New Nations for the 2010s

Sept 25, 2012


The New York Times has published an interesting interactive page about potential new nations. I hadn’t heard, for instance, that “at least a half-dozen Tuareg rebellions in the past century predate the recent declaration of Azawad as an independent state in Mali’s vast northern Sahara territory.” 

But it’s been a while since I paid any attention to any TPLACs of that part of the continent, and of course the conflict seems to be fairly byzantine. The odd thing about modern African borders, which were colonial impositions anyway, is that they’ve (mostly) lasted this long.

The one about China biting off a chunk of Siberia (#10) seems far-fetched. Sure, Moscow is far away, and the Russian state isn’t quite what it used to be. But I’d guess that any formal territorial grabs – as opposed to the informal kinds – would awaken the bear pretty quickly, and the bear would be in a vodka-besotted fury.

Interesting to note that none of the posited new nations are in the Western Hemisphere, so maybe the NYT thinks that Quebec’s secession isn’t too likely. This doesn’t involve a new nation, but I learned the other day that Bolivia has finally regained its access to the ocean, sort of.

Lost Mail

This weekend, Friday especially, was cold payback for the temporary summer we experienced last month. Even sunny skies today didn't make the air that warm. But it will warm up again soon, so essentially what we're feeling is a normal April. Except we're seeing May in terms of greenery.

On Saturday I received Ed's postcard from Kenya (see last Wednesday), which arrived after the one from Uganda, even though he says it was mailed earlier. Odd time we live in, when you can communicate electronically to tell someone the specifics of a paper communication that's still en route.

But at least Ed's Kenya card did not disappear down the international mail memory hole. When I was in college, a friend of mine took an early summer trip to the Soviet Union. Thirty years later I'm still waiting for the postcard she said she sent me from there. Afterwards she told me that about half of them got through. I thought of her in Russia a decade later when mailing cards in St. Petersburg, but as far as I know, all of those made their trips successfully (unfortunately I didn't have her address at that point, or I would have sent her a card).

While mulling on the subject of missing mail, I followed a whim and Googled "Titanic mail," and sure enough an article published 20 years ago by the National Postal Museum came up: "Titanic's Mail," it's called. Oddly enough. From it I learned that 7 million pieces of mail, including about $150,000 in postal money orders (in fat, 1912 dollars), went down with the ship, along with five postal clerks, who apparently spent their last hours trying to bring mail sacks out the bowels of the ship. Now there's a story that no big-budget boy-meets-girl-boy-freezes-in-the-north-Altantic movie is going to tell.

Word From Uganda

This week I got more mail from Uganda than I've ever gotten during the rest of my life so far. Both pieces were from Ed, of course.

Ed actually mailed the letter from his home base in Washington state, but he'd acquired the envelope at the Paraa Safari Lodge at Murchison Falls. The postcard, on the other hand, was mailed in Uganda. It pictures Murchison Falls.

"The River Nile, on its journey from its source at Lake Victoria to join Lake Albert -- here it is suddenly channeled into a gorge only six meters wide, and cascades 43 meters below," explains the Paraa Lodge web site. Cool.

The stamps on the card inspired me to check up on Ugandan currency, since I couldn't remember what they use. Shillings (Ush). Good for them. One stamp is Ush 1,200, the other Ush 700, for a total of 1,900 shillings postage. According to XE.com, it's very nearly 2,500 shillings to the U.S. dollar, so that's not so bad to mail a card from the Pearl of Africa to the heart of darkest North America.

One stamp depicts the Bell's Hinged Tortoise, the other the Rastrinebola agentea fish, no common name given. But Wiki tells me that, as a denizen of Lake Victoria, it's "local names are omena (Kenya), dagaa (Tanzania) and mukene (Uganda)," and I'll go along with that.

The "Zou Bisou Bisou" Tangent

I'm surprised that Lionsgate or AMC, in a fit of copyrighteousness, hasn't quashed this high-quality clip of Megan Draper (Jessica Paré) dancing to "Zou Bisou Bisou," which was a high point of Mad Men's season premiere in late March. Who knows, maybe they've figured out that clips like this will inspire people to seek out the entire episode. You know, as a kind of marketing.

Like most of the audience, I'd never heard of "Zou Bisou Bisou" before seeing the episode, not being as interested in mid-century French pop culture as Matthew Weiner seems to be. But it's a charming song, light and sweet as meringue. Also, it took me on a tangent. I'm often willing to be taken on tangents, which can be little trips from the routine of settled life. First, I went to the Gillian Hills version of the song, the video of which must have been made for the French Scopitones.

Proceeding from that, I learned that nearly 10 years later Gillian Hills was one of the girls with the ice lollies in A Clockwork Orange, and that her father was Denis Hills. They don't make 'em like him any more. Once I started reading about the elder Hills, I remembered where I'd heard of him before.

In 1975, he ran afoul of Idi Amin, who threatened to execute Hills for writing disparaging things about the Conqueror of the British Empire -- foolishly writing them, as Hills was still in Uganda at the time. A wrangle between the UK and Uganda followed, and eventually a message from Queen Elizabeth herself, which presumably stoked the dictator's vanity, persuaded Amin to spring Hills. All of this played out in news reports that year, which I remember hearing (that was also the year Franco died so slowly).

The Code for Efik is 144

I have on my desk a "Student Master Enrollment Form" that I need to complete to register Lilly for high school next year. In fact, I've already completed it. I just need to return it to the school, which I'll call Schleswig-Holstein High.

Some of the answer boxes require codes, including for language spoken at home. A helpful list of the three-numeral codes is on a separate sheet, listing 165 human languages out of the what -- 6,000? -- that are still in use worldwide (a dwindling number, I understand). The English code is 000, for example. Japanese is 011. Esperanto isn't on the list, but that's expecting eccentricity from a standard form, and that isn't going to happen.

I ran down the list to see how many languages I'd heard of. That is, the number I could associate with some part of the world or some group of speakers. That number is 112, including only those I'm completely sure of, though there were others I could guess at. Not bad, but I'm shockingly ignorant of many -- I'm guessing here -- African languages, the lesser-known languages of China, and maybe some stray Filipino tongues, with something from the diverse language stock of Papua New Guinea thrown in.

Efik, for instance, which is spoken by people who "inhabit the coastal area of South Eastern Nigeria and are very well known nationally and internationally partly because of the prominence of Calabar in Nigerian history and also due to their rich cultural heritage," according to the web site of Nka Ikem Esit, which says it's "dedicated to the provision of services that contribute to the socio-economic development of the peoples of Calabar (Nigeria), and minorities in the Washington DC Metropolitan Area."

I think "well known.. internationally" is a bit of a stretch, but then again part of the art of self-promotion is claiming you're already well known. From that web site, I also learn that "the Obong of Calabar is a democratic monarch, the paramount traditional head of the Efiks and the protector of the Efik tradition." Now that's a title, the Obong of Calabar. Apparently there was some kind of crisis in the mid-2000s regarding who would be obong, though the current title-holder seems to be Edidem Ekpo Okon Abasi Otu V.

I could pursue more information about that subject by going down the rabbit-hole of the Internet, but there's only so far I want to take this tangent. Still, it's remarkable where a standard form can lead you, if you're inclined to follow.

Ex Africa Semper Aliquid Novi

This is an interesting graphic. But what's the point? Africa's big all right. Number two after Asia in the all-continent square mile/square kilometer challenge. Everyone ought to know that, though I'm sure many people don't.

But if suddenly everyone in the world knew how big Africa is in the scheme of continents, it would follow that -- what? Africa would be held in higher regard because it's so big?

What would the graphic mean if, instead of the U.S., China, India and various European countries, you put in Canada and Russia? Africa's roughly 11,730,000 sq. mi.; Russia measures about 6,601,000 sq. mi.; and Canada comes in at 3,855,000 sq. mi. or so. That is, Russia and Canada would be short of filling up Africa by a Chad or Mali or the like.

This too is an interesting map, courtesy that endlessly interesting blog, Strange Maps. The numbers are a little old now, but the comparisons are probably still apt. Illinois' budget problems have been compared to Greece or Ireland, which might be appropriate in terms of relative debt load, but simply in terms of GDP, the state's failure would be more like an implosion of Mexico. Also remarkable is that, after decades of decline, Michigan still has an Argentine-sized economy.

The New Nation of Bob?

At about midday today I found myself wondering what the new nation carved out of southern Sudan is going to be called. That's the kind of thing that a longstanding fascination with political geography will make you think about. When I was young, I was so taken with our copy of Historical Atlas of the World and its maps that the book eventually fell apart. Sometime in the 1990s, I bought a reprint of it (which wasn't updated: the editorial cutoff remained about 1970) that I still peruse from time to time, for the sheer aesthetics, enough though the Internet offers the likes of this and this and much more.

I'm fairly good at dating old globes, too, a skill I wish paid something. There are plenty of giveaways. If I didn't know the globe we have around the house was almost new when I bought it in the late '90s, I'd know it was post-Eritrean independence (1993) but pre-Nanavut (1999). More exactly, Hong Kong has no colonial designation on it, but Macao still says "Port." So that pins the globe down to between the handing over of HK on July 1, 1997, and the creation of Nanavut on April 1, 1999 (Macao was Portuguese until December 20, 1999).

I keep a couple of older globes out in our garage -- who could stand throwing away a globe? -- including one made after the reunification of Germany but before the dissolution of the Soviet Union, a fairly tight window from late 1990 through 1991. The other one is older: it still has a divided Vietnam, and Angola and Mozambique as "Port." (both pre-1975) but also East Pakistan, which would put it pre-1971. But that globe, a lovely 12-inch "Land and Sea" Replogle, isn't old enough to include the likes of French West Africa. Closing the window a little further, it does sport Afars & Issas, which had been French Somaliland until 1967 (and became independent Djibouti in 1977).

A favorite of mine to find on an old globe -- and I have seen it, though I don't own one -- is the Central African Empire (1976-79), created by one Jean-Bédel Bokassa, or Emperor Bokassa I, who apparently decided that being a tinpot president-for-life of the Central African Republic wasn't grand enough. Wiki tells me that his full title was Empereur de Centrafrique par la volonté du peuple Centrafricain, uni au sein du parti politique national, le MESAN ("Emperor of Central Africa by the will of the Central African people, united within the national political party, the MESAN").

The reason southern Sudan came to mind is that I heard part of a radio show discussing the southern Sudanese independence vote. They didn't say anything about the name. The information on the official web site of the government of Southern Sudan (GOSS, which sounds like an organization trying to kill James Bond) makes me think it will be "Southern Sudan." I suppose it's their business, but couldn't they come up with something more interesting? "Equitoria" is still kicking around. Or maybe "Bob."

Carl E. Akeley, Taxidermist and More

"Sue" is probably the most famous item the Field Museum has. The display says it's the most complete T. Rex skeleton anywhere, displayed in the main hall (the Stanley Field Hall) of the museum. Oddly, the skull in the main hall, attached to the rest of the skeleton, is a replica, with the actual headbone one story up as the centerpiece of its own display.

The signs claim the head is too heavy to attach to the skeleton. But couldn't it be propped up in some way? Guess that's not dramatic enough. The jaws have to appear free and ready to chomp on some European tourists.

A lot of people were taking photos of Sue. Only a few steps away, also in the great hall of the Field Museum, not nearly as many people were curious enough about these beasts to take any pictures.

African elephants, and a fixture of the Field Museum for about 100 years, it turns out. But for the few minutes I stood next to them, I was one of only a few paying them any mind. Sue was getting all the glory.

Yet they are remarkable creatures. So too was the man who brought them to the museum, Carl Akeley. According to the Field Museum web site: "In the late 1800s, Carl E. Akeley collected and mounted animals for Field Museum, and revolutionized the art of taxidermy. None are more famous than the "Fighting African Elephants" on display in the Museum's Stanley Field Hall. Akeley made two separate trips to Africa in 1895 and 1906. Akeley was also a photographer, and made thousands of negatives of the trips including villages and native peoples. Some of these photographs were used by Akeley in mounting the mammals he collected..."

The Encyclopædia Britannica offers more detail: "... during his associations with the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago (1895–1909) and the American Museum of Natural History in New York City (1909–26) [Akeley] made five trips to Africa to study, hunt, and collect big game. In 1923, his book In Brightest Africa appeared. He died during his last expedition and was buried on Mount Mikeno in Albert National Park (now Virunga National Park, Congo [Kinshasa]), the first wildlife sanctuary in central Africa, which he had helped establish. His inventions include the Akeley cement gun, used in mounting animals, and the Akeley camera, a motion-picture camera adapted for use by naturalists, with which Akeley made the first motion pictures of gorillas in their natural habitat."

Go Togo!

The opening pageantry of the Beijing Games was one thing, but I preferred watching the Parade of Nations, which came right after. This time it was particularly interesting, since the teams appeared -- except for Greece first and host China last, per Olympic custom -- in order according to how many strokes it takes to write their names in Chinese, and then by stroke order. In effect, at random, as far as anyone unfamiliar with Chinese is concerned.

I insisted that Lilly watch some of the Parade too, as an impromptu geography lesson. I will raise no geographic illiterates if I can help it.

Later I wondered why subnational places like French Guyana and Greenland compete with the French and Danish teams respectively, but places like Puerto Rico, American Samoa, the Cayman Islands and Bermuda (for example) have their own teams. So I looked into it. Teams are fielded by National Olympic Committees, not nations, and those places have their own committees, for whatever historical reasons. But it's good to have some geographic oddities.

I also looked up the nations represented by one person in the Parade of Nations -- one-man or -woman teams in this year's Olympics. They are Grenada, Guinea, Haiti, Micronesia, Nauru, and Togo. Go Togo! I'm happy to report that as of August 14, Togo won a bronze. The event was Canoe/Kayak-Slalom, the winner Benjamin Boukpeti. According to the Olympic web site, he was born in France and lives in France, but paddles for Togo. Which is part of Francophone Africa, so I guess that's close enough. This post gives Mr. Boukpeti his due. Togo too. It's their first medal.

Speaking of Africa, I was much taken with the hats worn by the Lesotho team, among other colorful African garb that caught the eye during the Parade. Later I turned to Google, which knows all, and sure enough, they are called Basotho hats (after the main tribe of Lesotho), or Mokorotlo. Which are for sale on the Internet, if you really, really want one: $175. (And how much would it cost to buy one in Lesotho?).

This article's abstract claims that the Basotho hats were, in fact, relatively modern creations that have retroactively been attributed great cultural significance. This portrait of Moshoeshoe, everyone's favorite southern Africa king (or paramount chief) (except for fans of the Zulu Shaka), shows him wearing a top hat, though that image might have been for use by foreign newspapers. Hard to say.

Timbuktu! (or Tombouctou!) (or Timbuctoo!) (or even Tumbutu!)

I got a postcard from Timbuktu today. It's the first and perhaps last one I'll ever receive from that city, with such a storied name. Naturally, it was from Ed, very likely the only person I know who will actually make it to Timbuktu, a journey that takes a concentrated mix of time, money and inclination.

“Tombouctou” is the spelling the card uses. It’s a simple card, a picture of tourists (and other people, many of whom are probably touts, buzzing nearby) at the Djigarey-ber, one of the city's golden-age mosques, which to me looks instead like the inspiration for the Foreign Legion fortifications in every Beau Geste knockoff since Gary Cooper played the part.

The postmark says “Postes Mali 26.02.08” and the colorful Republique du Mali stamps are of 20F and 385F, the former with a “Scene de thé dans le desert” and the later sporting a “Femme Peulh.” There was some damage in transit, so the tea in the desert scene was a bit torn away, but you can still see the tribesmen dismounted from their camels, enjoying a relaxing spot of tea on the sands. I had to look up the Peulh, and they are the west and central African people variously known as Fula or Fulani or Fulbe or Peul or Peulh or Peuhl, at least according to Wiki.

At the bottom of each stamp is “Imp. Poste Tunis” which I would think means that that Tunisia had something to do with the manufacture of these stamps. Just a guess.

Ed says: “I’ve been here & you haven’t. Ha.”

True enough. If I can get a card at the Ford Presidential Museum later this month, I will write exactly the same thing back – it’s a fairly safe bet.

Hanta!

The annual fall rodent invasion is under way, with four field mice offed by the “Better Mouse Trap” (a brand name) under the kitchen sink in recent weeks. I don’t know if it’s really better than earlier models, but baited with peanut butter it does seem to draw them to their doom. It will have to do unless I can pinpoint their port of entry, but so far no luck.

As I was cleaning up droppings, something in the back of my mind made me think of hantaviruses. As well I should, since further investigation told me that rodent droppings can spread the virus, which causes hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, a condition that sounds a lot worse than merely unpleasant. Fortunately, the risk is vanishingly small in Illinois: two cases in the state since 1993, according to the CDC. Even if it were underreported by five times, that would still be only 10 poor bastards who came down with it in 12 years. More people have won the state lottery in the last dozen years, and the odds of that can’t be called good.

I wondered where I’d heard of it, though. One of those things you read about, file away, and recall when the right stimulus comes along. As first, I thought I’d read about it years ago, in one of the genre of scare books published in the early 1970s. We had a few, like The Population Bomb, around the house. But it turns out that the hantavirus was identified only in 1993, so I didn’t read about it 30-odd years ago.

Maybe it was Lassa fever, another rodent-vectored disease, that figured in end-of-humanity scenarios in the bestsellers of doom. Big things were promised for that disease, native to western Africa, but upstarts like AIDS and (maybe) bird flu have moved onto the world stage instead, while Lassa seems to languish in Africa.

None of this means I won’t die from hanta or Lassa or bird flu, or worse, someone else in the house won’t. Remote but always possible. But not worth worrying about after I finish reading the CDC web site.

Gambian at the Door

Lilly started school this week, 2nd grade. So far she seems to like it, except for one thing: getting up in the morning. That’s my girl.

Shortly after she arrived home on her first day, Tuesday, a woman on a bicycle rode up, rang our doorbell, and wanted to sell me educational software. Hadn’t had any door-to-door solicitation in a while—last time was some high school kids hawking some kind of home repair or something else I’d never buy from someone who just shows up.

Same with educational software. She was a slender young black woman, dressed for casual Friday, and said she was in the country for the summer from England. Working for some company, selling software, seeing the sites of suburban Chicago (I’m paraphrasing here). I said thanks but no thanks, and she said, “I get credit even if you look at one and say it’s interesting.” Hm. So I did that.

Oddly, not a trace of a British accent of any kind. In fact, she was speaking completely standard North American English, as far as I could tell in the few moments I heard her. “Where did you say you come from?” I asked.

“England.”

“But you grew up somewhere else? Kenya? Tanzania?”

“No, but you’ve probably never heard of it. I grew up in the Gambia.”

“Oh, West Africa. Surrounded by Senegal, isn’t it?”

“How do you know about it?” She seemed surprised. A little geography seems to have that effect sometimes, though I suppose she was used to blank stares.

“It’s on all the maps,” I answered.

She had to go on after that, leaving me to wonder. The daughter of wealthy Gambians (there have to be a few), educated by Americans somewhere, whose parents now live in London most of the time because, well, who wouldn’t prefer that to the Gambia? If so, why was she selling software? Daughter of Gambian exiles who repair shoes in Birmingham, but who nevertheless raised the scratch to educate their daughter? Does she have an uncle or some other relative near here? Muslim or Christian? Is she a Mandinka? A Mandinka at the door—now that’s an interesting thought.