Alasdair and Thomas ran up from Carlos Rolfe’s Pan in the Boksburg farming area, caked with mud from wrestling in the water and trying to build a raft and get the thing to float. Bums bobbing in the sun, they knelt on the bamboo raft and dug in the water on the sides whilst the […]
Rod MacKenzie
CRACKING CHINA was previously the title of this blog. That title was used as the name for Rod MacKenzie's second book, Cracking China: a memoir of our first three years in China. From a review in the Johannesburg Star: " Mackenzie's writing is shot through with humour and there are many laugh-out-loud scenes". Cracking China is available as an eBook on Amazon Kindle or get a hard copy from www.knowledgethirstmedia.co.za.
His previous book is a collection of poetry,Gathering Light.
A born and bred South African, Rod now lives in Auckland, New Zealand, after a number of years working in southern mainland China and a stint in England.
Under the editorship of David Bullard and Michael Trapido he had a column called "The Mocking Truth" on NewsTime until the newszine folded.
He has a Master's Degree in Creative Writing from the University of Auckland. if you are a big, BIG publisher you should ask to see one of his many manuscript novels. Follow Rod on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/Rod_in_China
Posted inGeneral
Forget ANCYL…what freaks out South African children?
“Today’s children are worried about more than just their homework and peer pressure — they are also worried about terrorism and climate change and whether there will be a future for their own children. These are just some of the serious issues a group of more than 170 New Zealand children have cited as major […]
Posted inGeneral
Volcanic eruptions and the end of the world
The eruption of volcano EyjafjallajÖkull has had its fun side. John Cleese allegedly paid a taxi driver $5 100 to travel 675 miles across a portion of Europe because he could not catch his plane. Oh, it was a car pool of people. As already argued, that taxi ride could be movie-making stuff, filled with one-liners. […]
Posted inGeneral
Crying for my country
I watch the welts appear through the boy’s underwear. The boy’s head is caught between a grinning, stocky policeman’s thighs which imprison the boy and keep him bent over. In front of the boy stands another policeman, face furrowed in thought as he wields the cane. The cane comes hissing down on the boy’s buttocks […]
Posted inNews/Politics
AWB’s Visagie and SA’s urgent need for communication among all parties
So Andre Visagie, secretary-general of the AWB, really lost his cool recently on e.tv to the delight of the international media, especially the BBC. Addressing Visagie in the talk show, campaigner for human rights Lebohang Pheko was passionately asking a string of perfectly legitimate questions about the poverty and oppression of (largely black) farm workers. […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Sad that Eugene Terre’Blanche is dead
My first reaction to reading about ET’s death was that it was an April Fool gag. But the news had already been reported worldwide, and I realised it wasn’t. And felt nostalgic. Let me speak for the good guys, people like me. Good guys, regardless of political leaning, seem to need people we love to […]
Posted inGeneral
My patronising attitude towards the Chinese
1 Book sales on my recently launched memoir, Cracking China are going well, and my publicist is doing a superb job. Most magazine and newspaper reviewers and radio stations are keen to do interviews with me, which is wonderful and a privilege. I look forward to the next radio interview, with Karen Key on […]
Posted inGeneral
The use of discriminatory pubs to unite SA
I was struck by the use of thematic uniforms and pictures in an upmarket Chinese restaurant, Red Guard Cafe, off Queen Street in Auckland here in Kiwi-Land. The waitresses and waiters were all in green, Maoist, military-style uniforms, complete with soldier caps displaying the red star. On the walls were a few pictures of the […]
Posted inGeneral
SpeakZA: I despise bullies
I despise bullies. Inevitably, my first experience of that was at school. Well I remember being lifted up by my shirt and banged against a school wall while the big, grinning bully and his cronies laughed at me hanging against the wall, shoes dangling in the air. I had done nothing to deserve this. If […]
Posted inGeneral
And in other news … ANCYL overthrows SA defence force
In a surprise, swift coup, the freshly appointed Brigadier General Julius Malema and his senior cohorts replaced all the military generals in Pretoria and elsewhere and are now offering a “final solution” to the predicament South Africa is in. A junior spokesman for the old ANCYL said the coup de’tat was “so easy”, because “our […]
Posted inGeneral
Kiwi ‘racism’ doesn’t remind me of apartheid
“It won’t take your mom long to get permanent residence,” said the immigrations official to Michelle, the Chook’s mom, on the phone. “She isn’t an Asian.” When Michelle, who as the daughter can sponsor her mother to New Zealand told us this story that evening, I breathed a sigh of relief as my permanent residence […]
Posted inGeneral
South Africans and the fine art of bitching
It’s the simple things in life that give us the most pleasure. The most meaning. And what can be more meaningful than sinking your teeth into the denials and accusations of Winnie M&M and the latest shenanigans of leaders like Zuma and Malema? Look at the sheer delight on Zapiro’s face as he shows off […]