via http://crispian-jago.blogspot.com/2010/07/periodic-table-of-irrational-nonsense.html

Maman (1999)

Amazing to spend time travelling with my family around South Africa, taking a break, seeing the sites, drinking a few beers, and kicking back.

On the stoep

Tech Support Cheat Sheet

via xkcd – A Webcomic – Tech Support Cheat Sheet.

orange Free State South Africa

I have been driving around the Free State near Smithfield South Africa recently, perhaps there is a political reason the Free State used to be called the “Orange” Free State, but it certainly is orange these days.

Check out the photos

Alison doing the banshee

I realise that i have not put up a single photo from 2008 – these arent so bad – perhaps a little heavy on the corny sunsets:

Smithfield South Africa photos from 2008

Truthdig – Cartoons – Easter Bunny

Mbeki’s siding with the Butcher of Khartoum is painful and incomprehensible. That the African Union must be maintained as a viable organization should never necessitate a choice between what is just and legal, against what’s politically expedient. The African Union should be an instrument of justice for all people of the African continent. What we have seen over the years is complete disregard of human rights in Africa, as dictator after dictator have ridden roughshod over their countrymen while others stand by the sidelines, with wide bemused grins.

Sadness weighs heavily on my heart as I look at many of these African rogues. It is even more painful and disappointing when one considers Mbeki who came onto the African stage with so much promise, so much hope for the poor of the continent. I judge Mbeki on a different scale, than, let’s say, Arap Moi, the former Kenyan dictator, because Mbeki’s of a purer pedigree and his tutorship was clean and democratic. He after all had Mandela’s blessings.

Sadly, Mbeki’s problem is not an uncommon one; it happens time and again when mere mortals try to fill the shoes of gods. After Mandela stepped down, many wondered if Mbeki had the character, intelligence and judgment to stand half as tall, half as upright as Mandela. Ten years have proved that Mbeki is a leader with feet of clay; a man of impaired judgment – one whose missteps include allowing himself to be hood winked by the likes of Khadafy.

The country he inherited could have been so much that it’s not now. His neighbors to the north had so much potential that has been leached by the tides of time, raw ambition and hunger for power; and pathologic hesitation on Mbeki’s part.

How, one wonders, could Mbeki be so blind as not to appreciate the horrors of AIDs among his own people? What illogical genius could have convinced him that Uganda’s success against HIV/AIDS with their ABC strategy was an aberration, and the dying South Africans were fiction? Knowing that Mbeki was sacrificing his own brothers and sisters to some inexplicable delusion, we waited, as HIV/AIDS continued to claim more South African lives. Mbeki could have saved them; he opted not to.

Mbeki could have saved Zimbabwe’s millions from the mad ambition of Robert Mugabe. He must have known that white farmers and the land they farmed, were used as pawns in Mugabe’s diabolical political gambit — a way to win votes and to remain in power — no matter that Zimbabwe’s economy was washed down the Zambezi. Youth must distinguish itself by forcefully restraining megalomaniacal old men.

By opting to do nothing, 3 million Zimbabweans are now in exile in South Africa, where hundreds were slaughtered by his own citizens out of fear that their livelihood was jeopardized by the immigrants. Prosperity needs champions; progress and human well-being need their own soldiers and committed advocates.

The disparity between South Africa’s haves and have nots continues to be pronounced. There has been no restitution for those dispossessed by Apartheid. Mbeki has ignored lessons he should have learned from Zimbabwe and Kenya, that: land reform should be tackled head-on; in the open and as judiciously as possible. The danger is land distribution is used by politicians to reward their cronies or to win votes. Even as Mbeki vacates the presidency, South Africa finds itself on a perilous perch. Every attempt should be made to defuse the likely explosion of the landless against the landed in South Africa.

Mbeki’s support of Al Bashir is but one failing among many; it was at first puzzling. It shouldn’t have. Mbeki is one of those black Africans, who watched the torture and killing in Africa from the sidelines; more concerned with the war the ANC was waging against the apartheid regime, than on the Arab murder and genocide against blacks in the Sudan. He is not much different from many sub-Saharan black leaders who think of Arab leaders as benevolent and benign; Arabs who reward them by delivering presents to their palaces in their impoverished countries.

Pius Kamau: Mbeki and the Butcher of Khartoum.

SOMALIA, ruined by civil war and foreign invasion, is considered the worst example of a collapsed country, according to an annual index of failed states produced by Foreign Policy magazine and the Fund for Peace, a research organisation. The top four spots on the index are all occupied by African countries, with last year’s leader, Sudan, falling a place. Africa is also heavily represented in the top 20, a list made up of enduring basket cases. Each country is given a score for a dozen political, military, social and economic indicators; the more unstable a country, the higher its total score. Zimbabwe has gained a place since last year and, given the current turmoil, could see its prospects worsen again.

Is it a moustache, do you think? I’m not sure. Ask many professed Africa experts about Robert Mugabe’s moustache, and about half of them will say, ‘He hasn’t got a moustache, are you thinking of Daniel arap Moi?’ It’s a tiny thing, nestling in the dimple of his upper lip. It can’t be a birthmark, because he didn’t have it when he was younger. I reckon he grew it in the late 1980s, when he decided to give dictatorial tyranny a proper crack. A dictator needs facial hair. The full Stalin can’t be pleasant in a tropical climate, and the Hitler, that’s just derivative. Nobody wants to be just another Saddam, and the African gentleman may often struggle with the full Fidel. Bob needed something new.

Britain has lost an empire and found a role: to faff on about pirates and biofuels (The Spectator)

South Africa presently has no opposition party that has any chance of meaningful power. Perhaps in time, the best option would be a split in the ruling African National Congress, but then the fear of violence and bloodshed will surely increase.

The ANC is now well and truly ensconced, with widespread corruption and syphoning of funds through all levels of power. Its clear that to rake in the bucks, you have to be a member of the ANC. And the problem of course is that it takes a powerful opposition to keep the ruling party on the straight and narrow. So while you are riding the gravy train what chances are there that you will join the opposition or split away.

Not until the abuse of power becomes absolutely clear to an educated majority of the voters.

Education is the key here, it may take a generation of educated South Africans before it becomes clear that the ANC should not be in power forever. While i am sure there are plenty of high minded moral ANC members – if i was a corrupt official I wouldn’t be that interested in improving the standards of education any time soon, nor would i be interested in expanding a diverse media through a free press, or supplying new media channels (say the Internet) to all points of this large country.

Some new photos from South Africa – Dorp means small town in the middle of nowhere (or in this case the Free State).

silence of the lambs?

The tea plant, Camellia sinensis, comes in many forms—black, green, oolong. What makes Camellia so healthful is its polyphenols, antioxidants that protect against cell damage and help prevent diseases like age-related decline, cancer and heart disease. But herbal teas like chamomile don’t have the same benefits. That is, all except one. The South African “rooibos,” meaning red bush in Afrikaans, has the benefits of Camellia without the caffeine.

Psychology Today: Tea from the African Bush

I have been addicted to Rooibos tea for several years now – excellent brew for the evening – but beware, it may not have caffeine, but it gives a little lift – not unlike the other Indian and Chinese herbs of the variety Camellia sinensis.

One of the most insidious pressures on tech-savvy people these days is the seemingly constant pressure to provide quick, top-quality computer and web support — to our families.

But it’s a responsibility that can quickly grow to wreak havoc on our schedules. You soon find yourself barraged with calls, making house calls, and squeezing in last-minute requests. It’s like the freelancer’s worst nightmare client, except a) you’re not being paid, b) you can’t ask them to take their business elsewhere, and c) you’re expected to offer a lifetime guarantee.

Last nights Newsnight on BBC2 painted a disturbing picture of life in Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe – check the link above for an outline and link to the video.

What is even more disturbing to me – with cholera epidemic just around the corner, people starving, and a life expectancy in the middle thirties for most people – is the continued complicity of the South African government and all that this implies – they are not about to condemn a brutal dictator because of the colour of his skin.

Its hard to imagine that conditions are any better for most people than during apartheid regimes of the past. The new rulers of southern Africa don’t seem to have read George Orwell’s Animal Farm – they seem to relish the prospect of grabbing power for themselves and screwing the people into the earth. There is going to be no revolution while people are busy starving. Meanwhile as the rulers in South Africa look over their shoulders in paradoxical envy, South Africa itself is flooded with poor Zimbabweans surviving as best they can in gangs that rob loot and rape.

Someone once suggested to me, that if the rest of the world threw up a fence around Africa – no one outside of Africa would give a damn. Apart from some resources – its hard to argue with this viewpoint. Is Africa going to be a mess forever? Is it all the fault of the colonial past – if so why isn’t East Asia in the same mess?

Go to my photos

marine supplies

Drove down to Cape Town and Hout Bay, via George and Victoria bay. A nice stop at “The waves” guest house in Victoria bay, then down to Cape Town and Hout Bay. Have a look at the complete album at my photo site .