Oft gefragt

I have forgotten what's good in these uncertain times.

When nothing in sure, it is easier to have your attention drawn to weaknesses in yourself and in others than to look for fleeting moments of life being ok. To paraphrase Robert Frost, the thing about life is that it goes on. There is no use in dwelling upon hardships and despair because all this overthinking will do is pull you deeper into the darkness.

But man, it is hard to stave it off when your sword is a stick and you bunked on the day there was an introduction to fencing. So now all you can do is go tilting at windmills, ever forward, always getting back on your horse.

Enough with the literary braggadocio - this weekend was good. From Thursday on, it was good. Good came back swinging. Good showed up at the group exhibition of What The Weekend Is Gallery at Urban Spree when the music was jamming and some of the art seemed like you'd want to put it up on your wall. Good continued on Friday with the Yemeni Film Festival, which introduced the parkour scene in the bombed city of Aden as well as the importance of hip-hop and breakdancing in Cambodia, Uganda, Yemen and Colombia through the Shake the Dust documentary, and then at the opening of Hans-Peter Feldmann's photographic exhibition at the C/O.  Good persisted throughout the night with Critical Mass riding by, crashing an architecture-meets-art party because I needed the bathroom and staying to enjoy free wine and a lady playing at a white piano whilst an elderly man fell asleep on a chair holding his Chardonnay, and then checking out a Russian grocery store with bottled tomatoes, meringues and sweets whose wrappers looked more enticing than their content.



Good did not give up after an already solid couple of days. In sauntered into Saturday whilst strolling through Mitte for Berlin's Gallery Weekend, where we mainly didn't understand the art and made dozens of gifs of ourselves with light installations. We continued on to a second-hand market where I bought pants that look like a dress and are wonderfully airy for the hopefully impending heat of summer. Aww jiss.


via GIPHY

After a nap we pre-drank nasty-ass Mexikaner (shots made up of Vodka or Korn with tomato juice and Tabasco or something. It is like downing a tiny Bloody Mary) and danced to the glorious music of the Backstreet Boys before going to a club where we hip-hopped into May. I am pretty sure my dancing skills are not great, but just shaking all the negativity off through the beautiful sounds of 90s hip-hop was close to sublime.

Good hit another six on Sunday with warm weather, a neighbour-barbecue and meeting a friend with her friend, the two of whom were in town for a concert. We hadn't seen one another in more than a year, so catching up on the details in person filled in the blanks between Skype sessions and phone calls. As they went to Yann Tiersen I headed to the May-1st-demonstrations because I didn't want to return home just yet and protesting in SA usually means people toyi-toying and destroying things, so I gathered that this could be equally interesting. More interesting than the clad-in-all-black crown of protesters and gawkers was the clad-in-all-black police: their uniforms look like the armour of ants, and their synchronised drills made the whole protest run smoothly. When I left, no cars were burning, no one was fighting, but to my dismay no one was really chanting their dissatisfaction either. Weirdly some of the officers also had what appeared to be video cameras on their helmets, to what purpose I am unsure of (identification of possible threats? recording all attendees? state surveillance?).

And then good had to prove one last time why it is aspirational: Monday meant writing applications that actually were responded to and then meeting up with the friends from Sunday before they left the city. We got ice-cream at Hokey Pokey and just chilled in the park for hours before they departed for the train station and I got to enjoy some time in the sun before another friend showed up and regaled me with his tales.

I shan't forget again - something good is always around the corner.

Chance to protest

Previously, I wrote about useless protesting going on in South Africa, but here is something you should sign your name to. When Nadine Gordimer states that the bill goes "totally against all ideas of freedom", you know it is worth throwing your funeral outfit on for a day of protest against the possible implementation of the Protection of Information Bill, which allows the government to punish anyone they think is holding and disclosing classified information with jail time of up to 25 years. I read a while ago that had this bill been in place, neither the arms deal scandal nor Zuma's sexual interactions with a young girl would have gone to court. This bill is seen as a threat to free-flowing information and minimises the government's accountability. Read more about the censoring of the Mail & Guardian's article on Mac Maharaj's involvement in the arms deal.


This is what future headlines could look like if we don't prevent this bill from passing : 

We don't need no education.

found on 9gag

Although 9gag is definitely not the most reputable source for news, this image is from the student protests in Bogotá, Colombia. For months they have been demanding free education and against proposed reforms to privatise tertiary education. For more information you can refer to the BBC's article.

This morning I was speaking to my sister about finishing my last exams next Wednesday and about thereby finishing my first degree. Since it is a BA ( Bachelor of Arts), many people dismiss it as being a degree for young ladies to find a husband and also as being useless in the market place. I know learning about post-humanism and Cartesian duality might not rake in big bucks for me in the future, and that I'll probably always be underpaid and overworked, and that finding a job will be harder than if I had studied engineering. But I am good at thinking. Not so good at math and calculations and numbers. So is it not more important to be good ( and associated with that, happy) than to be bad at your job and hating it?!

In any case, I am privileged to have studied at all, and to be able to further my education. This is a protest I would have liked to join, not students protesting about a fiesta being cancelled.

Protest

On TV, there are often ads encouraging responsible electricity use and tips on how we can contribute to saving the environment. But I wonder how many people actually do something? When they ask us to turn off all non-essential appliances like the geyser or the pool-pump, we don't do it. I mean, we do general things like recycling, turning the lights off when we're not in a room, having a compost heap ( well, sort of. We had one but rats started living in it so it had to be destroyed and now we collect all the vegetable/fruit rests and go bury them when the container is full) and not driving unnecessarily. But everything is also connected to saving money. I only boil as much water as I need, or my sister turns the geyser off, in the hope that it will reduce the bill.

The same goes for the rhino killings. I have no problem buying a bag at Woolies or sending an sms to donate R10, but actually going to protest somewhere seems like too much hassle. So there is a bit of a contradiction here: we want to save the planet without wanting to give anything up. But it shouldn't be easy to save the world. I mean, it shouldn't need saving in the first place if everyone could just have lived slightly more responsibly, but it's too late for that. We need to consciously take action. A friend of mine studies in Hamburg and he is constantly part of some student protest about fee increases, or world economics or saving the rainforest. When students at my university protest, it is because they feel the student elections are "racist" or because the food in the cafeteria is too expensive. The highlight was when they protested because Spring Day ( a huge get-drunk party) was cancelled. We still had a day off, but students were angry because the university did not provide a party. I think that was ridiculous. Find another party. Throw your own. Or maybe just do some work.

I think it was easier to protest in earlier years. There was one specific thing wrong at the time, and now it seems like there is so much wrong with the world that we don't know where to start. The ANCYL recently marched from Johannesburg to Pretoria to protest. My one friend works along one of the roads they marched past and she said she had never seen so much hatred. But I don't understand whom for. Who do you hate? The Apartheid government ended about 17 years ago, so that falls by the wayside.  Also, the Youth League should deal with the youth's current problems, like AIDS, education, getting people better living conditions, preparing them for a bright and productive future. Instead, 40-year-olds march in order to nationalise the mines, chanting "Viva Gaddafi" and singing songs that were deemed hate speech by a South African Court.

Half of what the ANCYL says does not make sense. I don't know it they are generally against anything ending with an -ism, or if they can define what communism is, or if know what they are marching for. How can you follow a leader who knows not what he says and has no respect for democracy? I would like to stuff Malema like a pinata and beat the shit out of him for taking advantage of people with no options and no education. If you don't know better you can't do better. But instead of inciting anger and hate, and basically destroying ideas of nationhood, unity and a "Rainbow Nation", you should consider what you are protesting for and if it will actually benefit the youth. Not by throwing money at a problem, but by actually trying to advance a society through hard work, education, dedication and compassion.

Malema has been suspended as President of the ANC Youth League.
Although this is great, it worries me that he could have become president in the first place and that the league is just a place for power-hungry people in their middle years to be overpaid for doing nothing. I say restructure the entire league. I say fire all incompetence and focus on building a better nation. We have so many other problems, a silly little man dancing on a podium should not be one of them.