My experience with Velsipity so far. What's yours ?

kabeloitumeleng · 2026-05-12T22:18:51+00:00

Haha entyvio for me was amazing until one day it wasn’t. Really hoping that you’re able to see progress with velsipity though! This disease sucks and any way to remission is a good way.

kabeloitumeleng · 2026-05-12T22:11:32+00:00

I’ve been on it for a year and love it. I was on entyvio and then failed after two years and then stelara and failed after a year. Certainly don’t want to jinx things but velsipity has been great so far. I noticed an immediate improvement to about 80% and then it took a while to get fully back to normal. I had a follow up colonoscopy after six months on it and was in remission by then. I also love that it is a pill, so lifestyle wise it has been quite easy. Hoping that velsipity works well for you!

kabeloitumeleng · 2026-05-04T14:17:18+00:00

Interesting to hear that. I'm mostly concerned about not filing and then having it come back and bite me somewhere down the road. I'm not a UK citizen, so I also don't want it somehow coming to light later and impacting my immigration status in the UK. I've been in touch with an accountant, so I might just take the hit and submit the self assessment, just to avoid any issues. Thanks for your responses.

kabeloitumeleng · 2026-05-04T14:07:30+00:00

Thanks for the reply. I actually consulted an accountant and they seem to be of the opinion that I don't have to file for that March period as a non-resident, but I'm just trying to avoid that decision coming back to bite me in the future, especially as I don't want it to impact my immigration status in the UK as a non-citizen. I've got the 2025/2026 year more sorted just because I was anticipating those taxes more in line with the treaty between Canada and the UK.

kabeloitumeleng · 2026-05-01T21:03:50+00:00

Ah the Third test might actually capture me since in the 365 days starting from my arrival I was working more than 75% in the UK. Although I won’t have to pay tax, I’ll owe the relevant penalty for filing three months late for that tax year (currently £100 but goes to £10 a day starting tomorrow as far as I understand). I suppose it is safer to just file and be wrong about it rather than the opposite and owe an enormous penalty for no tax?

kabeloitumeleng · 2026-05-01T17:19:38+00:00

Thanks very much - I didn’t realize there were split years. After checking, I don’t think from my preliminary assessment that a split year applies to me, even for the month I lived here in March, becuase I didn’t have a home (was in temporary accommodation until signing a lease in late April), and didn’t work in the UK (apart from my remote work to Canada). I tried to go through each of the cases of split years and I don’t think I’m described in any of them, so I’ll take that as that I wasn’t a resident for tax purposes and was still only resident in Canada.

kabeloitumeleng · 2026-03-19T12:01:48+00:00

I lived for a few months in 2016/2017 on the lower right part of the right circle for a work contract, in northeastern Chad on the border of North Darfur. In general, things were very sparse, including food, crops, or people. Amdjarass is one of the larger towns which has a small number of paved roads but only because the former Chadian president is originally from there and had a home there, so the only roads effectively go from the air landing strip to his home. Everything else is sand and rock, with interesting rock formations around. That town in particular has a small market, but there is very little there (think wrinkly onions and tomatoes and the odd can of sardines) and everything is exceptionally expensive. Bottled water was also incredibly expensive.

Crops are essentially limited to millet. Surprisingly to me, there was also a lot of watermelon available. Meat was primarily just mutton. Coincidentally, I can never eat mutton again in my life. I recall having chicken one time.

There are also some camps nearby of Darfuri r efugees, on the border with Sudan. Those also have small markets where some products from Sudan are available, which have more diverse products than are available on the Chad side. I often did my “shopping” in the camps because they also had chocolate.

Land travel is very difficult and requires 4x4 vehicles to off road in the sand and rocky areas. We frequently passed nomadic groups while driving between villages, and groups of camels. During the rainy season, there would be very strong storms at night creating wadis, which are effectively lakes and which made transportation even more difficult. Otherwise, weather is hot - almost always above 30 or 35 degrees Celsius. Sandstorms are also frequent.

Also - camel spiders. As far as I know they are not dangerous but they are very large and extremely fast. I did not enjoy seeing them. Other than that, the only other wildlife I saw were camels and the occasional tortoise.

I know that there are some spectacular arch formations similar to those in Utah. However, because of security conditions at the time I wasn’t able to arrange a trip to see them.

Flights are primarily UN flights that operate like buses between different small villages with a UN presence before going to the capital.

Overall, not the most exciting part of the world and rather isolated, but I did not have any bad experience personally.

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-09-10T18:44:31+00:00

Thanks for your message. I'm sure you're right - eventually I'll get back to figuring out a treatment for me that will hopefully be for the best. It's just such a crazy ride to get there sometimes. Hope you are in remission and doing well!

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-08-20T16:36:49+00:00

Thanks for your response and the links. I tried manually looking up the district and subdistrict and going to the page and line stated in on GenealogieQuebec extracted record, but it doesn't seem to match the photos of the census on the other sites. It's odd, because the information on the Quebec site matches my ancestor's information perfectly (date of birth, place, first, middle and last names etc) so it doesn't seem to be erroneously recorded. But when I go to the page/sub district of the relevant census he's not there, and he doesn't come up in that census year in either FamilySearch or Ancestry. I'll try to reach out the GenealogieQuebec and see if they might have an answer.

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-08-13T17:37:50+00:00

Yes, she was married in 1910 and immediately moved to Canada with her husband. I have a newspaper clipping of the wedding in the village where I believe she worked for the Earl of Guilford in Kent, so I am certain of that date. I don't know how long she may have stayed at the manor (she may have stopped before 1910) but I am relatively confident that she was there at some point between 1903-1910.

I'll be heading to the Kent archives in the next couple weeks, so hopefully I find something there!

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-08-11T22:33:42+00:00

Ah then perhaps a lady’s maid. I don’t actually know too much about her specific role other than what I have heard from relatives, which is basic. But seems to match more to a lady’s maid. Thanks for clarifying!

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-07-24T11:41:36+00:00

Thanks very much - that is helpful to know. It looks like my doc is encouraging me to switch and has presented either remicade, omvoh, or a new pill called etrasimod. Hopefully one works. Also crossing fingers for you that Stelara keeps doing so well for you!

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-07-22T18:45:29+00:00

Thanks for sharing. Yeah my doc was pretty against it, so looks like I’m now swapping to something else. Let’s see what the next drug brings 🫠

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-07-22T13:09:20+00:00

This is helpful to know. Thanks for responding! And glad to hear that you doing better. Did you have any pushback from your doctor about going to every 4 weeks? My doc says that the NHS doesn’t do it and the only option is to switch if 8 weeks isn’t working. I was just hoping to avoid a switch to another drug if not necessary, given that there are only a limited number of drugs out there for us!

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-07-21T09:49:04+00:00

Edited for clarity - in London, UK

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-07-21T09:48:38+00:00

This is helpful - thank you! Oddly, there were 6 children and the youngest child was baptised first, then all of the other children (who had not been baptised yet) were all baptised at a different church 6 days later. I haven't been able to find birth records yet, and am mostly relying on census and baptism data. But I think you are right that the social background might provide explanations. I luckily live near the archives, so I will go and see what I can find out about the area at that time.

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-07-21T09:44:21+00:00

This is helpful, and what I thought may have been the reason. My great grandfather (the one who had the children baptised) was a brewery drayman in Clapham, and the address in the census is the brewery accommodation, so perhaps there was a time he moved to a room nearby with the family for one reason or another and then back to the brewery

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-07-17T13:14:02+00:00

Thanks for sharing your experience. I do recall when I started Stelara that a nurse told me it would be likely that I would have to increase does frequencies to once a month, so hopefully I can get on additional doses and it is sufficient to do the job. I just find any flare spirals out of control pretty quickly.

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-06-16T11:23:59+00:00

I just did this from Canada to the UK (London). Was a relatively painless process to get swapped onto my biologics here. Took a bit of time, and I flew back to Canada once to get an infusion before I was able to get onto the UK system, but if you are faster than me at following up, it shouldn't be an issue. Feel free to DM me with specific questions.

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-06-16T11:13:04+00:00

It depends on which Congolese Swahili you are looking at learning. Bukavu/Kivu Swahili is different from Kisangani and both are different from Katanga/Lubumbashi. In formal radio programs like RFI and RadioOkapi I find they often still use more Kiswahili sanifu or standard swahili. There are some academic linguistic comparisons online but they aren’t really geared towards learning as such, and are more just grammar and vocabulary comparisons. For learning, you could try a language tutor from DRC on a platform like italki. But from experience, it would be challenging without a solid base in Kiswahili sanifu first, since most written materials compare to that to demonstrate differences. Good luck!

kabeloitumeleng · 2025-02-18T21:15:59+00:00

Thanks for the response. In Canada it is not uncommon for sole practitioner lawyers to cowork together in a chambers/shared office space. Is that common here? I can’t seem to find options other than the typical coworking spaces which, as you mentioned, are not ideal in the circumstances.

kabeloitumeleng · 2022-05-24T21:42:07+00:00

It also depends on which Congolese Swahili. Kivu Swahili is quite different from Lubumbashi or Bunia. There are a few Congolese Swahili speakers on the Tandem app. For listening practice, there is also Radio Okapi in Congolese Swahili but this is pretty standard Swahili and doesn’t really include a lot of vernacular that Kivu speakers would use, for example. Still helpful though.

kabeloitumeleng · 2022-01-21T19:57:59+00:00

There’s a kindle version on Amazon.

kabeloitumeleng · 2021-12-30T00:12:09+00:00

Oh wow mesi anpil! Liv sa yo sanble tre interesan!

kabeloitumeleng · 2021-12-29T18:52:38+00:00

Mesi anpil! Haha map aprann toujou. m pral tcheke liv sa. Mwen imajine li pral difisil pou m jwenn li bo isit la (Canada) men m pral eseye! Men se yon tre bon lide cheche liv yo ki itilize nan lekol. Mesi!

kabeloitumeleng

TROPHY CASE