The grand finale of Triple Fun Club 2011 Literary, Oratory, and Leadership Week came to a close recently at the Atlantic Hall, Hotel Presidential in River State

Last week was the 70th birthday of veteran and award-winning photographer, jazz percussionist, one-time trend-setting barber and publisher, Sunmi Smart-Cole . And as a way of celebrating that great moment that took place in Port Harcourt, Rivers State in 1941, SS Cole as he was fondly called who is of Nigerian-Sierra Leonean parentage put together a befitting birthday bash.

“We have an obligation to admire the talents in the youths and to celebrate them so as to give them a sense of belonging in the society”, were the words of the assistant parish priest of the St Denis Catholic Church Akoka, Bariga, Rev. Father Bernard during the 4th edition of the Little Miss St Denis beauty Pageant.

African music percolated with excited chatter as a crowd waited to hear Professor of Africana Studies Chinua Achebe kick off the Department of Africana Studies 2011-12 Conversations in Africana Writing Series Monday. Achebe and other authors were featured in a panel titled “Voice and Memory in the Poetic Imagination” at the George Houston Bass Performing Arts Space, which was filled to capacity with academics, students, writers and community members.

After his last solo exhibition titled Nigeria and Beyond which featured a historic political documentation of the heroes of Nigeria and other countries in the world in 2009, painter and the palette knife master , Oyerinde Olotu, who is one of those that believes that people’s future is usually guarded by its past is back with another solo exhibition tagged Cities, People and Countryside – Travels with an Artists Eye .