You Did What__ Mad Plans and Great Historical Disasters - Bill Fawcett [61]
You Are a Colony?
THE SPANISH AFRICAN COLONIES, 2003
The Most Recent Colonial War
Most people you talk to (except for Minister Kouassi of the Ivory Coast, who any moment now may find himself missing a head to talk with) will tell you that the age of colonialism is over, that all of Africa is independent now.
Not so. One of the oldest European colonial powers, Spain, still has several African possessions. In fact, you may recall a recent news article where five Moroccan soldiers captured a small rock of an island claimed by Spain. The next day, nine Spanish troops recaptured it, thus ending the latest colonial war in Africa.
Obviously, armies have downsized since a force of sixty Tanzanian soldiers overthrew the government of the Seychelles back in 1977.
You Cleaned How Many?
SOUTH AFRICA, 2002
African Math
“I have promised to keep his identity confidential,” Jack Maxim, a spokesman for the Sandton Sun Hotel in Johannesburg, told the Cape Times, “but I can confirm that he is no longer in our employment.
“We asked him to clean the lifts and he spent four days on the job. When I asked him why, he replied: ‘Well, there are forty of them, two on each floor, and sometimes some of them aren’t there.’ Eventually we realized that he thought each floor had a different lift, and he’d cleaned the same two twelve times. We had to let him go. I understand he is now working for GE.”
With that kind of math being exported to GE, heaven help our next generation of space shuttles.
So You’re Unhappy with the Way We Run Our Airports?
KENYA, TODAY
Your Explanation Fell Flat
We’ll admit that some of the cases we’ve discussed will stretch your credulity. Not this one. This one will throw it right out the window. Of an airplane. That isn’t going anywhere. In Kenya.
“What’s all the fuss about?” Weseka Sambu demanded at a hastily-convened news conference at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi. “A technical hitch like this could have happened anywhere in the world. You people are not patriots. You just want to cause trouble.”
So what was Sambu’s problem?
He is a spokesman for Kenya Airways, and he was explaining why a flight that was to originate in Kisumu, stop in Nairobi, and then continue on to Berlin, Germany, was just a tad behind schedule.
It all began when forty-two passengers boarded the plane, ready to fly to Nairobi, when the pilot noticed that one of the tires had gone flat.
That could happen anywhere. But what came next could happen only in Africa.
First problem: Kenya Airways didn’t have a spare tire at Kisumu.
Second problem: the airport’s nitrogen cannister was empty, so they decided to take the tire to a local gas station for repairs.
Third problem: someone had stolen the jack and they couldn’t get the wheel off — so they tried to inflate the tire with a bicycle pump.
Fourth problem: the bicycle pump didn’t work, so the pilot climbed out of the plane and tried to blow into the valve with his mouth.
Fifth problem: the pilot passed out from his efforts — and the tire remained flat. For all we know, it’s still flat as we write these words.
“When I announced that the flight had to be abandoned,” said Sambu, “one of the passengers, a Mr. Mutu, suddenly struck me about the face with a life-jacket whistle and said we were a national disgrace. I told him he was being ridiculous and that there would be another flight in a fortnight. And in the meantime, he would be able to enjoy the scenery around Kisumu, albeit at his own expense.”
Okay, now tell us how much you resent the security lines at your local airport.
You’re Building What?
SOMALIA, IVORY COAST, AND DEFINITELY BOKASSA, 1990
Projects
The Italians spent $300 million building roads in Somalia. What’s peculiar about that? At the time this cost came to more than $200,000 per each vehicle that existed in the entire country.
In 1990, Lilongwe, the capital city of Malawi, had a state-of-the-art television broadcast tower. What’s unusual about that? Except for the Capital Hotel in Lilongwe,