buildingmarkets-blog

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om nom!

my body is ready

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Wishing success to Myanmar’s first Literary festival after years of censorship and smothered freedoms! All best to all the writers and readers!

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Here, have an 'adults doing kid stuff is awesome' - Kabul workers on a playground.  via Play by Design

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Loooove the shots of entrepreneurs!

Liberia

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Winter cold is setting in in Afghanistan - not good news for IDPs and refugees without access to heat and other services.

Internally displaced Afghan children wait for winter relief assistance from the UN refugee agency at a camp in Kabul. Photograph: Musadeq Sadeq/AP

UN appeals for Afghan refugee aid as harsh winter proves deadly

The deadly struggle with Afghanistan’s bitter winter is only likely to get worse in the coming years, a top UN official warned, as he called for more aid money to be dedicated to emergency relief.

At least two children are already reported to have died from the cold this year in Kabul’s makeshift refugee camps, crammed with tens of thousands of Afghans who have fled violence or desperate poverty, despite a drive by aid groups to prepare for sub-zero temperatures.

“Each family already has two or three people who are sick,” said 77-year-old Shah Ghasi, who has squatted in the Bagh Dawood camp on the outskirts of Kabul for nearly a decade. “We only have hot water to try and keep warm – no stoves, no fuel.”

Last year the bitterest winter in decades caught the country by surprise, and more than 100 children died in the cramped and squalid camps around Kabul. This year there has been a more organised effort to get food, blankets, fuel and medicine to people who sometimes have little more than a sheet of plastic to shelter them from snow and ice.(more…)

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Fields in Khazget, Badakhshan, Afghanistan

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“Many young people will go abroad, maybe travel to African countries; what would you advice people who wish to do good in places that aren’t really their own places?’” __ If you even think you have the solution, keep it to yourself and seek the counsel of people. You may just hear your solution in someone’s voice. If you go into communities and think you’re going to change them, you’ve already failed before stepping on a flight. Go into communities with an open mind. Learn from local people and never go in with an arrogance of ‘I know’, because you’ll be setting yourself up for failure. If you go as a doctor and think you know the solutions to malaria, ask people. They will give you few more solutions to add. Don’t set yourself up for failure. People will read you, your talks and give you what they think you want to hear. Go, with an attitude of learning.

Leymah Gbowee, African peace advocate (youtube podcast)

Agreed - we need far more humility from international volunteers and around volunteer messaging and communications.

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Great pic!

…Traditional music Instruments shop in Kabul… #Kabul #Afghanistan #music #rubab #indie #capital #city

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'First' Afghan female rapper seeks reason with rhymes

KABUL: Sporting a long leather coat and western jeans under a headscarf, Soosan Feroz looks like many modern women in Kabul.

But she is a surprising new phenomenon in this conservative country – the nation’s first female rapper.

Her lyrics though are not unfamiliar for many of her fellow countrywomen – she raps of rape, abuse and atrocities that Afghan women have endured during decades of war in a country gripped by poverty.

“My raps are about the sufferings of women in my country, the pains of the war that we have endured and the atrocities of the war,” Feroz told AFP in an interview in the office of a local company that is helping her record her first album, between local performances including at the US embassy in Kabul.

Like most fellow Afghans, the 23-year-old says her life is filled with bitterness – memories of war, bombing and a life at refugee camps in neighboring Iran and Pakistan.

She was taken to Pakistan as a child by her parents and later to Iran, escaping a bloody civil war at home in 1990s.

Two years after the 2001 US-led invasion of her war-scarred nation that toppled the Taliban, the then-teenager returned home with her family.

She worked as a carpet weaver with her other siblings for a living until she discovered her new talent.

Told that rap and hip hop had become a way for many artists around the world to express daily hardships in their lives, Feroz says: “If rap singing is a way to tell your miseries, Afghans have a lot to say.

“That’s why I chose to be a rapper.”

She recalls her woes at Iranian refugee camps in her first recorded piece of music, “Our neighbours”, which has been posted on Youtube and viewed nearly 100,000 times:

“What happened to us in the neighbouring country?

“We became ‘the dirty Afghan’

“At their bakeries we were pushed at the back of the queue.”

The lyrics are borne from personal experience, Feroz said. “As a child when I was going to bring bread from our neighbourhood bakery, the Iranians would tell me, ‘go back, you dirty Afghan’.

“I would be the last one in the line to get my bread,” she said.

Millions of Afghans still live in Iran and Pakistan, which together hosted about seven million refugees after the former Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979.

Feroz was too young to remember the bloody battles of the 1980s between the Russian soldiers and freedom fighters known as mujahedin but her first song is full of war tales, with one line proclaiming: “We went to Europe for a better life (but) in refugee camps we rotted.”

Thousands of Afghans put their lives on the line every year to reach Europe through dangerous and illegal routes on land and sea. Those who make it often spend years in isolated refugee camps.

Afghan pop star Farid Rastagar has offered to help the young artist release an album, the first song of which will be released in January.

One of the songs is called “Naqisul Aql” which can be translated as “deficient-in-mind” – a common belief about women among Afghan men.

“In this rap, she sings about the miseries of the women in Afghanistan, about abuses and wrong beliefs that still exists about women,” Rastagar told AFP.

Afghan women have made some progress since the fall of the Taliban but many still suffer horrific abuse including so-called ‘honour killings” for percieved sexual disobedience.

Feroz, the daughter of a former civil servant and an illiterate housewife who remarkably let their daughter sing, has already made scores of enemies not only among conservatives but within her own family.

After releasing her first song on the internet, Feroz’s uncles and their families have shunned her, accusing her of bringing shame on them.

Others, mostly anonymous callers, have threatened to kill her.

“What’s my fault?” she asks. “I always receive phone calls from unknown men who say I’m a bad girl and they will kill me,” she says, her dark eyes welling with tears.

Sitting next to her is her father, Abdul Ghafaar Feroz, who says he prides himself on being her “personal secretary”.

“I’m not deterred,” Feroz said, her father nodding his head in agreement. “Somebody had to start this, I did and I don’t regret it and I will continue. I want to be the voice of women in my country.”

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Great shot!

West Point, Monrovia, Liberia

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We hope you had a restful and joyous  New Year! Our project is going well and we’re excited – and to that end, here are some recent stories of Afghanistan, human rights, and markets in the news. Let us know of any interesting or relevant articles or pieces you see in your reading travels!

Shopkeepers and businesspeople affected by the fire at Kabul’s Mandawi (main commercial district) are exempt from tax for the next 4 years – Wadsam Afghan News Business Portal

What’s at stake for Afghan women – Gayle Tzemach Lemmon for CNN

Another Afghan Buddhist archeological site is threatened because it sits on top of a copper mine – NYT

Afghan government raising tariffs on imported fruit juices in a move to protect local production – Wadsam Afghan News Business Portal

A beautiful set of photos of Afghan landscapes – Warkadang on Tumblr

Bleak humanitarian outlook for 2013 in Afghanistan – IRIN

Afghan refugees living in Kabul battle deadly cold as winter sets in – NYT

Great photos from a press conference of the Afghanistan Forum for Electoral Reforms – Thru Afghan Eyes

Insight: Once a symbol of new Afghanistan, can policewomen survive? – Reuters

Energy Drinks Take Afghanistan By Storm – Radio Free Europe

Top Human Rights stories on Twitter in 2012 – HRW

Long road ahead for Afghan women – Heather Barr for HRW

(Photo credit to Frédéric Lagrange: “The grasslands that surround Lake Chaqmaqtin, Afghanistna, sustain herds of goat, sheep, and yak.”)

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A+ satire.

Africa for Norway. Amazing.

The video is humorous, but there is a serious message. The point is that images of helpless Africans are just as inaccurate as the idea of helpless freezing Norwegians. A lot of Africans cannot relate to the patronizing videos and development initiatives.

The organization says it has certain goals with the video. Among them, that fundraising “should not be based on exploiting stereotypes” and that media should have more respect in portraying suffering children.

“We want to see more nuances,” it writes on its website. “We want to know about positive developments in Africa and developing countries, not only about crises, poverty and AIDS. We need more attention on how western countries have a negative impact on developing countries.”

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She knew her voice was important, so she spoke up for the rights of children. Even adults didn’t have a vision like hers.

Malala Yousafzai, the brave fourteen-year-old girl who wrote about the Taliban’s ban on girls’ education, is in critical condition after surgery. She risked her life to send the world the message that every girl deserves an education. Let’s honor Malala today by amplifying her voice. (via halftheskymovement)

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We're Hiring!

We have positions available in Ottawa, New York, Yangon, and Monrovia - apply now!

Of particular note is the open position of Executive Assistant to the CEO, otherwise known as The Worst Job in Ottawa. As Scott himself says,

“Let’s be frank. It’s a hard job. You need to stare at me across a desk all day. I have Al Jazeera blaring on the office TV, and I often throw nerf balls when asking staff questions. I’ll wake you up at 2 am on a Sunday to ask you why I am in Capetown and where my next meeting is. You work late completing expense claims that are largely composed of beer coasters and ticket stubs. And not only will I forget your birthday, but I’ll then send you out to buy a “Sorry I forgot your birthday” card.”

However,

“It’s not all bad. After an intense period of shock and dislike, most staff enter an extended phase of mild annoyance. Several of my EAs have gone on to great jobs at Building Markets and are now working in Afghanistan, New York, and Burma.”

So if you are organized, clever, don’t mind googling random Emma Watson facts, and have available mornings in Ottawa, please consider applying. (And yes, before you ask, we’re serious about the Betty v. Veronica question.)