Beauty of Africa

sleepy
Originally uploaded by make_change

In between all the reading on technology and development, I stumbled upon this author who felt justified to write a paper on the reasons that there is great wealth here in Africa. He then makes recommendations as to how one should take the riches of Africa and complement it with appropriate development practices. Easier said than done, but I guess it is necessary to repeat it every so often so that one doesn't get stuck in some kind of African pessimism (mainly media-driven) rut.

But I guess I read the article because I suppose I needed to confirm my own observations about this continent.
It is pretty spectacular when you can drive 1 hour away to see 25 lions huddled under the shade of a tree on a hot summer day. Every so often, I get stoked to see some unusual endemic flower in the Cape, crazy cacti like tree from Madagascar (in a botanical garden) and then some bumblebee thing that sniffs out my basil plants.


The patterns of fabric I recently bought in Ghana could break my bank account if I stayed long enough. Technology-wise, the blogs I read are African-based and shooting out novel ideas one cannot even fathom back in Vancouver. This space does not do justice as to the many African researchers I interact with each day who are making incredible contributions to science and development. So this is the flip side of Africa. No wonder it is so hard to leave.