What can ( various type of ) Brown do for you ?

For Halloween, I wanted to dress up as Aasif "I am tech "support/cardiologist" brown" Mandvi from the daily show. Unfortunately, that stupid thing called work got in the way.
Anyway, here is the sketch on immigration law in the US. Enjoy the skit, I believe these guys will. :D.
Happy Halloween !

Ny tanin-dRamano (Lolo sy ny tariny)

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If this is what it means to win a Nobel prize....

I feel obligated to rant quickly about a Nobel Prize recipient: (no, this is not about Al Gore 's C02 inprint thanks to his private jet, sorry to disappoint)
Our "godfather of molecular biology" James Watson, co-discoverer with Crick of the DNA structure and Nobel prize winner in 1962 apparently said this piece of nugget:

He says that he is "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – whereas all the testing says not really," and I know that this "hot potato" is going to be difficult to address. His hope is that everyone is equal, but he counters that "people who have to deal with black employees find this not true." He says that you should not discriminate on the basis of colour, because "there are many people of colour who are very talented, but don’t promote them when they haven’t succeeded at the lower level.

Thank you Mr. Watson for acknowledging that "there are many people of color who are very talented". You are truly too kind. Would like me to add some sugar to your cup of ignorant tea ? Watson is just another "brilliant" mind who bases his conclusions on IQ tests that are inherently culturally biased. ( before you retort that they are not, any of those tests are written in Malagasy ? I did not think so..and remember Those are the same brilliant folks who wrote "IQ of the nations" and decided that Madagascar had an IQ of 79 by doing the average of Philippines and Tanzania. Why ? You tell me, apparently it is common knowledge that if you have a 1/2 Philippino 1/2 Tanzanian child is de facto Malagasy :D...sorry I digress...)
This is not Watson 1st nugget either: he reportedly said that In 1997, "that a woman should have the right to abort her unborn child if tests could determine it would be homosexual."

The question that comes to mind is simple: is there a point where someone says something so mindbogglingly ignorant that we could "un-award" their prior achievements no matter how groundbreaking those achievements were ?

Was the discovery of DNA structure absolute genius ? Absolutely (caveat: apparently a 3rd women scientist may deserve as much accolade for this but did not get the prize). Is it crucial for understanding molecular biology as it is now ? No Doubt. Would I be doing what I do now without his findings ? Probably Not.
Yet, I would love for the Nobel Prize committee to put the dreaded * next to his award. The * would stand for "The person is a great scientist but he lacks basic common sense".
At your workplace , if you behave like a douchebag, regardless of your performance, there is good chance you will get fired. Athletes are getting cut out of their contracts by their team for damaging the image of a team publicly by acting like idiots. Did Watson with his comments not damage the scientific community? Did he not knowingly spite the community that honored him by doubting the intelligence of minorities who have helped him get his Nobel award ?
If you are an aspiring black scientist, would you not feel a bit uncomfortable reading those comments ?
"Do not promote them if they have not succeeded at a lower level". Am I supposed to think that if not for an act of kindness from the scientific community, I do not deserve to be a scientist ? Watson is supposed to be one of the leader of a community that ought to function solely on the bases of logic and reasoning. That statement was based on skewed and imcomplete data, led to the wort possible conclusions and he above all should have known better. I know that geniuses are often lacking in common sense but should that not be pointed out more forcefully if it is the case ?
Watson may have help Science spring forward with his part in the discovery of the structure but he set the community back a couple of years with his foolish comments.

Oct. 17th: Ranomafana/ Kelilalina vs Poverty

a new football: $0
candles for vigil: $0
repaired water pump: $0
Notebooks and pens: $0

Playing together and standing up against hardship: priceless

Click here for more photos and reports on Foko activities on the international day to overcome poverty.

Blog Action Day: GW still a controversy ?

"Let us be honest about the intellectual culture of America in general: It has become almost impossible to have an intelligent discussion about anything.
Everything is a war now. This is the age of lethal verbal combat, where even scientific issues involving measurements and molecules are somehow supernaturally polarizing. The controversy about global warming resides all too perfectly at the collision point of environmentalism and free market capitalism. It's bound to be not only politicized but twisted, mangled and beaten senseless in the process..."

( Joel Achenbach Sunday, May 28, 2006; Washington Post)
While the experts debate the impact of man on Global Warming, let us plant a tree or 2, just in case...
I am no climatologist but I know for a fact that my allergy episodes kicked up a notch the past 3 summers ( pollen analysis as evidence for climate change) .... and with such priceless information, it's probably better if I don't talk for a while.

NY times articles about Madagascar and Congo: media bias ?

(Photo credit to Lynsey Addario for The New York Times)

I admit it. I have a selective perspective when it comes to news coming from Africa in the media. Because of my work, I have to stay informed with the recent up to date with news related to healthcare and AIDS but I'd really rather not read about it. It's not difficult to understand why.

Let's imagine this scenario: you are a WWII war French veteran, you were captured and made prisoner of war, then you escaped and join the resistance. Decades later, you move to the United States where for some reasons, being French is synonymous to surrendering, waving the white flag.

At first, you would smile at the senselessness of the " surrender monkey" jokes and you would try to understand how such misconception came about. You would try to explain to people why this is an incorrect stereotyping of History and French people in general, and that it is rather disrespectful of the spirit of the memory of your friends who died in the Resistance.
You would soon understand that it is not in the interest of most people in the media here to portray France in a truthful manner. It does not appeal to the general public and most people would still remind you that you indeed surrendered to the German army and needed their army to free your country. You might grow tired of trying to explain the ineptitude of such stereotyping (although blogs like superfenchie and miquelon must be applauded for not giving up) .

Eventually you would find yourself rejoiced beyond reason that the national rugby team showed the world than there is no surrender in the French spirit. After the feeling of bittersweet redemption:( "yes, we showed them ! Surrender monkey, my a...") you come to wonder how you ended up feeling so strongly about the way people may (erroneously) perceive you.

Now, certainly the perception of Africa and France in the world is as different as can be but I feel the same kind of frustration when I read news about home in the media. Poverty, epidemics, helplessness....the list goes on and on....

As much as I try to tell people that there is so much more to Madagascar and Africa than what the media shows, I am growing tired of explaining that it is also a land of opportunities and hope, not in the future but right now.

I am certainly not denying that some issues needs most urgent attention ,(heck that is my job after all) but once in a while, I would like for the work of the people in the fields to be acknowledged with more emphasis . To keep with the far-fetched metaphor, there are also pocket of resistance back home, people who do not accept the fatality of poverty and illness.
It would go a long way in the change of outlook about Africa if more lights were shed on the positive progress and less on the extend of the desolation.

However, today I will make an exception to my volontary bias. I will not discuss the latest positive development in Africa.
Why ? Because, sometimes, I need a wake-up call. Because things are not OK. because some issues need more exposure, more outrage.

(photos credits to Hazel Thompson for The New York Times)

Two articles in the NYT discuss sexual violences in Africa, a recent one in Congo and an older one about Madagascar (it is now available for free so I am linking to it).
Here are a few excerpts from these articles:
In Antananarivo:

"girls as young as 5 are expected to confront their tormentors face to face. Perhaps most daunting, poor families must produce at least $15 to cover investigation costs like gloves and paper for medical exams. That was nearly enough to deter Claudine Ravoniarisoa, who appeared at Mr. Mouigni’s station one recent Thursday with her 15-year-old daughter. Wringing her hands nonstop, the girl told officers that a neighbor had raped her while her mother was hospitalized...“We had to do it,” said her mother, who said that everyone in her village knew about the case and asked that her daughter’s name and picture be used. “Everybody should be aware that things like this should not happen to children.”"

A more recent article talks about the rape epidemic in Congo:

"...in one town, Shabunda, 70 percent of the women reported being sexually brutalized...At Panzi Hospital, where Dr. Mukwege performs as many as six rape-related surgeries a day, bed after bed is filled with women lying on their backs, staring at the ceiling, with colostomy bags hanging next to them because of all the internal damage."

Portraying Africa under a positive light is a noble cause for it strives to give a more balance picture of the reality there. However, until we are significantly able to reduce the suffering of our own women and children, we are disrespecting their pain by not acknowledging the situation that some of them are currently in.

Intriguing (and intrigued) visitor

Isn't that quite a sight ? :D
You would think that the CIA would have upgraded to IE 7.0 (or even firefox 2.0) :D by now and find a way to block sitemeter from detecting their server.....
Anyway, my honorable visitor spent 25 minutes here and read 11 pages, I am flattered and also a bit scared :) ( But as they say back home, "Lama fotsiny ela ry zandry!"
My curious reader landed first on this humorous post about our honorable president Ra8 and president Bush's attempt at pronouncing his name.
I hope he liked the idea of Ravalo-man as our Malgasy version of a comic book superhero :D ( I kid, I kid ) and that he did not think too much of the Iranian president photo on the previous post :D.
It reminds me that it is never a good idea to blog while drinking.
Kids, don't blog and drink !