October 21, 2005
A Retreat to Virginia Woods
October Skyline Drive
I will retreat to Shenandoah National Park for a quiet period of reading and writing. My secretary will deliver urgent messages.
This park is renowned for its natural grandeur. The nights will be longer and it will be the height of the fall foliage season. I will take my binoculars and post photos on this page.
Our departure party will include Dale, Ijeoma, Mum, a niece and a nephew. I will remain while others return to civilization.
A 35-mile speed limit is enforced along the 105-mile length of Skyline Drive. However, we won't drive it all. We'll have frequent stops for a nature stroll.
Our Favorite Overlooks:
Range View Overlook at Mile 17.1, 2,800 feet. Ridgetops of the Blue Ridge, Massanutten, and Allegheny mountains.
Franklin Cliffs at Mile 49
Big Run at Mile 81.2
Stony Man Mountain Summit, Winchester Lodge at Skyland Resort
Recommended Historic Lodges:
Historic Big Meadows Lodge (Mile 51.3), rustic cabins, views of wildflowers.
Lewis Mountain Cabins (Mile 57.3)
Skyland Resort (Mile 41.7), rustic cabins
Shenandoah River Cabins
Waterfalls
Luray Cavern
Big Meadows, Skyline Drive
Posted by emeagwali at 09:05 AM | Comments (0)
September 19, 2005
Gym Log
Well . . . thought I'd publicly disclose my routine. Before I had my knee injury, I was running 50 miles a week and won a few city-wide tennis tournaments. I slowed down and slowly gained maybe 20 pounds. I need to bring my weight down, reduce my waistline from 36 to 34, develop a six-pack stomach, and become as fit as a marathoner. Feel free to prod me on if you're lurking. Your suggestions, positive or negative, may be beneficial.
Chest
Chest Press Flat.
Incline Dumbells
Incline Hammerstrength
Cable Crossovers
Triceps
Tricep Pushdown Rope
Tricept Pushdown Bar
Overhead Tricep Extension
Reverse Arm Pulldown
Back
Lat Pulldown Machine
Lat Pulldown Hammerstrength
Seated Row
T-Bar Rows
Biceps
Bicep Curl
Alternating Dumbell Curls
Drop Sets
Hammer Curls
Straight Bar Curls
Legs
Squats
Leg Press
Leg Extensions
Hamstring Curls
Calf Raises
Shoulder
Shoulder Press Hammerstrength
Front Delt Raises Dumbells
Lateral Raises
Shrugs
Posted by emeagwali at 10:14 AM | Comments (0)
September 09, 2005
Sunset Dinner at Zanzibar on the Waterfront
Dale and I had dinner at Zanzibar on the Waterfront, a multi-ethnic Washington, D.C. nightclub that attracts Africans, African-Americans and Caribbeans. We watched the sunset, listened to Bob Marley and danced to 50 cent.
We visited my mother and had conversations with Ngozi (my sister-in-law) and half a dozen nieces and nephews that were spending the night with her. Ngozi woke her son and said:
"Do you recognize him? He is your famous uncle that you read about in school."
Mum reminded me to call my aunt Mama Ifeoma and console her on the death of my cousin Ifeanyi - who died in childbirth. She also updated us with interesting stories from her last weekend's trip to Onitsha Convention in Houston, Texas.
Posted by emeagwali at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
September 01, 2005
Jazzy Summer Nights
September 1, 2005
8:30 to 10:30 p.m.
Hopkins Plaza,
Baltimore, Maryland
I attended concerts by Chuck Brown and Wayna.
Posted by emeagwali at 11:38 PM | Comments (0)
Concert in the Park
September 1, 2005
5:30 - 8:30 p.m.
I attended a concert in the Park (West Mount Vernon Park) at the base of the Washington Monument, Charles & Monument Streets, Baltimore, Maryland.
Performing were Assembly of Dust and Judd & Maggie.
Posted by emeagwali at 11:04 PM | Comments (0)
July 24, 2005
My Weekend at an Arts Festival
I swam, played soccer and relaxed (with Dale) at the three-day Artscape in Baltimore, Maryland.
Posted by emeagwali at 08:18 AM | Comments (1)
June 04, 2005
I Was Voted AFRICAN OF THE YEAR
Washington, DC - June 4, 2005
DC Convention Center
My wife, mother and son accompanied me to the African People's Intercontinental Awards. We had a great time and enjoyed meeting a dozen Nollywood stars.
The oration (as prepared for delivery):
Son of Africa, supercomputer pioneer, we honor you. We heed Kwame Nkrumah’s warning that, “socialism without science is void” in honoring you for crowning Africa with shining scientific discoveries. When you won the 1989 Gordon Bell prize, the “Nobel Prize of Supercomputing,” then-president Bill Clinton called you, “one of the great minds of the Information Age.” The New African magazine readers ranked you as the greatest African scientist ever. Ladies and gentlemen, for his groundbreaking discoveries and for the sheer force of his mind, we present Africa Man of the Year Award to PHILIP EMEAGWALI.
My acceptance remark:
Thank you for recognizing two scientists - Wangari Maathai and myself. We accept our awards on behalf of other African scientists that also helped push back the frontiers of knowledge and create our collective future. On behalf of all African scientists, I say thank you.
Posted by emeagwali at 11:10 PM | Comments (3)
March 19, 2005
Summer Retreat in Alaska
Read the Anchorage Daily News, Anchorage Press, Alaska This Month and Northern Light
My bike path:
Tony Knowles Coastal Trail
I will spend the first week in June (to avoid the crowd) in Denali National Park and Preserve.
I will come back in mid-Winter to take photos of
Northern Lights
(scientific name is Aurora Borealis)
Posted by emeagwali at 06:49 PM | Comments (4)
Weekend in Annapolis, Maryland
I had a four-hour walk yesterday. I wasn't feeling well and I took a detour to our local Barnes & Nobles bookstore. I called Dale to come and take me home.
Today, Dale and spent the afternoon walking through the historic streets of Annapolis, Maryland. Annapolis is a quaint village steeped in 200 years of maritime heritage. We relaxed at the waterfront and visited the Kunta Kinte - Alex Haley Memorial.
Posted by emeagwali at 08:56 AM | Comments (1)
March 04, 2005
A Little Bit Out There (in OTTAWA, Canada)
March 4, 2005
I had an hour-long interview with The Ottawa Citizen , one of the most widely read Canadian newspapers. The interview was about my forthcoming visit to Ottawa, my life and work.
I made the point that the early computer pioneers were mathematicians attempting to solve computation-intensive problems in physics. The first computers, or rather supercomputers, on the Internet were for mathematicians attempting to solve computation-intensive problems in physics. The Internet, was invented, to enable mathematical physicists access remote supercomputers and to solve computation-intensive problems.
March 5, 2005
My interview did not appear in The Ottawa Citizen . It was bumped by stories about the release of Martha Stewart from prison.
March 6, 2005
I travelled from Washington to Ottawa, the cold but beautiful capital of Canada. I checked into the Les Suites Hotel (les-suites.com, 1002) at noon and had a quiet dinner at an Indian restaurant, swam in the hotel's indoor pool, slept for an hour and wrote my speech.
I thought that I will be speaking on information management but discovered the day before my speech that the marketing materials stated that I will be speaking on the future of the Internet.
March 7, 2005
After speaking from 10:15 to 11:00 a.m., I had an hour of meet-and-greet and returned to my hotel to get some sleep. I only slept for three hours the previous night.
Since both the computer and the Internet are primary technologies that created the need to manage information, the very information they have made so readily available. To accurately forecast the directions of information management requires that we first accurately forecast future computer technologies.
QUESTIONS tossed during the Meet & Greet:
I was asked to explain my statement "The focus was on computing, but that wasn’t the problem. The problem was about communicating."I explained that you can have a hundred of the greatest minds in the world in one room and working on the same problem, but if they don’t communicate, it is no different than having any one of them working the problem alone.
Because we named it a “supercomputer” we first think of “computing” when the word “supercomputer” is mentioned.
But the problem was not about computing. It was about communicating. Because we had been computing for centuries, we knew more about computing than about communicating.
March 8, 2005
I swam, had lunch and headed to the airport. I read the newspapers and saw a profile of me in The Ottawa Citizen newspaper. The same article was distributed by wire service to 280 Canadian newspapers and also picked up by African newspapers. I introduced many new concepts in my 20-page speech but the media only highlighted the theme "African scientist says email of the future will be telepathic..." See the article You Aint' Seen Nothin' Yet
AFTERTHOUGHTS
After my speech, a lady said that it sounds great to be able to communicate without keyboards and monitors. I told her that I will go nuts when my brain is bombarded with t-mail spams and other nonsenses. Her children will visit pornography sites without her permission.
Also, the CIA could send subliminal messages and suggestions to Osama bin Laden. And strangers will send sexual suggestions to each other.
The possibilities are endless. [Send me your thoughts!]
March 10, 2005
Dale and I chilled out at The Funk Box, a Baltimore (Maryland) night-club. The performers of the night were reggae legend Jimmy Cliff and a Kenyan cultural group Jabali Afrika.
The shows were great. I have been a Jimmy Cliff fan since 1972, as a teenager in Onitsha (Nigeria, Africa) and I have seen him in concert on two previous occasions. He was the first to bring reggae to a worldwide audience.
Listen to Jimmy Cliff here.
March 12, 2005
My attention now shifts to my forthcoming speaking engagements in Germany and New York. If the weather is nice, I might also vacation in late April in Amsterdam or Berlin.
Posted by emeagwali at 09:17 AM | Comments (6)
June 20, 2004
African American Heritage Festival
African American Heritage Festival
June 18-20, 2004
Camden Yards
Baltimore, Maryland
I had a three-day getaway weekend at the AAHF.
I saw Ashford & Simpson, Gerald Levert,
LL Cool J
Anthony Hamilton
Maze featuring Frankie Beverly
Posted by emeagwali at 11:43 AM | Comments (0)
March 29, 2004
History of Science
Excerpts from a speech I delivered at the University of Florida, Gainesville.
Recently, I purchased the U.S. News & World Report. It was a special issue entitled “History’s Great Explorers.” It described the race to be the first man to reach the North Pole, which is the farthest point north or the end of the Earth.On the magazine’s cover is a big photo of Robert E. Peary, whom the U.S. News & World Report declared to be the first man to reach the North Pole.
The first man to reach the North Pole was not Robert E. Peary. The first man to reach the North Pole was an African-American named Matthew Henson.
On May 8, 1900, two co-explorers – one black and the other white - arrived near the North Pole.
According to the records, the black explorer Matthew Henson arrived at the North Pole 45 minutes ahead of his white co-explorer Robert E. Peary.
When Neil Armstrong stepped on the surface of the moon before Buzz Aldrin, we proclaimed him as the first man to walk on the moon.
Therefore, if it is correct to say that Neil Armstrong was the first man to walk on the moon then it is equally correct to say that Matthew Henson was the first man to reach the North Pole.
Race seems to be at issue here, but I am not the only witness to the effect of the “selective recording” of history.
Similarly, Europeans and Brazilians complain that American historians of science omit important scientific contributions made in their nations.
An Englishman named Joseph Swan invented the light bulb. The story was re-retold and re-centered around an American named Thomas Edison.
A Brazilian named Santos-Dumont achieved the world’s first heavier-than-air flight. The story was retold and re-centered around the American Wright brothers.
A German named Konrad Zuse invented, in 1941, the world’s first programmable computer named ZUSE Z3. The story was retold and re-centered around the American computer named ENIAC which was invented five years later.
I could provide a hundred examples of this type of scientific data that was historically ignored.
But it is African scientific contributions that are most often left out from textbooks.
Posted by emeagwali at 10:40 AM
Education For Extinction
In a Q&A, I explained that I am a scientist with a passion for history. Science is the search for answers to profound questions, while history is the compass that tells us who we are, where we have been, and where we are going.
Science is the story of ideas, while history is the story of people.
BRITISH EDUCATION IN AFRICA
I was born in 1954 in Nigeria, towards the end of the colonial era in Africa. During that era, it would be somewhat of an understatement to say that the education of my entire generation was greatly influenced by the dominant British culture and by their government under which we had lived for many decades.
In the 1950s, Nigeria belonged to what was then called British West Africa, and so Queen Elizabeth the second of England was officially the nation’s Head of State.
The Union Jack, the colloquial term for the British flag, flew in Nigerian offices, schools and public places. The Union Jack was a symbol of the British Empire and its old world dominance.
I remember my elementary school teacher telling us that “[quote]the sun never sets on the British Empire.[unquote]”
The Union Jack, my teacher explained, flew from India to Hong Kong, from Ireland to the Caribbean islands, from Egypt to South Africa, and in doing so, the Union Jack covered the earth’s time zones, substantiating the idea of British world dominance and control.
From our very formative years, Nigerian schools indoctrinated young Nigerians with the belief that British culture and all it stood for, exemplified the “civilized world,” and was therefore superior to the Nigerian culture.
MISSIONARY EDUCATION IN AFRICA
But British indoctrination went even further than flags and teachers’ comments.
Irish missionaries made sure that in our formative years, the message was impressed upon us that their Christian tradition was superior to our traditional forms of worship.
In missionary schools, daily prayers were compulsory, and Bible study was considered every bit as important as the three R’s: Reading, ‘Riting, & ‘Rithmetic.
Continue reading "Education For Extinction"
Posted by emeagwali at 10:11 AM
Reflections of a Catholic Boyhood
P.S.
University of Florida
Gainsville, Florida
March 29, 2004
I had a surprise guest Godwin Pius Nwajei. We shared a bunk bed at Saint George's Grammar School, Obinomba, Nigeria - an all-boys Catholic boarding school that I enrolled in January 1966. For years, Godwin has recounted to his daughter (a graduate student at the University of Florida) about a brilliant kid named Philip who fled his boarding school in April 1967 due to the Nigerian civil war. Since I did not return again to the boarding school, Godwin assumed that I died during the Nigeria-Biafra war in which one million lives were lost. Thirty-seven years later, his daughter called him and said "Dad, I found who you are looking for. He will be speaking on Monday in Gainesville campus."
In our first email invitation, I was asked to speak on any topic that is of interest to me. Yesterday, I discovered that I was supposed to speak on the value of education.
I shared my thoughts on the knowledge that is missing in the education you we received in schools.
I shared my thoughts on religious, cultural and scientific indoctrinations that take place in schools. K-12 schools in Africa were religious indoctrination centers and cultural propaganda machine.
It involves rejecting our past, and denying our roots. Africa’s K-12 schools – which are de facto religious indoctrination centers – are at the very center of it.
It involves turning our backs on our parents and our tribal elders as a valid source of wisdom and judgement. Our religious “indoctrination,” for that is what our school education amounted to, involved a total denial of anything “African” and need to come, naked, needy and ashamed, to try and embrace the white man’s culture
I was mis-educated. My teachers lied to me.
I was taught that Mungo Park discovered the River Niger. But I was not taught that a person of African descent was the first explorer to reach the North Pole.
I was taught that an Englishman named William Wilberforce lead the fight against slavery. But I was not taught that an Igbo man named Olaudah Equiano, wrote the most influential anti-slavery book.
In our Meet & Greet, I explained that:
"We have two types of knowledge: what you know and what you don’t know. What you don’t know is more important than what you know.Yes, what you know is important. But how you interpret the things you know is more important than what you know. A good education includes appreciating that what you don’t know may be more important than what you know."
In the Q & A, I explained that
- Sir John McPherson and Sir James Robertson were the Governors (Presidents) of Nigeria in 1954 (the year I was born).
- British West Africa includes Nigeria, Gambia, Sierra Leone, Gold Coast, Togoland, and Cameroons.
- The most common cars on the roads were the British Morris Minors and I listened to British pop icon Cliff Richard in the mid-1960s.
- Ninety-nine percent of my generation attended a missionary school; the Catholic Church, in particular, had a most profound influence on us.
- I only had eight years of in-classroom education before emigrating to the United States. In those eight years, I attended schools named Saint Patrick, Saint Anthony, Saint John, Saint Georges, and Christ the King. As you can infer from the names of these five schools, religion-centered institutions.
- Evening catechism was compulsory but a science fair projects were unheard. We devoted more time reading the Bible than a science encyclopedia.
We studied the Latin language which has been dead for a thousand years. That means no one knows for sure how the Latin language sounds. Latin experts guess how it sounds from inferences from Romance languages. Therefore, the Latin spoken in Roman Catholic Church rituals will be incomprehensible to Julius Caesar and his contemporaries.
Nonetheless, I have always wondered what it would be to time travel one thousand years backward to a Latin-speaking nation.
Would it sound something like this?
Di! Ecce hora! Uxor mea me necabit! [God, look at the time! My wife will kill me!]
Vah! Denuone Latine loquebar? Me ineptum. Interdum modo elabitur. [Oh! Was I speaking Latin again? Silly me. Sometimes it just sort of slips out.]
Continue reading "Reflections of a Catholic Boyhood"
Posted by emeagwali at 08:33 AM | Comments (3)
February 24, 2004
The Voice of Olaudah Equiano
Stockton, New Jersey
February 23, 2004
On December 13, 2004, I accepted an invitation to speak on Monday February 23, 2004 at the Richard Stockton College of New Jersey, Pomona, New Jersey. My contact was Ms. Amarachi Acholonu, an extremely intelligent Igbo-American pre-medical student.
During my speech, I drew inspirations from Pan-Africanist thinkers (Garvey, DuBois, and Nkrumah) and synthesized them with contemporary issues (intellectual capital and information technologies) and explored futuristic ideas (African renaissance, globalization, etc.)
I also paid tributes and brought to life "Black Heroes" who were pioneers of science, invention and technology. Finally, I reiterated the need to provide greater opportunities for African-Americans.
I enjoyed the after speech dinner and conversations with the father of Ms. Amarachi.
EXCERPTS:
I read from a poem that also called for peace in African villages.
The poem is adapted from the thoughts of the Ma’zi Olaudah Equiano, an 18th century slave abolitionist who is regarded as the “Father of Black Literature.”
At the age of 12, Olaudah Equiano was stolen from Ala Igbo and sold as a slave to the Americas. Equiano provided us the earliest written account of the culture and customs of Ndi Igbo.
This poem is called “The Voice of Olaudah Equiano.”
The thoughts belong to Ma’zi Equiano, the great teacher, onye nkuzi. The words belong to Uko Chikwendu Anyanwu.
And I thank Amarachi ada Acholonu, an Igbo student at Stockton College who invited me to this event for faxing this poem to me.
My people were a nation of joy!
Our lives were full of festivities
We needed no money, no theatre to smile, to laugh out our hearts.
Before the men in colour of half-baked bread
invaded us
With gifts of arms and gunpowder
To shoot and be our brothers’ killers
Round hats to close our heads against reason
Coloured goggles to deny us the sight of natural beauty.
With gifts of whiskey Umunnabuike became a forgotten name
As the alcohol stunned us to the dance of the crazy gods.
Our assailants alleged we were a people without souls –
They took us as slaves.
“Where are my people?”
I shout along the corridors of this world.
“Where are my people?”
Like a man obsessed with the thoughts of his people!
My people were a nation of poets and song writers.
A nation of musicians and folk singers
A nation of happy and lively dancers
Posted by emeagwali at 07:10 AM
February 19, 2004
Family: A Celebration of Humanity
San Diego, California
February 19, 2004
Excerpts from keynote speech
I would like to conclude promoting what we call Black Family Technology Week. It was celebrated last week.The theme for this year’s celebration is "Let excellence become your way of life - in your family, your education and your career."
I urge everyone to participate in next year’s celebration. However, we must remember that we are fathers, husbands, mothers, and wives first, and technologists second.
Therefore, Black Family Technology Week should also be a period of reflection.
A period for husbands and wives to strengthen their relationship with each other; for absent fathers to contact their children; to ask for forgiveness from ex-spouses we have wronged; and to forgive ex-spouses that have wronged us.
It is the family that nurtures children, transmits values from one generation to the next, and lays the foundation for our future.The family is the building block of society. One thousand years ago, a Chinese scholar wrote:
"When a man is at peace with himself, he will be at peace with his family.
When the families are at peace there will be peace in the villages.
When the villages are at peace there will be peace in the country.
When all the countries are at peace there will be peace in the world, then man can be at peace."
Posted by emeagwali at 01:11 PM | Comments (2)