Amazing amazing amazing.

Watching "Sea Point Days", the best movie I had never heard of, about my other other other homeland.

100% recommend. I'm not kidding, watch it.

Red Card, New York Times.

New York Times, we have to talk. Yes I read you every day. Yes you are the basis of my knowledge of news and culture. Yes because of you I know more about New York real estate than most people who aren't brokers.


This World Cup has provided an opportunity for a number of mediocre and badly researched articles in your pages about South Africa. Yellow card, New York Times, yellow card. I will not even stoop to linking them but if any of you have read in the Gray Ladies pages about how soccer heralded the end of Apartheid, represents the new South Africa, will prove a testing ground for the new South Africa, or is otherwise a Very Big Deal in ways it clearly is impossible to explain well in the course of one newspaper article, you know what I mean.

One quote, though, took the cake, and to continue the metaphor, pretty much draws a red card from me. This article discusses how apparently South Africa did a surprisingly good job as host, surprising given the problems, racking the nation. Fair enough topic - nothing innovative, perhaps, no real news there, or data, or item of interest, but yes, the World Cup went well, and yes people had low expectations, so there you go.  But what is this?

“The thing that overwhelms most is the level of professionalism of native Africans in knowing how to serve a bottle of wine properly,” said Philip Crawford, a designer of luxury homes from Noosa, Australia. 

Really? Really?? I try not to let my naturally left leaning self-righteous overflow when writing here, or really in general, but really? So first of all, my disgust is aimed squarely at the New York Times, who chose to publish this, not at the ignorant nitwit who said it.

Let me try to explain the foul here. The story in this article, insofar as there was one, is that the World Cup experience has been great given the obstacles South Africa faces: crime and poverty. This quote, in contrast, suggests that the South Africa, in hosting a fantastic World Cup, has overcome obstacles of, well, being full of "native Africans" - native Africans who apparently, should be expected to live in ignorance of wine pouring and other European arts.


Furthermore, New York Times, can you think of the greater significance of accolades to black Africans for being able to properly serve a visiting white man? Do you think this is the first time a someone has hopped off the boat and been pleasantly surprised how good Africans are at serving drinks? Do you think Africans haven't been pouring wine in Cape Town for 500 years? Really?? I am so so unimpressed.

WORLD WIDE EXCITEMENT

Eurovision and the World Cup! So much excitement. I have watched a few of the Eurovision entries, and none so far deserve special comment, but I suggest you all pick a few countries and do your research. For those a little hazy on the details of this Olympics of song and dance, check it out.

Even more legitimately exciting is the World Cup. So except for the actual soccer, about which I'm not so interested, I love everything about World Cup 2010. South Africa! Short shorts on nice legs! And I'm not going to say most of all, but perhaps as one among many equal beloved things, Waka Waka.

Shakira performs this song, based on a Cameroonian, popular in the 80's, which itself refers to Cameroonian sharpshooters in WW2. There is very little I can say to do justice to this song, so take a look:


Basically a lot of my college education should have prepared me to be able to explain at least parts of this video. I have learned a bit about film, about non western music and dance, about Africa and African responses to colonialism, about African literature and film. Without some help though, this film leaves me pretty lost. Is the Cameroonian military an important/ loved/ hating institution, or are they singing about something else? The band is wearing makeup that reminds me of blackface, what's going on? The New York Times, as always, help me out by telling me that the pillows stuffed into the band's clothes are meant to show how fat and lazy they have gotten by riding trains a lot - is that all that is going on?

Also, and quite tangentially, the only World Cup game I have every been to was Cameroon v. Brazil in 1994. I was, however, in Paris when France won the World Cup in 1998, and in the weeklong drunken loud celebration, a drunk mine attempted to pick my pocket, but failed because all I had in my purse was sunscreen.

Oh no, Winnie

Oh, Winnie. Controversial. While there are legitimate questions about what was the best path for post-Apartheid South Africa, it is hard to describe, even in hindsight, an entirely better path than the one Mandela courageously took the country down. If anything, he might have played a role in the untouchability and bloat of the ANC today, but that isn't really the same as claiming black South Africans still have too raw a deal. Really at every step in his career Mandela has chosen honesty, pragmatism, reconciliation, and peace over petty politics, self serving greed, which is much more than you can say, Winnie "this name is an albatross around my neck" Mandela.

Shiny New Busses

Whoa, fancy busses in South Africa! It's a good thing, for sure, and not a bad article, but it leaves me a little bit wanting. Like part of the unmentioned complication with the taxi-vans is that the perception, and at least mart of the reality, is that the taxi vans companies are run and staffed by Nigerian immigrants. Xenophobia in South Africa is real, and not pretty, and I would link to a relevant article here but unfortunately there are too many. Perception is that the taxi-van companies are run by mob related, illegal Nigerian immigrants, who are a major cause of the crime and violence in South Africa. Reality is that at least some of the taxi-vans are run by Nigerian immigrants, and that as 'gray' or maybe black market companies, these taxi-vans do not exist in a world of stringent labor regulations, and that there is a lot of pressure for drivers to go quickly at the expense of safety. Are the jobs in these new busses unionized? Are they going to be able to resolve the NIMBYism? Are the new busses going to be packed up and shipped back to Brazil after the World Cup? Who knows.

ALSO fascinating data that 1 in 6 working women in South Africa work in domestic service. Food for thought.

Battle at Kruger

I swear to god this is the best youtube clip ever. Watch the whole thing. If this doesn't make you want to go to SA, I don't know what would.