Introduction

A few weeks back it felt like Oprah was giving cars away. Only that the cars were books and we actually had to pay for them. So essentially not the same thing at all, but still amazing.

Every year Exclusive Books hosts a warehouse sale in Johannesburg (maybe twice a year?) and sells the books for R50 per kilogram (that's about €5). Holy shit.

The books were just too cool. My cousin and I just loaded in anything we thought could be remotely interesting (in other terms if the cover was colourful), but my sister was more discerning. In the end we walked out with 47kg between the three of us.

It is great to not have to fork out R800 for an art book. Normally, the books I use for research cost too much because they are in quite a specific field that doesn't interest the general public? Online activism, you say? We just push the 'like' button on Facebook and things change. Comic books and graphic novels as literary works? No, man, those are just for children/nerds. I'll wait til someone makes a movie out of it. How the Internet has affected/changed our way of thinking? Not really interested, hand me 50 Shades of Grey please.

Sure, I am generalising (as always), but what made the warehouse sale so fun is stocking up on books you would ordinarily not consider because they would not fit in entirely with the information you need and then not justify the expense incurred. But here, paying between R50 and R150 for a great art book is beyond worth it. I might have grabbed one or two silly books (like the one where you have to identify famous people by their hairstyle). Overall however this was better than Christmas and Easter and birthdays all put together.

Measurements

* “Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don't know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of witherings, of tarnishings.”

The sky above us shoots to kill

At the Huguenot Monument in Franschhoek, an man in his seventies held what appeared to be his grandson upside down in order for him to smell all the roses. The child was squealing with delight, and the grandfather was smiling, too. A happy little postcard memory.

At Yoav's concert in the Kirstenbosch Gardens, a girl was playing with her mother's hair.

Another little girl told my sister she likes her because she has "dots" (freckles) on her face.

Also at Yoav, one could witness the worried measuring of height in the eyes of a mother turning around to the call of her son's voice and finding him in the branches of a tree.

There is this photograph of the two of us, I am around seven years old, all blond-blue-eyed innocence. I lie against the fold of his stomach, counting flowers, he provides the love to lean on.
That is what it should have been like, til death, not difference, do us apart.

A year and a continent later, he is running behind me as I dart down the stairwell, trying to catch me. My castle is outside, furnished with enough blankets and a high-chair for my dolls to block him from coming in. I reach it in time and build my fort. He paces around in front of it, telling me to come out, ordering me to come out. A dragon in waiting. I won't be fooled. For days we don't talk. Even when it is my birthday I won't forgive. And now, many years and continents and opinions later, well, for months we don't talk and there is nothing to forgive any more because of choices made and lives lived apart.


As children, we search for the hand that will guide us though shopping malls and crowded spaces and won't lose us. We rely on that hand to hold on to the bike when the training wheels have come off but we're still too scared to pedal onwards alone. There is the protective spell of innocence uncorrupted by the bad in each other which life will hurl at us soon enough. There is also the real time protection of parents and family and siblings and whomever is in our lives to guide us.

The best memories are not the presents I got or the places we visited, but rather being treated to a strawberry milkshake at Wimpy by my grandmother because I ran errands with her all day, or my mom driving all the way from Pretoria to Jeffrey's while we were sleeping on the backseat of the Merc, or identifying cars in Geneva's morning rush hour, or building a tipi under the giant oak, or listening to Celine Dion for the millionth time. The best memories stem from being enveloped by love, and not worrying whether or not the hand would hold on.

 

613 shades of sad

When last we were here I carried him up/down the 100 or so stairs from/to the beach. My mom brought a sled and we pulled him over the sand when he couldn't walk any more. A week after returning to Pretoria I had to put him down, on the 31. December 2011. Being back makes me remember my Spitzi, and how much I miss him.

Brain Pickings chose John Homans' What's a Dog For?: The Surprising History, Science, Philosophy, and Politics of Man's Best Friend as one of the Top 10 books of 2012, which led me to this cartoon in The Big New Yorker Book of Dogs.

via Brain Pickings

Gracious

I have had someone walking away from me only once, and he has never noticed the loss created by that distance. Leaving does not always entail the option of coming back. Maybe it is the irony of fortune that my father chose to leave and never return, and my mother has to leave in order to return. Perhaps it is also a subconscious reassurance to the child in me that, without fail, she comes back to me, as I shall, without fail, return to her when I leave.

This poem by Cecil Day-Lewis, written for his eldest son, captures that letting go.

Walking Away

for Sean

It is eighteen years ago, almost to the day –
A sunny day with leaves just turning,
The touch-lines new-ruled – since I watched you play
Your first game of football, then, like a satellite
Wrenched from its orbit, go drifting away

Behind a scatter of boys. I can see
You walking away from me towards the school
With the pathos of a half-fledged thing set free
Into a wilderness, the gait of one
Who finds no path where the path should be.

That hesitant figure, eddying away
Like a winged seed loosened from its parent stem,
Has something I never quite grasp to convey
About nature’s give-and-take – the small, the scorching
Ordeals which fire one’s irresolute clay.

I have had worse partings, but none that so
Gnaws at my mind still. Perhaps it is roughly
Saying what God alone could perfectly show –
How selfhood begins with a walking away,
And love is proved in the letting go.

Don't say no,no,no,no. Just say yeah yeah yeah...

Now this is the way to a girl's heart: graffiti. ( this one via the Laughing Squid)

Eastern Market, Detroit Proposal (Marry Me Tizzie?) from Tizzie Onderko on Vimeo.

The wall was later updated with a little "she said YES!". Yay for happy marriages.

Great graffiti always makes me want to grab a spray-can and go out into the streets. After I saw Exit through the Gift Shop, a friend and I defaced some of the political party posters ( at that time the country was nearing some kind of vote, I am guessing for local government? As in the area one lives in, not national government). I accept that that was quite lame, but fun none the less. 

South Africa is not really synonymous with graffiti, and my best guess is that because we no longer really live in the cities, but in suburbia, there is no real graffiti. I know in Cape Town and Joburg there are a couple of artists though ( like Faith47, who features in the film The Creators about artists in SA). But in Pretoria? I haven't seen anything. Perhaps in other parts of the city? 

I'll have to look into graffiti here some more, it seems like an interesting topic for weekend excursions. 

Pulled

Quite a few couples that I know have broken up in recent months, separated after years, after thinking that it would last forever, after imagining walking down the aisle with another. 

It is hard being alone all of a sudden. I would compare being single to being a boxer : you are constantly fighting on your own. Sure, there are the fans that watch you and yell encouragingly from the stands, and there is the guy that hands you water and a towel and gives you advice, but ultimately, you are taking and throwing punches by yourself, for yourself. 

Now, relationships are different: suddenly you are part of a tag-team, with matching neon tights and all. There is always someone who has your back, who supports you, kind of like a person 'just for yourself'. I mean, friendships and family are important as well, but I think the significant other comes to be the person one could most rely on?! 

I don't know. I'm not much of a team player, so pretending to be Muhammad Ali suits me better than being part of The Miz & Big Show. 

Friends & Lovers

Incubus is sharing a 4 Track EP with their fans courtesy of Valentine's Day.
Get it here

Distance

I don't know how people have relationships, never mind long-distance ones. 

So this one is for you. 

For you I have slept
Like an arrow in the hall
Pointing towards your wakefulness
In other time zones

- Ondaatje

(I don't know where this quote is from because I just found it in a word document on my computer).

Wedding Bells

I have been to three weddings consciously. When I was little, I was a flower girl at my aunt's wedding, in April I went to a friend's wedding and a few weeks back to my great-cousin's. The first one was somewhat of a flop because my mother made my sister's and my dress, but my aunt had failed to convey a specific theme to her and we were dressed in the wrong colours.

During high school, I waitressed on the weekends at a wedding venue, but all it taught me was that I was a poor waitress and that weddings are often strange affairs where people either drink too much and celebrate together, or sit in awkward silence and leave early.

Since the wedding at the beginning of the year was the first one I was invited to, I  was so exited that I bought the present weeks before and had my outfit all planned out. On the day, the mother of the bride turned up late, so everyone had to wait for her to arrive. The guests were seated on five rows of long wooden benches on either side of the aisle underneath beautiful old trees and large white umbrellas. In front of me sat some older ladies and the one smelled distinctly of some fiery chewing gum, you know the red one with cinnamon in it that burns away your taste buds. My black and gold fan from the bachelorette party helped in wafting the scent towards others.

The wedding was held at Kleinkaap, an imitation Cape Colonial venue. The old trees and leaves on the ground reminded me of our garden in Geneva when I was little. We had an enormous, ancient oak tree in the corner and come autumn, the garden was covered in its leaves. Strange how enchanting dead leaves can be. Bach then I was quite allergic to the tree's pollen, so luckily these trees were different and I did not swell up like a party balloon.

During the ceremony, the priest spoke about how a marriage should not be seen as a business transaction or a prison. Although this is true, I doubt anyone ever goes into a marriage thinking: oh well, my life will be hell but I'll have bags of money. Perhaps in arranged marriages in Afghanistan where the girls are 12 and their husbands 40 that is the case (see Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns), but if one considers the typically Western view of marriage as being for love and being a commitment to someone for the rest of one's life, I found the sermon quite misplaced.

For the rest of the wedding, it was very nice, but the different wedding parties did not mix very successfully and some of the older people left after the food was served.

I don't know about all the rules at weddings, but is the main thing not the celebration of a union of love? Often I think people should just keep it a very intimate affair and only invite those people whom they feel will share in their joy. Brides worry too much about whose feelings will be hurt if they are not invited or if someone cannot bring a partner.

My cousin's wedding was great. It was a very Afrikaans wedding, but the place they held it at was lovely, the food was delicious, and above all, everyone was just so happy to celebrate the day with them. My sister and I initially felt a bit out because we are not directly related, but we were placed at the table with our other cousin and his family and they were very embracing. Everyone danced langarm ( long-arm, a type of dance) or just bounced around on the dance floor (my langarm skills need much improvement). The bride and groom also made speeches thanking their parents and various guests and I think in the end, everyone just really enjoyed being there and celebrating the day with them.

I think every wedding should just be a big party in honour of the married ones, and I hope that all future weddings will feel like the photographs on welovepictures.

on welovepictures

Koekeloer

* Jammer ek kry dit net nie reg om 'n dit (:) op die (e) te sit nie. Simpel Alt+ wil nie werk nie.

Party keer is ek moeg van sit en moeg om na my skootrekenaar se skerm te kyk en moeg om te maak as of ek gym toe gaan en moeg vir goed leer en moeg vir die mense om my en moeg vir die verantwoordelikhede van die aldag en net moeg vir die lewe. Party keer wil ek net my oe sluit en slaap tot ek volgende week van self wakker word en die wêreld heeltemal verander het.

Vandag het ek die tweede eksamen uit nege geskryf en ek is al klaar uitgeput. Dis nie dat ek dit nie geniet om te leer nie, dis net dat ek dit nie geniet om daaroor getoets te word nie. Ek sou verkies om net mondelinge te doen. Om julle te oortuig met my woorde, nie my skrif nie.

Nou ja. As ek moeg raak vir hierdie vier mure gaan stap ek party keer deur die buurt en koekeloer vir die mense wat hier om my bly. Noudiedag het ek die fantastiese heuwel ( haha) aan wie se voet ons bly  uitgestap (dis letterlik net 50m, ek laat dit nou na 'n berg klink). Toe ek aan die ander kant weer afstap kom 'n ouerige paartjie uit hul kompleks. Ek sou skat altwee was in hul sewentigs. Sy het 'n donker blou broek en blou toppie en 'n string pêrels gedra. Haar hare was mooi opgepof soos die dames in Mad Men. Die oom het 'n deftige helderbruin ( nie juis bruin nie, eer soos sandkleur) broek gedra met 'n ordentlike hemp, 'n bruin belt en netjiese bruin skoene. Dit was snaaks om mense te sien wat vir 'n sondagmiddagstappie so uitegevat lyk.

Die tweetjies het handjies gehou. Hulle skaduwee het een geword soos hulle die heuweltjie afgestap het. Hy het net een keer vinnig haar hand gelos om oor die straat te stap maar dadelik weer daarna gesoek toe hulle aan die ander kant was.

Ek powerwalk toe maar verby. Ek wil nie die derde wiel wees hier nie. En dit lyk bietjie snaaks as ek so vir hulle dophou. Dis snaaks wat mens so Sondagmiddag sien: kinder speel in tuine, mense braai, honde blaf. Dit lyk as of almal tog heel gelukkig is.

Later sien ek toe weer 'n ouer paartjie. Hierdie keer was hulle nie heeltemal so uitgevat nie: sy het 'n beige sak aangehad en sy wit hemp was die selfde kleur as sy hare.

Toe hulle sien ek stap aan die selfe kant van die straat as hulle het hulle vinnig gewissel. Ek wonder hoekom. Oor my? Ek hoop nie so nie. Ek hoor hy sê vir sy vrou dat die son nie so sterk sal wees aan die ander kant nie. Ek weet darem nie, dis 'n Sondagmiddag en die son is oorals.

Dis vir my lekker om vir die bure te kyk. Mens weet nooit wie woon agter al die hoe heinings nie en niemand gesels meer met mekaar nie. Vroeer het ons partytjies gehou en almal om ons genooi, maar daai dae is verby. Met party bure praat mens en het 'n goeie verhouding, maar met die meestes nie. Agter in die een hoek van die tuin is daar 'n hekkie wat na die bure se tuin gaan. Ek ondthou ons het hom toe ek klein was dalk een of twee keer oopgesluit. Nie meer nie. Ek wonder of die mense wat na ons in die huis gaan bly dalk weer die hekkie sal oopmaak of of ons gemeente maar almal agter hul mure sal skuil.

Love after Love

Love After Love

The time will come

when, with elation

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror

and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored

for another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,

peel your own image from the mirror.

Sit. Feast on your life.

 - Derek Walcott

Love Poem

See some of Brautigan's other work on this site. 

I like this one as well: 

"We Meet. We Try. Nothing Happens, But"

We meet. We try. Nothing happens, but

afterwards we are always embarrassed

when we see each other. We look away.

.

Padkos

SOOS ALREEDS GESE, EK KAN NIE WERKLIK GOED IN DIÉ TAAL SPEL NIE. Vergewe my foute.

Ons is op pad plaas toe en trek vroeg weg. Die stede lê slaapend, die kar se verwarming gaan aan toe die koue oggend onder 4°C val. Geen sonskyn skyn so vroeg, geen karligte is naby. Dis is ‘n vryheid op die pad,  sonder kwaai motoriste gewoond aan ure se sit in spitsverkeer.  Die eerste musiekmengsel stroom uit my ipod, ekstra gister saamgestel vir die gemak van my ma se ore.

Net buite die stad van goud begin die son opgaan, in tyd vir ‘n tarantaalfamilie om oor die pad te skarrel voor ek hulle tref. Ons ry lekker nou, my ouma sit agter en is in beheer van die padkos. Sy waak daaroor soos  ‘n leeuwyfie oor haar prooi, en ons sien nie ‘n krummel nie. My ouma dink ‘n slaaiblaar is ‘n volle middagete en waardeer nie die soetgoed en happies wat saamry nie.

Die keer ry ons nie reguit na Kroonstad rigting Senekal nie, maar gaan maak ‘n draai by Golden Gate, waar die lig en die wind en die reuke spelend ‘n sinfonie vir die sinne saamstel.  Bokkies skuil teen die berge, maar ek sien niks nie. Net my ma se aarendoë spot alles vir myle. Selfs die Sterkfontein Dam sien ek nie dadelik nie, maar toe val my oë oor die spieëlglad blou water wat agter die dam en die dale wegkruip.

Ons kies die N3 rigting Durban en stop in Clarens om ontbyt te eet. Dis die dag van die troue in Engeland, almal sit vasgeplak voor die televisie in die kafee. Ek dink die bruid se borste lyk nogals spits in die trourok en verstaan nie hoekom in die voormalige kolonië nog altyd ‘n obsessie met dié troue bestaan nie. Is dit die hoop van liefde en romantiese ideës van prinsesse en prinse wat vir ewig gelukkig gaan saamleef? Of is dit net om iets te sien wat mens self nooit sal bereik nie?  Snaaks hoe al die wit mense sit en kyk en eet, en almal wat daar werk swart is en nie die spektakel bekyk nie. Wat beteken royalty in die 21de eeu? Die koningshuise van Denemark, Swede, Spanje, Nederland, etc.? Wat is julle funksie, vra ek. Dalk wil die mensdom net ‘n ideal hê om homself/ haarself mëe te vergelyk.

Ons ry agterpaie Moria toe, maar dit het gereen en die pad is weggespoel.Ons stadskarretjie sukkel in hierdie made-for-4x4 gate. Moses kom haal ons en lei ons deur die koeie en deur die veld. Wilde koeie. Ek gedra myself soos ‘n stadskind en skreeu op hulle, dit is vreeslik baie pret want hulle kyk net verbaas terug.

Ouma spring in Moses se bakkie en jaag deur die veld se hoe gras en modder, ons sukkel sukkel agterna. Met haar 82 (?) jare se sy vir ons sy moes maar bestuur het, sy sien ons kon nie bybly nie. As jy wil ry moet jy ry, ou matie.

Die huis lyk soos altyd, maar ons is poegaai en wil na ‘n ete wat ons saamgery het van die Snorstad af net slaap. My tannie is nog nie eers uit Pretoria weg nie en dis al amper donker. My ouma is onrustig en stap die heeltyd deur die huis, elke voetstap word weerkaats deur die planke. Sy praat met ons of haarself, ek weet nie. Die heeltyd sien sy ligte aankom, maar ek dink nie die ligte beweeg nie. Laat kom tante en neefies en niggie. Honde ook. Ek maak as of ek te vas slaap om hulle te help uitpak, dit was simpel van hulle om in die nag na ‘n huis in die donkerte van die Vrystaat te ry.  

Dis lekker om daar wakker te word, en om die berg uit te klim en op soektog te gaan na boesmantekeninge terwyl mens teen rotse en bome moet afklim. Die sonsondergang en ‘n lekker biertjie laat ‘n mens die aldag van die stad vinnig vergeet.

‘n Ander neef kom , ek’t hom laas by sy broer se roudiens gesien, jare gelede. Ons kuier lekker saam, ek as enigste meisie moet my geslag verteenwordig en hou ook tot in die middernaglike ure uit. Hulle dink aanvanklik ek is van lotjie getik toe ek wil he hulle moet met my met lig teken, maar toe hulle drie die resultate op die kamera se skerm sien vang hulle vuur en gaan mal met flitse en bont plastiek.

Die volgende dag pak ons die pad terug aan, dit is weer ‘n gesukkel tussen moddergate en grasse deur. My tannie vergeet die broodjies wat ons gemaak het vir hulle in die yskas, so by die pitstop deël ons ons drie broodjies tussen sewe. My neef maak die kar se water oop nadat ons amper 3 ure gery het en die stoom brand die helfte van sy gesig. Simpel as mens die man wil wees sonder om te dink, ne. Almal is ietwat gespanne hierna, en ons ry maar aan met ouma. Gelukkig is die Astros voor as versnapering. Ons kom laat by die huis aan, maar gelukkig sonder verdere insidente. 

.

Feelmuseum

Croatia has a Museum of Broken Relationships, which exhibits the remnants of failed loves. By contributing to the museum, a person might get over their loss and hardship through creating something new: it is understandable, relate-able art.


The museum's site states:


"Whatever the motivation for donating personal belongings – be it sheer exhibitionism, therapeutic relief, or simple curiosity – people embraced the idea of exhibiting their love legacy as a sort of a ritual, a solemn ceremony.  Our societies oblige us with our marriages, funerals, and even graduation farewells, but deny us any formal recognition of the demise of a relationship, despite its strong emotional effect.  In the words of Roland Barthes in A Lover's Discourse: 'Every passion, ultimately, has its spectator... (there is) no amorous oblation without a final theatre.' "


If you have anything to contribute, be it shoes, a lock of hair, or a love letter, you can find the information on their website.

maybe a champagne bottle, like this one from a Turkish woman. 

This is the exhibit at a mall in Istanbul. Check out the New York Times article 

I wonder if parting with an object truly helps. But one must admit that most people are hoarders and cling to anything that they see as representative of an experience. Just think about the rise and rise of digital photography: we have a need to document every moment of our lives to make sure that we do not miss something. But I think that in capturing the moment, we miss being in it. I would rather have the memory of an instance than an image to which I have no real relationship. maybe we do not trust our memory enough. Memories can be changed and altered, memories are made by your own selection as to what to save and what to discard. 


I like these sad stories. It proves that we all share the need for love, that we all suffer at the hands  of love, but also that there is hope for moving on. For seeing the relationship for what it was: a period of time, an experience, but not something to pine after for years to come. 


There is a nice BBC video about the travelling exhibit, watch it here.



Perhaps the museum will bring its treasures to your doorstep soon. Perhaps your own object will be exhibited, or perhaps you can relate to those on display. In the end it is all about appreciation and love, is it not ?!  







.

This is Africa

What does MoMA stand for? What art is exhibited in the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich? Or in the Guggenheim? Modern Art. Art is constantly being categorized into a definition, because somehow it elludes it. Exxpressionism, Abstraction, Refiguration, Post-Modernism, der Blaue Reiter, Dada, Cubism, etc. All movements are descriptive of specific characteristics attributed to artists and works during a particular period in time.

However, this is not the case when considering African art. African art is just a collection of masks and tribal statues from the dark continent. There is no differentiation made between the Ndebele huts or a traditional mask from Ghana. It seems that Africa is a country, and not a continent consisting of 58 ( with South Sudan, I think) of them . This Western notion of thinking that all Africans, that all cultures and languages and attitudes, are equal, irritates me endlessly. I would be judged for equating Poland with Portugal, or Latvia with Sweden, so please, foreigners, do not think that anywhere is like anywhere else.

On that topic, the endless ranting about racism is also upsetting to me. We might have different skin colours, but we are all of the human race. And this thread of hatred for the other has been woven throughout history: colonizers killing the colonized, be they Aborigine, Indian or African. Furthermore, there is a great hatred within skin-colour as well, with cultures not getting along based on belief rather than on whether they are green or grey.

A blog I follow for the beauty of their wedding photographs, welovepictures , recently shot a wedding in Mpumalanga where the theme was "Colonial Africa". When I hear colonial, I think about oppression and the eradication of local cultures. Also, I think about the history of colonialism. Of how everyone wanted a piece of Africa. How a continent was divided up with complete disregard for the locals. And how this still affects the societies today.

But I do think that in this case, the bride was envisioning the old-worldly beauty of tea-parties, dinner sets, lace, boots, moustaches, leather, the smell of horses and train-tracks on the horizon.  The idea probably pertained more to the look of the era and its decadence than to its political implications.

So it irritates me somewhat when words are twisted and a person not given the opportunity to defend their views: Jezebel published an insulted view on the wedding pictures, which you can read here.

If you get angry about this, why is there no backlash to Top Billing Magazine's current cover shoot? It also depicts three men in modernized colonial attire in a colonial setting.

I mean, does this shoot not also show an aspect of colonialism? It is shot at the Royal Livingston in Zambia for God's sake. Is that not the most colonial place one could shoot it at? And yet, there, it is only seen as a fashion shoot.

Every time the safari trend creeps back into fashion with its faux-zebra and -tiger prints, with the shirt-dresses and khaki colours, you too are somehow wearing a more modern take on colonial clothing styles.

When you classify something as 'African' or 'Asian', when you mark a difference between the superiority of your culture to another, when you impose your attitudes and ideas on others, when you support big business over smaller industries, when you do anything where you are subjugating the one to the other you are applying a colonizer's mentality.

So please post-post-modern enraged hipsters, fight for something more than the racist attitudes you read in wedding pictures. Hell, South Africa's population is 80% black. I would expect there to be more black waiters than white ones, especially in a rural setting such as Mpumalanga, simply because there are about 38 Mio. black people and only 4 Mio. white people.

On Monday, 18. July, it will be Mandela Day.
The idea is to spend 67 minutes of your time doing something good for another person, helping out somewhere:

"The overarching objective of Mandela Day is to inspire individuals to take action to help change the world for the better, and in doing so build a global movement for good. Ultimately it seeks to empower communities everywhere. “Take Action; Inspire Change; Make Every Day a Mandela Day.”

Individuals and organisations are free to participate in Mandela Day as they wish. We do however urge everyone to adhere to the ethical framework of “service to one’s fellow human”."

check out the website here for ideas on what you could do. 

Perhaps you could write to the couple in the wedding images and spend 67 minutes with them at a shelter or a home and together help others, instead of focussing on their ignorance. Let's all change the world for the better, let's show that colonial attitudes of separation have no place in the 21st century. Be better than what you see in the images.  

Splitscreen: A Love Story

This shirt film was shot entirely on a cellphone ( the Nokia N8). Wonderful, isn't it. And somewhat of a disgrace to think that most people use their phone's video capabilities to shoot embarrassing, drunken or insignificant moments that they will either never watch or post on YouTube to the annoyance of their friends.

I was chatting with my friend earlier and wanted to tell her something funny and pretty and beautiful, but because nothing today seems to fit into that category, this short film will have to take my story's place. I know it is not funny, but it is rather remarkable and optimistic and just simply happy. And I think we all need a simple, happy moment sometimes.

Enjoy.

( here is the vimeo  link as well, I think the quality is slightly better? )



.

B est F riends F orever

During my last year at school, I thought I had found my friends for life. The ones who would be my bridesmaids. The ones who would be there when my children got married. The ones who would drink too much gin & tonic at the old age home with me. 

But then I left for a year, and even though I expected them to write me, or at least to write back, nothing happened. We kept in touch via facebook. They came to visit. And it was almost like always. The friendship was back on track. Perhaps I never gave anyone else a chance to be my friend because I already had excellent ones. 

So back in the land, I started at university. What an arrogant, ignorant person I must have been in that first year. None of my friends were studying with me, or even in the country. But I met an old one again, we had drifted apart previously, and she has become an integral part of my life. I always felt like I did not fit in with the other students because I was two years older ( a lifetime, I know, hahaha) and because I had seen some of the world, I knew what it was to do menial work and to have to earn ones own money. I still know what a privilege it is to learn. For a year I yearned to learn. I missed learning more than Mrs H.S. Balls Chutney. I missed finding something out and marvelling at how I had never considered that before. How I had never thought about it. 

But the ones studying with me seemed not to care. They were not aware. They liked things I had moved past. Again, quite arrogant. And again, I did not really give them a chance. 

Slowly however my old friends changed. Or I changed. Or everyone changed. My idea of having found my bffs was unravelling and everyone left. Near and far. 

So this year I opened myself to new people, fascinating people, people with completely different worldviews and people who have enriched my understanding through their optimism and their perspectives. New people who made me appreciate the value of seeing the world as faceted. 

Now know, I appreciate every one of you : old friends, new friends, close friends, far-away friends, friends who have driven me home when I couldn't, friends who come for tea on Sundays, friends who make photo collages, friends who sms to know if I got home ok or just ask how my day went, friends who need me like I need them. 

I know it is a cliché to say that one cannot choose one's family, but somehow I agree that one chooses one's friends. One chooses to work on a friendship, to keep in touch, to spend time together, to be in the life of the other. So it is a sad when one notices that one has lost one another, than there is nothing really to say when one is in the same room, that the friendship has changed to an acquaintance. But one must probably also accept that every friendship has a lifespan. Sometimes it is better to appreciate a person for their presence, no matter how long it was, than to dislike them for their absence.  

So I will write it again. Thank you for being in my life. You are the extended family of my choice. And I hope I am part of yours, too. 

Hang me out to dry

You said you wouldn't mind if I never spoke to you again. That if we never saw each other again, it would be all right with you. I answered that it could be arranged.

You make the fault of wanting me to be an ideal you have experienced in film and other friendships. But I am not your friend. I am your blood. There is nothing you can change about it. So stop trying to blame me for the non-existence of a friendship. Stop complaining about who I am not: I am not the one to come to when deciding between 20 pairs of shoes. I don’t want to go shopping with you. I don’t want to hear about your martial art. I don’t care about any of them. I care about you as a person in my life, not as a series of everyday choices to consult on.

But where are you now? Where is the person who was seen as a leader? Where is the person who could give great advice? Where is the person that went out dancing in white heels? I ask you now: what have you become but a shell of previous attachments? I know that as much as you cannot change me, I cannot change you. But there must be more to your life than this. You must have more ambition than this.

So please stop blaming me for your current situation. Stop taking it out on me when you have twosome issues. Stop comparing me to another, who is part of your DNA too: our halves were just mixed contrarily. We are as alike as we are different. We used to like similar things. Now everything has changed. Now I care as little as you do.

We were never the picture of filial perfection. But far away I could talk to you because you had a life that continued. Here you are stuck and you are of no interest any longer. Just as I won’t eat what does not taste well to me, I will not associate myself with boredom, with the acceptance of mediocrity. Perhaps this striving for more is a hindrance, there is not always a better or bigger or faster, but on occasion one must try harder.

I know my faults. All of you have this tendency to not be shy about pointing about my faults. Heaven forbid though that your flawlessness might be questioned. You are no diamond either.

My suggestion: look to your own faults before focussing on mine. Maybe I am the reason for your continued unhappiness. Perhaps you contribute to mine. I choose now not to care about these qualms anymore. Let’s keep our issues separate, let’s not continuously denounce the other, and hopefully then I will love you not out of the obligation associated with the vermillion in my veins, but rather because I actually like who you are.      

.

i ♥ you

To some people it comes very easily to say that they love someone. It seems natural to them to slip the three words in at the end of a phone conversation or when saying goodbye. The other day I was standing in the queue at Pick 'n Pay and observed a woman and her daughter telling the dad that they were going to another shop while he was paying and that they would meet him somewhere afterwards. When they had almost left the store, the girl and the mother both turned around and told the father that they loved him. And he then said : " I love you too my darlings." and smiled.

It was weird to me: they would be seeing each other in a few minutes. I think saying that one loves someone is a big deal. It is a commitment to that person. It is telling them that you give them a piece of your heart. Just like that. They can have it.

So saying it too often to me steals its significance. Perhaps others feel that one has to say it often to affirm the love one feels. And one has to hear it often to be secure of the other's devotion. Or that a child needs to hear it frequently to feel safe and, well, loved. I don't know. I can understand how this family wanted to make sure each one knew they were loved. I can understand how my friend always tells her sisters she loves them because she has lost others close to her. I can understand why my mother says it. I can understand saying ILY. But I cannot understand the feeling, because to me there are different types of love. The way family loves is different from friends, which in turn is different from passionate love.

Humans are obsessed with love. We sing about it. We write poetry about it. We devote entire oeuvres to a feeling that cannot be defined equally for each. We love to ♥.

Maybe I cannot understand it because I cannot box it in and store it away in my mind. Perhaps I cannot understand it because as often as it is true, it is also a lie.

Je t'aime. Te amo. Ek is lief vir jou. Ich liebe dich. I love you. Hmm.

It does not matter how many languages I learn, I cannot say it.
Which does not mean that I don't.



.