Census, Solar Eclipse and other Matters.

Wow, busy week. Apologies for the lack of posts.

I was finally counted in the census on Sunday 26th of March, after just 6 days of a complete shut down of Lagos State and most of the other states in Nigeria. The only details the enumerators took were my Name, Age, State of origin, Education, Occupation, Marital Status and my thumb print. All very well but the information we were given ahead of the census stated that we would be asked about other details such Toilet facilities, Television, Telephone, Income (a question I didn't know how to answer), Type of water supply and the size of the house. (bbc link)

None of these additional questions were asked of us or our security guards. Also I took a good look at the form the enumerators used. The forms were A3 in size and covered in red lines and text giving instructions. The box they had to fill for occupation was very small, especially as they had to use an HB pencil. When I told them I was a Software Design Engineer, the job title on my work permit here, they wrote "S ENGR" in the box, because that's all their was space for. I hope someone can interpret that!

Another point is they asked us 'Did you graduate?' and one of my colleagues who does not have a degree but an HND said 'No - I'm too old for University!'. The enumerator then marked the box for 'Primary' school education level. Good job we spotted that and changed it to the box relevant to HND.

On Wednesday we had the pleasure of viewing a partial Solar eclipse in Lagos. I originally planned to take a trip to Cape Coast in Ghana to view the total eclipse but the census has stopped the Nigerian Immigration Service working and so my passport isn't back yet with my new visa. So I couldn't apply for a Ghanaian visa, or I may not be able to get back to Nigeria!

The partial eclipse was very spectacular all the same. I witnessed a partial eclipse in the UK in 1999 but it was nothing like the one here. I suppose the light levels here are so much brighter than the UK that it's all the more noticable that it gets dark. Despite being a few hundred miles from the path of totality the Sun was eclipsed to leave only a very slim cresent, like the moon during first few nights after a new moon. It got quite dark, even darker than it gets when we are about to get a very heavy rain storm except the brilliant light that still came through from the sun was casting shadows.

I made a pinhole projector from one of my business cards and a hole punch and watched the eclipse. Occaisional drifts of cloud sometimes obscured the sun enough to view it directly but not really enough. The Nigerians were viewing it by looking at the reflection in a bucket of water but this seemed to bright for me, even with sunglasses so I stuck to my business card projector approach.

I've moved on a good deal with the phase 2 software, I now have a system working nicely for the first page of the form. I'm very happy with the improvements I've been planning and have now made, a few of the features that the data entry staff requested of the phase 1 software have now been implemented. Now most of the framework of the software is ready I should be able to move through the next few sections of the form fairly quickly. I hope to be able to call some of our Data Entry staff from phase 1 to come and start a test of the software during next week. If I can resolve the issues that test session brings up then I hope we can start the data entry of phase 2 week beginning April 10th. I'll let you know.


Technorati Tags: Lagos, Nigeria, Lagos, Nigeria, Eclipse, Census, Solar Eclipse

Hello, I'm here! come and count me... Hello?

4 days of the census over and we still have had nobody visit. Actually that's not true, on Wednesday someone came to let us know we would be visited on thursday at 2pm, however no such visit occurred.

Much of my 5½ years in this fair country has been spent handling enumeration exercises like this census. Okay, okay on a much smaller scale, but I think this experience I have, especially of operating in Lagos, means I can make some assessments of the news I've heard from the Newspapers about how the census is going.

Todays newspapers, in particular the Nigerian Guardian Newspaper that happened to be delivered today, have been fairly disparaging about the progress made so far. Basic materials needed to complete the enumeration have not been 'on the ground' for the start of this exercise. Enumerators in Lagos and other States are reporting that there haven't been enough forms available for collecting information and not enough other materials that are required like chalk and indelible ink. Money has not been forthcoming for payment to the enumerators, things appear to be generally badly organised and lacking any coherent structure.

A particular comment I liked came from Lagos State Information and Strategy Commissioner, Dele Alake:

... As at Today, the third day of the exercise, millions of Lagosians are yet to see the enumerators of the National Population Commission.

"Indeed, throughout the Federation, the first and second days have been devoted to the resolution of logistical problems such as payment of the enumerators, distribution of the materials, the discovery of the actual area to be enumerated by the officials and in rare cases, the enumeration of the houses.

The Guardian: Friday, March 24, 2006 - page 7

Lagos State Government have imposed a 3 day daytime curfew (8am - 4pm) to speed up enumeration from Tuesday 21st to Thursday 23rd of March 2006. Federal Government have imposed a further 2 days of 'restriction of movement' for Friday 24th and Saturday 25th of March.

This is a BIG BIG error. The cost of practically shutting down Lagos State alone must surely run into many billions of Naira a day. To shut Lagos, a city with an estimated population of 12-15 million, for this exercise when even the most basic things required are not even ready for day one is utterly foolish. I know many people may write to me now for saying that but let's call a spade a spade here, and don't forget who's putting in most of the financial muscle behind this census. That's right the EU, and therefore much of the blame must land at their feet for funding this project without taking a careful interest in the planning of logistics and procedure.

I stand to be corrected.

I heard that a friend who lives in Ikoyi was enumerated today so there may be hope yet!

Technorati Tags: Lagos, Nigeria, Lagos, Nigeria, census

Census curfew saves lives!

I was about to write a post about the census curfew which I have been enjoying very much so far. To get peace and quiet while I'm trying to work is a huge benefit. Yesterday I spent a while just standing around outside the gate to our compound enjoying the quiet and talking to our security. It's so strange to have empty roads and no traffic noise, most noticably the incessant horns of hurried Nigerian drivers.

I said I was 'about to' write that post because before I logged in to blogger I checked my bbc news feed and spotted a story about the census and decided to read it and about halfway down it says:

In the commercial capital, Lagos, people have been ordered to remain as home and correspondents say the streets are eerily quiet.

This has probably saved lives as the top nine stories of the 21-story bank in the city centre collapsed on Wednesday morning, AP news agency reports.

Wow, sounds nasty, so I did a little browsing and found that CNN had more of a story and a picture. I'm not sure of the legality of posting the picture here so I won't but it gives you a good idea of what happened. For those of you that don't know lagos, this building is reportedly on Broad Street, on Lagos Island the commercial hub of Lagos. In my opinion Broad street is the busiest road in the whole city so the number of lives that have been saved by the curfew in Lagos is very considerable.

Otherwise we have yet to be Enumerated in the census. As I was not eligible for the 2001 UK census I'd quite like my existence to be registered somewhere in the world.

As a final note this is my 150th post! W00t!
Technorati Tags: Lagos, Nigeria, Lagos, Nigeria, Census

Bar Beach reconstruction

Bar beach on Victoria Island in Lagos is currently being rebuilt (again!) Every few years it seems the sea washes away part of the road on the seafront and some lucky contractor gets the job to fix it. This year though it seems the contractors may be putting a bit more effort in by making some kind of Tetrapods or whatever they are called. Those things that look like some Giant's been playing Jacks. I guess they'll be using them to create some kind of reef or breakwater that will stop the erosion on the beach. Good Job.

Now if they would tidy up some of the car wrecks that litter the Lagos roads by using them in the reef too they could fix two problems at once!

Technorati Tags: Lagos, Nigeria, Lagos, Nigeria, Photo, Image, Photoblog, Sea Erosion, Sea Defence

Schindler's Lift

Update 2006-03-19: Thought I had better point out that I took this photo in a lift in a hotel in Lagos. Thought you may be wondering, apart from the obvious pun, why it was here.

Technorati Tags: Lagos, Nigeria, Lagos, Nigeria, Photograph, Photoblog, Image

Counting everyone in Nigeria

Well the big news in Nigeria this week is the upcoming Census. There are going to be restrictions on travel over next week to prevent people being counted where they are not normally resident. Most States in Nigeria are expected to declare public holidays on the days of the census in order that people will be at home to be counted. Problem is in places like Lagos, when there is a public holiday, the majority of the population being non indigenous to Lagos, may like to visit their home town where their family live. In order to stop that the Federal government have announced that there will be a partial restriction on travel on Friday and Saturday (24th and 25th of March). Don't know what this means exactly yet, and as the Census starts on Tuesday aparently I'm not sure how much help that will be.

In other news: I finally got us a new Internet Connection to replace our Multi-Links setup, with MyNetcom and it seems satisfactory so far. The cost for those interested is =N= 75,000 for the equipment and one month of service at 300kbps. After the first month you can change your tariff to one from a range of 100kbps at =N= 6000 monthly to 600kbps at =N= 45,000 monthly.

I was torn between MyNetcom and CobraNet. Although I had heard good things about cobranet I decided against them for a number of reasons. First their website does not give enough information about their service. secondly, their ADSL service requires a GTE phone line to be installed and I didn't need that extra hassle. Third if we were to use the wireless service we would no doubt need to have a mast installed because the technology used requires line-of-sight between the two antennas, we have a lot of trees and 4+ storey buildings around. The MyNetcom wireless service uses 3G mobile phone technology to connect so you just have a 3G modem connected through an ethernet port on your computer and the whole thing sits on your desk, meaning you can take it with you should you need to work on the move or in different locations. Finally the Cobranet prices were practically identical (=N= 70,000 set up, 12-21k per month) to MyNetcom but they did not mention providing a facility to downgrade the tariff if for instance we would have one or zero people here for a month.

I also finally found a workaround for those Internet Exploder rendering bugs, simply creating a horizontal line solved the positioning problem I was having. So as much as I'd like to I don't have to install Mozilla Firefox on the data entry pc's. I am now working on the Perl and MySQL back end, hopefully bringing in some tried and tested modules from the perl CPAN repository to replace some of the parts of the old system I had written myself and were a bit clumsy and a little temperamental, like session management and user administration.

Technorati Tags: Nigeria, Lagos, Lagos, Nigeria, census, internet, wireless, WiMax, netcom, mynetcom, CobraNet, ISP

How to get a Visa

I've spent a couple of days this week trying to organise the documents and paperwork needed to get my visa renewed for another year. All the hoops that need to be jumped through to get it are quite ridiculous. For instance Before I can apply for my multi entry visa I must first get my residence permit renewed. But you'd think that logically before you apply for resident status you'd have a visa right?

Well the residence permit costs about US$350 which is rather a large sum, and once you have that you can apply for the visa which we were charged NGN 16,200 for (that's about US$115 or GB£65). These only last a year so you can see the amount of revenue this generates. I can't understand though, why the Multi Entry visa doesn't equate to the Residence Permit, as you can't have a one without the other, they should just be built into the same document surely!

Well anyway, other than that I've worked on the prototype web interface a bit more and worked on my OU courses. I've still got a problem with Microsoft Internet Exploder messing up the layout, and I'm thinking of installing Mozilla Firefox on all PC's that will use the interface, that way I can stop worrying about this issue and move on to something else.

Technorati Tags: Nigeria, Lagos, Visa, Residence Permit

Photo Blog 2006-03-07

N... is still at her Aunts house, and although I've promised more pictures of her, I can't do that yet. So in the mean time I thought I'd kick off my promise to share some photos of Nigeria. I decided to start with the place I know best. My house. The links below take you to my flickr account where you can find All my pictures.


Front of House


Car Parking and Driveway


Side View of House 1


Side View of House 2


Side View of House 3


Patriotic Generators 1


Patriotic Generators 2


The Gatehouse


Dad


Lounge / Living Room / Parlour 1


Lounge / Living Room / Parlour 2


Main Entrance Porch


Freddies Room 1


Freddie The Parrot


Freddies Room 2


Freddie on his perch


the Bar Entryway


the Bar 1


the Bar 2


Dining Room


Kitchen 1


Kitchen 2


My Office 1


My Desk 1


My Desk 2

Technorati Tags: Nigeria, Lagos, Lagos, Nigeria, Photos, Photographs, photoblog

11 days in Lagos

Well, Sorry for not updating. A LOT has happened since I got back to Lagos, and I'll try and explain all below, but that's the reason for the long delay in updating.

First, I'm engaged! I decided enough was enough and asked N... to marry me on Friday 24th February and she said yes, so there you go. I bought the ring earlier this year when I was in the UK, but unfortunately I'd got the size a little bit wrong so until I can get a competent jeweler to adjust it she has to wear it with a band-aid plaster on the inside to stop it sliding off. But that's a secret so don't tell anyone.

I have no idea about dates or anything yet, we will have to see how it goes, but it will be soon. I've heard of Nigerian/Expat weddings having to take place on three occasions, two in Nigeria, (a Traditional wedding and a White Wedding) and one in whatever home country of the Expatriate, I'm pretty sure that all sounds expensive so we'll have to work something out there. I'm sure it's only necessary to sign a registry somewhere in the world just once to be married.

I've taken a few pictures as requested by my family but they are all a bit rubbish, I'm hoping I can get some decent photos this week, otherwise I'll try and work on the photo's I've got and upload them to my flickr account later this week. N... is currently visiting her Aunt who lives in Ikorodu which is close to Lagos. So any new photos will need to wait till after she gets back.

So apart from that news which I was holding back from this blog until I was sure my family all knew. ( I didn't think they would want to find out from this page!), I've only really got Work Stuff to report about. I have not yet managed to get out and about with my camera as I hoped I would.

I've been working solo on the Second Phase software upgrade. I've developed a prototype web interface which was going great until I tried it out on a windows machine and all the measurements I made on my Linux laptop seem to be out on the windows machine by 2 or 3 pixels - Very frustrating! Even if I use Firefox 1.5.0.1 in Windows and Linux it shows up different. I suspect now this has something to do with the Fonts so I'm going to play with those over the next few days to see if I can tweak it to look the way it should. Otherwise I'll be adjusting everything again.

I installed Wireless networking at my V.I. house so that Dad, Mike and I can move around a bit with our laptops. I've repaired the server from our Project office, the hard disk had failed with the lovely 'click of death'. I set up a firewall box at the Project office so that the internet access the staff discovered was available via an Ethernet port on the wall of the office, could be shielded. Don't want people elsewhere in the building snooping around, and certainly don't want to expose our network to the wider internet directly. It seems the only internet access is coming through a transparent web proxy server somewhere and that no direct connections can be made anyway. This is good news for our protection from the internet but bad news for setting up email other than via a webmail interface. It also means my dream of setting up a VPN tunnel between our offices is going to be a little harder to achieve without a dedicated internet connection.

I'm looking into acquiring a WiMax Internet Connection, currently myNetCom are the ones I'm looking most closely at, but I've yet to see the system in action to know if it's any good.

That's it for now. Please post your messages below but be patient if your message does not appear promptly as I will continue to moderate all comments before they appear here due to some rather odd messages I have received from some peculiarly Stupid People who obviously can't understand my admittedly flawed version of English and seem to get the totally wrong idea about what I'm saying, probably because I use very long sentences like this and they get bored and make up their own endings.

But there we go, as to be expected with these blog things I guess.

Technorati Tags: Nigeria, Lagos, Lagos, Nigeria, Engagement, VPN, WiMax