There are few things that excite me as much as purchasing a new ‘old-fashioned’ book. The only problem is, books aren’t cheap in this country. Especially when e-books are available for free. But nothing beats the feeling of turning a physical page to me, so I’ve made peace with the fact that I will have to suffer financially to indulge literary cravings. Imagine my delight when I discovered Pages, a local online store that sells all sorts of books at extremely affordable prices a week or so ago. I became slightly trigger-happy, clicking on the ‘Add to Cart’ button countless times. By the time I was done, I had ordered over twenty books. When they finally arrived, I took them off the hands of the deliveryman, but not before we had a small conversation that went as follows. “Did you buy all these books for yourself?” the deliveryman, who couldn’t have been older than 25, asked. “Yes”, I answered. “Do you actually plan to read them all?” he continued. “Yes”, I responded. “Won’t you get tired?” he quizzed me. That question took me aback and I will tell you why. I don’t want to sound like an old fuddy-duddy, but I am genuinely worried about this generation of Rwandans being raised on a steady diet of social media platforms. It’s my feeling that they are getting ‘too tired’ to consume information that is longer than 240 characters. Okay, I realize that that might be an exaggeration. But in all seriousness, I fret that we are witnessing a generation of people who, while having all the information in the world just a click away, lack the tools to make sense of this very information. I love Twitter; it’s a platform that allows me to skim through a lot of content without much effort. But I also do know that it’s a platform that celebrates the pithy one-liner and outrageous statement. It isn’t a place that revels in thoughtfulness, unemotional debate and complexity. It’s all about likes, retweets and going ‘viral’. Which is fine; that’s what that particular social media is supposed to be about. As long as that is not where you are getting ALL your information from you should be fine. The problem is, that’s where I see the vast, vast majority of younger Rwandans getting their information from and as a result, I’m witnessing more real world evidence of Twitter’s negative effect i.e. unreasoned arguments based on feelings rather than facts, intellectual arrogance that isn’t based on any scholarly merit and sloganism. I know that I will be accused on bourgeoisie thinking, but I am of the opinion that we need to do better as older Rwandans to ensure that those who are coming after us are not only able to consume the information they are being bombarded by, but are able to digest it as well. I strongly believe that old-fashioned books can play a key role in this. So dear parents and older siblings, do our country a favour and buy your children books. Not just schoolbooks. But books about culture, African history and politics. Let’s create a well-rounded, thoughtful generation. It’s not that hard. But the risk of not doing so is immense. Just go online and see the tomfoolery going on. ………………………. Let’s seize the moment in play in the premier league This year’s FIFA World Cup has been one for the ages in my humble opinion. We’ve seen last minute goals, penalty shootouts and the emergence of a genuinely competent English national squad. But the most exciting part of the overall affair has been the shocking number of upsets that have seen ‘big’ teams such as Germany, Argentina and Spain sent home by much ‘smaller’ teams. I believe that what we are seeing in Russia is being mirrored in the real world. Smaller countries are discovering that the big global powers have feet of clay. They aren’t behemoths that are invulnerable, they can be challenged without fear of death. Technology transfer and globalization has given smaller countries the opportunity to play in the big leagues. Now it is up to us to grasp these opportunities and seize the moment.
