There is renewed violence north of Goma, but it is very unlikely that life here in town will be affected. Relative to the open warfare of the last decade, these skirmishes really aren’t much for Muzungus like myself to worry about.

I feel my privilege as an American more than ever. This morning was country-club tennis with young med students who are also staying at Lyn and Jo’s gorgeous home, followed by a run and a swim in the endless, quiet lake that the house overlooks. Tonight is some huge expat party with a number of NGOs in the area. The main concern for us regarding the new violence up north is whether we’ll be able to go see the gorillas in the coming weeks.

I’m just picking on one side of my two-days new experience. The rest of what I’ve seen will be saved for another post; the cognitive dissonance is difficult to express. I’ll be visiting our school on Sunday to meet with our teachers. That will be out near the displaced persons camp that the school serves; maybe I’ll write about that, next.

Quick post: I arrived last night, safe, sound, and with all of my gear intact. I’ve hit the ground running. Today, I met with the Congolese board of the Goma Student Fund and installed a preliminary version of OpenMRS for the AIDS pediatrics ward.

The place I’m staying at is gorgeous; truly a sanctuary in the midst of this very poor area.

More, soon. There are already countless interesting things to report…

Installing ubuntu on a bunch of donated laptops,
originally uploaded by Nargopolis.

People have responded to the letter in my last post, and in force. I’m up to 5-6 good laptops, now, and starting to worry about the weight restrictions on my flight.

Update: I had just enough time laser etch all the laptops with the HEALAfrica logo. Hopefully, this will make them easier to get across the Congolese/Rwandan border, and less desirable to steal once I get them there.

Here’s what I just sent out to friends and family, last night. The donated gear and well wishes are rolling in as I type this. I’m pretty excited, to say the least!

Homepeeps:

Some of you may know that I’m heading off to the Democratic Republic of the Congo for six weeks, starting next Friday, 8/24. I’m emailing a) to give everyone the details on what I’ll be up to and b) to put out a call for useful gear that you might want to donate.

THE PLAN

So, first, the lowdown. My plan is to help build up the IT infrastructure at the regional hospital in a city called Goma, on the border between Rwanda and the Congo. If the stars align just right, I’ll be able to set up a local network and software to run an electronic medical record system for them. The nonprofit that I’ll be working with is an amazing one called HEAL Africa (http://healafrica.org), which runs the hospital and a coordinates huge number of services in the area.

I will also, of course, be working with the Goma Student Fund (http://gomastudentfund.org), the educational non-profit that Devon Lake started and that I have been on the board of for the last four years. I’ll be visiting our teachers and helping our students get started with the new school year.

Who knows what else I’ll be up to? Visiting gorillas, perhaps, or writing Instructables to showcase local makers. I can’t wait. I’ll posting updates in various forms; send me a quick message if you’d like to get them.

OLD GEAR!

If you’re anything like me, there are treasures hiding in the dark corners of your closets and drawers. A quick pass over my room netted old digital cameras, wireless routers, and even a decent laptop, all dusty with disuse. Rescue these gems from their uncertain fate, send them with me (a tax-deductible donation), and I’ll put them in the hands of people who will use them until they can’t be used no’ mo’.

What to donate:

• Laptops: I won’t be able to use total junkers, but decent laptops (last five years or so) are gold. If I can find a powerful enough one, it may end up being the server for the entire hospital’s management system.
• Laptop power supplies: I especially need one for a Dell laptop…
• Digital Cameras: Who uses a 1MP camera, anymore? Not you, but I’ll bet that old camera will do just fine in Goma.
• Networking gear: Wireless routers, hubs, ethernet cable, crimpers, etc. to make it all play nice together
• Flash memory: USB keys, Compact Flash, etc. All those little cards and readers lying around like confetti in your room.

So, bring me your old gear! This weekend is an ideal time. I’ll be overjoyed to take anything you have, up to the day I leave, but packing to get under the baggage limits is going to be an adventure, as it is…

Love, Hugs, et cetera, Eric

The new Prototype release candidate (1.6.0) looks awesome. This library really has delivered the promise of Javascript: Lots and lots of flexibility, allowing us to code in several different programming paradigms at once. This new release will hopefully bring object-oriented, aspect-oriented, and functional programming into the mainstream.

I’m probably the last person to notice this, but if you hover your mouse over xkcd.com comics (here’s one), you get another funny punchline.

They’re like the little margin sketches that you get in the venerable old Tom Toles and Pat Oliphant comics, but tailored for the web.

For his thirtieth birthday, Logan had a great idea. Instead of asking his friends for gifts, he asked us to speak our minds to a politician of our choice. Here’s my hastily-worded message:

I just wanted to write to Senator Obama to let him know that, although I am more inspired by his overall message than I am by any other candidate, he lags on one of my key issues: environmental sustainability. I believe strongly that our country can take the lead in the global effort to bring humanity’s industrial practices into balance with the natural world. I believe we can reap major economic, public health, and personal benefits from this effort.

Whether true or not, the media that I receive about Senator Obama does not put him in the lead on these issues. This article, for example, lauds Senator Edwards’ comprehensive plans and pans Senator Obama for being vague: http://grist.org/feature/2007/07/06/candidates/

I urge Senator Obama to speak clearly on environmental issues, and to put forth specific plans on how we are to address global climate change, species loss, and pollution.

Sincerely, Eric Nguyen