A TV set pulls more users to a community centre

Nguruman Community members have something to smile about this coming season, when all people elsewhere will be glued to their TV screen watching the World cup it will be the same here. The top ten remotest tech village with access to internet has now added one more innovation that will ensure the village catches up with the latest news and happenings.

With the presence of a Community Knowledge Centre supported by Arid Lands Information Network the centre has equipped itself with a digital television set where users can catch a glimpse of the daily happenings and especially the world cup.

The community centre has been receiving enormous number of people since the TV set was installed, the most common users at the centre are school going children who after school cant wait to rush at the centre to watch cartoon programmes.

Pride of the Maasai...

Maasai are the southernmost Nilotic speakers and are linguistically most directly related to the Turkana and Kalenjin who live near Lake Turkana in west central Kenya. According to Maasai oral history and the archaeological record, they also originated near Lake Turkana. Maasai are pastoralist and have resisted the urging of the Tanzanian and Kenyan governments to adopt a more sedentary lifestyle. Read More>>>>>

BOOKS CHANGE LIVES

Book Aid International is a small charity organization based in South London.Book Aid International increases access to books to support literacy, education and development in sub-Saharan Africa.

Its one of one of the world's foremost library development charities and provide around half a million books to libraries in sub-Saharan Africa and the Occupied Palestinian Territories every year. They support libraries in schools, refugee camps, prisons, universities, communities and more. As well as donating books, they also support libraries by providing grants for purchasing books locally, maintaining library buildings or training for library staff.

In sub-Saharan Africa 162 million adults are illiterate and most people simply cannot afford books of their own. Without literacy people are not able to access education or health-care, take advantage of opportunities for employment, or participate in social, economic and political decisions which affect their lives. And without books, literacy is very hard to foster and maintain.

In a bid to highlight the plight of the African Readers Book Aid toured Nguruman Community Information Center, and filmed a short Documentary on how book changes lives.Enjoy watching....

Nguruman Maarifa Community Resource Centre from Book Aid International on Vimeo.

ENTASOPIA'S VILLAGE TECHNICIAN

Entasopia, is a village more than 100 miles from Kenya’s capital city, Nairobi. The area is linked with only one dusty, rocky road. At the village the main economic activity is pastoralism but there is Asian vegetable farming. The area has no electricity and the only available source of power is solar which is only found in counted homesteads. The transport system is inefficient and most people use trucks and Lorries used to ferry vegetables to the city. The total population is approximately 4000 the Maasai being the dominant tribe.Read more>>>>>>>

Our Knowledge Centre

An oasis of connectivity in rural Kenya.

ENTASOPIA, Kenya: The road from Nairobi winds 160 kilometers to this town deep in Masai country, the asphalt giving way to sand and dust, until finally it is just a dirt track climbing over broken hills and plunging back to desert flats. The going is slow.

The outpost, with about 4,000 inhabitants, is at the end of that road and beyond the reach of power lines. It has no bank, no post office, few cars and little infrastructure. Newspapers arrive in a bundle every three or four weeks. At night, most people light kerosene lamps and candles in their houses or fires in their huts and go to bed early, except for the farmers guarding crops against elephants and buffalo. Read more>>

VSAT Technology lands in Entasopia village

Alin team pulling resources for the new VSAT

In November, 2008 a VSAT was installed in the center to enhance internet services. The exercise was carried out by students from Michigan University’s Imagine Africa in USA in collaboration with , ALIN.
The VSAT started operating on the 26th November 2008 after the technical work was done by David Musila, from KDN, Raphael Marambii of ALIN and Dennis Mutwiri of Baobab Communications.


Services sought
The following services are sought since the installations of VSAT at Nguruman.They include:
• Training on the Internet: Youths and Adults have been flocking at the center to get training on internet,web-2 tools,online social networking tools and applications.
• Sending and reading mails: Government officials, Development Workers, visitors and students get in touch to the outside world by sending and receiving emails everyday.In fact almost every community member holds an email accounts.
• US Visa Applications: We receive visitors who book for their Visa interview online at the center. We have so far assisted two users book their Visa appointments online.
• E-Government services: Members of the community use the center to download vital documents like PIN registration forms, University application forms the center also assists the community members apply for green card.
• Reading online newspapers and journals, the center assists the users get latest information on health, agriculture, HIV, Gender issues and the current affairs.This helps them be enlightened since no newspaper reaches the village.
• Entasopia village is only served by two televisions sets and they are located in public places where people pay a fee of ksh 10/- to watch news or a movie, film. Most people cannot afford this fee daily thus they visit the center to watch short clips of music videos, news bulletin via you tube and blip TV.
• Scholarships and Job Applications. This is done by both the jobless and those employed looking for greener pastures and students looking for scholarships to further education.
• We have a range of professionals including teachers and other practitioners who are doing research for various projects. These also include people doing various development projects and are searching for funds and donors.
• Chatting with friends and family through social network sites
• Creating blogs and Web albums for saving their pictures especially on Picasa
• Searching information concerning agriculture, livestock and various livelihood information including market and prices.