DAKAR, Senegal: Khaby Lame, the Senegal-born world’s most popular TikTok personality who never says a word in videos watched by millions of followers, addressed the youth in his native country on Friday when he was appointed as UNICEF goodwill ambassador.
The 24-year-old influencer, who has over 162 million followers, rose to fame with charming videos of his reactions to everyday life in which he never says a word. His following surged during the pandemic, when he was fired from his factory job and used the extra time on his hands to make and upload more videos.
Being a UNICEF ambassador will allow him to “see all the world and its problems,” Lame said, adding that he hoped he could contribute to solving some of them.
“It’s a true honor to be appointed as a UNICEF goodwill ambassador and be part of an organization that puts children’s rights front and center every day,” Lame said in a statement. “From my own experience as a child fearing poverty, struggling to find my passion at school, and losing my job during the COVID-19 pandemic, to finding my place and calling in the world, I know that all children can thrive when they are given a chance and opportunity.”
Senegal is a major source of irregular migration to Europe. Over 60 percent of Senegalese people are under 25, and 90 percent work in informal jobs. They have watched for years as money made from natural resources has gone overseas, and many say they have no other choice but to embark on treacherous journeys in rickety fishing boats across the Atlantic.
“I tell them to dream big,” Lame said when asked about his message to Senegal’s youth. “Try and do your best to accomplish your dreams, even though there are people telling you that you cannot reach them.”
Lame moved to Italy from his native Senegal when he was an infant with his working class parents, but was only granted Italian citizenship when he was 20.
“I’ve been in Italy for 20 years since I was only 2 years old,” Lame told The Associated Press in Dakar. Looking sharp in a beige suit and a matching tie, he added: “My blood is from Senegal, but I feel Senegalese and Italian at the same time.”
Lame’s appointment to UNICEF came at the end of a four-day visit to Senegal where he met children and young people who are driving positive change in their communities.
World’s most popular TikTok personality Khaby Lame joins UNICEF as goodwill ambassador
https://arab.news/yzhex
World’s most popular TikTok personality Khaby Lame joins UNICEF as goodwill ambassador
As warming climate hammers coffee crops, this rare bean may someday be your brew
- The tree’s deep roots, thick leaves and big trunk help it thrive in extreme conditions where other coffees cannot
- Earth’s warming climate is causing problems for big coffee producers everywhere and some are looking to a rarely cultivated species that may stand up better to drought and heat
NZARA COUNTY: Catherine Bashiama runs her fingers along the branches of the coffee tree she’s raised from a seedling, searching anxiously for its first fruit buds since she planted it three years ago. When she grasps the small cherries, Bashiama beams.
The farmer had never grown coffee in her village in western South Sudan, but now hopes a rare, climate-resistant species will help pull her family from poverty. “I want to send my children to school so they can be the future generation,” said Bashiama, a mother of 12.
Discovered more than a century ago in South Sudan, excelsa coffee is exciting cash-strapped locals and drawing interest from the international community amid a global coffee crisis caused mainly by climate change. As leading coffee-producing countries struggle to grow crops in drier, less reliable weather, prices have soared to the highest in decades and the industry is scrambling for solutions.
Experts say estimates from drought-stricken Brazil, the world’s top coffee grower, are that this year’s harvest could be down by some 12 percent.
“What history shows us is that sometimes the world doesn’t give you a choice, and right now there are many coffee farmers suffering from climate change that are facing this predicament,” said Aaron Davis, head of coffee research at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, in London.
Excelsa could play a key role in adapting.
Native to South Sudan and a handful of other African countries, including Congo, Central African Republic and Uganda, excelsa is also farmed in India, Indonesia and Vietnam. The tree’s deep roots, thick leathery leaves and big trunk allow it to thrive in extreme conditions such as drought and heat where other coffees cannot. It’s also resistant to many common coffee pests and diseases.
Yet it comprises less than 1 percent of the global market, well behind the arabica and robusta species that are the most consumed coffees in the world. Experts say excelsa will have to be shown to be practical at a much larger scale to bridge the gap in the market caused by climate change.
Coffee’s history in South Sudan
Unlike neighboring Ethiopia or Uganda, oil-rich South Sudan has never been known as a coffee-producing nation.
Its British colonizers grew robusta and arabica, but much of that stopped during decades of conflict that forced people from their homes and made it hard to farm. Coffee trees require regular care such as pruning and weeding and take at least three years to yield fruit.
During a visit earlier this month to Nzara County in Western Equatoria state — regarded as the country’s breadbasket — residents reminisced to Associated Press reporters about their parents and grandparents growing coffee, yet much of the younger generation hadn’t done it themselves.
Many were familiar with excelsa, but didn’t realize how unique it was, or what it was called, referring to it as the big tree, typically taller than the arabica and robusta species that are usually pruned to be bush- or hedge-like. The excelsa trees can reach 15 meters (about 49 feet) in height, but may also be pruned much shorter for ease of harvesting.
Coffee made from excelsa tastes sweet — unlike robusta — with notes of chocolate, dark fruits and hazelnut. It’s more similar to arabica, but generally less bitter and may have less body.
“There’s so little known about this coffee, that we feel at the forefront to trying to unravel it and we’re learning every day,” said Ian Paterson, managing director of Equatoria Teak, a sustainable agro-forestry company that’s been operating in the country for more than a decade.
The company’s been doing trials on excelsa for years. Initial results are promising, with the trees able to withstand heat much better than other species, the company said. It’s also working with communities to revive the coffee industry and scale up production. Three years ago it gave seedlings and training to about 1,500 farmers, including Bashiama, to help them grow the coffee. The farmers can sell back to the company for processing and export.
Many of the trees started producing for the first time this year, and Paterson said he hopes to export the first batch of some 7 tons to specialty shops in Europe. By 2027, the coffee could inject some $2 million into the economy, with big buyers such as Nespresso expressing interest. But production needs to triple for it to be worthwhile for large buyers to invest, he said.
Challenges of growing an industry amid South Sudan’s instability
That could be challenging in South Sudan, where lack of infrastructure and insecurity make it hard to get the coffee out.
One truck of 30 tons of coffee has to travel some 1,800 miles (3,000 kilometers) to reach the port in Kenya to be shipped. The cost for the first leg of that trip, through Uganda, is more than $7,500, which is up to five times the cost in neighboring countries.
It’s also hard to attract investors.
Despite a peace deal in 2018 that ended a five-year civil war, pockets of fighting persist. Tensions in Western Equatoria are especially high after the president removed the governor in February, sparking anger among his supporters. When AP reporters visited Nzara, the main road to town was cut off one day because of gunshots and people were fleeing their villages, fearful of further violence.
The government says companies can operate safely, but warned them to focus on business.
“If I’m a businessman, dealing with my business, let me not mix with politics. Once you start mixing your business with politics, definitely you will end up in chaos,” said Alison Barnaba, the state’s minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Environment.
Barnaba said there are plans to rehabilitate old coffee plantations and build an agriculture school, but details are murky, including where the money will come from. South Sudan hasn’t paid its civil servants in more than a year, and a rupture of a crucial oil pipeline through neighboring Sudan has tanked oil revenue.
Growing the coffee isn’t always easy, either. Farmers have to contend with fires that spread quickly in the dry season and decimate their crops. Hunters use fires to scare and kill animals and residents use it to clear land for cultivation. But the fires can get out of control and there are few measures in place to hold people accountable, say residents.
Coffee as a way out of poverty
Still, for locals, the coffee represents a chance at a better future.
Bashiama said she started planting coffee after her husband was injured and unable to help cultivate enough of the maize and ground nuts that the family had lived on. Since his accident she hasn’t been able to send her children to school or buy enough food, she said.
Another farmer, 37-year-old Taban John, wants to use his coffee earnings to buy a bicycle so he can more easily sell his other crops, ground nuts and cassava, and other goods in town. He also wants to be able to afford school uniforms for his children.
Excelsa is an opportunity for the community to become more financially independent, say community leaders. People rely on the government or foreign aid, but when that doesn’t come through they’re not able to take care of their families, they say.
But for coffee to thrive in South Sudan, locals say there needs to be a long-term mentality, and that requires stability.
Elia Box lost half of his coffee crop to fire in early February. He plans to replace it, but was dispirited at the work it will require and the lack of law and order to hold people accountable.
“People aren’t thinking long-term like coffee crops, during war,” he said. “Coffee needs peace.”
Australian navy rescues adventurer who hit a cyclone while rowing across the Pacific Ocean
- Aurimas Mockus taken aboard Royal Australian Navy landing ship HMAS Choules, where he is undergoing a medical assessment
- Mockus activated an emergency beacon on Friday after rowing into stormy seas and 80kph winds generated by Tropical Cyclone Alfred
MELBOURNE: An Australian warship on Monday rescued a Lithuanian solo rower who had encountered a tropical cyclone while attempting to cross the Pacific Ocean from California.
Aurimas Mockus was taken aboard Royal Australian Navy landing ship HMAS Choules, where he was undergoing a medical assessment, Vice Adm. Justin Jones said in a statement.
The 44-year-old adventurer had been stranded for three days in the Coral Sea around 740 kilometers east of the Queensland state coastal city of Mackay. He had rowed there in an enclosed boat nonstop from San Diego headed for the Queensland capital, Brisbane.
He began the 12,000-kilometer journey in October and was days away from Brisbane when he ran into the storm, which is forecast to cross the Australian coast within days.
Brisbane is 800 kilometers south of Mackay by air.
Mockus activated an emergency beacon on Friday after rowing into stormy seas and 80kph winds generated by Tropical Cyclone Alfred, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority said in a statement.
The rescue authority sent a plane that made radio contact with Mockus on Saturday. Mockus reported he was “fatigued,” the authority said.
The warship is taking Mockus south beyond Brisbane to Sydney in New South Wales, the navy said.
The cyclone has continued to track south and on Monday was 450 kilometers east of Brisbane, authorities said.
The cyclone is forecast to turn west and cross the Australian coast on Thursday or Friday.
Mockus was attempting to become one of the few rowers who have crossed the Pacific alone and without stopping.
Brit Peter Bird arguably became the first in 1983. He rowed from San Francisco and was towed the final 48 kilometers to the Australian mainland. But he is considered to have rowed close enough to Australia to have made the crossing.
Fellow Brit John Beeden rowed from San Francisco to the Queensland city of Cairns in 2015 and is considered by some to have made the first successful crossing.
Australian Michelle Lee became the first woman to make the crossing in 2023, rowing from Ensenada in Mexico to Queensland’s Port Douglas.
Another Australian, Tom Robinson, in 2022 attempted to become the youngest to across the Pacific, albeit with a break in the Cook Islands. He set out from Peru and spent 265 days at sea before he was rescued off Vanuatu in 2023.
A wave capsized the 24-year-old’s boat, leaving him clinging naked to the hull for 14 hours before he was rescued by a cruise ship that made a 200-kilometer detour to reach him.
Oz, Bond and Quincy Jones: Oscars a musical ode to film icons
- The Oscars gala traditionally features performances of all the tracks nominated for best original song — this year, the ceremony on Sunday bucked norms, but musical numbers still punctuated the show
HOLLYWOOD: The Oscars gala traditionally features performances of all the tracks nominated for best original song — this year, the ceremony on Sunday bucked norms, but musical numbers still punctuated the show.
Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo opened the star-studded gala with a tribute to Los Angeles — which recently suffered devastating wildfires — that also celebrated their Oscar-nominated roles in the blockbuster film “Wicked.”
In a glimmering red dress and shoes nodding to Dorothy’s magic slippers, Grande belted a touching version of the classic ballad “Over the Rainbow” from 1939’s “The Wizard of Oz” starring Judy Garland.
Erivo then joined to deliver a soaring rendition of “Home” from “The Wiz” — both “The Wizard of Oz” and 1978’s “The Wiz” are tales about the fantastical land of Oz that “Wicked” also riffs on.
Grande and Erivo ultimately brought the audience to its feet with the film’s hit song “Defying Gravity,” which brought some attendees, including co-star Michelle Yeoh, to tears — especially thanks to Erivo’s chills-inducing climax.
Later in the show came a James Bond medley, a celebration of the film franchise that just controversially came under the creative control of Amazon MGM Studios.
The Oscar stage turned Bond set featured a dance number led by “The Substance” star Margaret Qualley — who is a trained dancer.
Lisa — a member of the K-pop group Blackpink — descended from the ceiling to sing Wings’ “Live and Let Die” from that 1973 film.
And Doja Cat literally dripped in diamonds to sing Shirley Bassey’s “Diamonds Are Forever,” before an orchestra joined Raye to close the performance with a cover of Adele’s “Skyfall.”
Mick Jagger popped by to present the prize for best original song, which went to “El Mal,” the track off “Emilia Perez” written by Clement Ducol, Camille and the film’s director Jacques Audiard.
“We wrote ‘El Mal’ as a song to denounce corruption,” Camille said onstage. “We hope it speaks to the role music and art can play, and continue to play, as a force of the good and progress in the world.”
Before presenting the award, Jagger joked that “the producers really wanted Bob Dylan to do this — Bob didn’t want to do it because he said the best songs this year were obviously in “A Complete Unknown” — the film about Dylan.
“Bob said, ‘You should find somebody younger,’” the Rolling Stone frontman quipped.
Oprah Winfrey and Whoopi Goldberg presented a tribute to the late Quincy Jones, the composing titan who orchestrated the sounds of the music and film worlds for more than 50 years.
“Quincy was love lived out loud in human form, and he poured that love out into others and into his work,” Winfrey said.
Latifah then brought disco to the Academy Awards with a performance of “Ease on Down the Road” — yet another nod to the world of Oz — from the musical film adaptation of “The Wiz,” which Jones worked on.
Host Conan O’Brien added in his own song and dance after his opening monologue, poking fun at the show’s reputation for trudging along at a glacial pace.
“I Won’t Waste Time!” he sang.
The show ultimately clocked in at nearly four hours.
Pakistan’s old English manners spell youth Scrabble success
- In the eccentric field of competitive Scrabble, Pakistan’s youngsters reign supreme — the current youth world champions and past victors more times than any other nation since the tournament debuted in 2006
KARACHI, Pakistan: “Dram,” meaning a measure of whisky. “Turm,” describing a cavalry unit. “Taupie,” a foolish youngster.
Not words in a typical teen’s vocabulary, but all come easily to Pakistani prodigy Bilal Asher, world under-14 Scrabble champion.
Despite a musty reputation, the word-spelling game has a cult youth following in Pakistan, a legacy of the English language imposed by Britain’s empire but which the country has adapted into its own dialect since independence.
In the eccentric field of competitive Scrabble, Pakistan’s youngsters reign supreme — the current youth world champions and past victors more times than any other nation since the tournament debuted in 2006.
“It requires a lot of hard work and determination,” said 13-year-old Asher after vanquishing a grey-bearded opponent.
“You have to trust the process for a very long time, and then gradually it will show the results.”
Karachi, a megacity shrugging off its old definition as a den of violent crime, is Pakistan’s incubator for talent in Scrabble — where players spell words linked like a crossword with random lettered tiles.
Schools in the southern port metropolis organize tutorials with professional Scrabble coaches and grant scholarships to top players, while parents push their kids to become virtuosos.
“They inculcate you in this game,” says Asher, one of around 100 players thronging a hotel function room for a Pakistan Scrabble Association (PSA) event as most of the city dozed through a Sunday morning.
Daunters (meaning intimidating people), imarets (inns for pilgrims) and trienes (chemical compounds containing three double bonds) are spelled out by ranks of seated opponents.
Some are so young their feet don’t touch the ground, as they use chess clocks to time their turns.
“They’re so interested because the parents are interested,” said 16-year-old Affan Salman, who became the world youth Scrabble champion in Sri Lanka last year.
“They want their children to do productive things — Scrabble is a productive game.”
English was foisted on the Indian subcontinent by Britain’s colonialism and an 1835 order from London started to systematize it as the main language of education.
The plan’s architect, Thomas Macaulay, said the aim was to produce “a class of persons, Indian in blood and color, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals and in intellect.”
It was instrumental in creating a colonial civil service to rule for Britain according to Kaleem Raza Khan, who teaches English at Karachi’s Salim Habib University.
“They started teaching English because they wanted to create a class of people, Indian people, who would be in the middle of the people and the rulers,” said Khan, whose wife and daughter are Scrabble devotees.
British rule ended in the bloody partition of 1947 creating India and Pakistan.
Today there are upwards of 70 languages spoken in Pakistan, but English remains an official state language alongside the lingua franca Urdu, and they mingle in daily usage.
Schools often still teach English with verbose colonial-era textbooks.
“The adaptation of English as the main language is definitely a relation to the colonial era,” PSA youth program director Tariq Pervez. “That is our main link.”
Loquacious lingo
The English of Pakistani officialdom remains steeped in anachronistic words.
The prime minister describes militant attacks as “dastardly,” state media dubs protesters “miscreants” and the military denounces its “nefarious” adversaries.
Becoming fluent in the loquacious lingo of Pakistani English remains aspirational because of its association to the upper echelons.
In Pakistan more than a third of children between the ages of five and 16 are out of school — a total of nearly 26 million, according to the 2023 census.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif declared an “education emergency” last year to address the stark figures.
“People are interested in Scrabble because they can get opportunities for scholarships in universities or for jobs because it provides the vocab,” said Asher’s sister Manaal.
But the 14-year-old reigning female number one in Pakistan warned: “You’ve got to be resilient otherwise Scrabble isn’t right for you.”
In the Karachi hotel, Scrabble — invented in the 1930s during America’s Great Depression by an unemployed architect — is an informal training program for success in later life.
“The main language of learning is English,” said Pervez.
“This game has a great pull,” he added. “The demand is so big. So many kids want to play, we don’t have enough resources to accommodate all of them.”
At the youngest level the vocabulary of the players is more rudimentary: toy, tiger, jar, oink.
But professional Scrabble coach Waseem Khatri earns 250,000 rupees ($880) a month — nearly seven times the minimum wage — coaching some 6,000 students across Karachi’s school system to up their game.
In Pakistani English parlance “they try to express things in a more beautiful way — in a long way to express their feelings,” said 36-year-old Khatri.
“We try to utilize those words also in Scrabble.”
But when Asher wins he is overwhelmed with joy, and those long words don’t come so easily.
“I cannot describe the feeling,” he says.
Private lunar lander Blue Ghost touches down on the moon with a special delivery for NASA
- A private lunar lander has touched down on the moon, delivering a drill and other experiments for NASA
- The flurry comes as NASA strives to ignite a lunar economy and send astronauts back
CAPE CANAVERAL: A private lunar lander carrying a drill, vacuum and other experiments for NASA touched down on the moon Sunday, the latest in a string of companies looking to kickstart business on Earth’s celestial neighbor ahead of astronaut missions.
Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lander descended from lunar orbit on autopilot, aiming for the slopes of an ancient volcanic dome in an impact basin on the moon’s northeastern edge of the near side.
Confirmation of touchdown came from the company’s Mission Control outside Austin, Texas, following the action some 225,000 miles (360,000 kilometers) away.
“We’re on the moon,” Mission Control reported, adding the lander was “stable.”
A smooth, upright landing makes Firefly — a startup founded a decade ago — the first private outfit to put a spacecraft on the moon without crashing or falling over. Even countries have faltered, with only five claiming success: Russia, the US, China, India and Japan.
Two other companies’ landers are hot on Blue Ghost’s heels, with the next one expected to join it on the moon later this week.
Launched in mid-January from Florida, the 6-foot-6 (2 meters) tall lander carried 10 experiments to the moon for NASA. The space agency paid $101 million for the delivery, plus $44 million for the science and tech on board. It’s the third mission under NASA’s commercial lunar delivery program, intended to ignite a lunar economy of competing private businesses while scouting around before astronauts show up later this decade.
The demos should get two weeks of run time, before lunar daytime ends and the lander shuts down.
It carried a vacuum to suck up moon dirt for analysis and a drill to measure temperature as deep as 10 feet (3 meters) below the surface. Also on board: a device for eliminating abrasive lunar dust — a scourge for NASA’s long-ago Apollo moonwalkers, who got it caked all over their spacesuits and equipment.
On its way to the moon, Blue Ghost beamed back exquisite pictures of the home planet. The lander continued to stun once in orbit around the moon, with detailed shots of the moon’s gray pockmarked surface. At the same time, an on-board receiver tracked and acquired signals from the US GPS and European Galileo constellations, an encouraging step forward in navigation for future explorers.
The landing set the stage for a fresh crush of visitors angling for a piece of lunar business.
Another lander — a tall and skinny 15-footer (4 meters tall) built and operated by Houston-based Intuitive Machines — is due to land on the moon Thursday. It’s aiming for the bottom of the moon, just 100 miles (160 kilometers) from the south pole. That’s closer to the pole than the company got last year with its first lander, which broke a leg and tipped over.
Despite the tumble, Intuitive Machines’ lander put the US back on the moon for the first time since NASA astronauts closed out the Apollo program in 1972.
A third lander from the Japanese company ispace is still three months from landing. It shared a rocket ride with Blue Ghost from Cape Canaveral on Jan. 15, taking a longer, windier route. Like Intuitive Machines, ispace is also attempting to land on the moon for the second time. Its first lander crashed in 2023.
The moon is littered with wreckage not only from ispace, but dozens of other failed attempts over the decades.
NASA wants to keep up a pace of two private lunar landers a year, realizing some missions will fail, said the space agency’s top science officer Nicky Fox.
Unlike NASA’s successful Apollo moon landings that had billions of dollars behind them and ace astronauts at the helm, private companies operate on a limited budget with robotic craft that must land on their own, said Firefly CEO Jason Kim.
“Every time we go up, we’re learning from each other,” Kim said.
