Lidia I would agree with you that environmental groups tent to be prodominatly composed of white people. Indeed racial politics need to be incorporate within environmental lobbying. However, you fail to consider causations, and the conditions which produce this lack of participation. Many blacks, or native people are reluctant to participate in such arena’s. They are more fused on other pressing issues, social rights, as you indicated most of the blacks came from social organizations. Inviting you to the event is a start to begin with. Aside from that, lets look at Somalia and its environmental issues, who is lobbying there, other than Fatima Jibril – our nomadic way of life is degrading, and soon those people will end up in cities, that are already inadequate. Blacks won’t support environmental movements, there was this brother from Kenya, who was trying to rally support for a mine in Kenya, and his view was primarily based on economics, and the exploitation of people based on race, and class. He has similar views as you, but as Lbx who met him can testify, no one was willing to even give ear to his views, simply we just don’t care about environmental politics. And your right in suggesting that there needs to be convergence of ideologies, the environmental and racism. But when you attack environmental groups, I think it’s a bit aggressive, these people are rallying for issues that affect us all, even its not racially motivated, like global warming. …yet environmentalists work without an understanding of the power relations inherent in the legacy of colonialism and racism. Most environmentalist understand power relations, many of them are part of the anti globalization movement, they support equal distribution of wealth, and many of them are practical in advocating pressing issues of today, to reminisce historically, they will be merely suspended as being all about theory, instead of the practical. Sadly, as long as they maintain that position, those of us dedicated to social justice and anti-racism will struggle against environmentalists to make our concern heard. I think you attacking those within the same circle as you, I’m tired, and I would rather write more analysis on this claim, but I’ll will say, environmentalist are more welcoming to include other cultures within their activities. I do agree with you that the discourses they employ are often unwelcoming to people with unique postcolonial identities, and sometimes they do view your claims as being passé, because in the end they support all the issues in which your camp is advocating. In term of gender politics, I think we can safely say, environmentalists are leftists generally, and they do embrace the humanist thought. I think the key discussion here should be, who will advocate the environmental abuses that Somali is experiencing, we can debate western activist groups in their methods, and deeply analyzes their internal policies and we can of course try to make a case the racial undertones that they often deploy, but the pressing matter is this, lets get practical, let’s start a movement towards a real social cause that impact millions of people ---- Somalia, for example illegal toxic dumping in our coastline. But good topic, we need to the get the subject going about Somalia, because eventually, what good is a government if the people are unable to inhabit in their own land due to environmental hazards.

Brown. How do these people amass such ammounts of monies @ such a young age? They prolly started with a business idea that took off, small business, however, a lot of people fail when starting a small business. Another major thing is that, unlike many Somalis these people usually have the financial and emotional support from their social networks and family. Is there something were are missing in here? Somalis need to work together, we are suffering from the do it alone syndrome, we all want to be the it person, and we don’t network because the person that is able to help us the most might from another tribe, and etc, and we hold more bias towards them. Also Somali people suffer from the ‘I’m older’, so I know more syndrome as well. There are many young Somali people with great ideas, but they’re not being accepted in the elite stylistically amateurish Somali business community. Is there a single Multi Millionare today in N.America???? Where? There are Somali millionaires, there are some in the states, in terms of regions, California, Virginia, and around the Eastern parts of the US. I’ve seen some very wealthy people in Canada, but they’ve reached millions in terms of cold cash, but in terms of assets and investments, whether it’d be real estate, there are a lot, especially in Toronto. In Somalia there are several millionaires there as well, in particular an area which is flourishing is the trading business, in the future, governmental contracts, media establishments will produce wealthy individuals. How can we get there? Its simple, we need work together…

Legend I send my condolences to you and your family at this time, may he enter the next life peacefully, and may Allah grant him entrance to paradise.

http://www.mogadishuuniversity.com/news_ranking_world_universities.htm http://www.webometrics.info/top100_continent.asp-cont=africa.htm

Beautiful pictures, it really looks peaceful, can't wait to visit.

Aeronwen Congrads on your 3000+ post, and to think couple weeks back braggin about my 200th post.

--------------------------------------------------- Crash – this years top, amazing script and cinematography The Usual Suspects House of Sand and Fog King of New York [Frank White] Pulp Fiction Gangs of New York City of God MegaCities: 12 Stories of Survival Fight Club New Jersey Drive -------------------------------------------------- Nothing really beats documentaries --- see Gangs of Rio

Nuradin’s work are catered towards western readers, many Somalis, don’t read his books, kind a sad, but he should write a book which is not too complex. As a writer I agree that he deserves respect and recognition.

Tolstoy Your post was rather long to read, but nonetheless, you have presented your view/argument with historical and academic references, although your conclusion was rather unclear, and your thesis within the post was hard to detect, perhaps there was more than one. But I must say it was worth reading your post, you’ve managed to produce interesting and rather challenging piece to the forum. Here’s my question to you, are you giving legitimacy to the political elections that took place in Somaliland? If that’s the case, correct me I’m making an accusation here, but I thought your post advocated ontological reasoning, but when you say the elite should rule the mass aren’t you neglecting the relativist tradition. I would understand if you are redefining Burke’s subjective aesthetics to selective entities, and abandoning postmodern theory all together, I think you’ve suggested in a previous post that postmodern ideals are corrupt as in the case for NGO’s and outsiders invading the social norms in Somaliland. In sum, are you saying that the people, the mass excluding the elite in Somaliland lack the capacity to reach universal standards of political judgments. I think that people in Somalia lack political imagination, and if their universal ideals start and end with the warlords, I think it’s impossible for the people to accept change. They are clearly familiar with the institutional codes [roadblocks, illegal taxation, uncalculated deaths, etc] that are set up by those in power. The only thing they can do is function within the overall strategy, they can only make do, and they’re tactics are very much limited. Why can’t use the French Revolution as blueprint for Somalia, the people are already accustomed to the misery that is their lives, and those who are caught rebelling by the slightest bit are doomed. For our purpose, I think poststructuralist theory should be applied to the rest of Somalia if not Somaliland in understanding the conditions that sustain support for anti-revolutionary attitudes and the warlord should be looked at as an institution of power. Lidia the Somali Enlightenment is not going to emerge in this Century.

There are many factors that must be calculated such as careers, education, family, and etc. It get complicated when people start thinking about commitment, it involves all these other variables --- its not just about the chase, and at the same time, you’re giving up your individual freedom, and you’ll be held responsible by another person --- and many of us think that’s romantic, but a lot people want their freedoms, in terms of education, wealth, and the pursuit of personal dreams. If all those things are settled within a relationship, then I think commitment is possible, which is why most people negotiate these things before fully committing.

Dear Future Me, Remember to always laugh and smile, to treat others like you’d want to be treated. Lastly, remember to share your wealth with those who’ve been there for the past decade, and remember to drop a line to the haters – and make sure that you remind them that you did it for them, and without their constant doubts, and pathetic attempts to discourage you that all this would not be possible.

Thanks for the link, I have been looking for this kind of information for a hot minute now, thanks again.

I’m guessing that you want us to enjoy life wherever we might be at, which is a good point, its time for Somalis to stop being modernist nomads. Somalis spend their entire lives moving from one place to another without setting up a viable support system for their children. We can’t always migrate to where they’re giving more welfare allowance. Stay where you are, its no worst than where your headed.

On my plate I have rice with potatoes, green peppers and onions. Not freshly made, but fresh out of the microwave, yum.

^^^^^ I didn't see the image below, its late here, and i'm tired, just waiting to load my system with food to sustain me for tomorrow's fasting.

Love is a legal drug that is unregulated that can sometimes end in tragedy. Often many people get lost in search of love or something they can’t have because we the people encourage them to pursue their impossible love, the idea of talking about love, or rather the idea of romanticizing about happiness is love in itself. Lastly, love can sometimes evolve from necessity, the need to breed is not love, so when we say mom and dad, we are not certain that they loved each other, many of us were born out of necessity, and many of us are the children of the moving industrial human reproduction complexes now searching for the unknown.

I was once told that Somali weddings cost anywhere from 5k to 40k. I could not believe this that people would spend so much money on weddings, and the divorce rate within our community is very high. Some couples even break up in months -- let alone making it through the year. I say just go to the mosque and get married, use the money for something else, you’ve got your whole lifetime to entertain your family and friends – clearly you can’t spend so much money when you haven’t got that much.

I think there are couple of rules to the extend in which music is allowed in Islam. For example, the way the music was produced is crucial, if its digitally produced is not permissible. I even remember someone once telling me that those who listen to music will get hot lava poured into their ears ------ I have yet to investigate such claims by asking a scholar. I would agree with you that music during the holy month is not a good idea, even after afur. I would recommend people put audiobooks, Islamic lectures and the Quran on their iPods.

Wasn’t there a tall Somali guy, I remember seeing a picture while back. A friend of mine met him in Puntland – I thought he was the tallest man.

Sky you beat me to it, its been long day, this was one of my tasks, I’m glad you posted this ---- Let’s get the votes going people. He was in Montreal this past Thursday and his performance was amazing, somehow after his shows a lot of people start asking questions about Somalia. We need to support this brother -- he represents Somalis, and supports our culture in the mainstream.

Ramadan Kariim - may Allah make it easier for us.

A sickening, disgraceful and an unfortunate event, our prayers go out to the family and the young boy. May they recover from this ordeal.

You have to get voted in? I didn't know that - what will you do once elected? i'll stop with the questions, goodluck with your campaign.

I’m guessing you read Nietzsche in college Brother, you need to abandon your humanist rationale, clearly there are scientific evidences that a higher being controls all in the universe.

7 we can pick names out of a hat, it would be fun, but i'm getting one for my birthday, i been asking everyone to get me one --- so i'm getting it finally.