Cross Roads

Last week or thereabouts, i ventured out of my hideout to explore some fresh opportunities for sales and also for work space. The smell of freshly baked goods safely tucked away in my blue branded Manchester United bag along with my Arsenal branded Helmet. A contrast of sorts in an age of sports betting. The first meeting (Kanjokya Rd.) went well...managed a little bit of activity on the sales front as well as well as some fresh blogs. The choice pieces of chocolate cake safely tucked away by the enterprising youth. As i prepared to leave, something about the darkness in the corridor led me to use the stairs instead of the elevator or lift if you have a leaning towards England. When i got to the ground floor there was a mixture of humor (common in these circles) and distress as one employee struggled to get out of an elevator stuck half-way between two floors. Another quick attempt to market my merchandise and then a mad dash towards yet another event slated for Ham Towers.  A few ...

Today in an act of what some refer to as serendipity, I attended an event that was supposed to be an information session for women. The event is designed to women to get involved with technology and is put together in collaboration with google. Like other similar drives such as the ones that were organized by the Makerere University, and sponsored by the Carnegie Mellon Trust, this push is an attempt to get more young women involved in technology related fields. Back in the day when I was part of the Cisco Academy, I remember that Young Women were offered scholarships to study technology related fields. Th bulk of the information regarding this internship or training is available on the OutBox Hub Page. The Lead Richard Zulu talked about various aspects of the program and was keen to extract as much information from the young ladies as to what hinders them from participating in similar technology driven encounters. As one of the only guys in attendance, I had two major questio...

While some have often criticized Big hat for not being a man of any particular faith, there are some hints into his thinking especially the title of his book:Mustard Seed. The book in my view is rather refreshing and it contains the thoughts of a man who will not necessarily bend to the will of powerful faith lobbies and colonialists but is brave enough to present his reasons for his doubts and fears. A little seed (which also happens to fall under the Kingdom Parables along with that of the leven or yeast) whose size says nothing about what it can produce if it finds itself in the right place. So in this case he represents faith. An act of belief that allows a person to take on as truth those things which he cannot see. The touted top contender of his post. Mr. Grace on the other hand, seems to represent as his name says what we refer to as unmerited favor. The section of scripture describes an aspect of God that appears to all men and that plays the role of a te...

A few years ago, a writer penned a rather popular book which he titled Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus. I suppose the idea behind the book was to help shed some light on the differences between men and women. My concern though is that there may be a little bit more to this statement and the title of the book than meets the eye-the possibility of a greater reality. Over the last few years i have sat on a side lines of a simmering battle between the sexes. This battle has taken on various forms but has recently gotten more complex and more visible and perhaps even invaded the sphere of politics. In the book of Genesis the serpent had a confrontation with the woman and as a result a rivalry was born that was predicted to last all of eternity. "I will put enmity between your seed and her seed...you will bruise his heel and she (he seed) will crush your head". So the quest to solve the mystery began, first to find the identity of the fruit that cau...

This past week i attended an event by the Angels Hub. It was a business meet up which was designed to introduce young students to some new ideas in investment. As such there was a good choice of panelists The few people i spoke to helped shed some light to some of the changes that have taken place at the Angles hub including mergers or agreements with Mara Launchpad. The moderator was a dynamic young man whose apparent knowledge of his subject helped steer the ship into its direction while constantly reminding us to identify business opportunities and glean knowledge from those that had been given the platform to speak. The First a representative from National Agricultural Research Organization, The Second a representative from the Stanbic Bank, The Third a young business man with a car hire company, The Fourth a representative from the Presidents Office (in for a representative from Ministry of Finance). The First Speaker gave us Experience and some ideas abou...

At the hopefirstgroup and alertconsulting (http://alertconsulting.net/) we have created a course on the management of conflict (http://learn.alertconsulting.net/)in this regard, we have created the bulk of our material from a local library (impressive in it's size and quality). This week we are examining the life of Machiavelli as he makes a strange comeback. Primary source of material points to his relevance in our day and the tough decisions that politicians must make to GAIN, CONSOLIDATE and KEEP POWER. The Microsoft Encarta Premium Describes a few key areas that give some structure to the book. It is useful to realize that the book was written as a guide book for a ruling family in Rome and designed to help the current family understand clearly the link between the present day leader and his circumstances and the direct link to leadership. 1. Leave nothing to chance. Use of strategy in the rise to power. 2. Organize your military and keep them in check. If possible...

Sun Tzu Wu was a native of the Ch`i State. His ART OF WAR brought him to the notice of Ho Lu, [2] King of Wu. Ho Lu said to him: "I have carefully perused your 13 chapters. May I submit your theory of managing soldiers to a slight test?" Sun Tzu replied: "You may." Ho Lu asked: "May the test be applied to women?" The answer was again in the affirmative, so arrangements were made to bring 180 ladies out of the Palace. Sun Tzu divided them into two companies, and placed one of the King's favorite concubines at the head of each. He then bade them all take spears in their hands, and addressed them thus: "I presume you know the difference between front and back, right hand and left hand?" The girls replied: Yes. Sun Tzu went on: "When I say "Eyes front," you must look straight ahead. When I say "Left turn," you must face towards your left hand. When I say "Right turn," you must face towards your right hand. When ...

An army is made up of many distinctive units. Each of those units has a unique purpose and function. If each of these perform as they are required then the better part of the battle is guaranteed. If all things remain constant. Government funded contracts and projects are assigned primarily on merit and trust. The best way to achieve both is to stand up and be counted which is what many of our politicians have done. The benefits of being in office are many one of which is access to influence and the possibility of work. You will find that most of the visible faces therefore have the can keys to quite a measure of funds. This inevitably means that companies will also start whose founders will invariably also be members of parliament and cabinet ministers. If the choice is made to establish an organization instead, it will also probably have at its helm one of the aforementioned. The challenge then for opposition members is that without a link to the ruling party, money will tend...

The past two weeks have been a roller coaster of sorts and we have had a lot of back and forth between our major donors and the core of the government. Two bills have driven the debate on aid and both deal indirectly with the question of human sexuality. The Americans have considered a revision of the aid to Uganda and there has been no shortage of threats and counter threats from both sides. Uganda has produced its own champions in the Aid and Trade debate Andrew Mwenda (Independent and Formerly Monitor) who took on Bono as well as Andrew Rugasira (Good Africa Coffee) who makes a strong argument for trade versus Aid. Maybe what we are experiencing is the revival of a concept formerly mentioned in Mustard Seed in which Big Hat mentioned the term 'Okugururika' or surprise attack which in his book (and in Ankole Culture), is often frowned upon. The confidence/arrogance of a people who prefer frontal attacks. Perhaps an aspect of Ankole culture has crept into the Internal A...

When one of the most popular U.S presidents was in power, the nation went through a split that threatened the union and that forced brothers to face each other on the war front. In addition to this, men that had sat under the tutelage of the same masters were forced into opposing sides at the helm of their respective armies as generals. There are some similarities between Uganda, U.S.A, Poland and Post War East and West Germany and Burma. The level of surveillance was so intense and so ingrained into the populace that family members often looked at each other with suspicion and fear and moral compasses were ruined. What this meant was that men and women, out of fear of being watched often resorted to false identities and dual meanings as a means of communicating and living (or surviving). There is a family which seems to summarize this dilemma. Historic stalwart Sam Njuba and Getrude Njuba the former a key player Forum For Democratic Change while the latter a member of National Resist...

You know how in the underworld movie, there is a species of bat and a species of wolf? And then in between there is a hero who is a hybrid of both and is supposed to help make a difference? Well maybe that is a summary of the battle between the races. Perhaps this is the role that the half-caste plays as a mediator between the races. And it kind of makes sense given the nature of things and the rise of B.H.O! It is a safe position from which i can launch criticism for the races. Nothing particularly pretty about bats and beasts. And the possibility of finding an in between that merges the interests of both and that can provide a sense of redemption. This week i got the sense that we were still in one of those pre-revolutionary war days. England was launching an assault on the U.S and attempting to flex her muscle to rein in an old rebel. This time, though the race card was used in Hollywood. How you ask? Well by presenting an Oscar to a non-African American director and actress...and t...

Your modem is like your phone. They are both assigned a physical device address as well as a virtual address that depends on the network through which calls are routed. Both devices come with sim cards that are supposed to help connect you to your provider. There are times when your competitive market might cause you to test out other networks. The way this works is often, phone service providers negotiate deals with hardware people which often mean that users are tied down to single networks and hand sets. Use your search engine to find out "how to unlock your gprs USB stick" and test out some of the option that are provided. There are tools available that will allow you to use your modem on more than one provider. This will allow you to find out if your modem is really running at 2Mbps or more.  These same tools are available for those who purchase cheaper phones but feel like they need to use those cheaper phones on more than one network. What you usually need in this rega...

If you are in the linux environment, try to set up a dual boot of both ubuntu and your favorite windows system. Then carry out a search on the software that is recommended for each side and then go thorough the download process. You will find that Ubuntu manages software in a slightly different manner...which in my view is a little better because you can manage downloads and upgrades. You might find it rather difficult to process some functions such as the addition of devices like Ipads and ipods, but make sure for this case, that you get the libraries for specific devices (libdevicemobile). This will allow your music software to talk to your devices. Also make sure that you have all the tools you need to access music and video (plugins). These can be downloaded on mass or individually.   

There was a time when two sons, possibly twins (one conception two births) had a fight. The two had different callings. One was a herdsman while the other was a cultivator (a tiller of the land). Back in the day, the blessings of the not so visible God (after eviction from Eden) were bestowed on men in the form of sacrifices. Herdsman would bring an animal and offer it while the Cultivator would present a portion of his produce for the same purpose. For some reason one offering was deemed more acceptable than another and from that time onwards, something went wrong. The calling of the first son meant that he had to find a way of feeding his animals and domesticating them. The second son had to depend on the land for cultivation and the promise of rain. Today a couple of centuries later, another set of cultivators is competing for power with a group of herdsmen. And maybe just maybe they are not really competing for power as much as they are for approval. There are some universal challe...