Have you heard the latest from that congregation of wise heads who are busy formulating the new Children’s Act? Apparently if I should inadvertently (hypothetically speaking, of course) roundhouse-kick my son in the jaw and knock his back-chatting behind out, it will cost me R300. I hate hearing news like this because I’m never sure […]
Ndumiso Ngcobo
Once upon a time, Ndumiso Ngcobo used to be an intelligent, relevant man with a respectable (read: boring-as-crap) job which funded his extensive beer habit.
One day he woke up and discovered that he had lost his mind, quit his well-paying job, penned a collection of hallucinations. A bunch of racist white guys published the collection just to make him look more ridiculous and called it 'Some of my best friends are white'. (Two Dogs, ISBN 978-1-92013-718-2).
Nowadays he spends his days wandering the earth like Kwai Chang Caine, munching locusts, mumbling to himself like John the Baptist and searching for the meaning of life at the bottom of beer mugs.
The racist publishers have reared their ugly heads again and dangled money in his face to pen yet another collection of hallucinations entitled 'Is It Coz 'm Black'.
He will take cash, major credit cards and will perform a strip tease for contributions to his beer fund.
Posted inNews/Politics
Opposition politics: The worst job in the world?
I feel that I haven’t engaged in my favourite pastime in the world in a while; oversimplifying complex matters I don’t fully understand. I feel that I owe myself the indulgence. It’s a Friday, after all. I saw a guy driving a funeral parlour van the other day and thought to myself: “What a crappy […]
Posted inBusiness
Do we really want the tourists to come in 2010?
At some point on Wednesday, two individuals descended upon the humble abode I share with my family. They had apparently been sent by some other individual from my efficient municipality to serve us with a “notice to disconnect” our power supply on the basis of non-payment. They figured that while they were there, they might […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Who do YOU want to be the next president?
In my book I have a chapter entitled “Let the masses eat pap” in which I publicly declare my voting record since 1994 when FW de Lincoln said people with my melanin content could. My rationale for revealing this great secret was based on two observations: 1. Figuring out that a black male who grew […]
Posted inLifestyle, Sport
Humour-writing instruction — part one
The second-most-popular question I get asked is: “When you sit down to write, are you consciously trying to be funny?” (The most popular is: “Why do you keep embarrassing yourself writing rubbish on a platform such as Thought Leader when you could be using it to write something meaningful that adds something to public debate? […]
Posted inSport
Perfection. The story of one set of tennis
I have never been one for team sports. I prefer the lack of ambiguity associated with individual sports. Mediocre players can still make a living by hanging on to the coat-tails of superior teammates. I feel I must mention Michael Vaughn at this point. Enough said. I love the idea of two competitors locked in […]
Posted inGeneral
Why satire beats debate hands down
Disclaimer: This is not a post per se, only a follow-up to my last piece, “Could Mbeki be too smart to govern?”. If you found that one mind-numbingly boring, sit this one out. I’ll post something tomorrow. The first time I heard about the existence of the worldwide web, my mind couldn’t even begin to […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Could Mbeki be too smart to govern?
I get many emails from satisfied readers and from readers who think I’m a nitwit. One reader of the Silwane Files sent me this email: Hi Ndumiso, I thoroughly enjoyed your blogs from when you were blogging on Amagama. I have noticed that since you started blogging on Thought Leader, you have been on a […]
Posted inGeneral
The only crime statistic that matters, according to The Secret
Unless you’ve been held hostage by infidel-busters in Baghdad and featured in MTV videos next to angry guys wearing balaclavas for the past three months, you’ve heard about the book The Secret. Gazillions of people swear by it and have used it to cure themselves of all manner of ailments, from cancer to arsehole-ishness apparently. […]
Posted inLifestyle
A vacuum-brained cretin leaves a paper-foil trail. Smokers are idiots
Disclaimer: The following piece is not recommended for sensitive readers. It contains strong language, politically incorrect utterances and general profanity. Reader discretion is advised. I have confessed before that I am a walking bundle of personality disorders. One that I failed to mention is that I am fighting a losing battle against anger management. The […]
Posted inGeneral
An irrational believer in God
In January 1984, a 12-year-old was shipped off to Catholic boarding school by his parents to begin his secondary education in Vryheid, northern KwaZulu-Natal. That young man was yours truly. Innocent and idealistic, I joined 200-odd other young people aged between 10 and about 20 years old at Inkamana High School. One of my mentors […]
Posted inLifestyle
Van Zyl Slabbert guzzles Redi Direko’s bathwater on a podium
Among my many personality disorders (incredible arrogance, extreme sarcasm, narcissistic tendencies, shameless self-aggrandisement, compulsive argumentativeness, condescending nature and so forth), the one that worries me the most is what I call my brain-in-mouth disease (BIMD). It’s a pretty serious condition that is caused by the malfunctioning filters between my brain and mouth. That is a […]