Time To Live in Djibouti

[Jacaylbaro]

NEW YORK-- Djibouti (pronounced ji-boo-tee), also known officially as the Republic of Djibouti, was chosen by the United Nations as the top country in which to live in 2007.

 

The result, which was announced at the UN's headquarters in New York, came as a shock to some, as Djibouti is not commonly known as a world leader by any of the standards previously used to determine each country's ranking.

 

When asked to justify the selection of Djibouti as this year's top placement, UN spokesperson Robert Daly, had the following to say: "We decided to abandon the HDI this year and instead make the selection based solely on how cool the name of each country sounds. Djibouti was clearly the coolest."

 

The Human Development Index or HDI, a measure of factors such as life expectancy, standard of living, and education was formerly used by the UN in determining the rankings. Skeptics of the decision were immediately appeased after repeating the name of this year's top selection.

 

"Djibouti! Wow that is awesome," said Gary Bettner, a sociologist at the University of Maine. "I'm very pleased that the UN has finally abandoned arbitrary decision-making and returned to reaching informed, conscious conclusions."

 

The UN representative to Djibouti, who will be referred to as Bob, as his name it too hard to spell, was ecstatic. "This truly is a great day for all of Djibouti. I am truly pleased that our country has been selected by the UN as the best country in which to reside. Sure, our government is a puppet-democracy, we are struggling to end a decades old civil war, and we are facing rampant unemployment, but hey, Djibouti is damn wicked to say."

 

'Djibouti' has quickly gone on to become more than solely the name of a country. New York teenagers swiftly picked up 'djibouti' as a new catch-all buzz word, with many teens heard exclaiming "that's so djibouti!" or "I totally want to djibouti that chick." Thanks to the internet, the new vogue word has spread to even the furthest reaches of the globe and should soon replace old stand-bys such as 'radical' and 'tubular'.

 

This year's lowest ranked country was the People's Republic of Blmleh, which is so undjibouti to say that even its own residents refuse to acknowledge its existence.

 

HERE

[Blessed]

Loooooooooooooooooooooooooool

[Juje]

A resident of Djibouti, clearly ecstatic with the announcement.

[Nehanda]

Warya SheekJ waad warbadantahay. Djibouti has more to offer than its catchy name. Wa magalo qurux badan with many toolos such as Xarta. Plus no dagaal kama dhaciin.

[N.O.R.F]

They sold their airport and port operations to make a quick buck. I hope this wont be repeated in SL or Somalia insha Allah.

[N.O.R.F]

Jet Planes Will Be Able to Land at Hargeysa Airport Next Year

 

Hargeysa, November 3, 2007 (SL Times) – Somaliland Minister of civil aviation Ali Mohamed Waran Ade announced last Saturday that Hargeysa international airport run way will be repaired and extensively rebuilt.

 

The minister stated that the government will invest $400,000 to enlarge the airport run way, which will allow heavy jet planes to land at Hargeysa airport for the first time.

 

The minister added that the project will be finished in early 2008.

 

“Somaliland Diaspora who come home in the summer meet problems when they are flying to Hargeysa Airport, because on their way home the planes take them from the country where they live to countries that are Somaliland’s neighbors, then these passengers are put in low quality foker planes that fly them to Hargeysa. The reason this is the case is because Somaliland airport cannot handle heavy jet planes. But we are expecting that in early 2008, jets will be able to land at Hargeysa Airport for the first time in history,” said the Minister of Aviation in a press conference he held at the VIP reception of Hargeysa airport.

 

“Most of the airline companies in the country use Russian foker airplanes. African Express Airways is the only company that uses Jet planes, but its airplanes serve only in Berbera Airport, which is the only airport in the country in which huge jet planes can land. African Express Airways, too, will benefit once Hargeysa airport is improved because then its passengers will not have to go all the way to Berbera then come to Hargeysa,” the minister explained.

 

Source: Somaliland Times

 

Glad I wont be going to Djabouti anymore!!!

[Ibtisam]

^^YEs, about bloody time too! that is the best news! I hate them suicidal planes from DJ & Dubai! Seriously it is terrifying!

[Xidigo]

They are building Hargaisa airport only? waa yaab. atleast waxay dhisi lahaayeen jidka lagu ba'ay ee u dhexeeya Dila iyo saylac.

Malaha taasi concern kooda maaha. :mad:

 

Riyoode is just there for the name.

[Nehanda]

Iyo jidka kale ee lagu xogeey o uu dhaxeeyo Barbara iyo Burco.

[Xidigo]

Labadaba anaa maray abaayo macaanto. Please ha is ku misayn labada jid.

 

Jidka barbara iyo burco u dhexeeya wuu dhisan yahay atleast wuu dhaamaa boqol kiiba.

Waligaa ma martay jidka Dila iyo saylac U dhexeeye?

 

Dadku way ku dhinteen really :mad:

[N.O.R.F]

^^I know what your saying laakin the govnt is cash strapped (when ever Riyaale is not scooping some for himself) and that road is not a priority at the moment. Sadly.

 

Originally posted by Nehanda:

Iyo jidka kale ee lagu xogeey o uu dhaxeeyo Barbara iyo Burco.

Thats the best 'highway' in SL. Waa toos. No problems.

 

Ghanima, I know what you mean. Flights direct from Dubai would be good for me and the family. Going through 'dhib'outi is a nightmare.

[Xudeedi]

I am sure this announcement came after the Letter from Djibouti by Jacon Laksin pubslished and dissiminated on Somali newswires.

----------------------------------------

 

"THE EXPLANATION for some of this disrepair can be summed up in one word: khat. A green, leafy shoot common to East Africa and Yemen, the plant is supposed to act as a kind of African Viagra, speeding up blood pressure and generally boosting one's energy reserves. If so, it seems that Djibouti has acquired a particularly bad batch, because khat's effect on the locals, particularly the men, is anything but energizing. "After 12 o'clock the men are completely useless," one civil-affairs worker in Djibouti told me. She meant 12 o'clock in the afternoon.

 

Casual observation bears this out. Look around the capital city any time after midday, and you will see whole packs of men collapsed in restful torpor on roadsides and street corners. It's no surprise that many of the maintenance workers at the American military base in Djibouti, Camp Lemonier, hail from neighboring Ethiopia and Somalia. The locals are just not up to the job.

 

All of which prompts an uncomfortable conclusion. Because crushing poverty is such a famous fact of African life, it's sometimes assumed that Africans bear little to no responsibility for their plight. It's sobering to realize that, in Djibouti at least, one of the chief obstacles to progress and development is Djiboutians.

 

Consider the central government. Djiboutian president Ismail Omar Guelleh's smiling, avuncular face appears on scores of billboards throughout the capital, but his presence throughout the remainder of the country seems decidedly more limited. Colonel Robert Adamson, a trained veterinarian who travels across Djibouti as part of a military-led initiative to inoculate local livestock, notes that he and his colleagues are doing a job that the government won't do. "It's not like we're competing with local projects" Adamson says. "We're doing things that no one is providing for the people."

[Che -Guevara]

Waa Jaad cun badanyihiin,but that's da case with all Somalis today.

[Xudeedi]

^Nimaan Shaqaysan shaah waa ka xaaraan. Fadhiga halaga kaco.

 

 

"We decided to abandon the HDI this year and instead make the selection based solely on how cool the name of each country sounds. Djibouti was clearly the coolest."

I missed this part

[Abu-Salman]

Actually, both Djibouti International Airport and Port were leased to Dubai so as to mitigate rampant corruption and neglect while attracting foreign investments and cooperations (how else to limit fraud, "khating" and nepotism where simple clerks to highest ranking officials practise them?).

 

Maybe the standards at the Airport have not been that upgraded, but I'm yet to understand the exact causes of these recurrent complaints, wether it's in term of unduly long waiting periods, lack of staff professionalism, cleanliness ect?

 

Having said that, spending huge sums of money in such trivial issues as Airports comforts in a region where 400 000 $ could provide schools and clean water for a small town is particularly unwise (comparable to Africans States owning their own aircraft fleet when their population are facing easily preventable diseases and illetrism).

 

Not only were people using small Russian planes (if not cargo or military planes) for decades to travel from Djibouti to Hargeysa but the degree of comfort was among their last priorities (unlike the unrealistic or extravagant expectations born from living abroad).

 

As for risks, you get much more exposed whenever you step outside your house or even inside, wether coming from an unruly car traffic, Tuberculosis, contaminated water/food ect (in contrast, every type of planes are strictly maintained).

 

As for the propaganda "journalistic article", we should always question the motives and background of such unconstructive Western writings, designed merely to distord reality as to relentlessly fuel further anti-Islam prejudice by appealing to the average American Ego (with little knowledge of the rest of the World).

 

The above-cited one by Jacob Laksin was clearly the work of a (Jew?) journalist affiliated to the chauvinistic Phillips Foundation which have their own prejudicied agenda to further(unfortunately, people unfamiliar with such methods may fell into the trap).

 

Shouldn't any honest, self-coherent journalist focuze much more on how the US spend hundreds of billions in Iraq while the president vetoes the bill widening access to healthcare for poor American children, the obscene inequalities across races and citizens, the distortion of "democracy" by powerful lobbies, lack of any American coherent Public Health policy, poor quality, double standards education which maintains the US at the bottom of industrialized Nations despite their unequaled, ever-rising prosperity concomitant with their prowess in undermining every environmental treaty, sabotaging poor countries access to generic drugs as well as fair trade ect?

 

In fact, I wholeheartedly support a ban on Khat but one can not blame a particular symptom without looking at the big picture characterized by diluted moral norms and the concomitant acculturation and we all know only too well how Western moralizers reacted when the Islamic Courts in Somalia outlawed Khat and other drugs usage (particularly hypocritical when one can land in prison for Khat smuggling in much of the Western world and the one of the most crucial socio-economical recommendation by their NGO/organizations, in our context, has been to address this issue)...

 

PS: What do people complain about exactely, concerning the regional airports?