite matatu grafitti thus far: 'down as beach'. we drove behind this for quite sometime pondering the meaning behind such a boldly pronounced yet seemingly meaningless statement. and, eventually, we realized...it's meant to be 'down-ass bitch' (tm ja rule--he whom i never thought i'd 'tm'...sigh). mwahahahahaha.
*note to self: get thee a 'down as beach' t-shirt*
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