Does it come with a badge?

Thursday night was quite eventful (I know it’s Saturday now - but this is the first time that I’ve had to write about Thursday so let’s play some catch-up?).

The evening kicked off with me leaving work a bit early to attend the first Police Community Forum for Sector 3 (my hood at the moment). I got to meet some of my neighbours and the very helpful and efficient Captain Adams who is our SAPS liaison.

We had to elect a chairman first, and we picked Howard who organised the meeting in any case and seems to know the most about what’s been happening in our area. And then we had to pick a Deputy Chairperson too. The lady who was initially selected said she would do it provided they would allow her to publish the matters discussed because she was also part of the press. Captain Adams would have none of that, and that is how I became the Deputy…hehehe…yeah for crime fighter me!

I guess I am also not allowed to publish it here then? Oh well, I won’t go into specifics in that case - but in a nutshell we got feedback and stats of all the crime in our area over the last week (which is quite an impressive amount for such a small area but I’m guessing I’m not allowed to tell you exactly how much!), and we discussed two matters which was of specific importance to our neck of the woods. It took a bit of time to get it all discussed and the next meet will be on the 19th of June. We all got Captain Adams cell number which he has promised to be available on for us 24 hours a day - I wonder if he realises that most of my neighbours NEVER sleep.

In light of the recent unrest and xenophobia attacks throughout South Africa, I will just say this: It’s not right. There are a lot of innocent and vulnerable PEOPLE getting hurt and killed just for being different. On the other hand you can see that the citizens of this country are also fed up with government’s incompetence in sorting out real problems of illegal immigrants and the problems that come with them (drugs, crime, housing, unemployment). Still, it’s not right the way that it’s being dealt with. And personally the whole thing looks way to organised to me to just be some random fall-outs between neighbours and if government really were opposed to the attacks (as they say they are) would there not be a more serious show of force to curb it? We should all be appalled at what’s happening, and if you’re not then perhaps you should consider who would be next once these mobs have killed or driven out the first lot of people they don’t like at the moment.

My own neighbours quite surprised me at our community meeting too. These are meek and mild mostly retired folk. And more than one of them told the police in so many words that if they (the police) didn’t sort out the problem in our area they (the neighbours) would start doing it themselves. They aren’t talking about wide spread mob action like we’ve seen on the news or anything, practical non-violent but still illegal things was what they are planning to do. When you allow that to happen, where does it end? Who decides what’s right and what’s wrong when people start taking the law in their own hands in any matter and to any extent?

Is this the beginning of the end for this rainbow nation? Was it a sham to begin with, can it really have an end in that case? or is it a speed-bump on the road to peace for SA? Who knows…we’ll all have to wait and see. I still maintain that if you are not part of the solution then you are part of the problem. You’ll have to decide for yourself where you stand in that equation…

On a more positive note: straight after the doom and gloom of my very first community police forum we (Troep and myself) headed over to Brackenfell for a mid-week snoek braai with some good friends.

I was a bit apprehensive about going out on a “school night” since I knew that Friday was going to be a big day again at the office. But JacoStein (your house mate picked this nick for you if you were wondering how I got to it ) offered to give up his bed for the night so I could sleep over and not have to drive back home in the middle of the night.

The man (JackStein) knows his pillows, let me tell you! We had in depth discussions about what the best pillow is and how many gives the best nights rest, and what exactly you need to do to get the most out of a good selection of pillows. I would go as far as to say he is the only pillow expert that I know. I think the next time I need to go buy some new ones he will have to be my consultant for the day. And I slept like a baby in his bed, other than my own I’d have to say this is one of the best beds around to sleep in. Thank buddy, hope the living room wasn’t too uncomfortable?

The snoek was delicious, done over an open fire the way it should be done with some clever tin foil manouvres and a secret sauce whipped up by JacoStein for the basting of the fishy. We had it with corn on the cob and garlic rolls. (I don’t care about the other people at work - garlic is tasty good for you and it keeps vampires away - that’s good enough for me).

Hot topics of conversation centered mostly round the upcoming Seepkamp that they will all be attending in July. *sigh* I used to go to that camp religiously - in fact, I once resigned because I couldn’t get leave to go and I made it clear in my employment contract that it wasn’t optional for me.

Seekamp is a magical week for anyone who has ever been there. It gets organised my a handful of students and young working people (usually anywhere between 15 and 30 dedicated individuals who put their heart and soul into the project) who then take roughly 100 to 120 high school kiddies down to Boknes for a week of fun and learning. A large percentage of these kids are from foster care homes and orphanages, and even the rest that do pay are subsidised by the efforts and fund-raising efforts of the organisers - Ekwilibruim Staatmakers (used to be R.A.U. Staatmakers). At times I really miss being part of something this special. It’s fantastic sharing that week with great friends and people, but the part that you never expect is how much you get from the kids. I can honestly say that on every single of those camps that I was part of there was at least one kid that would just creep into my heart, just with their stories and by being who they are. I wish I could run into them again now after all this time, and maybe…just maybe…that week would have meant something really special to them too and given them something positive to remember even when life gets a bit rough round the edges?

The fund-raising is done by way of special projects and also by donations made by companies and private individuals who want to make a difference. If you’d like to be involved in any way, there are loads of ways to do that. There are opportunities for sponsoring T-shirts or taking out add space on the 2008 camp T-shirt which every camper gets as part of the experience. Also various opportunities to donate food, blankets and other items that they need to make the camp a success. You could also sponsor a child who cannot pay for him/her-self to go. If this is something that you’d like to get involved in then you could have a look at this site here or get in touch with Ekwilibrium Staties here.

Everything but the kitchen sink

Right…ramble time! Let me clue you in about all the latest recent events round here on my adventure.

Firstly, work wise and the BigBoss visit: he came, he saw, he conquered. He kicked off his visit by having one-on-one’s with every person here. Shortly after this my friend FatCat resigned. I don’t know how that chat went for it to have that kind of outcome, but I know FatCat’s not been a happy camper for a while now…it wasn’t that much of a surprise. My own one-on-one was relatively painless. I came in, Sparrow and BigBoss were talking amongst themselves about nothing in particular, then they said what they expected of me in future and asked me if I could do it. I said yes, then BigBoss said that I looked kind of nervous. So I answered that I was, however it was the good kind of nervous, and that I realise things had to change and I was ready for change. I could tell that he liked that a lot. So he said that both him and Sparrow felt that I could do it and believed in me and sent me on my way. It was actually a pretty nice chat to be honest - no complaints out of me.

The next thing he did was rearrange the entire office. From the training we received when we just started I recognise this as a sign of dominance being shown to Sparrow (who did not seem to fussed one way or another…I still think there’s more to this attitude than meets the eye…wtf are you up to lil Sparrow?).

For the rest of the week the BigBoss then showed “special interest” to individual members of the team in turn, some flourishing under it and some wilting under it. We got through it more or less intact, one team member down, one sent home for the day on Friday for an attitude adjustment, one’s email access blocked indefinitely for abuse, and a couple driven to tears or very close to tears during in three days. He’s only leaving on Wednesday and some predict another 1-3 resignations before then. End of June to mid-July Sparrow is off to the Ukraine to go reaffirm his marriage before his Russian in-laws and while he’s gone BigBoss will be ruling the roost. Sparrow joked that he’ll probably come back to an entirely different team altogether! Not really a joking matter, is it? That’s is my f-ing team he’s talking about! I told him I might go too, but I will NOT resign so they’ll have to fire me if they want to get rid of me. Sparrow said we’ll see and started giggling like a schoolgirl. I’ve been through plenty, there is no way that he BiggBoss can crack me in three weeks… nuh-uh! (I’ve survived, and at times flourished, in environments much more corporate than this for more than 10 years, three weeks is not enough to crack me I assure you…it does not matter who’s trying).

On Friday I had to make an exception to the exam-no-drinking rule for my team. We took BigBoss to ol’ Buckley’s (the regular Friday haunt of the team) - I swear the barman was just about ready to greet us with tears in his eyes (we’re big spenders and good tippers and we’ve been gone for the last three weeks!). There was ceremony and drinks being bought because of a contest we had at work on Friday - which BigBoss and Sparrow threw with some pretty bizarre point deductions in my team’s favour. It’s a victory I suppose but it would have felt more so if we got it without the weird deductions from the other team’s points! Also, we were playing with one less team member than the other team cause she got sent home (see previous paragraph). ET had to buy me a beer and say some fairly embarrassing stuff as part of the ceremony, which she did like a real trooper! Looks like this will be a weekly thing now and I suspect that at some point in the near future it will be my turn to do the same for her cause she is on fire when it comes to dealing. I’d rather be in her team than against her to be honest, but we don’t always get to pick do we?

We introduced BigBoss to Buckets and got him completely trashed. Last time he was here we did it using Buffalo Rules. He says he’s been trying to implement Buffalo in the UK but no one’s having any part in it. Wait till he shows them Buckets! As far as the rules of Buffalo go, it seems that three weeks is just long enough for some people to forget MONTHS of training…two silly buggers ended up having to down Fishbowls and the new girl had to down more than 6 different drinks for Acceptance - all handed to her by the same culprit. ATM was having a blast taking advantage of her trusting nature, shame, poor lamb.

Right…that more or less covers work for the time being (I told you this was going to be a long ramble when I got round to it, didn’t I?).

Home… there are some interesting developments here. Alexander is busy busy busy with the burglar proofing and it should be done some time this week - whoohooo! Snails have infested the garden and one has even infested my bonsai garden…cheeky git! I’ll have none of that…it’s going to relocated to the other side of the fence tomorrow. I don’t care if they chomp the rest of the garden down to twigs but they better stay out of my bonsai garden and my orchids!

The other house-mate, will in future be known as TheLocust. The boy doesn’t seem to be firing on all cylinders at the moment. He’s owes almost every person he knows some cash and we never see him except maybe once a week or so when he swoops in to eat everything that’s not nailed down, tries to borrow more money and the buggers off again. He often gets seen on these once a week drop-ins with some fairly questionable characters, so I’m locking my bedroom door on a semi-permanent basis now. According to Alexander there [may/may not], be a very strong possibility that he’s developed an expensive habit of the sniffing variety. If this is the case I am very sad about it, and I hope he hits bottom soon so that he can turn this shit around. He’s decided that the best way for him to get out of the hole he’s in was to resign from his work and spend his days marketing products and services that no one’s ever heard of before. I don’t know if he’s aware of it but he is rapidly heading for a very unpleasant intervention if he does not start pulling his weight round here.

Mind, body and soul…all present and accounted for. I’m slowly but surely implementing the keys from that book I was telling you about. The first one about spending an hour a day by myself is working just great - makes me feel really calm and centred even when all hell breaks loose round me. The second one about the 5 hours of exercise a week is still taking some getting use to. I have to fit most of than in over weekends because it’s dark when I leave and get back here during the week. The third one is about eating food that is alive and healthy, I feel somewhat like a bunny from all the salad and fruits I’ve been munching this week. Also, can I just say how much I LOVE balsamic vinegar! The fourth one is about constant learning - you’re meant to read at least half an hour of inspirational and constructive stuff a day, I’m up to my ears in that so it’s more a case of limiting myself to half an hour a day - so I can check that off no problem. Next week I’ll implement another two…so far so good.

Studies and exams…two down and four to go. I’m making no predictions whatsoever about the outcomes. I am happy to say that I won’t have to reschedule any of them to go to the UK for training - the company is letting me finish writing first before I go. My next exam is on Wednesday so I suppose now would be a good time to wrap this up and get back to the books, right?

Hope you all have a kick-ass week ahead! Whatever you’re doing - do it with pride, energy, enthusiasm and passion!

*Clicking on the image will take you to DeviantART where you can learn more about the artist and the art

R.I.P. Bijkersma Family

In between my studying today I took a well-deserved break and caught up with a bit of the posts and updates in my feed reader. Amongst others I also have all my facebook friends’ status updates running through there and I saw that one of my friends, Anneke Bijkersma, was thanking everyone for their support in this difficult time - so I decided to give her a call and find out what was going on.

What Anneke told me shocked me to silence - and I am not easily shocked to silence - there is absolutely not one single thing that I could say in response to the news she shared with me.

About a week ago, Anneke and her brother and sister went to the game reserve for a few days and on their return found both their parents, and the woman who cared for her mother (her mom was partially paralysed), brutally murdered in their house…her grandmother barely survived and is at the moment fighting for her life in ICU. Anneke says that her grandmother did manage to speak a little before she was taken to hospital and she said that one single man monster walked into their house and then slit first the care-giver and her mom’s throats and then her father’s before going for her grandmother too. He took nothing…and then left as quickly as he arrived. He was a stranger to them - who knows what could have moved someone to do something gruesome like this.

Anneke says that her other grandmother also passed away in the same week - and she is organising and attending four funerals this week.

These were people I knew! They were open friendly good natured people, regular down to earth middle class people, not living on a farm far away from anyone or a modern day mansion - they stayed a normal red brick house on the main road of Florida Johannesburg. I’ve had dinner in that house. I’ve spent evenings chit-chatting with that family (even though they were speaking in Dutch and I was speaking in Afrikaans, it worked just fine).

They are survived by their four children. The funerals are tomorrow. My thoughts and prayers are with them all.

The first thing I did after speaking to Anneke was phone my own family - I just wanted to hear their voices and make sure they were still okay.

• How do you get over something like that?
• What is this country coming to?
• Where will it all end?

I know no one really gets to decide when their time is up - but I hope that I get to go one day in a natural way of old age after a full and happy life and not in a senseless violent attack like this. But if that is what’s in store for me know this: I might go…but I will not go quietly.

I’m sick and tired of these sort of horrors.

• Is there even one person in SA whose life has not been touched by crime and violence?
• How can we turn this around?
• How can we take back this beautiful country from the rubbish that is choking it with this kind of terror?

It’s hard for me to study law when I see all the lawlessness around me. How do I get myself to believe in the words that I have to know and understand when it feels like such a farce in these times that we are living in? Inherently I’m an idealist, and I had hoped to fight the good fight and to make a difference in the lives of actual people one day with my degree - perhaps I’d make more of a difference if I could teach people how to defend themselves, or how to structure an effective lynch mob?

*sigh*

Anyway, I’m not quite at that point yet - but one thing is for sure. Something’s got to going to give soon. Not just for me. I think everyone has had enough of this shit…and when it happens, it won’t be pretty.

National Cleavage Day - Dedicated to (un)HooX

Today is Wonderbra’s National Cleavage Day in South Africa…and as promised I hereby dedicate this day to HooX.

Whether you are showing some off today or just admiring the view, there’s no denying that breasts have a very special place in our world. For some a thing of beauty, for some a part of their identity as a woman.

It’s a sad statistic that breast cancer is becoming so prevalent that one out of every 8 women suffer and or die from it (sorry I could only find American stats, but you get the idea right?). Take the time to do regular self-examinations, early detection could save your life! If you’re not a Do-It-Yourself kinda girl, get a boy-person to help out…rumour has it that most of them are quite eager to participate.

Now for the dedicating part of this post…

This Cleavage Day I would like to dedicate to HooX, who has always been an avid admirer of the female form as can be observed by his regular Tuesday postings.

HooX, hope you get to spend your day in place where the custom of Cleavage Day is well established and enthusiastically embraced by all the locals. I’ve taken the time to put together a little selection for you just in case that’s not the case.

Happy Cleavage Day!

For those of you who still don’t know about HooX’s NCD (National Cleavage Day) project, please go have a look over here and here. If you’ve got it then flaunt it for this worthy cause.

Maybe some other time?

Where in the world do you just get to adjust Time-Itself to suit your fancy as to how light it should be outside when you get up to go to work?! Well, follow this link here to see where in the world this is done and when.

They actually missed a spot. This stupid practice is also enforced in our office, which is nowhere near any of those areas indicated. *Gmf!* It’s all just a matter of time before anyone can just decide what time they want it to be really. Anarchy! Pure anarchy I tell you!

Whose to say I can’t just draw a little imaginary line (almost like the imaginary borders on maps) round my immediate area of control (bedroom) and say that from now on it will be 21:15 in here at all times? Why? Because I say so…that’s why. End of story.

I don’t know - maybe it makes more sense when you grow up with it? I just think it’s silly.

As of this past Monday it’s been an hour [earlier/later/different] in our office. I’m sure we’ll all get used to it by next week or so. Seems to me that our clients are just taking advantage of the confusion to come in as late as last week before this nonsense and then leave an hour earlier than they should this week after the adjustment?

Well, I am nothing but persistent…I’ll just catch up with them some other time I guess.