9 October marks the anniversary of the Universal Postal Union established in 1874. Today many years down the line the use of post has dwindled due to the advancement of technology. I remember when I was growing up I would check the ‘letterbox’ each time I walked past the gate. Sometimes I would go to gate solely to check the letterbox. Now I click buttons to check my Gmail mailbox.

Walking into a local post office in Harare you will discover that they have now ventured into offering other services like Ecocash, selling motor insurance and selling CDs. They have taken the stance of being ‘bambazonke’ in their quest for business survival. Who can blame them in Zimbabwe where many businesses have expanded their services to survive? Word on the street has it Chicken Inn will be selling sadza soon.

Despite the challenges being faced by post offices in Zimbabwe, it is important to recognise their efforts in delivering mail. Over the years Kubatana has been sending postal products to its membership. Most recently Kubatana sent out postcards through the postal service and one enthusiastic subscriber had this to say when they asked to get some postcards: “I cant wait to get the postcards so I can send a love letter to my mum and sweetheart. Technology has killed letter writing and the anxiety of waiting for the postman to deliver that special letter…”

Despite Internet uptake being high in Zimbabwe there still exists that group of people who do not have access to the Internet. By sending postal products to its membership Kubatana has been able to reach some of its remotest members in Sadza, Mbalabala, Mudzi, Watsomba, Mbire, Chibuwe to mention a few who do not have access to the Internet.

Thus joining the world as it commemorates World Postal Day is of paramount importance to Kubatana. Thank you Mr Postman for that anticipation of waiting for a letter in the letterbox by delivering our products using your services!

What:  Chimurenga (SA) launches THE CHRONIC at Book Cafe
When:  Thursday 3 October, 5.30pm
Where: Book Café, 139 S.Machel Ave/6th Street, Harare

On Thursday 3 October, the Book Café Bookshop invites Zimbabweans to the Harare launch of South African magazine “The Chronic” by Chimurenga, an innovative Pan African cultural platform based in Cape Town, whose network of cutting-edge contributors has gained an audience that includes public intellectuals, social leaders and activists who are instrumental in shaping Africa’s trajectory.  The launch will be presented by Teresa Ayugi, with a documentary film interview and Question & Answer session.

The Chronic is a quarterly gazette published by Chimurenga. It is a publication born out of an urgent need to write our world differently, to begin asking new questions, or even the old ones anew.

When will the new emerge – and if it is already here, how do we decipher it? In which ways do people live their lives with joy and creativity and beauty, sometimes amid suffering and violence, and sometimes perpendicular to it? How do people fashion routines and make sense of the world in the face of the temporariness or volatility that defines so many of the arrangements of social existence here?

These questions loom over a contemporary Africa. Yet most knowledge produced on the continent remains heavily reliant on simplistic and rigid categories unable to capture the complexities that inflect so much of contemporary life here.

The Chronic is one small, deeply subjective attempt to do things differently. They recognised the newspaper – a popular medium that raises the perennial question of news and newness, of how we define both the now and history – as the means to best engage the present; this question of thinking and writing critically about contingency and human agency today. They selected the medium both for its disposability and its longevity, its ability to fashion routine in a way that allows us to traverse, challenge and negotiate liminality in everyday life.

They favoured writing, art and photography that is open, plural, and inflected by the workings of power, innovation, creativity and resistance, and arrived at “a gazette, a collaborative living document that seeks out our capacity to continually produce something bold, beautiful and full of humour. We titled it the Chronic, a nod to both the art of chronicling, of documenting historical events in real time (the time-zone we call ‘now-now’), and because things are, well yes, chronic.”

Artist: Chaz Maviyane-Davies

The graphic above shows just a few of the names of the thousands and thousands of Kubatana subscribers who receive information from us each week.

Some of you have been with us for just a day, others for more than 10 years. And we thank you for your support.

We would like to give you two pre-stamped Kubatana postcards so that you can send a ‘letter’ to a friend, loved one or a family member living in Zimbabwe.

Action
Send an email to: products [at] kubatana [dot] net with Free Postcards in the subject line. Please make sure to give your name and postal address and you’ll get a gift from Kubatana in the post.

Kubatana encourages starting and expanding conversations, personal, social and political.

You add, we multiply!

NoViolet Bulawayo will be signing copies of her novel, We Need New Names, shortlisted for the ManBooker Prize.

When: Thursday 19 September
Where: FOLIO bookshop in Borrowdale Village
Time: From 10.30 – 12.00 noon

We look forward to seeing you there! Please tell your friends.

Google kicks off ‘Africa Connected’ Competition
Deadline: 11 October 2013

Google is calling on entrepreneurs, creators, innovators and web-lovers in Nigeria and across Africa to share their stories of how the web has transformed their lives and work.  Whether you’re a photographer, an entrepreneur, a fashion designer or a community activist, if the internet and Google tools have played an important role in your success, Google wants to hear from you. In the next five years, 7 out of the world’s 10 fastest growing economies are predicted to be in Africa, and the Internet is playing an important part in this.  Google’s new initiative, ‘Africa Connected: Success stories powered by the web’, aims to gather the largest collection of inspiring stories about ventures established online by Africans, in Africa.

Five successful entrants will win $25,000 each, and will also have the opportunity to work with a Google sponsor over a six-month period.

“Google wants to hear from young, spirited entrepreneurial web adopters in Nigeria and other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa who have a healthy disregard for the impossible and who are using the web and technology to do cool and extraordinary things to rise above their circumstances, change their world, and achieve success. We want to showcase the amazing achievements happening in the new Africa”, says Affiong Osuchukwu, Google Lead for the Africa Connected initiative.

Categories for entries include Education; Entertainment/Arts/Sports; Technology; Community and NGOs; and Small Businesses. 20 semi-finalists will be selected from initial entries to take part in an interview and to produce a short promotional video. A judging panel made up of Googlers and external judges will then determine the 10 finalists.  The 5 winners, in whose lives the web and Google have played a pivotal role, will then be selected by the online voting public.

For more information and to enter the Africa Connected contest, visit here