Africa

And we treat it like a heart attack no matter what.

And some of that I think is warranted because these policy choices have real implications, and there are people who lose their healthcare, and there are kids in Africa who have passed away because USAID cuts have happened.

And I, I don't lose any of that in thinking about how to communicate about politics.

But in this instance, especially if you are trying to open a mind to a different point of view on politics or, you know, to your friend about their partner that you think, uh, it would be better served if you found someone else, meeting them at their level of seriousness gives you the best chance of getting in there.

And then we had the Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments, a group in Uganda that was led by a man by the name of Joseph Kibwetere, and in 2000, when he predicted the end of the world, when it didn't happen, all of his followers were encouraged to die.

Over 750 bodies were recovered, and right now, as we sit here, there is a trial going on in Africa, in Kenya, uh, of a leader of a cult called the Good News International Church, led by a man by the name of Paul Mackenzie, who's now charged with killing over 400 of his followers by encouraging them to fast and pray to death.

They recovered over 400 bodies.

So what we see over and over again are these suicides p- and these deaths playing out in the most extreme groups called cults.

Con senegaleses.

Con senegaleses en, en África.

En África negra.

Con lo cual me pegué un baño de tres culturas maravillosas y diferentes y diferente trato y fue muy divertido.

Luego cuando he trabajado en América, pues lo mismo, he trabajado con amish-

We're really switching gears here.

What game was created by British game designer Leslie Scott in the 1980s based on a game she played with her family as a child living in Africa? The game's name came from the Swahili word to build.

See, this is an eclectic trivia list.

I have no clue.

Why does it say in 1982? I think it's supposed to say what? What 1982 Toto song whose title is a continent.

Do I even need to go any further? Yeah.

Africa.

Okay.

In the first two decades of the new millennium, rich people and the corporations they ran went to great lengths to convince us that we did not need to fear them or worry about the enormous wealth and power accumulating in their hands.

They were preventing diseases in Africa, launching prizes to solve the climate crisis, declaring commitments to equity and diversity, and pledging not to be evil, even as they busted unions, fought minimum wage increases, and resisted regulation.

We didn't need to bother investing in social programs or taxing the rich because they would create such incredible prosperity that everyone would benefit and the rest they would fix with their philanthropy.

Or so we heard when they gathered in Davos and Aspen at TED and at the Clinton Global Initiative.

The first thing I'd say is caballos is a strange word in Spanish.

It primarily means mackerel, but it does refer to the natives of the residents of Ceuta, this Spanish autonomous city on the northern coast of Africa.

It's not the only one.

There's also Melilla, another one a little bit further across from that.

And I think in particular, Vinnie Jr., Mbappé and Gonnathé regarded it as being not just sort of pro-Spain, but also being anti the margins, anti the sort of the the disparate nature of what being Spanish means and specifically being anti-migrant as well.

And of course, all of these players, I mean, Vinic Jr. is of Afro-Brazilian descent.

Konate and Mbappe, of course, have heritage in North Africa as well.

So I guess that's where that comes from.

Ouagadougou, could you? That's brilliant, isn't it? Anyway, I was there in the 1999-2000 for the New Year's Eve.

I was in that part of Africa.

So I went to Burkina Faso, I went to Bobo Dio Lasso and we went to this big lake and there were hippopotamus in the lake.

And I love, love me a hippo.

Jessie Febrey is a South African woman international chess master and two-time national champion.

She'll be representing Africa in the first FIDE-rated chess tournament where? In Antarctica in January next year.

Six players representing all six inhabited continents will play a 12-day polar chess expedition.

led by England's grandmaster, Nigel Short.

So could you really say you've won a tournament on every continent? So then this somehow materialized and over many months of planning, they decided to put something together.

Yeah.

You're not just representing South Africa, you're representing an entire continent of more than one billion people.

You'll be playing alongside Nigel, who challenged Garry Kasparov for the World Championship.

I recall an incident that will illustrate this.

Some time ago, I set out for Africa, traveling with a very good friend.

We went my way of South America flying, and there were not two seats available in the same plane from Miami to Natal in Brazil.

I spent a day in Trinidad while my friend went on to Natal.