What do you get paid to do? Right now I get paid to watch movies. My wage works out to about R250 an hour for two hours to sit with a group of Chinese first-year university students and watch movies — usually of my choice as they forget to bring movies of their choice. 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
China taught me to laugh, SA taught me to weep
My maid, a sweet young lass called Tang Ying, brings me a punnet of strawberries under a thick layer of purplish mould. It had been softly rotting away, hidden under a packet at the bottom of our vegetable rack. She wants to know if she should throw it away. In the Family Convenience store of […]
Posted inLifestyle
An embarrassing truth
I just figured out an embarrassing truth. I woke up with an enormous hangover/nausea today, Sunday, my first babbelas in a long time, but I think it was more the rich food (German eisbein and sausages, etc) that I pigged out on which was delivered to our home last night. My wife, Marion, went off to […]
Posted inGeneral
Racism and the power of apology
The Chinese worker suddenly and loudly laughed at me as I strode under my umbrella into the parking lot where our apartment building is on Beijing West road in downtown Shanghai. He stood directly in front of me and laughed, smirking at me: it was a loud, mocking, donkey’s bray. He shouted something at his […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Wonderful China! Facebook and Twitter big no-no’s
Very wonderful China! 棒极 了中国! Yep, we can’t get into Facebook or use Twitter here in China any more, or for the time being. This is apparently due to the recent riots in Urumqi. We can certainly read about the riots in the (state-approved and monitored) newspapers such as China Daily and Shanghai Daily. I […]
Posted inLifestyle
The day my wife (nearly) went blind
I know there are many people who scornfully knock the saying “everything happens for a reason”. However, they do miss the profound chink onto appreciating life more: there is a teacher in every event. Whether one acknowledges the teacher in the event is another matter. Once giving consent to that truth, the chink then opens […]
Posted inNews/Politics
China blocks internet: We want our soft porn
I want it all and I want it now — Freddie Mercury China’s rationale for introducing built-in software to filter out porn sites is definitely candy coating, says this man on the ground in Shanghai. Government policy states it is to protect people, especially minors, from viewing porn? That’s horse manure buzzing with blue-bottle flies. […]
Posted inGeneral
So … you done some ‘dicky measuring’ lately?
I am convinced some men buy large, expensive cars to make up for a certain lack in the groin area, or for a lack of performance in that area. (Perhaps it’s only perceived, like “ooh, I’m grossly overweight” among anorexic women.) And before the era of the automobile one of the compensations used to be […]
Posted inGeneral
Free booze in China and so forth
It can be a laugh a minute living in this country. Oh I am sure the PCs and semi-literates will find my sense of humour (heck I don’t make it up, it is in your face and waiting to be photographed or copied) completely inappropriate. I am glad. Funny is funny. To hell with appropriateness. […]
Posted inGeneral
Dale Williams under the mistletoe … smiling expectantly?
Anton smiled bitterly, shaking his head, cleaning his pub counter. “Ja, me and my boet, we bought the land out near Kommetjie, got builders and sub-contractors in to build a sweet house for the family. Most of the construction was finished … ” sighs, ” … and one day my boet went to have a […]
Posted inLifestyle
When the shite hits the fan, who do you blame?
I am really a self-fulfilling prophet of late … Talking myself into awful tummy trouble as described in my last blog which had to do with beliefs, then I started to rummage around for material to write about another favourite, blame-shifting. The same day, yesterday, one of my current schools, a primary school, hit me, […]
Posted inGeneral
Do you know what you believe? (And a squiz at Zuma’s Address)
That squiz at Zuma’s State of the Nation Address comes after my thoughts on beliefs, or beliefs on thoughts; they are interchangeable. Once upon a time, not so long ago in fact, I thought I would skip a day’s work here in Shanghai and dreamed up the typical excuse that I was sick and settled […]