(23-04-2020, 17:22)Ruby Wrote: I watched The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind. It's about a young Malawian boy, William Kamkwamba, who had an interest in engineering and was always tinkering around with bits and pieces he found at the local dump. This, his persistence, and his ability to see the bigger picture result in him being able to find a solution to getting water to beleaguered crops. Malawi is largely undeveloped and he and his family live in a small, more or less subsistence farming community, subject to the whimsies and extremes of the weather which severely impede crop production - it's nothing but an almighty and thankless struggle, an endless cycle of poverty not helped along by the usual corrupt government officials, nor by the short sightedness of the population themselves who are not able to see past immediate needs - who can blame them? Hunger is a dreadful scourge. 

This movie will definitely open eyes to the desperate conditions and food insecurity that afflicts so much of the continent. Plenty of Malawians end up in South Africa - they can only school their children if they pay the fees, which is why most come here - to be able to give their kids a better opportunity. Often, they themselves have not been schooled and don't speak English yet the chances of them making any money at all are so much greater here despite all the hoops they have to jump through, the menial labour, low wages and the sometimes terrible xenophobia with which they must contend. And it's a generalisation, i know, but those with whom I am acquainted are damned hard workers. 

Anyway - this is based on a true story and contrary to all the misery mentioned above, ends up being one of hope and survival albeit against fairly heavily loaded odds. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boy_Who_Harnessed_the_Wind