In an age where identity theft is rife, it is increasingly difficult to reconcile the fact that almost everywhere you go in the country, one is expected to provide detailed and quite crucial information about yourself. Moving between the National Library and a university library, over several weeks recently, I had to provide my identity […]
Lifestyle
Posted inLifestyle
A beautiful squalor: photos from Che Fang
Her hand is a smile opening him to this place – Che Fang; the bitter twists of steam from oil drums used to fry dumplings and egg cakes on this nameless path to the school where he teaches … …the Chinese mist gentling the bareness of people’s lives here, the threadbare clothing and shoes. The […]
Posted inLifestyle, Media
Back in my day
Life was simpler in the 1970s. Those were the days when my mother dressed me in brown corduroy and made me eat Jungle Oats, and Maya the Bee was on TV. Things have changed since then. Yes, there is the obvious stuff like no apartheid and iPads and cars that can park themselves. But what […]
Posted inLifestyle
12 socially awkward situations
I am a social disaster. Despite my love of speaking (show me a stage and I long to be on it), I am painfully shy. I find social events excruciating. That’s why I have a drink first and sober up while everyone except the designated drivers gets steadily plastered. Sources of anxiety are numerous and […]
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7 reasons to never have sex again, ever
Something occurred to me the other day, as these things do. I was walking out of gym, the endorphins from the exercise setting my mind to meandering like a basset hound following a scent trail in the local park, when a question stated itself. “How would you feel,” asked my inner voice, “if you were […]
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The trouble with braais
Sunday in South Africa is traditionally a big day for braais. And I have to confess, I’m not a big fan of them. Oh, I love braaied chicken sosaties (the ones made with thigh meat are the best). I enjoy the relaxed atmosphere, the Sunday afternoon smell of smoke, the soothing burble from sport on […]
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An acknowledgement
I am never very good with dates. Unless it’s a significant one, like January 1st or Friday the 13th, I tend not to notice the number on the calendar. So it was only late yesterday that I realised it was January the 18th, the fourth anniversary of my mother-in-law’s death. She was 67. It was […]
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle
On the politics of bottom-touching in China
I recently had a fresh cultural shock here in China: seven to 10-year-old kids, at the primary school I sometimes teach at, who have a fondness for running up and touching my backside. Including in class. I tried to understand the reason why. I think it’s because Westerners, by and large (forgive the pun), actually have butts. There […]
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Unstoppable forces and immovable objects
“That’s my new house,” my Chinese tour guide gestured toward a row of featureless apartment blocks beneath our vantage point overlooking the river, “and that’s where I used to live.” She showed me a photograph of a modest two-storey structure within the walls of the ancient city of Fengjie. It presumably remains intact, albeit more than […]
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The dreadful purgatory between waking and sleeping
The most depressing sound in the world is the tweeting of the Olive Thrush, Turdus olivaceous. It’s the first bird to wake up for the dawn chorus just before the earliest light leaks over the horizon — and it’s the sound that all insomniacs dread. The mockingly sweet notes mean that soon it will be […]
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Where have all the Maltese Poodles gone?
Sandton sheep, a school friend used to call them. They were everywhere, behind every security gate, in every flat and on every lap. Even if you couldn’t see them, you could hear them. They were the emblematic animal of the Joburg suburbs. If we were going to redesign the city’s coat of arms back in […]
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Would Joburg be Joburg without the Hillbrow Tower?
“The skyline is burning” goes the song I’m playing in my car. The track is titled The Horizon is the Beltway and it’s appropriate (in that way that random things often are) because I’m driving around looking for vantage points from which to photograph the Sandton skyline. Now that I’m introducing Sandton into my work […]