Hujambo!

I just noticed a new VSO blog aggregator, VSO Journals. It’s not an official VSO venture, though word has it they’re working on their own version as well. I think I read somewhere that the dude who started it was a VSO volunteer once, but I can’t remember where I saw it. Anyways, the site was created to collect all VSO blogs in one place. It’s fascinating to know that there are other dudes and dudettes out there right now in Africa, Asia, South America, etc blogging away. The Internet is crazy. I encourage you to go read some blogs, post some comments, and tell your friends.

On a side note, I am now realizing how uncreative I was in naming this website. The “__(insert name)__ in __(insert country)__” naming scheme is very popular. I guess the main bonus is the ease of memorization. The down side is that you end up sounding really unoriginal… I promise I truly thought I was being cute when I picked this site’s first name: http://sarainkenya.org. It’s turned out to be a popular trend in naming; from memory, for starters:
Read more

Spam on the Internet is a reality. It’s all automated these days; computers crawl the net looking for places to post their garbage. Most of it is related to drugs. You usually see it in your e-mail or in the comments section of some blog articles you happen upon. I get a bit of spam on this blog but, thanks to Wordpress’ Akismet plugin, you guys never have to see it.

Every day I log into my blog’s administrator console and see a summary of what has happened. Who’s visited, who commented, which posts are popular, etc. This morning I cracked up when I saw this one in the spam queue:

Subject: Mexican valium….

Lethal dose of valium for dogs. Xanax valium. What is valium used for. Injectable valium. Valium patient advice including side effects. Buy valium online save wholesale price yep. Valium liquid form. Valium….

Are you kidding me? Dogs?! And Mexican valium, nonetheless! That’s hilarious! The spammers will try anything to get past the spam-detection filters. I wonder if a human helps them come up with those wacky ideas.

Also, I had three others in the queue regarding valium too. Do people really buy this crap online? Wow…

If you have a relatively-new Nokia phone it should be able to play videos, which is totally sweet. Any video that you can play on the computer can be converted to a format that your phone can play; videos from YouTube, VCD, SVCD, DVD, XviD, etc. All you need is FFmpeg (I use GNU/Linux, but FFmpeg also runs on BSD and apparently Windows). I’ve tried Nokia phones running Symbian S40 and S60, but it should work on other phones too (the 3gp file format was designed with mobile phones in mind).

If your phone has a bit of horsepower (tested on Nokia 5130 XpressMusic and 5320 XpressMusic), you can convert using the following command:

ffmpeg -i all_shall_perish-eradication.flv -f 3gp -vcodec mpeg4 -b 150000 -s 320x240 -r 18 -acodec libfaac -ab 64000 -ar 24000 -ac 2 all_shall_perish-eradication.3gp
Note: the “-r 18″ sets the frame rate. The video skips on some phones if they can’t keep up with the frame rate (even with the bit rate set lower, like 100000). You shouldn’t notice any loss of quality with a setting like 18 (most videos are closer to 30), but the video will be much more pleasant to watch. Play with the settings and pay attention to video/audio synchronization when people are talking, for example.

Phones like the Nokia 2630 and the 3110c use more-conservative settings, such as:

ffmpeg -i all_shall_perish-eradication.flv -f 3gp -vcodec h263 -b 100000 -s 128x96 -r 12 -acodec libamr_nb -ab 12200 -ar 8000 -ac 1 all_shall_perish-eradication.3gp

The difference between the two is:

• Video codec
• Video quality (-b, “bit rate”)
• Audio codec (AMR was designed specifically for voice data)
• Audio channels (-ac, stereo sound needs left and right!)
• Frame rate

Enjoy.

I was walking around in Tala’s market today with a buddy when some old mlevi (“drunkard”) with a guitar came up to me and started strumming and saying some crazy things. Then, all of the sudden, he mentioned something about La Bamba. The funny thing was, I recognized the beat, and it was right on. I waited a few seconds and then started singing, “Para bailar la bamba… para bailar la bamba… se necessita una poca de gracia.” To my amazement this guy instantly started singing along with me. He may have even known more of the lyrics than me!

The guy was even wearing a Sea World hat that said “Whale Trainer,” hhahahaah! That, and the fact that Despised Icon released some studio clips from the production of their new album, made my day today.

I’ve written a few times about using GPRS with Linux in Kenya. First I was using Safaricom’s “Bambanet” USB device, which was merely a re-branded Huawei e220. A few months after that I sold the Bambanet and was using a Nokia 2630 over Bluetooth wireless. Last month I upgraded to a Nokia 5130 XpressMusic, and then sold it and upgraded to a Nokia 5320 XpressMusic (the 5320 runs Symbian S60, which is way more advanced than the S40 on either of my previous Nokias). The procedure is the same for all Nokia phones when using Bluetooth, but when using the USB cable there are a few show stoppers.
Read more