Heri

Malagasy Ltd is an emerging company which was labelled “startup business of the year” in the U.K. last year. 

They are selling produce from Madagascar, and specifically target products that can be reselled with a high markup, namely coffee, chocolate, and spices from Madagascar. These are bought locally, for a fair price, and then transformed and packaged in a local manufacture (say instead of doing it in an European factory).

Products are then sold in a health and fine food store.

I really like the approach taken by the business’s founders. This is not a NGO or a non-profit but a business which analyzed the value-chain and pinpointed key products that could be sold successfully in european markets. The marketing approach is great too, by telling the story of the Island. Of course, everything is done according to trade fair principles.

I wish they’d sell some in Canada. I know a few people who can help them make it an instant success.

Congratulations to the founders, namely Tsiry Wilkinson, Nel Kelsall

I have discovered just recently that there was also another Heri in Montréal, who happens to be also a guy from Madagascar.

See, I have just spent the whole 2007 year getting introduced as ‘Heri’ to everyone I met, and nothing else, and the bet was that I was the only one wearing that name here in Montreal and possibly in Québec. Having another guy named Heri doesn’t make sense anymore then to call me to just use the first name.

Oh well. Expect an update of the blog soon, as I might just get a new design too.

I lived for 7 straight years in Kenya, and this shaped most of my personality, my music tastes, my view of the world. I also learned how diversity can enrich a nation, but at the same time, each group keeping its own culture and characteristics.

In this sense, Nairobi with its diverse population coming from the Europe and North America, from South-East Asia, all over Africa, and of course the infinite diversity of Kenya ethnic group was a symbol, an oasis compared to the continent. When the Rwandeese genocide erupted, at the other side of the Great Lakes, people would thought that it would create instability in Kenya. Indeed, Kenya and its neighbors received its share of refugees, adding up to the contigent from Somalia, but stability and good life prevailed.

One of my “real” souvenir would be watching The Lion King with its “hakuna matata” motto; and I think it captures one part of the kenyan spirit.

The events that started in Kenya from 24th December are very sad, and the saddest thing here is that they were mostly started by a tiny group of politicians (I could count them on 2 hands). I know most kenyans don’t have any problems at all living with other ethnic groups. Politicians whose only sole envy (ego) is to be in power are ready to sacrifice the soul of their country just to get 4 more years.

This is is important because as history showed, they might just succeed (cf Zimbabwe)

Nevertheless I am confident in the turn of the events. This time, it will somehow get solved, as there is too much in stake. And more importantly, I believe in the Kenyan spirit. I saw just a few days ago about a documentary about a Canadian-Somalian-Kenya singer, named K’NAAN, who authenticity and generosity is inspiring.

Je vous souhaite beaucoup de santé, de succès et de prosperité

Pour 2008, j’ai beaucoup de projets, et j’espère trouver le temps pour en parler sur ce blog:

• Blitzmaker est un web app pour les gens qui travaillent sur le web,
• Montreal Tech Watch, encore et toujours,
• un projet sur des “social tasks”,
• un jeu persistant massif (MMO) – on verra si ce sera purement HTML+javascript, ou si je peux faire un client Flash,
• Blitzweekend, un camp pour créer des produits en 48 heures. Ce qui est intéressant, c’est le coté compétition entre équipes.

Avec d’autres montréalais, j’ai aussi 3 projets en cours:

• un gros projet pour créer un portail sur montréal, avec un annuaire, des cartes etc. rien d’extremmement innovatif, mais ca va prendre néanmoins beaucoup de travail
• j’ai aussi un projet sur les microformats. je ne sais pas si ca va marcher encore, mais on verra tres bientot (en mars) si ca “poigne”

Bien sûr, ce sont juste les projets web, ruby on rails, à Montréal… question de rester focusé sur un sujet.

I am looking for beta-testers for a fairly simply (web) project related to blitzweekend.

Helps if you are a freelancer, a designer, a developer, or an entrepreneur and always looking for talent, in your city or in other parts of the world.

Email me at heri@madmedia.ca

thanks!

Yesterday evening, someone broke my locker, while I had 1 hour of sports, and took my wallet. Apparently, the !@#…\ who did it also broke other people’s locks.

I called the bank, and they told me that they registered 5 transactions in the last 30 minutes, with a total of $700. They had the exact amount, the different shops the thief went to, and the time.

Needless to say I am really pissed off. There was also the Carte d’assurance maladie in the wallet, the debit card, $100 in cash, and other cards that will take me days and weeks again to renew. To make it even more painful, the police said they are closing the case, because there are no witness(es). I think this really got me angry because there was a way to get the place and time where the thief went. But they don’t want to make the effort, something that seems to be well-known by thieves.

Now, I am not going to blame anyone about it. It’s best to do something about it (I am an engineer at heart anyway) so I was wondering if there was any website out there that lists all the lost/stolen objects. Some sort of mix between google maps pins with a database, and asking people if they have seen something. People would register the valuable objects, pets, people they have lost or have been stolen, and visitors are then asked if they saw something at a particular hour. An idea, anyone?

You would think that writing about a new editorial line for this blog would get me to actually follow it. Instead, what I did was posting about events in Burma and a photo sent to me from Madagascar

Anyway, here it is, I promised to post about stuff I worked on, so I will post for now a simple HTML website, one that I did 3 months ago, and next, there will be stuff that required programming. It’s the website made for a friend, she has a bed and breakfast on the Plateau, Montreal, and wanted a website for her summer clients.

This is a pure CSS/html website, there was no programming behind, just some design discussions and some (over)use of Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator. She also wanted some Flash effects (snow falling from the leaves) but I somehow managed to run away from her suggestion. She also wanted some curvy lines and fancy fonts, to which I responded a blank look. Our opposite “design” philosophies finally landed chezfanny

screenshot of the homepage, other pages follow the same canvas

The website works best with Safari or Firefox. It has a funky logo, have a lush background mixed with a moving menu system. We also wanted to change the website’s theme according to the season and the weather, by changing to white in winter for instance, but she didn’t have enough material to do that. But it’s ok, we really liked the overall result and so did her customers, and that’s what matters.

If you want more info., here are the tools that were used for the process:

• CSSEdit (which is great)
• Color Schemer Studio (which I don’t use anymore)
• xScope (which is more than great)
• Photoshop
• Illustrator (something I should use more)

* textmate

If I had to redo it again, I guess I would use StaticMatic

A photo of my mother, about 30 km from the capital

I received this photo by email today. I don’t know why but I found it so cool. It somehow revives childhood memories, and scream “real” to me — after a weekend talking about MVC, ruby arrays, and other virtual stuff.

I hate blog memes. I also hate assimilating countries to dictatorships according to what you hear in the media. One man’s dictator is often the country’s hero, and if you don’t experience what is going on in the country, it doesn’t make sense to support either party. For instance, the sandinists in Nicaragua were labelled rebels in the early 80′s, and that was the US’s excuse to actively support the previous governement by sending weapons and CIA field officers. However, if you go to the country, the story is totally different as the sandinist movement was a grassroots movement that was spurred by pretty much every Nicaraguan. The same thing is hapenning in Zimbabwe and in Iran, although the situation is much more complex.

As such, I don’t really want to have a judgement about what’s happenning in Burma. The country was closed to foreigners since the current governement took power and we can only guess what burmeese people are experiencing. I know too well this exercise will bring stories of torture, abuse, ignorance, violence etc. even though it’s mainly second-hand information that back them up.

As such, I cannot judge the current governement until I go there. Visit the website about Free Burma, International Bloggers’ day

But I can do one thing though, and it’s wishing freedom for the Burmeese people, against whoever is threating their freedom. I wish they have the strength and willpower to stand up.

Beyond Burma, I also have a thought today about North Koreans, Kurds, natives of Darfur.

Yesterday, I learnt that my neighbour was dying because of her cancer. This was a hard news to stomach. Even though I didn’t know everything about her and her past life, I knew from the beginning she was a good person, the one that would care and support you.

Today, I also learnt that my instructor in eskrima was also gone, without notice. Like yesterday’s news, I was just left dumbfounded. This was just the sort of thing I took for granted.

But then…well when you think about it, I really shouldn’t be sad about it. I knew my neighbor did everything she wanted to do in life. She was leaving in peace. For eskrima, I know we gave everything we got. 100%. 200%. It was short but intense, with memories of us running like wild in Montreal parks during the hot summer, doing figures in front of _surprised_ hassidic jews. We couldn’t have done more. And maybe that’s all it matters in the end.

Today, a friend then told me “an era is gone”. I agree with him. And like people who would shout “the king is dead, long live the king”, I wanted to tell him back “an era is gone. Long live the new era”

Time to move on then. And I will remember giving 100% of myself.