Tribute

Rougesang by dood van Mandela

ondergronds het ’n rif geskuif

die aarde struikel

verward swik die son

toe sy asem hom verlaat het in die nag

het die sterre geduisel

want alles is verstrengel

wurgend aan sy dood

sy dood en die dood alleen

ineens is alles droef

asof ons in ’n groot skadu staan

asof glas deur ons breek

asof klip in ons splinter

asof ons gedagtes in fluisterende wanhopige groepe rondvlug

soos assegaaie in die grond bly vassteek

trillend

in Qunu weier die beeste vanoggend om uit die kraal te gaan

by Lusikisiki lê die visse na aan die oppervlakte

in Mvezo maak die korhane geen geluid nie

die gedagte aan Mandela laat ons binnekante knak

(ons wou sy sterwende liggaam nie sien nie)

ons kan selfs nie die mond oopmaak nie

(ons wou sy sterwende liggaam nie sien nie)

om te begin praat oor sy dood om te praat oor sy dade

(ons wou sy sterwende liggaam nie sien nie)

oor sy bloed wat pyl soos ’n luiperd na geregtigheid

(ons wou sy sterwende liggaam nie sien nie)

om te vertel van sy werke, sy sagte ongelooflike krag

(ons wou sy sterwende liggaam nie sien nie)

die lieflike nate van sy blommende vergewende kopbeen

(ons wou sy sterwende liggaam nie sien nie)

die stormram van sy tong

wat toekomste tot ’n verbonde kern wring

ons kan nie reg laat geskied aan Ons Grote

(ons wou sy sterwende liggaam nie sien nie)

ons wil dit nie sien nie

in die voetpaaie, op die sypaadjies, in busse langs die paaie

bondel ons swyend bymekaar, ons die gewones

ons sprinkel ons trane oor hom

ons besprinkel die erflating

van die Vreeslose Kryger wat ons eenmaal regeer het

ons besprinkel die lyk wat gewas moet word

ons besprinkel die geopende bloed van Mandela

ons gewones was hom nie met water nie maar met liedere

met droefheid neem ons sy liggaam

ons was dit, ons bad dit

met hande wat hom liefhet, raak ons aan sy dade

ons gee hom aan, van hand tot hand

hoog bokant ons koppe

die man wat ons van onsself gered het

o singende bloed van die seun van uNosekeni

o palms van Mvezo vol sterre en reën aan die oewers

o arms van Qunu wat ’n land se diepste wonde omhels

die Groot Aanmekaarbinder

niemand se strottehoof kan Mandela se lied end-uit sing nie

niemand ontglans ooit ons Groot Saambinder vir ons nie

niemand oortref hom in morele gesag nie

geen leier is nog ooit só deur sy mense lief gehad nie

hy wat ons beste gesig was

hy wat ons aan onsself teruggegee het

die beliggaming van die wêreld se smagting

na iemand wat omgee

wie se dade onbeskaamd goedheid wou bring

geliefde Mandela, bring seën op ons, jou kinders

laat jou lewe sy vingerafdruk op ons almal laat

dit sal lank duur voordat ons ooit weer ’n mens so edel

iemand so genesend en koppig mooi

so taai van inbors so streng insluitend van beginsel

so elegant en oorrompelend van hart in ons sterflike arms kan hou

– Antjie Krog

(Gebaseer op die weeklaag geskryf vir Moshoeshoe 1, “LITHOKHOKISO tsa Moshoeshoe le tse ling” deur David Cranmer Theko Bereng.)

Maya Angelou also wrote a tribute poem entitled His Day is Done. 

My salvation lies in your love

Yesterday, incredulously, I watched as President Zuma announced Nelson Mandela's death. Until now he had always bounced back from his numerous hospital stays. What it must feel like to be home, now, to share in the sadness of his passing and the joy his life had brought. In Germany an epic storm is causing floods and blowing away trucks, but what nature inflicts on itself seems tame compared to what people can do to others - it took an indomitable will and a humanity that most lack to be able to forgive one's oppressor as Mandela did.

My whiteness and my youth prevents me from truly understanding what the struggle was, what had been sacrificed and what it meant to live in a country where race controls your life. Actually, no : I have never not had freedom, but I know that race is still a deciding factor in SA. It is a ripple underneath everyday life that somehow refuses to disappear. I notice when I am the only white person because I feel it makes me vulnerable. white + girl = better watch your back. Not always, not everywhere, not because everyone is some criminal, but simply because the ripple of racism is closely followed by the ripple of crime and corruption that washes over any hope for a better future.

I wrote at the beginning that it is astounding what one person can do to another. I wonder if now we have moved past racism to class difference being the main social problem: those who have nothing see no moral qualms in killing another for a cellphone. However, if you have a roof over your head and enough money in your bank account you might wonder how someone could be so dismissive of the rights (and in the worst case scenario the life) of another.

It is difficult for me to speak on these issues while sitting in another country, starting a new life here. But within two weeks three of my friends were assaulted in one way or another and it is very hard to remain 'Proudly South African', to say wonderful things about your home and assure people that the crime is 'not that bad'. I miss my family, my friends and my country all the time, especially after hearing news like this. I miss the sunshine, December holidays at the beach and not looking like a pale vampire. I miss feeling like I belong.

But I also enjoy not having to be afraid all the time and being able to walk home, alone, at 3 AM after a friend's house warming and not worrying about being robbed.

As the blanket of sorrow falls over South Africa and everyone is in a state of mourning, I wonder what Madiba's death will mean for the future of the country. What influence did he still wield, if any? How will power relations in the ANC shift? Will Zuma stay on for a second term? Why do people not see that at least in part they are voting for their own demise? It will be an exciting time to observe what happens to Mandela's legacy, and whether the people of the rainbow nation will manage to find a pot of gold at its end or fail in this endeavour. I choose to cling to optimism because historically South Africans have fought too hard to attain the rights listed in the current constitution. It cannot have been for nothing.

Après moi

via On the shoulders of giants on Pinterest

My meaningful distraction was putting all the books I have read under my bed and all the ones I have used for intellectual-fake-credit on my bookshelf to be read. If I am to be jobless and poor after graduation, at least I can pretend to be a writer who needs to work on what she has read.

Scars on land

I always thought that when by body dies, they can take every part of it except for my eyes. But now, well, take it all. If someone else can survive and my brain is already dead why shouldn't they. Maybe there is an afterlife and organ-less I will be some kind of crippled zombie type. Who knows, perhaps karma exists and I will be rewarded for selflessness or something. All I know is that in that moment, what I was is never coming back, and if someone else can profit from life though mine ending, why not.

Almodóvar's Todo sobre mi madre considers everything from belief to sexuality to AIDS, and also looks at organ donation by starting with a mother losing her son and having to make the choice to donate or not.




If you want to become an organ donor in South Africa, please visit their website.

Green Gates

This was taken at a restaurant in Plettenberg Bay at the beginning of the year.

I'm not a vegetarian. But I do try to eat less meat. I don't particularly like the taste, and since I haven't killed the animal myself, I don't always feel entirely right when eating meat. Debates about needing to eat meat and humans being omnivores, or debates about not needing to eat meat, or any animal products for that matter, don't really interest me that much. Eat what you like. But know what you are consuming, where it comes from, what it is made of. I mean, the occasional McD burger where you could be eating anything really is fine, but in general one should know where the food you eat is coming from. I read somewhere recently that 40 years ago, the temperature needed to burn a human body was much lower, simply because these days all the chemicals we consume need a much higher temperature to be destroyed.

I just think that decades ago meat was much more appreciated, that the life lost was more conscious to the one eating it. Now, you go into a supermarket and buy a steak/some ribs/chicken schnitzels/or whatever, and you don't see it as an animal, as something dead. Eating death.

Mourning Part II

I won tickets to see Two Door Cinema Club, Isochronous and Desmond & the Tutus, courtesy of 5 Gum, and it really was a great night. Dancing, dancing and more dancing.

But at about 4 AM, our last dog Milou passed away. I don't know. When Spitzi died, it was horrible and I cried for days because he was the dog-of-dogs, the great character that cannot be replaced, the one that I still miss. Now, Milou, well he was also a little character. He often was a little bitch, growling and not liking children and having bad eyes and teeth due to the incestuous nature of the Yorkshire Terrier breed. He was a little rat, sneaking over to the neighbours and raping their poodle.

He could however also be a nice dog, one that wants to sit on your lap, one that squeezes tightly against your body in order not to be cold, one that 'smiles' when you get home, one that races you on the beach, one that sleeps on newly washed clothes, one that will be missed, dearly, as well.

Resurrect

I found this book by James Bradley ( his blog is also noteworthy) on my grandmother's shelf and after a year of only reading "proper" literature ( as in the books that form part of top 100 lists, but are tedious to get through), this was a good read. I like books that transport me far away from my reality, into another time and another country, where the mindset and the circumstances are vastly different from my own.

The Resurrectionist follows the life of Gabriel Swift, who is orphaned at a young age and as a teenager starts working for an anatomist. Through various choices he is fired and "descends into a hell partly of his own making and the violence of the London underworld" ( read the full description and listen to three readings by the author on Faber & Faber) . The story is also loosely based on the Burke and Hare murders, where two Irishmen killed 17 people and sold the bodies to Dr Robert Knox.

What I liked most was Bradley's preoccupation with how our identities are shaped and how the fragility of life is often ignored. We take living for granted, without considering that it all has to end, sooner or later.

"They are such little things, these lives of ours; cheap got, cheap lost, mere flickers against the ever dark, brief shadows on a wall. This life no more substantial than breath, a light which fills the chambers of our bodies, and is gone."

ek stamel ek sterwe*

Die jaar toe ek weg was het ek dit gemis om jou elke oggend te sien en te sê: " Goeie môre bokkie, het jy lekker geslaap?"

Ek het dit gemis om my hande in jou vel te druk en om jou agter jou ore te krap.
Ek het jou gemis en wou na elk een toe stap wat soos jy gelyk het om hulle koppies te vryf.
Ek en jy, ons het saam grootgeword. Jy was altyd net hier, net waar ek jou nodig gehad het.

Jy kom soek my in die oggende, jy lê buite die badkamer se deur en wag, jy kom stamp jou neus teen my been as jy wil kos hê, jy poep soos geen ander nie, jy krap die deur om buite toe te gaan, jy pipi in die huis, jy het my verjaardagpersent geeet toe ek 9 was, jy kom lê onder my bene as ek 7de laan kyk, jy lê in die kombuis altyd in die pad, jy raak omgewonde as ek vir jou 'n kombersie op die vloer in my kamer sit, jy het die meubels se onderdele gekou toe ons in die VSA vir vakansie was, jy hou daarvan om jou kop by die venster uittesteek as ons ry, jy wat vroer jou lyf tussen die diefwering kon deursqueeze, jy wat my neus lek as ek jou optel, jy wat verlore was vir 'n middag, jy wat by die kar wag as jy al die bagasie sien, jy wat die perfekte groote is om 'n drukkie vir te gee, jy as enigste vir wie ek sê dat ek lief is vir jou.


As jy buite lê en slaap kyk ek of jou ribbe beweeg, of jy asem haal, omdat ek altyd bang is dat ek nie daar sal kan wees nie as alles verby is.

En nou was ek daar. Jy kon nie meer loop nie en ek moes jou dra. Toe ons by die veearts instap het ek al geweet maar gehoop jy het net iets slegs geeet. Ek het gedink ons sal somer vinnig weer by die huis wees, ek wou jou nog bad vir die nuwe jaar. Ons was 9 uur daar. 10 uur was ek alleen by die huis, sonder jou, sonder die kans om jou ooit weer te sien en te hoor en aan jou te vat.

Ek sien die heeltyd die klein lyfie voor my, die tong wat uithang, die tannie wat sê ek kan nou vir my "'n nuwe baba gaan kry" en hoe ek jou daar gelos het, alleen, hoe jy nou in 'n vrieskas wag om verbrand te word.

Jou bakkie staan nog hier en jou halsband lê op my tafel en jou kos staan in die kombuis en die bure se honde se ore voel soos joune en ek weet dit is belaglik en almal dink jy was net 'n hond en oud en dit moes gebeur en ek weet dis waar maar jy was myne. Jy was myne. En nou is jy weg en die huis leeg en as Milou alleen oor die vloere stap kan ek jou naels se getippel nog hoor.

Ek mis jou en dis eers een dag dat jy weg is.

Spitzi 15 November 1996 - 31. December 2011.

*

While I was away I missed greeting you in the mornings and saying : “Hello darling, did you sleep well?”

I missed you and wanted to walk up to everyone that looked like you and wanted to touch their faces. 

I missed it to run my hands through your fur and to scratch you behind your ears.

The two of us, we grew up together. You were always here, just when I needed you.   

You look for me in the mornings, you lie in front of the bathroom door waiting for me, you press your nose against my leg when you want to be fed, you fart like no other dog, you scratch the door to go outside, you pee in the house, you ate my birthday present when I turned 9, you lie underneath my legs when I am watching 7de Laan, you are always in the way in the kitchen, you get excited when I fetch a blanket to put in my room for you, you chewed the feet of our couches while we were holidaying in the USA, you like to have the car window open and stretching your face out of the car when we’re driving, you who could squeeze your body through the burglar bars, you who licks my nose when I pick you up, you who were lost for an afternoon, you while you wait anxiously by the car, afraid we’ll leave without you, you who are the perfect size to hug, you who are the only person I ever say “I love you” to.

  

When you are sleeping outside I watch to see if your ribcage is moving because I am always afraid that I won’t be there when everything comes to an end.

And now I was there. You couldn’t walk anymore and I had to carry you. When we walked into the vet’s I knew but I was hoping you had indigestion. I thought we would be out of there in no time; I still wanted to wash you for the New Year. We were there at 9. By 10 I was at home, without you, without the chance to ever see you or hear you or touch you.

I still see your little body, laying there, with your tongue sticking out, the lady holding me and saying that now I could buy myself “a new baby”, how I left you there, alone, how you are stuck in a freezer waiting to be burnt.

Your bowls are still here and your collar is on my table and your food is still in the kitchen and the neighbours' dogs' ears feel like yours and I know this is a bit ridiculous and everyone probably thinks I am exaggerating and thinking that you were just a dog and old and it had to happen and I know it is true but you were mine. You were mine. Now you are gone and the house is empty and when Milou walks across the floor I can still hear your nails scratching on it.

I miss you and it has only been one day that you have gone away from me.