Suspense of disbelief
I am sorry, but that Robertson’s Spice ad where the mama tucks her chicken under her arm, scales the highest mountains and sails the roughest seas to get the best spice for it, is just incredible. Like, not credible. Like no sane person can believe it. I watch her shuffle to the quaint little shop next to her house with the chicken, uncovered, I watch her in the row boat and later, climbing majestic mountains in, perhaps, China or somewhere, and all I can think of is… salmonella. I am ready to bet my bottom dollar that the agents of Satan came up with an idea that their client hated, and bullied them into buying said terrible idea for hundreds of thousands during a very slick casting session… or something. Either way, Robertson’s should fire its communications manager or whoever approved the “ends of the earth” pitch. No food product should be that intimately associated visually, for an entire 30 seconds, with possibly gazillions of air-borne- and other pathogens.
No, really. The optimal temperature for pathogens to double in number every 20 minutes is between 5°C and 65°C. I would guess that the chicken in the ad maintained an average temperature of about 26°C for roughly four weeks. (Obviously I don’t think for a second that she rowed ALL the way to China or somewhere.) But let’s move along.
The other thing that is harder to believe than yet another Hollywood ensemble romcom (I have a strong feeling that Valentine’s Day is going to be at least as nauseating as Love, Actually) is how JZ is handling the 20th child debacle. Or 19th child debacle, according to the M&G.
It’s ongoing, it’s still being debated fiercely by radio hosts, callers-in and media scholars alike, and the papers just don’t seem to tire of it. So JZ apologised on the weekend, but nobody seems to buy it. He has apologised, the feeling seems to be, too many times in the past. For frack’s sakes (OK, I confess, I had a little BSG lapse on the weekend) the nation isn’t simply a big happy Catholic church. You don’t get sent home with some Our Fathers and instructions not to sin again every time you leave the confessional.
I really think our prez should get his very own ad agency and an image coach. And if he suspends Julius’s security detail, it won’t even cost the tax payer a cent.
Filed under: Food, In the News | 1 Comment
Tags: advertising, Jacob Zuma, Julius Malema, TV
Sexual gladiator
Somebody sent me this link this week:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zuma:_Tales_of_a_Sexual_Gladiator
with the byline: Does life imitate art? The text of the page itself is not particularly illuminating or ironic, but I thought it was worth sharing.
Filed under: Stuff | 2 Comments
100% disappointed
I have recently found my exchange-family siblings on Facebook. That was very exciting – like this I discovered that even Miet, my Italian mother, can now be reached on email, which is great. These days, considering the hullabaloo that surrounds an actual letter (envelope, stamps, trip to the post office) one has the notion that such a document must be long, well-composed, immaculate in terms of grammar, spelling and of course, wit. Even before starting, one feels the gravity of the task, and that does not make it any easier to embrace. In fact, letter writing in that format becomes a pain in the ass, and for a very busy girl like me, something to avoid. As a result, communication suffers. But now Miet has an email address, so I will compose a missive to her maybe tomorrow.
So what does my Italian family have to do with our Playboy President? (Ha! I think I just gave it away! My first novel, I suspect, should not be a crime thriller.)
Well, being armed with a new email address, I thought about the letter that I would write. And really, today of all days, it was impossible to not even imagine writing about Thandekile Matina Zuma, JZ’s illegitimate 20th child, with Sonono Khoza.
Shame of the Nation! the Sowetan declared, and Redi’s phone rang off the hook with calls from indignant grandmothers, construction workers, members of the opposition and other whites and blacks.
Everything I thought was said: he sends worse AIDS-messages than Mbeki, he is an embarrassment as a statesman and a president, he is a complete fucking idiot. And I felt real shame, and wished that I was living in Spain (on the plain in the rain etc.) where I would obviously not care anymore. Until I mind-composed my letter to Miet. It occurred to me that as clueless politician who just cannot keep his dick in his pants without it making a little dark spot on the wool, JZ differs not that much from Silvio Berlusconi. Other than, of course, that none of JZ’s wives are suing for divorce as a result of the headlines.
This compunction that causes rampantly undignified and indiscreet sexual behaviour has afflicted many kings and presidents through the ages. Solomon was reportedly “loved by many strange women” and had, according the Book of Ultimate Truths, 700 wives AND 300 concubines. JZ has some way to go.
If you take a funny little quiz called “Philandering Presidents” on funtrivia.com, you will find that the shenanigans of JFK and the lovely Bill Clinton were not really all that unusual.
Thomas Jefferson lusted after his neighbour’s wife, one Betsy Walker, and Lyndon Johnson was famous for selecting the White House secretaries according to their looks. “I can’t stand an ugly woman around,” he apparently said. The most awkward was perhaps Franklin Roosevelt, whose mother cut off his allowance when his wife complained to her that Lucy Mercer, Eleanor’s social secretary, was writing Frank the most inappropriately intimate letters.
On 702, both Redi in the morning, and David O’ Sullivan in the afternoon harped on about JZ’s responsibilities as president. The issues that they and their callers identified were: 1) the moral high ground; 2) the Mbeki comparison; and 3) the fact that taxpayers are supporting his mushrooming household (there are rumours that Mr Lovepants (Andrew, did I get that right?) will make an honest woman out of Sonono soon). David seemed particularly adamant that as a public figure, the president had no right to a private life, especially when it dented the national budget.
We should call this the American Model of Radio Reporting when Confronted with Possible Moral Ambiguity. Nobody can forget how the Bible belt feasted on the Monica Lewinsky story. And who can blame them? If you run on a family-values ticket, then you better honour and obey.
Unlike the French, who clearly don’t give a toss. During the ML saga, enlightened bloggers relished the discretion with which the French press treated Jacques Chirac’s alleged affair with Claudia Cardinale (unlike the Brits and the Italians) and Francois Mitterand’s protracted extra-marital sex life that also apparently produced offspring. When Paris Match published photographs of his daughter with his long-time mistress Anne Pingeot, he was unashamed. “I have a natural daughter,” he said, “Et alors?”
Here at home JZ, our “100% Zulu Boy” clearly bangs to a different drum when it comes to… er… traditional morality. (I would so love to know how – and if – Ray McCauley is going to address the issue on Sunday.) So I think David O’ S should take his moral outrage and find something imaginative to do with it, even though that is not his job.
The point is that our Zulu boy has been caught with his appendage in the cookie jar not so long ago, and that almost turned out badly for him. This repeat offence makes one think that our president is an idiot savant of sorts, with some mysterious use for True Powers in the Party, who completely underestimated the determination of his Richard to poke its nose into matters quite beyond decency and state, and as a result, are now finding themselves (post-Polokwane) reeling from pillar to post with damage control. Talk about just desserts.
The whole thing would be funny if it wasn’t so horrifying. It’s really (from my point of view) not about the fact that he is president. It’s about the fact that he is the president of the country with the highest prevalence of HIV and AIDS in the world, and that he keeps on fucking around without a condom, and getting bust. As an example of the infinity of human stupidity, he is barely ahead of Julius Malema. And considering his reportedly endless charisma (they LOVED him at Davos, it was said) just imagine the change he could make, if he really cared.
And that, I think, is the real shame.
Filed under: Stuff | 1 Comment
Stupid. Vain. Arrogant.
Nationalising the Reserve Bank for the princely sum of R12 billion will, as we know, be of benefit to no-one in this country. It will not even satisfy the arrogance, vanity and stupidity of the ANC panjandrums for very long, as arrogance, vanity and stupidity is never satisfied.
Monetary policy is not determined by the private shareholders of the bank, but perhaps it should be, as the government‘s interpretation of “fiscal prudence” is clearly “let’s piss money down the toilet”. Can the Treasury just say NO? Is this possible? Can the Planning Commission speak with the voice of reason?
Can’t some organisation start a “How to spend R12 billion and actually make a difference to people’s lives” campaign?
Instead of making a few people very rich (Who are the SARB shareholders? Are they mainly white men? Would that be very ironic?)…
Build schools, buy books. Give doctors a pay rise. Establish a centre for homeless people. Help bright kids who worked hard at school to go to university. Build a wind farm – invest in sustainable energy models. Something. Get the entire ANC NEC a brain transplant. I swear that will be of benefit to millions.
For fuck’s sake.
Filed under: Stuff | 8 Comments
Boksburg is the new Potch
It’s just a thought. But you know how you gotta get those down when you have them.
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Supersize me
Reuben had simple values and basic needs.
(I have decided that I have to start writing fiction, and liked this very much as opening sentence for a short story. The rest of the story will come, I hope. But never mind that.)
Yesterday, for about ten minutes, I actually wondered what it would be like living in Boksburg.
I was driving with my folks down a road called something like Noordrandweg from Game to Builders’ Warehouse. From the right, aeroplanes of various sizes were flying in at 90-second intervals to land at OR Tambo. It is always a thrill to see a huge aircraft descending from fairly close quarters. And there, over Noordrandweg-something, they were coming in as if a really big person was shaking out his aircraft piggy bank in slow motion.
Earlier we had lunch at the House of Ribs Family Restaurant, where you can have eat-as-much-as-you-can carvery for R80 per person. Even the more modest version for R55-a-plate meant you could have soup and bread to start, as much salad as you like, and then as much food as you can pile on your plate – and it was quite astonishing to see what was possible – and then, just in case you were still peckish, a couple of slices of pizza. The pyramids of food that were carried to the tables by people of all sizes were really impressive. It was impossible to imagine that people could actually go back for seconds without keeling over of a heart attack en route. Impossible.
The carvery is the earliest version, I think, of “supersize me”. I don’t know if anybody else who grew up in a small town remembers going to the local hotel for the Sunday lunch buffet, and seeing evidence for the first time that if you keep on giving people food, they will keep on eating it way beyond any bounds of decency or reason.
Not surprisingly the place was abuzz from quite early on. I would guess that it seats about 250 people, and I thought that they turned their tables about twice while we were there. Seven hundred and fifty plates… I think they make a lot of money.
But that was not the amazing thing. What I really liked was the loud swooshing of jet engines that powered towards the landing strip while we ate. That and the electric train that did continuous rounds near the rafters right around the restaurant.
Anyway. The House of Ribs and its toy train is not a reason to live in Boksburg. The aeries passing very close overhead and the shopping you can do at supersize-me versions of every supermarket experience you can dream of, these might be reasons. I think living in Boksburg must be a little like living in middle America.
It was a thought. But it did not last very long.
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Oh. I understand.
I suspect this is what you say to children who insist that they have been playing with their invisible friends at the bottom of the garden. (If they say they have been playing with fairies, the response might be “oh, that is nice” before you give them a thorough beating.)
It follows then, that this is the appropriate response when a guy declares that “Arsene Wenger is GOD” (sic on the caps). The conversation on Facebook went a little like this:
Alan: on top of the world with The Arsenal!
Michael: Here we go, here we go. Please God dont let Cesc get injured or sold do Barcelona
Betty: Michael you know 1) there is no god and 2) if there was, she’d never interfere with the trading of soccer players… right?
Michael: Arsene Wenger is GOD
…to which, of course, I replied: “Oh. I understand.”
So now I know that Arsene Wenger is a French football manager who has managed Arsenal for the past 14-odd years. I know quite a few Arsenal supporters, but did not guess the religious fervour of their support for, well, a football team.
As one does, I googled pictures of Arsene and I thought they were very amusing. I can see why he be god. He really has a good face for the part.
Que diable sont-ils là-bas?
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Tags: Arsene Wenger, children, Facebook, God, soccer
Sunday morning
The wind moves the leaves of the trees outside the window. The rustling is reassuring, like a soothing piece of ancient music. I love wind when I am in not in it. Like now. When I worked in Cape Town often I sometimes hired a flat in Vredehoek, and there, as we know, the wind can blow like it wants to kill someone. And I loved it. I loved being warm and safe while the weather raged and moaned as it whipped against the concrete blocks of 20’s deco.
But wind is something I really don’t like on my skin. Like when Mary irons my cotton shirts so flat that the polyester thread melts, and then scratches. All day. In my neck. You get the picture.
Wind is really my least favourite element, from a tactile point of view. A cool breeze on a sweltering day is a blessing for sure, but I find any other form of moving air in any other situation… uncomfortable. I don’t like to eat al fresco when there is even just a little wind. The irregular rustle of trees is charming only when I hear it. On my back it feels like a gentle but mean nudge from someone saying please leave, you are not wanted here.
There were ten thyme sprouts visible in the pot this morning. I felt enormously pleased and watered everything generously.
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Tags: Sunday morning, thyme
Hey there 2010
The year has not only started, January has already passed the ½ way mark. I look at the blog and wonder why it has been impossible for me to post something. In all other ways things flew out of the starting blocks.
Started work at The Project on the 4th. I was alone in the office for the first week, but that was very pleasant. A full house means that five people squeeze into a room the size of a big nut. The sardine situation will be alleviated in February sometime, when the whole school moves across the road into the Braamfontein Centre where we will have at least twice the space, apparently, and many windows. I have been put in charge of buying the coffee machine. I was very excited by the idea until it transpired that “coffee machine” means microwave, kettle, cups, mugs, spoons, plates, milk jugs, dishcloths (I am sure) knives and forks and so on. Note to self: must develop infrastructure acquisition strategy of some kind.
I registered for the 2nd half of my masters. Research report and creative writing for journalists. I got the reading back and the books and started reading last night. Note to self: revise relationship with Tom Wolfe. Although Bonfire of the Vanities was fantastic and A Man in Full a pleasure, I am Charlotte Simmons dragged a bit for me. The definitive early 60’s-new-journalism-stuff just never grabbed me. Don’t know why. Maybe it was the wrong time for me to read it – I could not relate to it at all. But whether I relate to it or not, I think I will be ploughing thought it in the next few months.
I invented my first phrase of the year. “Myrmidons of Mediocrity” are people who appear to be employed in administrative positions, but do not actually achieve anything at all. In this way, Wits is no different from the post office. Really. One day I will turn the short film I made about a man poisoning his family so that they could find post mortem employment at the post office for a monthly fee into a short story. (It has done before you know, the book does not always come before the movie.) Anyway. I think you get the idea.
So. Full steam ahead. My plants all survived my absence and, in addition, the basil seeds that I sowed before I left actually came up and are flourishing. I love that. Bolstered by this triumph I immediately sowed about 200 000 thyme seeds and a full eight teeny-weeny green sprouts are already thrusting bravely towards the sun. It is going to be a good year, I am sure.
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Tags: calvin and hobbes, post office, Tom Wolfe
The last time I ate in a Spur was in 2003. It was in Fordsburg, it was a group-thing with the folk from the dojo (The Islander was visiting from NYC and I was invited because he was staying with me, otherwise it would have been a black-belt-thing only) and I did now know that the Spur in Fordsburg did not serve beer. It was a bit embarrassing.
Right now I am settled in with a Spur cheeseburger, some wine and the cricket on a huge screen on my left. At the table in front of me two young okes have just downed what I assume are their first shooters and ordered their second round of beers. I suspect they are drowning their sense of impending doom, as the English are fast catching up to our first innings score with six wickets still in hand. Cook is just out for 118 and Collingwood is standing firm with 72.
“Forever Young” (Alphaville. 1987, I think) is on the speakers. In this moment I feel as close to happy as is possible. Pretty damn groovy.
There is a perfectly reasonable near-truth I can tell about why I am where I am right now. I am in the Soaring Eagle Spur at OR Tambo airport, and I could say that I am here because I have a four-hour stopover and I am waiting for a Cape Town flight. This is true, and would even be reasonable if 1) I was going to Cape Town or 2) I did not just fly in from Port Elizabeth. Truth is that I could actually just catch a cab home, and then, be home. But what fun would that be?
I am waiting for Ruth to get in from CT, and then John Barnes is collecting us at half six-ish. So, technically, what I said is effectively true even though the real story is that I made a completely odd lift-arrangement to get home in order to hang out at the airport for four hours. I could have asked a friend to come and get me, or just forked out the R200 for Maxi Taxi – it’s hardly a price above rubies – but here I am, and feeling, as I said, pretty damn groovy.
I hear a thick Afrikaans accent behind me order a cup of rooibos tea with cold milk. I look. A tall, well-proportioned man is ordering for his mother, a wiry and elegant but clearly conservative mevrou in a blue pants suit. Her air is stern and pleased, as if she has noticed that I noticed how well she has raised him. The boys ahead ask if I am (sic) finished with the tomato sauce, and ask if I am charging for it. I say maybe. A couple with an animated infant leaves. The baby waves and drools goodbye in baby talk. His father encourages him and waves goodbye to the whole section on his behalf.
There is a strangely uncontested freedom in the anonymity of being alone in the throng of a public place. Airports are places of transit. They are not as such the beginning and endings of journeys I think. The Golden Eagle Spur at OR Tambo is a halfway house.
Somehow the time in PE passed too quickly. We did not finish the quilt, in the end (although I will put up a picture of the work-in-progress as soon as Ben emails it to me), for a variety of reasons that will only make sense to people who make quilts. (We had to unpick the border because it turned out we were working with two different colours white and we had a helluva time deciding how to actually quilt it, so we ended up unpicking again. But it will still be beautiful when done.)
I did not even finish my book, although I think I am going to take quite a chunk out of it as soon as I have posted this blog. I still have an hour and a half to kill.
Christmas and the 26th were spent with my mother’s siblings and their broods and grandbroods. It was great to see everybody together, briefly.
And now, too soon, I am back in Johannesburg. My holiday is over. On the one hand it felt too short, on the other, long enough. I have a lot of work to do to prepare for the work I am going to do next year, but I will also have time to settle in, file 2009’s reading away, and think about what the hell I was thinking when I thought I was going to write for a living.
But first I am going to put my feet up on the plastic cow hide and read my book and keep an eye on the cricket and wait. And all of that other stuff will wait for me.
Filed under: Travel | 1 Comment
Tags: family, holidays, Writing
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