Happy Birthday and another Meme...

click images to enlarge

Happy Birthday to me
Happy Birthday to meeee
Happy Birthday, dear Vanilla
Happy Birthday to meeeeeeeeee!

Yep, it’s that time of year, tomorrow is my burfday - another year younger another year stronger… Well, I can dream, can’t I? Whaddayamean, how old am I? You must be kidding, I’m not telling you that! I mean I don’t want to destroy any of your illusions, now do I?!




And now, time for some light-hearted fun. I’ve been tagged by Janey over at Whittering On to do A Meme About Various Things. It’s a title which inclines me to think that someone wanted to create a meme and be nosy without having any obvious end or purpose… Mind you, do any of these wretched memes ever have any real purpose... Cynical old me, must be a symptom of age...




A Meme about Various Things


What were you doing ten years ago?

Watching my father die, having to sell his business and discovering there was a lot more to me than I thought there was.
Realising my marriage was on the rocks.
Falling foul of and falling out with my then-stepdaughter.
Discovering I was going to be retrenched – sooner rather than later.
Reclaiming my self by starting to have a mid-life reawakening!
1998 was a foretaste to the very rude awakening that was 1999.


What are five things on your to-do list for today (not in any particular order):

Wake up
Get up
Have a shower and brush teeth
Do the grocery shopping.
Go to bed.


What are some snacks you enjoy?

I’m not a snackish kind of person – I generally exercise discipline in the snack department. Mostly, I’d sooner have a banana. But I’ll nibble crisps/chips and dark chocolate occasionally. I do love popcorn but it doesn’t love me.


What would you do if you were a billionaire?

Leave South Africa (mind you, I’ll do that without being a billionaire!).
Buy a villa in Tuscany or Switzerland.
Create a foundation to aid the environment and wildlife or choose an existing NGO with which to work and support - either wildlife, environment or child abuse.
Travel lots.
Splurge on some designer outfits. I lurve Armani and Ferretti – hey, what can I say, I have my materialist side too, you know!
Invest the bulk of it in order to create another billion... and found another foundation.


What are three of your bad habits?

Drinking juice directly from the bottle.
Procrastinating.
Piling up more and more books next to my bed.


What are five places where you have lived?

Cape Town, South Africa
London, England
Guernsey, Channel Islands
Dublin, Eire
Durban, South Africa


What are five jobs you have had?

Shop assistant/window dresser
Scriptwriter/Video Director-Producer for a corporate
Marketing executive and copywriter
Marketing and Communications Manager
Marketing Director


What were the last five books you read?

I don’t suppose you’re going to believe me if I tell you I actually can’t remember….
So, let me rather tell you what I am reading:
100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Author Author by David Lodge
What I Was by Meg Roshoff
Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman
Emmanuel’s Book channelled by Pat Rodegast – again.
Remember, I did say there were piles and piles of books next to my bed…


What five people do you want to tag?

Um… Kimy, Taffiny, Helen, Rambler, Bart - and anyone else who wants to do this!

Hello Xenophobia, my old friend, you raise your ugly head again...

I was pondering what to write about today when Angela arrived.
“Did you see the news last night?” she asked me.
I hadn’t.
“They’re killing Zimbabweans and Malawians – beating them – three people have died.”
“Who?” I asked, “who’s killing them – where?”
“Zulus – in Alexandra.”
Alexandra is a shanty town in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg. An estimated 350 000 people live in “Alex”. They occupy 8500 formal houses, 34 000 shacks, 3 hostel complexes, 2 500 flats and numerous old factories and buildings. In the past few days xenophobic violence has flared across the community as local people have lashed out foreigners – Malawians, Zimbabweans, Congolese, Rwandans… Claiming the foreigners take their jobs and their homes. The foreigners, terrified for their lives, have fled to police stations where they are barely getting any food. Some, in fact, have had no food for a few days.
“They say that we must go back to Zimbabwe,” said Angela, “But we can’t, Mugabe is killing us there. Everyday he is killing people. I’m frightened. What if the Xhosas here start doing the same thing here in the Cape. Where will we go? We can’t go back. And if we stay here, South African black people will kill us. I’m worried.”
Worried is an understatement.
“What about Mozambique?” I asked.
“Yes, they are good people in Mozambique, but there are no jobs. You just sell things in the market. I don’t know what we will do.”
And so we face another grim reality of Angela’s daily existence. And that reality is xenophobia - rampant xenophobia which spills and spreads like an oil slick from the north to the south of South Africa. And the interesting thing is this: While, by and large, most white South Africans have accepted the nearly 5 million refugees from various parts of Africa, most black South Africans have not. They view these foreigners as troublemakers who “steal” their homes and their jobs. Ironically, the refugees have aided the South African economy hugely, doing whatever jobs come their way – while many locals would prefer to see largesse simply handed to them on a plate. So, yes, local people may be right in saying the foreigners are stealing their jobs – but only because they can – because many locals are simply not willing to work in the same way. It’s a tragic sort of irony.
“I pray every day to God,” said Angela, “I pray that he will make them not hate us and hurt us. I don’t understand it,” she said, “We are all Africans together.”
And therein lies the greatest irony. Not only are we all Africans together on this benighted continent, but we are all humans together, not just in Africa but in the whole world. And look at us, look at how we bicker and fight. I often wonder what an ET looking at this planet must think.
The simple reality is this, one man feels he is threatened and he attacks the man who lives next door. You see it the world over. You just have to look at the rise of nationalism across Europe. You hear the same arguments in the UK – “these foreigners are taking our jobs, we must have tougher immigration control”. And so it goes. It's a strange phenomenon for a global "village" isn't it, the villagers hating and fighting with one another.
But while most of us sit in our safe houses, with food on the tables, in Zimbabwe – and countless other places - people are starving and living in fear of their lives.
And as the global economic crisis plays itself out the people who are worst hit are the poorest. Local people are rising up at this moment against refugees because food prices have soared as a result of purported global food shortages – but you just have to look at the considerable food waste in the West to really question the reality of that position.
“I can’t go back to Zim,” Angela said as she pushed the iron back and forth over a shirt, “We will die. I know we will die. If Mugabe doesn’t kill us, we will starve to death. But I am frightened to stay here. I don’t know what we will do.”
And I have no answers. I don’t know what to say to her. All I can do is pass on the phenomenal goodwill that so many of you sent her via this blog last week. And when I do so, her eyes soften and she says, “Thank you, thank you, there are good people in the world.”

For more on the Alexandra violence and the plight of African foreigners in South Africa, you can take a look here here, here and here

Remembering the Origins - a short story

The tunnel wound in labyrinthine twists through the depths of the underwater cavern. A dim light filtered through its membranous walls, blood red and eerie. The two children, their hands grasped together crept forward past smaller caves and other passages, constantly aware of the danger lurking within the depths of the only world they knew.
This was how it was. Always seeking refuge, always on their guard, tiptoeing forward, voices hushed - when they dared to speak at all.
The girl was the stronger of the two, more courageous. The boy was timid – not weak but of a more delicate nature – not created for a world such as this. He looked to his twin for guidance. She in turn focused on protecting them both.
She stopped and he felt the tension running from her arm into his. He paled, trembling. She squeezed his hand and pulled him into a nearby cave. They waited, listening, barely breathing.
In the distance they could hear the sound of damp slithering. They felt the presence of the creature seeking them, its tongue flickering, its maddened red eyes glancing this way and that. They could feel the movement of its search vibrating through the venous walls of the cavern, that living cavern that pulsated and throbbed in its self-created glowing light. It was a place that should have sustained and it was a light that should have nurtured them. Instead it was a place in which they were hunted, forced to live on their wits, terrorised at every twist and turn.
“It’s coming closer,” said the girl. “We must get out of here. It will sniff us out.”
“I’m frightened,” said the boy.
“I know, but we must get out of here before it gets any closer.”
The risk was great, they both knew it.
The boy quailed at the thought. He didn’t know how much longer he could go on like this. This was not a world in which he wanted to live. And if it was a taste of the world beyond, the world to which they were destined to go, then…
His knees buckled beneath him.
“I can’t go on,” he said looking up at his sister, his eyes weary, pleading.
“You must,” she said, tugging at his hand, pulling him to his feet.
“I can’t. I’ll slow you up.”
“No, you won’t, I’ll help you. I’m not leaving you here.”
He pulled his hand from hers as the serpent’s hissing breath slunk closer.
“I can’t do this anymore. I can’t. I haven’t the strength for this. Not anymore. I can’t go on.”
“You must,” the girl insisted. “I can’t leave you here.”
“No,” the boy said, gazing into her face, his expression softening. “This is no longer my journey. You have to go on alone.”
“But I don’t want to,” she whispered, struggling not to let her voice break into a wail.
He smiled at her. “I don’t think there’s a choice.”
She stared at him, at his pale, beautiful face. He may have been the frailer one, but the serenity of his wisdom was something she couldn’t doubt. He wasn’t meant for this world, nor the one beyond. His journey ended here. She knew that. Just as she knew it was only her resilience and fortitude which would enable her to survive - her sheer bloody-mindedness.
“Are you sure?” she said.
He nodded.
Her heart breaking, she turned from him and slipped across the passage, ducking down a side tunnel. Turning back for a brief moment, she saw the red and black of the serpent’s scaly body as it undulated in sinuous motion, its eyes glinting with self-obsessed greed, towards her brother.
Now she was on her own. And she would outwit it at every turn. It had got one of them, it would not get the other. She would fight it to the bitter end, she would fight for both of them, in this world, and in the sunlit one beyond.

Searching for Autumn

Much inspired by some of the lovely autumnal shots I saw on several blogs last year, I decided to try and capture some autumn colours of my own. Only I forgot one small detail. We tend not to have much of an Autumn. We seem instead to go from summer to winter with nothing more than a vague murmur inbetween. So many of the trees seem to keep their green foliage until the first big blow of winter, at which point, giving themselves a good shake they shed their clothes and stand in glorious nakedness for winter. But that waywardness didn't stop me from trying to capture a glimpse of Autumn anyway. A trip to the arboretum and vineyards just up the road produced the the images below. Some are experimental, with me trying to capture good bokeh on some of the shots.


And since I'm not feeling overly creative in the words department right now - yes, I know, a terribly sin for a writer to admit, but there you go, it happens, I thought I'd share this with you - while you're enjoying Spring!

ODE TO AUTUMN
by John Keats

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness!
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'erbrimmed their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers;
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, -
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing, and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

Angela's Story

It is probably a place so far removed from your consciousness as to be but a distant memory in the foggy enormity of space. The name may be familiar but the place not. After all, those things and places by which we’re not directly affected are places and things for which we seldom spare much thought– unless the media constantly pummels us with them – and even then, they remain “somewhere out there”.

So if I say “Zimbabwe” to you, I wonder what you think. Some place in Africa? Another African country with a despotic dictator as its leader? A country with ravaging inflation of over 260 000%? A place where unemployment, violence and intimidation are a daily part of life? A place where food and other shortages are commonplace? Maybe, if you follow the news, you’re even aware that Zimbabwe had elections several weeks ago where the leading party was finally overthrown by the opposition, but have refused to go quietly.

Zimbabwe lies on South Africa’s northern border. I’ve never been there but I’m told it is a beautiful place. Its people are warm and friendly, hard-working, optimistic and outgoing. The standard of education is high. The land is richly fertile. It is a country that has always sat quietly in my consciousness. I’ve had friends and colleagues from Zimbabwe. I studied with Zimbabweans – back then most had left the country not confident of its future. How right they were.

Today Zimbabwe is in turmoil, in agonizing death throes as its economy collapses and its people suffer unspeakable horrors. Amnesty International said in a recent report that on the genocide scale, Zimbabwe sits at Level 7. Level 8 is the point after it has all happened. Yet does the world realise or recognize this?

For me, the Zimbabwean crisis has suddenly come so much closer to home. It has done so because I met Angela.

Angela works for me. She’s a refugee from Zimbabwe who is sent once a week by a domestic agency to clean and iron. Angela’s roots, her very being, are tied to Zimbabwe, and all she wants to do is go home. But it’s not safe.

Angela used to make clothes and sell them in a market – until Robert Mugabe had the market burnt down because the people who worked there did not support him or his ruling party. Those who oppose Mugabe have much to fear, and so, Angela and her husband, like two million others, left Zimbabwe and came to South Africa to seek work and safety. She doesn’t like it here because many South Africans, predominantly Xhosa people, don’t like foreigners. They view them as a threat; see them as taking their jobs. And this is partially true; Zimbabweans (and Malawians, Congolese, Rwandans etc) like to work and they work hard and well because they want to improve their lives. But while Angela lives here, her little daughter is still in Zimbabwe, with her Angela’s mother. Or so we hope.

You see, last week Angela came to work and told me that she was desperately worried. Her daughter had not appeared at school the previous day. Her mother’s phone had gone unanswered for days.

“They live,” she told me, her eyes dark with fear and sorrow, “in a rural area. That’s where Mugabe is killing anyone who opposes him. It’s okay in the cities and towns, but in the rural areas, he kills.”

This may sound overly dramatic but let me give you yesterday’s excerpt from a South African newspaper, the Mail & Guardian:

Thousands of people have been beaten, thousands more driven from their homes and about 20 murdered, according to the opposition, in an army-led campaign of violence focused on rural areas where the opposition performed well.

And all this because Mugabe lost the elections held nearly six weeks ago – and Mugabe and his generals refuse to accept this loss. They have, after all, been in power for 28 years. They have plundered Zimbabwe of its value (and sold out what is left to the Chinese). They have set themselves up in palatial homes, drive Hummers, Bentleys and Benz’s. Their wives shop in Paris. They’ve shipped considerable funds offshore. And all this while the economy has crumbled, people have died of AIDS and farmers have had their land taken from them in other campaigns of violence and terror. Eight out of every ten Zimbabweans is without work. For those who do work, they inevitably have to pay, yes, pay, for the privilege of having a job*. Almost every Zimbabwean, Shona and Ndebele alike, lives in uncertainty and fear, because like Slobodan Milosovich, Mugabe’s reign of terror affects all his people (given his efforts to make it a cultural conflict failed). And of course, in the way of all self-justifying dictators, Mugabe and his cronies insist that all these outcomes are a direct result of British colonialism and interference.

And this is the thing; despite it all, Zimbabweans live for the day when it will all be better - and Angela smiles. She doesn’t know if her child and her parents are dead or alive. But she lives in hope. She is beautiful, she is strong, she is extraordinarily courageous. And on top of all the uncertainty with which she lives, here in South Africa she has to face outrageous xenophobia and is taken complete advantage of by the company who employs her. That, however, is another story and right now I’m too angry to tell it.

There is plenty of information on Zimbabwe on the web and in recent press reports. Zimbabweans themselves, willing to take the risk, have their own websites describing the reality. My pal Baino also wrote an excellent post on the topic a week ago – I’d urge you to read it. The world is thankfully, and finally, outraged. But what, I wonder, will it do about Zimbabwe? What, I wonder, is to be done?

* In one instance a report told of a man who worked at a supermarket, whose wife had to go out and beg with the children, so she could give him the money to actually get to work because his meagre salary couldn’t afford it. But, he said, he’d sooner have a job than not, as one day when things came right, that job would be a wonderful asset to him.


Postscript: I'm happy to be able to tell you that Angela's daughter and parents are safe. They had gone to the nearest town for safety's sake but have now returned to their village. We can but hope that they will continue to be safe. I think one of the hardest things for Angela is that she's not seen her daughter for nearly two years.

A return from paradise revisited

And so I return with hundreds of photos, as brown as the proverbial nut, relaxed, happily married and with my routines in a total muddle. Lest you think I’ve been away for nearly a month, I confess I haven’t, but I seem to have been running around for the last week or two trying to get myself back on track.


And where did I go? Well, think tropics, the Indian Ocean, dark volcanic mountains, rolling fields of sugar cane, white coral beaches, palm trees and turquoise lagoons and you’ll get the picture. For those who have an inkling, yes, I returned to Mauritius. And how was it? Good – but not spectacular. The service in the hotel, where we’ve stayed before, was not brilliant, despite an upgrading to supposedly “5 star +” status. Cunningly, they managed to “forget” we were on a honeymoon package and, until I stalked off to “have words” with management, the service is described, at best, as “ornery” and at worst, as downright sloppy. All I can say is thank goodness for Sam the restaurant manager who went out of his way to make our stay special.


But hotel service aside, the other thing that really got me about “paradise” is how greedy it has become. In the past you could get good bargains on fabrics and clothes, now, despite setting itself up as a “duty free shopping haven”, I found everything (despite some hearty bargaining) to be on average 5 – 12 times more expensive than it is here. A Polo shirt, for example, at the Ralph Lauren factory shop (much of the stuff is made on the island) was three times more expensive than it is in the mall down the road… Prices in the hotels, long known to be astronomical, have gone insane. A bottle of water costs 120 Mauritian Rupees at the hotel and 14 MRU at the local shop… Moreover, local people are increasingly of mixed opinion as the Mauritian government sells off more and more prime and beachfront land for the development of still more hotels and luxury (golf) estates for wealthy foreigners. Starting prices on these estates are on average US$800 000 - this while the average salary of a skilled Mauritian worker is only US$ 2,600 per annum.


All that muttered about, and despite having our luggage searched on arrival and finding no transfer to the hotel (as pre-booked), we still had a really good time. Nothing beats lounging around on a long, white beach or snorkeling in warm, crystal clear waters. Having been to Mauritius twice before, we didn’t do as much sight-seeing as usual. This time we just spent a day wandering the back streets of Port Louis, the island’s capital city, and another getting annoyed in the “duty free” shops – a pastime made better by visiting Grand Bassin, the sacred Hindu lake.


All told it was good and a wonderful break, but I don’t think I’m likely to go rushing back.

And lest you think I came away with only the mutters and photos (see my flickr account), I’ll share with you two of the pieces I scribbled in my notebook whilst sitting on the balcony early one morning…


A world full of pastels scattered with vibrant brights... A Gauguin painting come to life. Dusky skinned islanders, heart-searing bougainvillea, a bird the colour of joy. And sights merge with sounds creating the whole.



A blue boat, a pink boat, on palest blue water, blending with the hiss, rush and murmur of the ocean’s stroking. Twitters and chirps and cheeps enfold green fronds and pink, yellow and orange blooms. And threaded through it all, completing the tapestry, the scent of frangipani, orange blossom and lilac.



A rich evocation of all that is life, the parts made whole in a single vista. And amidst it all the watcher observes the solitary fisherman, patient, eyes drawn only by the water.



The lagoon, a tranquil lake of serenity mirrors the sky as the fisherman in his pink boat checks his nets. Beyond the reef, where the coral lies exposed by the low tide, dolphins slide in loping rhythm through the sky blue ocean. Only the thin dark line of the horizon defines the boundary between sea and sky as, merging, the two appear one.


Another fisherman poles through the lagoon on a flat-bottomed craft, his eyes searching the coral gardens for the prize.


And as the sibilant susurration of the sea fills the middle distance, the immediate vicinity is syrupy with birdsong. Sparrows, bulbuls, mynahs, weavers – their voices rise above the ocean’s lulled roar – a tropical symphony murmuring multiple interwoven stories as a new day dawns.

A rose is a rose is wedded bliss...

Aaah, sigh, wedded bliss... Who'd have thought. Certainly not me. And there I thought it was really just going to be a bureaucratic formality - and in fact it was so much more. Sigh... Moon...

As a friend wrote to me in an email today: "You know, in many ways I believe that we receive gifts when we know how to appreciate them. Then we can nurture every special moment, work out the differences and walk a smooth and happy path with the one we love."

This is so true. Getting married the second time has been a richer, deeper and totally joyous experience. I'm happy being married - and I didn't believe I'd ever say that!

As another friend said, "I'm sure the "guides" are beaming from ear to ear, and saying things like "isn't it great when they do it the right way round like this? Work at their relationship first - get married as a result of that?!" and "it's beautiful when souls marry in reality, without the scales still on their eyes" - or something like that :-) "

The ceremony was short, simple and beautiful - with me in my little red dress.

First Patrick, our marriage officer and a really lovely man, read us a poem by Pablo Neruda...

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

that this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

Then he did a special cleansing and blessing ritual of the rings with water and fire. We said our vows, exchanged rings and he finished off with a Celtic blessing:

Deep peace of the running wave to you.
Deep peace of the flowing air to you.
Deep peace of the quiet earth to you.
Deep peace of the shining stars to you.
Deep peace of the infinite peace to you.

As we walked outside, moony and beaming, we noticed that the clouds that had filled the sky all day had rolled back to reveal the vast blue heaven while scattered diamonds glinted off the sea.

We arrived home to find a huge flock of guinea fowl in the driveway - not the usual mob - but a far bigger group with young ones and adolescents. We fed them and soon after the regulars arrived. The new flock flapped and fluttered up to the roof while the regulars filled the driveway and then they all sang - sweet syrupy notes filled with gentle twitterings - so very different from the usual raucous clucks and squawks. There is nothing quite like the sound of guinea fowl singing, it is sweetness itself. The guinea fowl, for those who don't know, brings the Goddess energy and the energy of protection. So as a final note to our marriage, we received a guinea fowl blessing. It doesn't get much better than that!

Dinner out was wonderful - the food a medley of flavours, woven together into a symphony of taste. And there were special touches too - flowers in our serviettes and a platter of sweetmeats at the end with the words "Congratulations on your Wedding Day" piped in chocolate on the plate with lots of little chocolatey hearts.

It was a good day and the best is still to come - the honeymoon...! On which note I will advise you that this blog is going into a short hiatus while I... well never you mind! :-)

Be good, take care of yourselves, be happy, be loving and loved, have fun and soar on the wings of grace and good humour.

With love and hugs to all of you.

See ya' soon...!