NGONGE, why think in extremes? You think this is better than actual choice of attire? I think Somali women can decide for themselves. Sometimes I wonder why there's such a high divorce rates among Somalis.

No one like radical feminism! Just like no one likes radical practitioners of religion and ideologies. I think people here are talking about basic human rights and those rights that women should have based on the fact they can be discriminated upon due to their physical difference. How can Somalia in the future fully utilize its 50+% citizens and take down barriers? Frankly I don't think religion is the issue at all. It is a mental state of the people and the changed dynamics of the culture in the last 22 or so years. Whenever I look at pictures of todays Somali girls for instance in Somalia they look more shy and with less self confidence. A very different contrast to 60's - 91'. Perhaps this may be different experience for those that actually went back.

What is Western about this? Are we talking about an animal or a woman? What is wrong with some of you people? Would you say the same about your sister/mother? What is unacceptable of things like this? - Right to work - Access to healthcare - Access to education - Freedom of movement - Freedom from (sexual) violence - Freedom from discrimination - Freedom from degrading tests of rape - Freedom of speech - Equal inheritance - Freedom to start /join a political party etc. Or do some of you truly believe that a woman cannot have these rights?

No that's not important. I only wonder why Matt Baugh was replaced so soon.

The new ambassador to Somalia has worked from '02-'08 in Israel and his wife is a Jew. Very interesting.

Thanks Chimera. Original letter here. This government is not letting it get bullied by Kenya. 200 nautical miles full of oil, gas, fishery, coral. No questions about its sovereignty. I just looked at Kenya's coast. It looks so small compared with Somalia.

This is a PDF file on how the Japanese money will be spent on Somalia. Source

Japan pledges $32 billion aid (private investment, public private, infrastructure, health, education etc.) for Africa to boost investment. Also 1000 scholarships for Africans. After their scholarships they will have the opportunity to do an internship there at Japanese companies. “Africa Business Education Initiative“. (ABE) Source.

With education do they mean formal education or religious? Or both? Good news.

Aren't we all heading to fast with statements like that? Compared to most African nations we lag in almost everything. Why do people believe that Somalia will become an economic power house? Just wondering. I think Somalis need a bit of patience & realism. I also think we lag in basic social norms. I recently heard that it's even a taboo seeing a woman going to a toilet or coming out of it. It will take a while for Somalia to heal from 22 years of stagnation.

This is Game of Thrones y'all. Somali style.

People compare islam's state today with Christianity about 400 years ago.

D.O.C;955505 wrote: First of all, I think those of you who are muslims shouldn't be debating about islam unless you have an adequate knowledge for our dear religion. Secondly, this is a playground for everyone in any kind, therefore you guys need to be cautious, attentive and watchful of what you (SOLers) write. There are certain organisations and charities monitoring our activities in this forum for their benefits and if Mr Marksman is an associate these organisations, I am not surprised! Interesting.

I'm interested in opinions of individuals. No one can speak for someone else. @Tallaabo I agree. But in my opinion there should be restrictions in spreading a different religion other than islam. I'm all about social cohesion. Not about which religion/ideology is true or not.

Nuune if you were so steadfast in your religion you would not have made that statement. As if Muslims have never been in contact with people of other faiths/ideologies.

What is your opinion about Christian missionaries in Somalia? I read some people online talking about how to 'save' Somalis and it kind of disturbed me. I'm not saying Christian Somalis disturb me. Not at all. But the spread of these teachings can lead to social friction if it gets too big. Outreach Ideas Christians need to help with the material and physical needs of the Somalis. What is it with Christians and their need to make everyone Christian? LINK LINK * Pray that the Somali's would come to know Jesus Christ, who is the Bread of Life. * Pray for Somali Christians, who are greatly despised by their people. * Ask God to touch the hearts of Christians in northern Ethiopia so that they would be willing to share God's love with the Somali's in the southern provinces. * Ask the Lord to raise up Christian teachers who will work among the Somali and share Christ's love with them. * Pray that God will raise up prayer teams to go and break up the soil through worship and intercession. * Ask God to grant favor and wisdom to the missions agencies that are focusing on the Somali. * Pray for effectiveness of the Jesus film among them. * Ask God to anoint the Gospel as it goes forth via radio and television to the Somali. * Pray that God will reveal Himself to them through dreams and visions. * Ask the Holy Spirit to soften their hearts towards Christians so that they will be receptive to the Gospel. * Ask the Lord to raise up strong local churches among the Somali. This is an old saying about Somalis “I knew an Italian priest who had spent over thirty years among the Somalis and he made two converts, and it amazed me that he got even those two. The Prophet has no more fervent, and ignorant, followers, but that is not their fault that they are ignorant. Their natural intelligence is second to none and when the education factories start work among them they should surprise Africa, and themselves.”

Can someone tell me if Sheikh Sharif will be barred from ever trying to be a president again in Somalia?

Let's just hope this nonsense will end (Arabic being an official language) and Somalia leaves the Arab League. So far the Arab League has delivered only one (1) Million US dollars for the African Union Mission in Somalia and zero dollars for the Somali Transitional Federal Government. Compare this disparity with the money provided by Arab League to rebuilding Gaza in Palestine for the recent Israeli devastation. Saudi Arabia provided one (1) Billion US dollars, Qatar $250 million and Algeria $100 million in addition to more than 7.5 Billion Euros pledged for Palestine by the members of the Arab League and European Union countries. The Arab League provided ten times more relief and donation to Sri Lankan Tamil a Buddhist nation with no connections to the Arab League than Somalia. The inaction of the Arab League and member countries is shocking when it comes to Somalia a member country that the League can have a positive effect with very little financial support and political support. Somalia has done its share to assist the mission of the Arab League over decades. It is high time for the Arab League to do some soul searching and re-evaluate its conduct and absence in the Somali conflict or is it Somalis are too dark to be a member of this exclusive club? Source

Reasons Why Somali is Harder Than Your Language Recently I was discussing with @JaredRomey about an article he posted, “9 hard languages for English speakers.” I replied that I don’t know why Somali never makes it onto those lists; they tend to be the same list: Chinese, Arabic, etc. Jared suggested I blog about why Somali deserves to be on the list. He suggested five reasons why it’s hard– I came up with eight, but I’m only a beginner. In difficulty, Somali can stand its ground against the hardest languages. Yet the Foreign Service Institute puts Somali in category 2, where 3 is the hardest. Category 2 includes Farsi and 3 includes Arabic. I’ve studied both, and I don’t see how this is so. Somali seems to be way harder than Farsi and of at least the same level of difficulty as Arabic. If you drew a Venn diagram of languages and their hardest aspects, Somali would overlap with a lot of them. While Mandarin and Somali have tones, Mandarin has no case. While German and Somali have case, German has fairly simple sounds. While Arabic and Somali have difficult sounds, Arabic has a consistent writing system. Plus Somali does some odd things with prepositions you’ll have to read about, below. Somali is a doosy, but the challenge is made lighter by the joy of Somalis hearing their language spoken by a foreigner. For a bit of background: Somali belongs to the Afro-Asiatic language family, in the Cushitic branch. More famous branches of this family are Semitic, to which Arabic and Hebrew belong, and Egyptian, which includes the language of the ancient Pharaohs. Some overlap with Arabic, then, is natural. 1. Three (four?) writing systems. When Somali was originally written down in the Arabic script in the 13th century (Wadaad script). In 1920, another script was invented that somewhat resembled the Ethiopian writing system (Osmanya script). A more minor script was invented in 1930, called the Borama script. The official script since 1972 has been a Latin-based alphabet (Somali alphabet). 2. All the hard sounds of Arabic: The guttural sounds that foreigners have trouble with in Arabic – they’re all in Somali. The emphatic ha, the ayin, the qaf, the raspy kha – they’re all there. (They’re spelled x, c, q, and kh, respectively.) Additionally, Somali distinguishes between short and long vowels, like in Arabic, and other languages like Japanese and Finnish. So my friends correct me if I say “si” rather than “sii.” Finally, they have a retroflex “d” (spelled dh) like in Indian languages. 3. Some of the tones of Mandarin: Most have heard of the four different tones of Mandarin: high, low, falling, and rising. Somali only has two, high and low, but they can sound different depending on the environment they are found in. They change the meaning of the word, too! “Boy” is ínan, and “girl” is inán; “dog” is éy and “dogs” is eý. 4. Irregular plurals like German or Arabic: A Somali noun forms its plural according to a pattern that is not predictable from its singular, and Somali has 7 or so patterns. This concept may sound familiar to German or Arabic-speakers. Unlike English, which almost always forms its plural with “-(e)s,” Somali has no “regular” plural suffix. So the plural of áf “language,” flattens the tone and repeats the last syllable: afaf. For some nouns, a suffix is used, so hoóyo“mother” goes to hoyoóyin, and áabbe goes to aabayaal (also note the tone shift). Finally, words may shift gender as they go from singular to plural. 5. Prepositions – unlike anything: Somali prepositions don’t resemble any language I know. They’re a challenge, so I’ll explain as well as I can based largely on this academic source andthis textbook. They are divided into prepositions and “deictic particles.” They have four prepositions, roughly “to”, “in”, “from”, and “with”. “Deictic particles” indicate activity relative to the speaker; the four Somali deictic particles indicate toward the speaker, away from the speaker, toward each other, or away from each other. One may need to use both a preposition and a deictic particle. Somali tends to place these items in front of the verb, not the noun. For example, “I pulled the man out of the well with a rope” is nínkíi bàan cèelka xádhig kagá sóo saaray. The last five words literally mean, “well-the rope with-from towards_me I-raised.” Similarly, “they used to give us news about it” is way inoogá warrámi jireen, literally, “They us-to-about news gave.” They could have thrown a soo in there, too, right after inoogá. It seems to me they cluster all the prepositions together. In the first example, “from” goes with “well” and “with” goes with “rope,” but both stick by the verb. In the second, “to” goes with “us” and “about” goes with the unspoken “it.” Unscrambling in real time what preposition goes with what is beyond my level right now. 6. Cases – like Greek or German: Somali has four cases, but not the ones you may know from, say German or Greek. They are absolutive, subject, genitive, and vocative. Absolutive is used when it is by itself, and subject if there is another noun in the sentence. Genitive, like in other languages, indicates possession, and vocative is used in directly addressing someone or something. Like the plural, they are marked with a suffix or tone change, depending on the class of the noun. In addition, like in German and Greek, the absolutive and subject are marked on the article, as well. However, Somali also has different articles depending on whether the noun was mentioned before or not (similar to English “a” and “the”). 8. Poetry: Somalis are known for their love of poetry. Richard Burton noted in the 19th century the widespread recitation and performance of poetry among Somalis. When Somali is spoken it is peppered with poetic allusion, proverbs, and alliteration. The uninitiated cannot understand the depth of the language without a deep knowledge and appreciation of the poetry. Before you feel discouraged, let me tell you that Somalis love to hear their language spoken by foreigners. Some non-Somalis have become YouTube sensations by simply interviewing in Somali. When you try to learn the language, you will receive tons of help. Somalis love their language, and their love is infectious. Enjoy taking on this challenge of learning Somali and all the new, friendly people you will recruit to help your efforts and entertain with your enthusiasm. Source

" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> Somalia Conference - Prime Minister David Cameron opening speech Does anyone know more about this International Trade and Investment Conference on Somalia on May 8th? Resources? There's also another in Kenya in June (LINK) , but I haven't heard of this trade conference.

I may not have a good understanding of Sharia. Can you guys help me out? My opinion that is formed over the years is that Sharia is detriment to development and an insult to humanity and dignity. I wish people would stop the romanticizing of this. There is some things about sharia that I highly value, such as the care for environment, animals and a strong attitude against corruption. If I am wrong please let me know. I'm trying to understand. Does sharia imply: - Women are worth half of the man in court. (Which means statements of two women is equal to one man) - Women receive half of the inheritance, men full. - Death penalty for apostacy (THERE IS NO COMPULSION IN RELIGION. REALLY?) - With rape cases, 4 witnisses (4 men, double women) are needed that had seen the act. - Men can divorce their wives easily by saying a word (and in some countries even allowed by a text message). Women filing for a divorce is more difficult.

One of the women that is running is called Faadumo Ugaas Bare. LINK

The Swedes are already looking for office space.

Ethiopia Denies Planning to Withdraw From Somalia Link

Read one Somali guy saying she should repent, ask for forgiveness and should be a homeworker. This woman (and all succesful Somali women) are positive rolemodels for Somali kids. Have you seen her CV? Wowzers.