Playing the victim

The other day I read a newspaper article about this man who the unfortunate encounter with this lady on the street. This man was on his way to work in his car and suddenly he spots this criminal sauntering on the street which he prides himself in keeping clean – even though he is not involved in the community criminal watch.

He decides to take action, by ridding these streets with this unnecessary announce that plagues this country with its abominable existence. He gets out of his car, adrenalin pumping, pulse racing, and his body ready for action. He approaches, stretches his hand to the gods as if asking them to give him power as he is about to cleanse these streets. He pulls his hand down from the heavens with such force I swear the onlooker saw his hand ignite with fire from the fiction caused by the descent of the hand like a NASA space drone re-entering the earth’s atmosphere.

PA! A resounding slap that sends this vile creature to the floor. Stunned by such power the creature slowly tries to get up and react to this attack, but the hero is on fire and will use all of his power to conquer and defend these streets. The hero will be remembered for his heroic acts for generations to come, he will make his ancestors proud, and when his time comes he will surely enter the gates of Valhalla.

So the other day I read a newspaper article about a man who had the unfortunate encounter of seeing a prostitute roaming around his neighbourhood; he did what any man would have done. He got out of his car, walked up to this ‘jezebel’ and slapped her across the face like how ‘A-pimp-named-slick-back’ would have done. He kept is pimp hand strong and told this bitch to get the hell out of his block, because he does not appreciate ladies like her defacing this wonderful and clean neighbourhood. Imagine the little white boys seeing such a lady? They would be distracted from their studies thus holding back the nation.

Stunned and confused the “jezebel” tries to get up but he persists, by pushing her down to the ground with his manly force… she had no chance of defending herself. She was embarrassed and vulnerable with no help from anyone and as soon as this man had left she wept, picked her purse and continued on her journey to work.

The other day I read a newspaper article about a black woman who had the unfortunate encounter of being assaulted by a white man in the streets of Kenilworth, the Southern suburbs of Cape Town.

This black lady was on her way to work – as she is a domestic worker – and suddenly this man came at her with such anger and such hate the she didn’t even have time to do anything except to stand there and receive a beating from this unknown stranger. She tried to get up and go to work but this random stranger proved to be too strong for her to do anything. She stayed put and she hopped that he would eventually leave her alone.

He left and she picked herself up. When this evil monster was in his car driving off, he screamed at her shouting “YOU CRIMINAL!”

When this story had reached a journalist the perpetrator tried to spin the story as if he was the victim in this situation. He says he thought she was a prostitute and so he got out of his car and slapped her once. He felt remorseful about his action immediately after he had assaulted her, he repeatedly tried calling her to apologies for his actions but she would not answer any of his calls because he thinks she wants his money.

The arrogance of this man is infuriating. What if that was my mother or your mother who was on her way to work trying to feed her family with what little she gets from her job? This is but one recorded incident that happened in the city of Cape Town, were domestic workers are beaten and threatened with clenched fists on a regular basis.

Post-Apartheid and we still have people treating our mothers as prostitutes, thieves and slaves that white men can do what they wish on them with no consequences. All I’m asking for is respect for your employees and to treat them as human beings.

Yes, I know that not all white men are evil and have no respect for other human beings, but when I read articles like this one, I’m heart broken and pissed off to learn that there are still people in this country who act like the oppressors that ruled this country.

When will this end?

http://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/he-came-up-to-me-and-just-klapped-me-1.1767030?utm_source=digg#.VEgM5fmSyB6

That’s just how I feel.

My memory loves you; it asks about you all the time. When you’re far from me my memory reminds me of the times we spent together, it reminds me of the bad times as well as the uncomfortable moments we've shared.

My heart wants to stop loving you; it wants to stop beating every time I think of you. When you said you were done, closing the chapter without a beautiful ending my heart grew hard as if it had heart diseases. My heart is weak and my heart has been scared by your sudden change of mind.

My memory loves you; it taps my heart's shoulder almost every morning and almost every night. My memory speaks to me with a careless whisper forgotten as the sands of time reach the bottom of the hour glass. My memory has placed a force field protecting the memory of you from aging as I desperately try to forget.

My heart wants to stop loving you; it wants to stop and not beat in the same rhythm as your heart once did when we were chest to chest on a cold winters night. My heart wants to beat for the sole purpose of survival and not for anyone else. My heart wants the pain of losing you to go away.

My memory loves you; every lonely night when I blink I see your face and every fiber in my body is alive again. As the days turn into weeks, the weeks into months, and months into years my memory fights with everything it has to remember your laugh, your eyes, your fingers dancing on my hands. My memory does not want to let go.

This has become my life. This is me moving on. This feeling that has consumed and frustrated me has manifested it's self as an ambitious writer who hangs on to his surroundings like a drunk ghost in an empty vessel .  

But please don't worry about me. My heart will keep beating and my memory will keep record of your existence, I'll be okay my love; I'll be all right.

For the love of my language

Do we love ourselves or are we just pretending?

lately I've notice that when I'm with my friends and we all can speak Zulu, we have a tendency to speak English. We are so proud of ourselves by the way speak and the big words we use in our conversations. To be honest, I think when we speak it's like a spectacle to behold for the old Zulu folks that once were.

We are all young, educated ambitious people and we are proud of who we are and where we come from. We flaunt our names to the people that aren't from our country (or to those that know little about our culture) that don't really know how to pronounce our names, we walk around with our inflated chests as if we have been given the title superman or superwomen. We come from a culture of pride and even though we don't show it much, we are proud of our names. Our names have meaning and with our names we inherent a sense if direction.

My question is this: 'Do we truly love ourselves?'

We pursue education and enlightenment to become better 'world citizens'. We always aim to be the best in whatever we do, so we can make our parents proud. We dream of the day we honour our parents and the heroes that died for you and me to have this opportunity to become whatever we dream of being.

Do we honour them by forgetting a language they taught us when we were infants in their strong arms? Do I honour them by writing this post that is confronting the challenge we are struggling with everyday in another language?

One of my favourite writers struggled with the same problem. His insatiable thirst for knowledge betrayed him when he was a little boy by speaking English to his mother who can only speak Tshona.
His mother slapped him because she felt disrespected in her own house.

When some of us go to school we have to learn everything in a second language. Life becomes a little bit confusing and difficult but we find a way to make it work, so we don't disappoint whoever sent us to school. But hey, it's all for a better education right? It's for a fucking better future.  

I am whatever I say I am!

I’m a black man who was born in the Republic of South Africa. I descend from the Zulu kingdom and I now reside in Cape Town. This is who I am, if you ignore my race, the clan I belong to or any information I give you about myself, then you are purposefully choosing to ignore my identity.

A few days ago there was an advert made by a reputable advertising agency about feeding poor kids. The communication was provocative and eye opening, but unfortunately it came off as racist.

The advertising showed a small black boy being treated like a dog, by a rich white lady.

The message reads; “The average domestic dog eats better than millions of children.”  

The message is true and this is the crisis we are facing in our country. I believe the message is correct, and it’s about time we face facts.

Alza Rautenbach the founder and CEO of feed a child was the lady in charge of signing off this advert. She was on eNCA defending this advert saying; everything was done with the intention of causing a reaction. What truly got me boiled up inside was what she had said while trying to defend the advert. She said she does not see colour or (at the very least) her organization does not see colour.

I am a black man and I’m proud to be black, I’m not ashamed of the colour that shells my skin, I’m not ashamed of the melanin that covers my entire body. If you’re white I don’t think you should be ashamed of your skin colour, the same goes if you green, pink, purple or blue. Colour is part of your identity.

The colour on your skin is part of your identity and if you don’t see the colour on my skin or anybody else’s skin colour, for that matter, then you are purposefully choosing to ignore our identities. 

I’m a black man who was born in the Republic of South Africa. I descend from the Zulu kingdom and I now reside in Cape Town. This is who I am, if you ignore my race, the clan I belong to or any information I give you about myself, then you are purposefully choosing to ignore who I am.

Here is the link to Alza’s response to the ad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAUbW5zIad8 

Emancipate yourself from mental slavery

"So we finally made it, we made if even though we had our backs up against the wall!" The best line I’ve ever heard in a song. These are the words of Chester Bennington from Linkin Park.

A few weekend ago I went home for a funeral, a family member had passed away and it was a very sad and a beautiful goodbye. We mourned and we reflected and we later spoke politics. We spoke about what the current leaders intend on doing and we spoke about ourselves as black people. Don’t worry guys, this one’s for the black folks.

We – as black people – have been dubbed as the race that consumes a lot and produces less. When we are stressed we go shopping, and when we celebrate the festive season we spend almost all that we have saved up during the year, AKA 'Stokvel.'

As a young black man I think it’s my moral duty to do my best to inform, educate and help rehabilitate the minds of black men and women. We as the youth will lead this nation in the near future but we need to know how are we going to do that. I don’t have all the answers but what I do know is that we have to start looking at our spending patterns and reduce them drastically. We have to save and invest as much capital as we can so that we, as a race, will be financial emancipated and thus we can start looking at producing more goods than consuming most of them.

We as black people have never really been a people of greed, we have African proverbs that have been in existence since the beginning of time. We have lived on the premise of collective survival, “ umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu”. This is not something to be forgotten because this is how we defended our great nation many years ago against foreign nations. we have stood fast up until we decided to let greed creep into our hearts and destroy our people and what we have.

Bob Marley says it well, “emancipate yourself from mental slavery”.

Together we can build this nation; together we have a better shot at tomorrow.

Together we can all sing as one and say:
"We finally made it. We made it even though we had our backs up against the wall!"

Patel responds to DA claims on jobs stats

These are my experiences. This is not my design.

These past couple of years that I've lived in Cape Town has made me notice that there is a HUGE difference between the white people in South Africa and the people of colour. This is my experience. This is not my design.

Beautiful city, picturesque views and gorgeous women in a city with rich and interesting history. The move to Cape Town was a very exciting one and to be in a place that has so much to offer was amazing. Cape Town is rated as the best city to visit in South Africa and it’s probably the best city to live in. I was overwhelmed by Cape Town and I was hooked, I fell in love and I wanted to stay... that was up until the pink stiletto dropped.

On my stay I learnt a few things about Cape Town, I learnt that race is a big deal in this beautiful city that once wanted to exclude itself from the rest of South Africa; I learnt that Cape Town is probably the most racially divided city in South Africa. 'That is such a harsh thing to say,' you catch yourself saying. All I ask for is for you to hear me out. This is my experience. This is not my design.

When I was with my girlfriend (a white girl) we went out clubbing, and on two different occasions I almost got into unnecessary fights with white guys. The first night I was at a club dancing with my girlfriend and this random guy comes up to me and screams in my ear over the music "This is not America!" I ignored him and continued dancing with my girl. He taps my shoulder and screams in my ear again "This is not America!" Eventually I respond and say “you’re just mad because she's dancing with me and you dancing with your boys.” He responds by forcefully by pulling my girlfriend away from me and pushing me to the side. Naturally I got mad and let's just say we exchanged words and actions. This happened again when we went to the same club at a different night. Two white guys walking around like they owned the place intercept me from my girl and start talking to her as if I’m just an enigma that one can easily walk through. The lack of respect these 'boys' have exhibited is disgusting. What makes it worse is that I'm expected to brush it off and turn the other cheek because we live in a fucking rainbow nation.

But alas, I'm not the only one who has gone through this unforgiving experience. My black friends who have been in a relationship with girls, tell me their stories, they tell me what it’s like to date a white girl. Their stories and my story has too many similarities. They get pushed to the side by some random white boy and start talking to their girls as if they are not even there, then the girl has to interject and tell these disrespectful fellas that she is with her boyfriend. We don’t fight these boys because one against a team is never fair and unfortunately that’s what they do when they go out, they get drunk, get into fights with a team of barbaric men behind them and search for a potential mates.

What I learnt from these experiences is that young white people don’t really see young black people as equal, and considering our history many young people of colour are saying to each other: ‘One day there will be a day of reckoning!’

Yes I’m black, I’m a human being, I’m young and you treat me like a subhuman in the land of my ancestors? FUCK THAT! but for them their actions say 'FUCK EQUALITY!'

I write from my experiences because my world is shaped by these experiences. I'm not a fighter I'm a lover, but just like your hero Nelson Mandel, I will take up arms and fight for what's right. question is will you?

These are my experiences. This is not my design.

A Black and White Relationship.

Some writer advised me to write everyday about things that I can write about every day. So I’m going to write a post about what happened yesterday. Of course I’m going to use similes and metaphors, with that said I hope you enjoy.

I woke up in the morning. I took a shower. I went to work. I did a bit of work. I had some breakfast. I carried on working while I was listening to music. Because of my contract I can’t tell you what I did exactly, but it was work.

My girlfriend wanted me to join he for drinks at some restaurant in observatory, but alas I couldn’t make, I was working until 7:15pm. When I eventually went home, we started talking about race, I don’t really remember how we got there but we were in it like a toothbrush in a dirty mouth. The conversation got heated but she tapped out because her English is limited.

I flipped open the laptop and we started watching the big debate, and boy let me tell you it was a BIG debate in the staunchest sense of the word.

But lets backtrack a little bit; we need some information concerning the reason why I flipped open the laptop. This is the reason; I said to my German girlfriend: ‘white people in this country will be killed because they choose to ignore our (black people) suffering and only care about themselves. Yes this country has a lot of problems but there is this undying tension in the air between the race groups of this country, and if we don’t resolve this, there will be war.’

At first she thought I was being racist but then we flipped open the laptop and she saw for herself how some white people in this country really don’t care about reconciliation and moving forward as a true rainbow nation. 

On the show there was a clip of Desmond tutu saying, that white people are lucky they were not killed for their past transgressions, black people still wake up today from a shack and they go and work for white people in the city, and they are still treated like secondary citizens. One of the members (white) said why doesn’t anybody acknowledge that those comments said by Tutu were racists. The crowd’s response was unanimous like the votes for Sony Bill Williams fight against the White Buffalo, the crowd said, “Because it’s true!” 

One thing that is also true. For once in our lives we were all honest, people were angry and the truth was revealed (or a part of it). If we continue to talk like this and resolve the problems at hand we will reconcile and truly live in a rainbow nation. Until then, in the words of Lebo Mashile, “When the lights are off everybody is …cked”.

At the end of the debate my girlfriend was silent.

The purpose of this was not meant to make her feel bad, or for me to feel as though I have some power. I wanted her to see what it’s like to be a black South African living in a country were your ancestor suffered for over three hundred years and the people that benefited from that suffering showed not that they care or at least they want to make emends, they still benefit while the rest still suffers.

  

The thoughts from the other side

What better way to start this post by saying ‘I’m in!’ I’ve finally done the impossible, I've stayed out of jail, got an education and finally got a job. I’ve reached for the stars and I’m slowly but surely morphing into one. I’m on the other side Y'all!

Through vigorous training and self-discipline I’ve worked hard and I’ve become a junior copywriter (not that glorious). These are my humble beginnings into advertising, and hopefully in the future I'll be someone big and awesome.

The other day one of the senior writers started talking about the new Bells ads. She mentioned how inspiring and tear jerking it was. We agreed and we thought King James did a great job.

When she asked the other creative director, he said he felt dirty after seeing the ad, he said it’s a beautifully crafted ad but the message was not spot on. ‘If kids saw this ad they would think learning to read is good, as long as I get a whiskey after I’ve done my work’.

Of course this is one man’s opinion, but what got me thinking was that we help form societies norms (not that I didn’t know of this before), we help shape society and we dictate what is right and what is cool. We as the advertising industry form thoughts, beliefs and some of us, base our values in accordance to what we see on TV.

I think what my creative director was saying is that, we can’t put anything and everything on TV just for the sake of making money. We have to be careful with our advertising, even when we aim to inspire we must be careful as to what we say on TV, radio or general print ads.

Which is why I wanted to get into advertising. I want to change the way society sees itself, my advertising goals is not based on getting awards but encouraging people to value themselves, to help rehabilitate our country from what we went through.

I particularly want to inspire motivate the youth to be proactive, and just like how we were once brain washed by the government into thinking black people are just slaves, I want to use propaganda to change the way black people see themselves.

All i'm asking is that you give me this opportunity to try. let me see how far I can go and what I can do.

This is how some people think from the other side of the TV screen, but of course some of us think differently. I’m still learning though.

Check the cracks

Recently I read a post written by a very intelligent lady, talking about the filth that happens in Observatory, Cape Town. It was beautifully written and very insightful.

I scrolled down on the comments below and found everybody concurred with what she had written. Some people were inspired and want to collaborate, others said it was the truth and someone said: “the evil is common and universal”.

I too praise the writer for painting a vivid picture of Observatory or commonly known as ‘Obz’. This wonderful name reminds me of the movie “Oz the great and powerful,” a beautiful movie and a captivating story (at least that’s what I think).

Her post was honest, but I think it was a little biased. Her view is that of the man behind the pointing finger, she has not concerned herself with the person who’s at the receiving end of the pointing finger.

I think she was a little illiberal about the educated young man who left Gugulethu to drink coffee in the “white Cafes”. Sometimes one wants to escape the stresses of everyday life, to indulge in the things that the 'new South Africans' can indulge in. She was unenlightened towards the mother's over protective instinct, who thinks her mixed race child is of a superior race. Maybe the mother acts in this way because she understands that her child will be subject to scrutiny and judgement by people like the young lady who wrote the 'filth of obz'. 

This is the new South Africa, we need to find common ground as people. don't get me wrong I totally understand that it's easier said than done, and politically I may be coming off as unpatriotic  to the black man's struggle, but truth be-told we see what we want to see. 

We can put on our blinkers and ignore what's really happening around us, or we can appreciate that everything is not all black and white. if you look into the cracks you'll find stories.

While other people see a place filled with filth, I see a melting pot, a young nation forming it’s own identity to distinguish itself from the ever changing world we live in.

This is just my inexperienced rebuttal, just a different side to what she has presented. Have a look see:  https://www.facebook.com/notes/wanelisa-xaba/obz-the-heart-of-liberalism/391445220999638