Showing posts with label people. Show all posts
Showing posts with label people. Show all posts

Thursday, December 3, 2015

Dance like a girl: B-Girl Terra




I don't post about cute cats.  But dance videos?  Yes.  I  get goosebumps when I see videos like these.  The best ones always are of children with boundless energy of children.  I couldn't help notice her little shoelaces came undone before the camera cut to her putting on her elbow guards and hat :)

 Today at Secret Sunrise, I jumped around with a 6 year old, and she didn't stop dancings.  She wasn't not tired.   No heavy breathing, fatigue, or feeling like it's time to stop.  Me on the other hand was wondering hwo long I could keep up with her.  I had to stop. She kept on going.

  I noticed the same from B Girl Terra.  No deep breathing, just a pure clear vessel of movement, focus, agility and skill.  She doesn't stop.

 Can't wait to see what more she shares with the world.
Jungle - Platoon from Jungle on Vimeo.

Tuesday, February 3, 2015

The Funny Thing about Social Media - see what happens in real life . . .

Follow my blog with Bloglovin
http://sensemasala.blogspot.com/

 Social Media is an amazing tool however when the word 'media' gets replaced with "real life experiment, see what happens when the LED screen is no longer between you and the people you are connected with.


  Check out this clever improv video of the delightfully cheeky Jena Kingsley.



She explains: " Social networking is completely out of control these days. But do the things we do online make sense in real life? Follow me as as I test social media activity on unsuspecting New Yorkers! I partnered with Relationship Science and their new app MINE by RelSci (http://m.onelink.me/373bf49b) "





Monday, March 17, 2014

Public art meets crowd-funding for social change #ANOTHERLIGHTUP in Cape Town, South Africa






 On De Waal Drive, driving out of the city bowl in Cape Town, South Africa, you have the view of the Cape peninsula's valley also known to many people as The Flats.  The Flats extends all the way to areas like Monwabisi, a sub-area of Khayelitsha, one of Cape Town's most populated districts.


 On that same drive, you can see the new Urban Visionary, a multi-storey mural and light installation created by the founders of Thingking and artist Faith47.  They collaborated on the new design and have enabled public street art to be a catalyst for change through crowdfunding for a social cause.  They aim to raise funds for public street lights to be installed in Monwabisi Park, Khayelitsha, through the organisation VPUU (Violence Prevention through Urban Upgrading).  For every light that is funded for in Monwabisi, the Urban Visionary mural is lit up in the evening- inspiring and engaging more people to become more active members in their society through #anotherlightup


 To read more about it here and to donate to #anotherlightup:



About the project | #ANOTHERLIGHTUP







#ANOTHERLIGHTUP from Design Indaba on Vimeo.

The mural on the same wall before Feb 2014 Urban Visionary #anotherlightup was put up

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Care-free With Cancer. The power of the creative spirit




 If only for one second,  you will see how documenting emotion and bridging creative thinking can make us all smile - if only for one second.

  Props to the this wonderful concept and strength to the individuals and families living with loved ones with cancer.

 MIMI Foundation "If only for One Second" project

Sunday, December 8, 2013

Learn the ism's: Consumerism Lyric Video-Lauryn Hill





"Television running through them like an organism"

If you haven't learned all your scism's and ism's, Lauryn Hill's will teach you on her new track Consumerism.  In her official statement she says, “Messages like these, I imagine find their audience, or their audience finds them, like water seeking it’s level.


Lauryn Hill – Consumerism Lyrics | Rap Genius

Monday, October 21, 2013

Slam Poetry Videos by Holly McNish - Food, Language, Love, Womanhood, Human Rights.




 "Kids can't even read the ingredients of their meal time"

 Powerful stance on food rights. Whole Food Nutrition.


 

 "I'm happy I'm learning Spanish." Activate the left and right brain. Ride the language love train.

 

 "So I whispered and tiptoed with nervous discretion. But after 6 months of her life sat sitting on lids, Sipping on milk, nostrils sniffing on piss, Trying not to bang her head on toilet roll dispensers, I wonder if these public loo feeds offend her, 'Cause I'm getting tired of discretion and being polite."

 Why not to be embarrassed when a mother feeds her child - from her breast.

 Holly McNish's honest words and delivery on potent topics of food, language, love, womanhood, human rights.

Thursday, July 18, 2013

"You have to have style." -Carlyne Cerf de Dudzeele



 "I like to play,"  confesses Stylist Carlyne Cerf de Dudzeele.  In this clip she explains her hate for runway and trends but her love for tracksuits.
 
 Some style wisdom:  "Chic is not money. You have to have style."

 Let's run with that!  X
 


Monday, May 27, 2013

Urban Agriculture and Balanced Nutrition for the City of Cape Town: Food Security Summit



 Tomato flavoured corn chips are more accessible to children than GM-free tomatoes in South Africa.

  Meanwhile, Hulett's Sugar was a main sponsor/contributor for The National School Nutrition Programme Recipe Book.

 Is Education being sold out to food companies controlled by profit instead of the well-being of their consumers?

Was combatting dietary diabetes on the Dept. of Education's agenda?

The good news is that questions surrounding food security are being asked and brought to the awareness of Cape Town citizens.

One solution is to develop proposals for preferential trading of producers selling
Sponsors of the Department of Education support a recipe book filled with their products. 
healthy and local food.  This could change our feeding
landscape and changing this picture to the left of the young child snacking on "Crack -a- Snack" to him displaying a bite from his apple grown on his street corner.

Only two options for vegetables in the South Africa Dept. of Education Recipe Book.  Oh, and don't forget to add sugar!

Other questions regarding food security concerns and solutions in Cape Town:

Wetlands to possibly be used as organic farming in? 
 Agricultural focus schools?
Educational programmes to reduce dietary diabetes and practical skills for healthy food production?
Utilising urban space for food gardens?

The Food Security Summit held in Khayelitsha on May 24 and 25, 2013 addressed pressing issues around our shared necessity: Food justice, urban agriculture, and health education were some of the topics discussed.  Below is the document that was shared on May 26th, 2013.




Site E in Khayelitsha.  Potential for urban food production.
Declaration of the Food Security Summit held in Khayelitsha on 24 and 25 May 2013



We, the delegates gathered here at the Khayelitsha Campus of the False Bay College, have engaged over the last two days about the challenge of food security facing our communities. 
With the benefit of listening to a keynote address by the Minister of National Planning, an address by the acting Mayor of Cape Town and various inputs from the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF), the Provincial Department of Agriculture, the City of Cape Town, the Philippi Horticultural Area Food and Farming Campaign and the Mitchells Plain Education Forum (MPEF);
And having participated in vigorous discussions in commissions that covered the following critical areas of urban food security:
1) Enabling urban food production and access to markets for small-scale farmers;
2) Addressing the health and well-being of urban residents through food-based interventions (e.g. household and community gardens, nutrition education, making healthy foods more accessible in the market);
3) Social safety nets to ensure food security: The role of civil society and government in assisting vulnerable groups;
4) Urban planning and governance as tools to address food insecurity; and
5) Food justice and the Right to Food;

Food security solutions: Urban agricultural, community gardens and home food production
And having had the privilege of conducting site visits to the Siyazama Community Gardens, the Rocklands Primary School and the Philippi Agricultural Area;
And further noting:
That food security is defined by the FAO as:
“[T]he condition when all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active, healthy life.”
Although much of the focus has historically been on ensuring the availability of food at the national scale, household-scale food security is comprised of availability of food, access to food, use of food, and the stability of availability, access and use. Each of these dimensions needs to be addressed in order to ensure food security for urban residents.
There has been a remarkable turnaround since about 2005 in child underweight and stunting trends (although the latter, especially, is still too high) but at the same time there has been a steady upward trend in both mean Body Mass Index figures (with the mean now close to technical obesity) for adults (both male and female).
Food insecurity is not simply determined by household poverty and food choices, but also by market structure, food pricing, access to safe storage and cooking technologies, access to social protection, amongst others.

We therefore resolve :
To ensure the utilisation of existing land attached to people’s houses for food gardens, beginning immediately with a pilot project in at least one Mitchells Plain and one Khayelitsha street;
• To engage National, Provincial and Local government authorities, parastatals as well as private land owners including churches and mosques to release excess land at schools, churches, correctional and health services facilities;
• To lobby the City of Cape Town to ensure that urban agriculture is included as one of the land uses in the spatial development framework;
• To engage with the owners and prospective owners of the “DENEL” land at Swartklip to ensure that the development plan includes clear set-asides for urban agriculture to benefit the surrounding communities;
• To protect all agricultural-zoned land within the City of Cape Town and on the urban edge from opportunistic attempts to rezone and/or sell such land;
• To initiate a focused land audit to identify appropriate land for urban agriculture within the South East Metro region. This audit should be completed within six months;
• To investigate the use of the wetlands within the PHA for organic farming;
• To campaign for the establishment of an agricultural support centre/hub to support all aspirant agriculturists and farmers in the South East Metro;
• To support subsistence smallholders as well as commercial farming where viable within the South East Metro;
• To support small-scale producers with access to abattoirs, warehouses and packaging facilities to ensure that these producers obtain maximum value from the various stages of the production and distribution chain;
• To support the objections to all attempts to rezone the Philippi Horticultural Area, including the consideration of legal steps to secure this land for urban agriculture. In particular, the Summit agreed to organise a special presentation to the leadership of KDF and MPEF as well as the steering committee concerning the 475 hectares Rapicorp 122 land;
• To initiate awareness programmes on balanced meals in the community;
• To have education programmes on the dietary causes of diabetes;
• To initiate comprehensive training on the establishment and maintenance of household and community gardens, especially for people who are not able to buy and store fresh vegetables;
• To promote early childhood and school-centred solutions to provide balanced meals for poorly nourished children. Such solutions should include food gardens at schools and kitchens with trained community dieticians/nutritionists. This could include community development workers and those employed by the Community Works Programme.
• That the NPC be requested to assist to ensure alignment and co-ordination of government programmes regarding social safety nets;
• That a social compact including KDF and MPEF and other role players should be established to drive social 
security provisioning in these areas; 
• That the IDP of the City should be used as a tool to address the food security needs of the community on a sustainable basis. Such IDPs should include a clear programme of land release to support a fair social safety net and be informed by the need for a local food security strategy;
• To reaffirm that Khayelitsha and Mitchells Plain have been declared as Presidential urban renewal nodes and that this status should be maintained to ensure ongoing support from all spheres of government;
• That co-operatives should be the main vehicle through which community food production takes place and that there should be an urgent investigation as to the status of the Khayelitsha Poverty Reduction Programme;
• That recipients of Child Support Grants should be monitored as part of the social compact to ensure that they complete their schooling;
• That there should be community consultation about urban space utilisation for food gardens;
• That there should be national regulation for food retailing;
• That there should be monitoring by the City of both food pricing as well as quality;
• That, as part of the process of finalising the National Food and Nutrition Security Policy, an opportunity should be created to discuss the use of pesticides, GMOs and other farming production inputs;
• To develop proposals about preferential trading for those producers selling healthy and locally produced food and to lobby for implementation of these proposals by the City;
• That central to the attainment of the right to food is to ensure adequate access to land, water and appropriate seed;
• To embark on a programme to strengthen all community-based organisations involved in urban agriculture by securing support for organisational development, funding and capacity building; 

Many South Africa dinner tables do not serve fresh fruit or fresh vegetables.  It mainly consists of starchy produce, grain,  sugar and sometimes meat.
• To call for the urgent finalisation of the National Food and Nutrition Security Policy and ensure an opportunity for dialogue and participation as part of this process;
• To fully support Section 27 of the South African Constitution and call on Parliament to urgently address the required legislation and regulatory framework to give effect to these provisions;
• To call on DAFF and the broader social cluster within Government to convene a broader Western Cape summit for all urban communities in the province on urban food security, with the possible support of the NPC. To further call on DAFF and the social cluster to convene similar food security summits in at least one urban centre in each of the nine provinces;
• To support the unregistered ECD centres to obtain registration so that they may benefit from the relevant state subsidy;
• To convene a public forum in the South East Metro to discuss the impact of GMOs on food security;
• To call for an urgent engagement with the relevant Government departments to ensure that the ECD, Primary and High school curricula include the provision of practical skills for the production of food;
• To approach DAFF and DTI to conduct a value chain study to assess the income earned by small-scale producers as well as other participants within the South East Metro;
• To initiate a broad public awareness campaign about food justice and the right to food. 

We further resolve that, in order to ensure the implementation of this declaration, the KDF and MPEF executives should convene the steering committee within two weeks to develop an implementation plan to take the content of this decaration forward.
We further noted the following offers and proposals:
• Bidvest offer to enter an MOU regarding the purchase of product grown by community growers;
• An Urban Agriculture Exhibition (Show) for Khayelitsha and Mitchells Plain;
• Youth Animal Show;
• Agricultural focus school to serve Khayelitsha and Mitchells Plain;
• A social media intervention, including cellphone technology, for community nutrition and farming networks; and
• Invitations, both formal and informal, for a community delegation to visit various organisations in China, Cuba, Brazil and Italy.
And thus resolve that these proposals be further discussed by the steering committee to be convened by the KDF and MPEF.
In conclusion we declare our deep gratitude to all those responsible for organising and funding the Food Security Summit in Khayelitsha.

Our special thanks are noted to the following Sponsors:
• DAFF
• Old Mutual
• City of Cape Town (URP)
• Brimstone
• Khayelitsha Community Trust
We leave this summit energised and passionate about implementing the contents of this declaration and are confident that we will make progress in the struggle against poverty and food insecurity.

Sunday 26 May 2013 

Saturday, May 25, 2013

Cape Town Taxi Cab Drivers: Food for Thought


   A few years ago, I contacted Layne Mosler, founder of TaxiGourmet.com.  I admired her taxi journals and the search for New York City's best food joints by the city's very own cabbies.  I knew Cape Town would be a great place to explore the city's diverse culture, stories and places to eat. Food is not only a shared necessity, but I thought a unifying tool for positive interaction and meaningful conversations.  Highlighting taxi cab driver's tips and favourite spots, could promote a broader awareness, respect and appetite for the cultural diversity and flavours in our city.  Since then, I have met various cab drivers and digested delicious food and interesting stories that come from various parts of the country and Africa.  

  Today, I sat on the steps of Darling St. and Plein St. with Eti, an independent taxi driver.  He shared some thoughts about Cape Town, his struggles and happiness and where a vegetarian, like himself, goes to eat Cape Town's best burger.

         


  It was past lunch time, and the streets were full of Saturday shoppers.  Four young men were playing "Beautiful Girl" on trombones and trumpets with a growing crowd of afternoon spectators.  While Eti waited for customers he told me that making a living on four wheels gives him happiness and minimal stress. 

"To work for yourself is very good. I like people and I enjoy being a taxi driver." 

 His jovial smile and sociable manner matched the slogan painted across his white taxi: Meet as Strangers, Leave as Friends.  Eti has been an independent tax cab driver for four years.  He arrived in Cape Town, South Africa from Burundi, in 2000.  He left his birth country, Burundi, as a young man to avoid being forced to fight in the army.

"I came by ship to Zambia," he proclaimed, "I came to seek peace."

He crossed Lake Tanganyika, the world's longest fresh water lake in the world, to escape the war in Burundi.  Four days later, he arrived in Cape Town to meet his brother and cousins who had settled here.

"Cape Town is my home city, no doubt.  But my refugee status is the only problem.  It's like you're in prison. When my father passed away I couldn't leave because of my refugee status.  This makes me sad.  If I wanted to leave and go on holiday, maybe Mozambique or Zambia, I can't."

  A person with refugee status in South Africa can lose their refugee or asylum status if they leave the country without permission from The Ministry of Home Affairs.  Applying for asylum in South Africa involves applying for a permit/Section 22 every three months until their application is approved.  The permit does not recognise a person as a refugee, it is simply proof that they have applied for the status.  If the application is approved, then the person will receive a refugee document ID and travel documents, which have to be renewed every two years.

Before Eti became a taxi driver in Cape Town, he worked as a security supervisor in Groot Constantia near Jonkershuis Restaurant.  

"The owner of Jonkerhuis, Chris, is a good friend.  He is a good person to me.  I know him because I was looking after his business when I worked in security."

He shared his thoughts about Cape Town and what makes it different from where he grew up.

"It's a city with a lot of different people and different countries.  Even the city authorities care for the people in the Mother City."

In the winter season, taxi cab drivers work longer hours to meet their daily quota.  For Eti, he parks his taxi close to one of his top three lunch spots.

"Eastern Food Bazaar has everything; Asian, Pakistani, Indian.  I like the fried rice. I'm a vegetarian," he proclaimed. "It's keeps you strong, and it keeps me healthy. 

His second choice on where to eat in Cape Town is Jonkershuis.

"I eat their burger."  He confessed that the burgers are so tasty that even a vegetarian would eat them. :)

"I also eat at the Nigerian restaurant on Loop St near the Pepper Club.  I enjoy the bitterleaf soup." 

 "I'll definitely try that!" I answered.

I asked him what else he wanted to tell people visiting or living in Cape Town. 

"Instead of people being afraid of Cape Town's city or the taxi drivers, they must trust us,"  Eti added.

  This sentiment is shared by many independent Cape Town taxi cab drivers.  Besides finding cabbie's recommendations for Cape Town's restaurants and cafes, sitting down and listening to stories of Cape Town cabbies highlights our culturally-plural and complex city.  It promotes an exchange of ideas, reveals global topics and issues and promotes a greater understanding of our city and fellow citizens.  Many cab drivers in the Cape Town continue to share and access the best of what the city has to offer and like Eti, reveal their happiness and peace by calling Mother city their home.  

_______________________________________________________
*names have been changed.  

 On May 25th, 100 in 1 Day, a festival of doing was activated in Cape Town with over 100 urban interventions/activities/installations, etc.  Taxi Cab Lunch, was an intervention to motivate people to Taste, Share and Explore the city through the eyes of Cape Town's cab drivers.





The Hungry Season - Food Security in South Africa

#foodsecurity #southafrica 

Sunday, May 19, 2013

Her Love for Horses . . . Off The Track Thoroughbred OTTB qoutes from my sister



This is my sister KOKO and her horse, Lazarus.  She sells clothing apparel with an OTTB graphic and statement that is loved by OTTB owners and lovers.  Join her along for the ride on her blog Sweet Horse's Breath and shop at her Etsy Store OTTB Tee's. Her facebook page is also full of great content to follow: OTTB Tee's FB



The portraits of just her horse, Lazarus, I took when I was visiting her in Michigan.  It's the only horse I actually love, you can understand why by reading her blog.  But also, look at his eyes and giraffe neck . . . swoon.


Thursday, April 25, 2013

David Chancellor's Hunter and Hunted: Images of Social Ecology and Wildlife Economy



David Chancellor: "I'm called a documentary photographer."

In the small lunchtime lecture room at Cape Town School of Photography, we travelled across the Kalahari, Namibia, Zimbabwe, and Kenya with Chancellor's 'Ghost Train.'  He described the 'Ghost Train' as a viewer's journey to an unknown place of understanding when viewing some of his images. In his medium format film image, Huntress with Buck, he pointed out that you may see the landscape first, then the girl, then the light, and then wonder about the girl in this landscape.  As a viewer, you may not know where the photo story is going until you start to engage with your own observations and relations.  The 'Ghost Train' experience left my husband, Chris, and I with a feeling of inspiration and engagement with questions of our own.

The Huntress with Buck image won the Taylor Wessing Portrait Prize at the National Portrait Gallery, London.

  I was inspired by his technique of 'slow journalism.'  By shooting on film, he finds himself engaging more with people than people being more interested in what he is capturing.
"I like the fact that people can't look at the back of the camera and see an image."
"I don't like digital, full stop."

  His time spent on the series, Hunter, took years to confront people's suspicions and battled with people's perceptions of why he was taking interest in documenting, "What actually happens in the Hunting Industry?"  As a documentary photographer, he looks at subjects that people aren't seemingly familiar with.  He develops trust within a culture, an industry, which in return allows him to develop hundreds of rolls of film.  By default, his photo series weave a story around human wildlife conflict and tourist trophy hunting.

  His sensory process of using film inspires other questions in his work.  While shooting Hunter and Hunted, he came in close contact with dead or dying animals.  In Safari Club and Diorama and Cases, he explored the 'life' of animals stuffed and put back in their natural form.

He explained that his personal work of Hunter, Hunted and Safari Club took 6 years, 4 of which were shooting.  Chancellor wanted to understand after the years of Sir Peter Scott's conservation of wild animals, "Where are we now?"

I recently saw his photo, Untitled Hunter #1, Trophy Room taken in Dallas, Texas at the Wildlife Photography of the Year Exhibition, hosted by NHU Africa and the Iziko Natural History Museum in Cape Town, South Africa.


  The photo taken in Texas, as a part of Safari Club series, was the only photo in the Wildlife Photography Exhibition that had only one living animal in the picture; the Untitled Hunter.  The photo surfaces debate around conservation, ecology, hunting and invites discussion around Social Ecology and Wildlife Economy.  As for the man known as the Untitled Hunter, he has asked David for a print.


   Chancellor continued his lunchtime lecture by sharing some of his current unfinished work in Kenya with Rhino poachers and also some 'snaps' of his family.
"As photographers, we should be able to do anything."
"You don't need people to pigeon hole you"


 I walked away from David's lecture engaged.
 Engaged with the need to question.
 Engaged with the want to understand.
 And engaged with urge to document.
 I'll continue to do so, on all mediums . . . and free from any pigeon holes.




Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Taxi Cab Lunch: 100 in 1 day Cape Town-A social movement for citizen-powered change

100in1day_introduction1 - YouTube:

 On May 25th, 2013-- Citizens across the world and Cape Town, South Africa will take part in a 100 or more urban interventions across their communities, streets, towns and neighbourhoods created and implemented by every one and any one interested. Inclusive Acts of Experience.

 Some interventions may be:
 - establishing a public bench with sound equipment for citizen expression, music and message sharing.    - urban gardening
 - city soup swaps
 - installing park equipment
 - planting trees
 - pasting art

 "Citizens, organisation, students, children, teachers, rebels, and politicians are invited to voice their dreams through actions, pop-up events, performances, social games, artistic interventions, and urban hacks. Together we will create a diverse and uncontrolled global movement."  Orange Innovation-KaosPilots

 I visited the KaosPilot's temporary hub for 100 in 1 day Cape Town on 36 Buitenkant Street, upstairs from the Truth Coffee HQ.

I submitted my intervention and invite all of you to become a part of participating in it.

It's called Taxi Cab Lunch: Travel. Experience. Taste. Share.

  Instead of asking a cab driver to take you where you want to go, you get in and engage: ask... Where do you like to  eat lunch?  

 This springs into a genuine exchange through a shared common bond we all share…food, a language that connects us across age, background, economic and verbal language barriers. The variety of our interactions may lead to meaningful and genuine exchange between different crosssections of our society, our city.  It may also highlight many issues and realities of our city and country beyond it's borders.  The taxi cab lunch is a way to bridge our borders and be an aid toward exchange and respect in a cultural diverse canvas … raising our awareness through the experience of food in the culturally plural African city we all share.  As we open our minds and palettes, we can share our experiences. Accessing a part of the city through the eyes and stomach of your fellow urban citizen: The learning starts there.  

 So hop in a cab, and travel, experience, taste and share.  

 Write, blog,  take pictures, GoPro, video, film, audio record and share it across your favourite medium.  

  Send me a link and share your thoughts.  Be inspired!  I was . . . http://www.taxigourmet.com/about-taxi-gourmet/

 Ready, set, . . .  May 25th, 2013: Taxi Cub Lunch.

Saturday, March 30, 2013

Inspiration for 100 in 1 Day Cape Town: Let's Plant Some shit.



When the problem becomes the solution: FOOD.  Growing it and sharing the seeds for a healthy future.  Props to "Let's Plant some SHIT!"  Ron Finley's talk gave insight on what motivated him and his team to grow edible usable greens.  http://www.ted.com/talks/ron_finley_a_guerilla_gardener_in_south_central_la.html
LA Green Grounds is an inspiration to create action, intervention, share ideas.  




On a Cape Town ground level: I wonder what we could come up with at 100 in 1 day: Cape Town facilitated by Kaospilots


On May 25th, 100 in 1 day: Cape Town will be a citizen driven festival of doing, that let's us realise our dreams we want to see and create in our city just like Ron Finley did.   

 I want to see food forests and fruit trees to be at bus stops.  When I walk my dog, I can also bring a bag and pick fruits in my neighbourhood along the way.  I do find fruit trees where I can . . . here are some of my recipes from The Culinary Linguist.

An interesting fact:

"Why did Jan Van Riebeeck plant roses in the Cape? Not for cut flowers, but for rose water"

 - Hetta van Deventer-Terblanche - South African storytelling on a plate (from her talk at EatOut Food Network DsTV Conference in Cape Town)

Now I don't feel so bad picking lemons occasionally from Company Garden's lemon tree in the rose bush section.  


Friday, March 1, 2013

Detroit, Sugarman, and South Africa

A story strong to South's Africa heart beat, plays a different tune for Detroit's singer-songwriter Rodriguez.

picture jacked from Google.com
  Living in South Africa and hearing the impact of his music upon adults from that generation is fact to how powerful the powerful influence of music is to our collective history.  Music's language connects personal experiences across the world.

The locational link of this particular music story-South Africa and Detroit caught the interest of my dad, who grew up in Detroit.

 He recently forwarded me this article after watching the Documentary made about Rodriguez and South African listeners: Searching for Sugarman.

 Rodriguez' lyrics and music stretched beyond the artist's imagination into a moment of history that has been shared with the world.

  Click here to read the article:

   Long before Oscar-nominated doc, Detroit writer went on his own search for Sugar Man | Movies | Detroit Free Press | freep.com

Tuesday, January 29, 2013

What All Parents Should Do . . .

Tina Fey: I want to thank my parent's for somehow raising me to have the confidence disproportionate with my looks and abilities.  Well done, that is what all parent's should do.

Sunday, November 4, 2012

"Grandma's clothes look incredible" MACKLEMORE & RYAN LEWIS - THRIFT SHOP FEAT. WANZ (OFFICIAL VIDEO) - YouTube

My friend Mary sent me this link because I'm one of the many girls who has fly dookie brown leather jackets and 99 cent priceless Tshirt from thrift shops around the world.   Love this flavour!  Now when I go to clothes swaps, I end up holding onto the fine cotton threads I've had since 5th grade, and getting rid of the new shit... may just have to do a compilation remix of my thrift journeys from Honduras to Cape Town with Macklemore.  And I am definitely going to use this as inspiration for the next music video I work on :)

  MACKLEMORE & RYAN LEWIS - THRIFT SHOP FEAT. WANZ (OFFICIAL VIDEO) - YouTube




Saturday, September 22, 2012

World Rhino Day 2012: Do you care if Rhinos disappear?

 

 Our Earth loses 2 rhinos a day due to acts of killing these endangered animals for money.

 Rhinos are poached predominantly for exotic animal-part trade or medicinal mythical cures-medical ideas that have been scientifically proven to not treat or cure what they are advertised for.

 The value of protecting rhinos needs to be taught in order to replace the value of trading their parts.  Poaching is not the only problem, but it is the most important one to stop as educational projects and programmes can reverse the idea that the demand for them is necessary.

   A man in South Africa, as seen in NHU Africa's Saving Rhino Phila has begun to farm as a way to influence a flood of rhinos horns into the marketplace, thus reducing their price and striving to maintain a healthy rhino population. But farming rhinos is not a solution as it doesn't eliminate the myths of these medical 'cures' and provides a 'safe' place for killing animals that will be may one day be called "previous wildlife, now cattle".  Although there are other human-caused risks to rhinos, it is imperative to stop poaching these animals and supporting positive wildlife conservation education.


  Human-centric ideas such as rhino horn uses for human consumption only decrease the longevity of our wildlife and will drive them into extinction.  We have a responsibility to our planet to work towards becoming wildlife conservation activists in our own capacity.

  Chris Mason from Natural History Unit Africa, produced and directed this Public Service Announcement, PSA, for World Rhino Day 2012: a Call for action to support Anti-poaching projects by WESSA, The Wildlife and Environment Society of South Africa. They filmed it on Kloof Street, Cape Town City Bowl, on a timelapse and reversed the Mak 1 One art piece into a disappearing artpiece.

  It asks a question:  Do you care if Rhino's disappear?  

    Let's hope this message and many other efforts allow us to care everyday to take responsibility to the stop of poaching.  

  Ideas to combat poaching through education projects are welcome to be shared here.




  Other artists share concern about the killing of Rhinos.  The Wooster Collective showcased words and pictures from another prolific Cape Town based graffiti aerosol artist, Faith47,  painting in Shanghai, click here to see and read.  She brought the spirit of African Rhinos into Asia.


Thursday, September 20, 2012

A Raw Sun in Marikana


MARIKANA
by Ari Sitas

The digital images fold as the TV screen tires
The cops, rifles in cabinet, past their third beer are edging towards bed
The night is quiet as the smelter has been closed,
the only music is of the wind on razor wire
the ears are too shut to hear the ancestral thuds on goatskin
humanity has somehow died in Marikana
who said what to whom remains a detailed trifle
the fury of the day has to congeal, the blood has to congeal
I reverse the footage bringing the miners back to life
in vain, the footage surges back and the first bullet
reappears and the next and the next and the next
and I reverse the footage in vain, again and again in vain

The image of the man in the green shroud endures
Who wove the blanket and what was his name?
There are no subtitles under the clump of bodies, no names
stapled on their unformed skull
A mist of ignorance also endures, a winter fog
woven into the fabric of the kill
The loom endures too, the weaver is asleep
The land of the high winds will receive the man naked
The earth will eat the stitch back to a thread
What will remain is the image and I in vain
Reversing him back to life to lead the hill to song
In vain, the footage surges back
another Mpondo, another Nquza Hill, another Wonder Hill
the shooting quietens: another anthill

My love, did I not gift you a necklace with a wondrous bird
pure royal platinum to mark our bond?- was it not the work of the most reckless angel of craft and ingenuity? Was it not pretty?
Didn’t the bird have an enticing beak of orange with green tint?
Throw it away quickly, tonight it will turn nasty and gouge
a shaft into your slender neck
And it will hurt because our metals are the hardest- gold, pig iron, manganese
yes, platinum
Humanity has somehow died in Marikana

What is that uMzimu staring back at us tonight?
Darken the mirrors
Switch off the moon
Asphalt the lakes

At dawn, the driveway to the Master’s mansion
Is aflame with flower, so radiant from the superphosphates
of bone
of surplus oxygen and cash,
such flames, such a raw sun
such mourning by the shacks that squat in sulphur’s bracken
and I wait for the storm, the torrent, the lava of restitution
the avenger spirits that blunt the helicopter blades in vain

these also endure: the game and trout fishing of their elective chores
the auctions of diamond, art and share
the prized stallions of their dreams
their supple fingers fingering oriental skins and their silver crystals
counting the scalps of politicians in their vault

The meerkat paces through the scent of blood
I want it to pace through the scent of blood,
she is the mascot, the living totem
of the mine’s deep rock,
the one who guards the clans from the night’s devil
she is there as the restless ghosts of ancestors
by the rock-face
feeding her sinew and pap

goading her on:
the women who have loved the dead alive
the homesteads that have earned their sweat and glands
impassive nature that has heard their songs
the miners of our daily wealth that still defy
the harsh landscape of new furies
the meerkat endures-
torn certainties of class endure
the weaver also endures: there-
green blankets of our shrouded dreams
humanity has died in Marikana

The strike is over
The dead must return
to work.


-----------------
" (written after a tough two weeks and seeing Pitika’s miner sculpture with the green corrugated iron blanket) "

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