London Free Press

Image sells, even in Africa. And so Nokia's annual Face of Africa contest, a shameless commercial venture now in full swing, will again make some young African woman very wealthy, at least by her parched continent's standards.

Thanks for that gift from last year, the Gulliver's Travels book. Very nice choice. The Houyhnhnms, those horse-like characters, were so bright, so noble. And those savage Yahoos: so dim, so lost. Poor Gulliver couldn't see himself in them.

but like Western liberties we now take for granted, they won't come overnight.

We're finishing another back-to-school month, as good a time as any to ask why so many Canadians are underwhelmed at how our education system is preparing their children for the 21st century.

A handful of lessons are buried in the sorry state of Iran's recent investigation and trial involving the death of Canadian photo- journalist Zahra Kazemi. They're buried in the pile of lies and nonsense that's often engrained in the not-so-free world, where, in my experience, up is certainly down if the right person says it's so.

I don't generally get reverse-culture shock. That's the phenomenon where, after spending time in the developing world, some people return to their rich homelands to scream and pull their hair out while walking in long supermarket aisles filled with every pet food imaginable.

Tomorrow is Mother's Day. Most of us will likely say thanks to your mom in some fashion. Good thing. A mother's job is not easy.

Okay, let's not be totally surprised that Jesus wields power outside the West. He did, after all, live in the Middle East. But after its big splash in North America, did anyone -- I mean anyone -- expect The Passion of the Christ to be allowed in the Islamic Middle East, let alone break movie records here?

The Middle East. Quick, what do you think of? Oil? Terrorism? Women wearing head-to-toe burqas? Islam? Script with funny squiggles? Can you honestly think of much good? If you had a free ticket to holiday anywhere, would this region even make your short list?

Canadians may fuss and fume from time to time over roads and traffic, but they know nothing -- I mean nothing -- about how truly horrendous the driving experience can be.

A car is sprayed with gunfire. Several men in the bullet-riddled vehicle are left slumped over, bloodied, quite dead. A scene from The Godfather? No, just Yemen.

We're in what's called the Pearl of Africa, where red-dirt roads cross rolling, green countryside; where elephants get the right-of-way when on safari, and, even in the capital, wild monkeys might run across your tin roof and wake you in the morning.

Irshad Manji doesn't come across as your typical religious reformer. With stylish glasses and punkish hair, this pint-sized woman is better known as a TVO journalist and gay rights activist than a Martin Luther nailing his 95 Theses on Wittenburg's church door.

Among the more interesting reactions over this summer's so-called great blackout came via the car radio when my wife and I were driving in the Muskokas, learning how the outside world was faring in the darkness.

Let's hope someone, somewhere learns something from the murky death of Zahra Kazemi, the Canadian-Iranian photojournalist whose brains somehow got bashed in while she was in police custody for photographing student protesters outside a Tehran jail.