The Evolving Ape looks back on 2008

Well it has been a year full of events. Just like any other year actually. It is now time to sum up and look forward to new adventures. Being a selfish and egocentric son of a b*tch, this recap will be done only amongst my own blog posts from the past year (well from April and forward, as this blog haven’t had its 1 year anniversary yet).

April 26th Kommer Mugabe att tillåta en förlust
The Zimbabwe crisis dominated the first couple of months on my blog. I then grow tired of that conflict. As can be seen in this post (although in Swedish) I was wondering whether or not Mugabe would accept a defeat in the election.

May 5th Securing food production is more needed than land distributions
As the oil and food prices were increasing at the beginning of the year, I commented on this in an early post that food security must go hand in hand with structural, political and sometimes cultural change in many countries. This issue would be brought up several times more throughout the year (see Dec 29 here below).

May 24th Shocked but hopefully not surprised
The xenophobic attacks in South Africa threw many people into the harsh reality that they have been avoiding for so long. People, regardless of ethnicity (or “race if you like) can be racists and do horrendous things. I noticed that the “We and Them” mentality can grow big anywhere, even in a rainbow nation like South Africa.

June 26th Klimatförändring – ett litet problem i sammanhanget
In the space of a couple of months two polar bears drifted ashore on Iceland, and one of them was shot on the spot. I commented that climate change is not only about CO2-emissions, but also about getting to terms with a potential mass migration of species; animals and plants, over man dominated land. And with that the potential of mass extinction.

August 8th Are Olympics athletes cowards?
Before the start of the Beijing Olympics there were a lot talking about boycotts and so on. I gave some suggestions of how the athletes could protest in the most attention-attracting manner. Unfortunately no one listened to me. In fact the only athlete that dared to protest, by throwing away his Bronze medal, was the Swedish wrestler Ara Abrahamian. But he protested for other reasons.

August 29th McCain less generous than Obama
Many people were surprised that John McCain chose Sarah Palin as his republican vice-president candidate in the US elections. I showed however that McCains face did not signal generosity as much as Obama’s face did. Accordingly, McCain needed to pair up with someone that would compensate for his shortcomings.

September 5th Africa needs new blood
Although Africa may have stopped bleeding ceaselessly, some blood transfusion is need so that fresh thinking can help the continent back on its feet. In my little “study” I noticed that the average time in office for a leader in a southern/central African country was 12 years. Which clearly signals an inbreeding in ideas and thoughts.

September 11th Okapi – video clip
Some good news! The shy and elusive okapi was spotted in Virunga National Park. This was the first time outside its known home range. It indicated that the long period of armed conflicts in the region (Rwanda, Uganda and DRC) seemed to have spared this extraordinary animal.

September 26th Video clip of war in Virunga National Park
Some bad news! The armed conflict in DRC caught fire again. I linked to a video clip that showed rebels shooting inside the Virunga National Park, which house the famous mountain gorillas and the elusive okapi (see September 11). Fears are growing for a new Rwanda, and both people and species have practically nowhere to go.

November 27th We need more westerner civilian causalities!
The terrorist attacks in Bombay, India, caused a full-scale media coverage of the event. This made me wonder what is needed in order to draw attention to other conflicts around the world, such as the one in DRC.

December 29th Can starvation be of any good?
In the last dying days of 2008 it was reported of a emerging starvation catastrophe in Africa. If the financial crisis doesn’t steal all the attention, this might be the head news for the next couple of months. And lets hope that the solution will not be just to save starving children for the day, but really create structures that will allow them to never end up in that situation again.

Finally, my news years resolution for next year will be to write more about environment and development, and less about politics, on this blog...

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