Rooideur & Patriotisme

Ek weet nie heeltemal hoe voel ek hieroor nie. Ek het nog nooit lekker in gepas in my Afrikaanse subkultuur nie, maar weet feitlik niks van die Joods-Engelse subkultuur waaruit by pa stam nie. Ek het groot geword as 'n tipe "Third Culture Kid" met 'n groot dosis Hollywood flieks (my ma het 'n videowinkel gehad), fantasie boeke (ek het Lord of the Rings gelees toe ek nog op skool was, lank voor die flieks uitgekom het), Britse humor (Waiting on God, My Family en 'Alo 'Alo is van my gunstelinge), en my ma se liefde vir musiek: klassiek, country, Elvis, en musiekblyspele soos West Side Story. Min eg Suid-Afrikaanse kultuur. In my subkultuur is daar nie veel rugby, bier, en braaivleis nie. Die plaas . . . dis 'n deel van wie ek is. Maar dis onteien en verewig weg.

Terug by die Rapportryerbeweging en die Rooideur-projek wat kos voorsien aan minderbevoorregte Afrikaanse kinders. Ek dink daar is waarde in so 'n projek. Arm Afrikaners is inderdaad 'n groep wat oorgesien word weens historiese redes. Wanneer mense dink aan arm, honger kinders in Afrika, is dit nie aan wit gesiggies waaraan hulle dink nie, so hierdie is seersekerlik 'n afgeskeepte gemeenskap.

En ek was op 'n tyd self ook 'n arm wit "Afrikaner". Vir vele Suid-Afrikaners, en veral vir anderskleuriges is dit 'n anomalie. Ek onthou hoedat ek self nie geld gehad het vir kos nie, en swartmense dan by my wil geld bedel en selfs kwaad word vir my as ek nie vir hulle geld wil gee nie. Dis vir hulle ondenkbaar dat ek nie geld het nie -- in hulle gemoed is ek bloot 'n selfsugtige, wit leuenaar. Daar was een geleentheid wat 'n bedelaar my gevloek het, omdat ek nie vir hom geld wou gee nie, min wetend dat ek heel eerlik was toe ek verduidelik dat ek nie geld het om vir hom te gee nie.

Wat my pla van die Rapportryerbeweging se Rooideur-projek is die poging om patriotisme of nasionalisme te kweek. Daar is seker niks fout daarmee in opsigself nie, maar dit voel vir my amper soos daardie sopkombuise by kerke wat vir die armes kos sal gee, mits hulle na 'n preek kom luister. Die kos is nie werklik gratis nie--jy moet met jou siel daarvoor betaal. Kinderstjies, hier is vir julle kossies, maar sing saam: "Ek sal lewe, ek sal sterwe, ek vir jou Suid-Afrika!"

Vir my is daar niks fout met 'n trots in jou kultuur en land nie. Maar dit bly selde by net 'n onskuldige, trots. Baie vinnig slaan dit om in 'n selfvoldaanheid, 'n ons is beter as die res, mentaliteit. Patriotisme, soos nasionalisme, maak dit maklik om jou naaste--die mense wat soos jy lyk en dink--lief te hê soos jouself, maar moeilik om die wat anders as jy is lief te hê; want patriotisme is inherent eksklusief en nasionalisme is inherent aggressief.

Ja, asseblief, gee die kinders kos. En ja, leer hulle van hulle geskiedenis en kultuur. Maar wees versigtig oor jou motiewe.

The South African National Anthem

Below is the South African National Anthem, with translations of the non-English parts in parenthesis.

It is a combination of two anthems, and combines five languages, isiXhosa, isiZulu, Sesotho, Afrikaans and English.

The first part (the first two stanzas) is the "Nkosi' sikelel' iAfrika" section, and is a hymn that was composed in 1897 by Enoch Sontonga who worked as a Methodist mission school teacher. Later more verses were added in isiXhosa by the poet Samuel Mqhayi, and Moses Mphahlele translated it into Sesotho in 1941. The hymn was later adopted as an anthem for political meetings during the struggle years.

The second part of the anthem (the third and fourth stanza), is based on the poem "Die Stem van Suid-Afrika" by die Afrikaans poet C J Langenhoven in 1918. It was put to music in 1928 by Reverend ML de Villiers. In 1952 it was translated into English as "The Call to South Africa" and in 1957 it was adopted as the anthem of South Africa. Between 1994 and 1997 both "Nkosi' sikelel' iAfrika" and "Die Stem van Suid-Afrika" were sung. The new combined National Anthem was adopted in 1997.


Nkosi' sikelel' iAfrika
(God Bless Africa)
Maluphakanyisw' uphondo lwayo,
(Raise high Her glory)
Yizwa imithandazo yethu,
(Hear our Prayers)
Nkosi sikelela, thina lysapho lwayo.
(God bless us, we her children)

Morena boloka setjhaba sa heso,
(God protect our children)
O fedise dintwa le matshwenyeho,
(End all wars and tribulations)
O se boloke, O se boloke setjhaba sa heso,
(Protect us, protect our nation)
Sethaba sa South Afrika -- South Afrika
(Our nation South Afrika -- South Afrika)

Uit die blou van onse hemel,
(From out the blue of our heavens)
Uit die diepte van ons see,
(From the depths of our seas)
Oor ons ewige gebergtes,
(Over our everlasting mountains)
Waar die kranse antwoord gee
(Where the cliffs echoes an answer)

Sounds the call to come together,
And united we shall stand,
Let us live and strive for freedom,
in South Africa our land.

A Weekend of Dance

I was lucky to receive a complimentary ticket through a friend of a friend to attend the annual Seoul Choreography Festival last night. The festival brings together the best dance choreographers in Korea for a dance competition that stretches a couple of days. The viewing I saw last night included two outstanding performances under the title "Blue Blood".

This morning (Sunday) I went to train in capoeira the Afro-Brazil fighting dance. I'm the organizer for a martial art group in Seoul that meets roughly every second Sunday to train in martial arts. I try to get as varied a selection of instructors as possible and this weekend we got to train with a great capoeria instructor from Jamaica. Capoeira requires lots of rhythm and part of the lesson we had this morning involved Afro-dance sequences to help us loosen up our bodies in order to move smoother during the "fights". It was lots of fun.

Then in the afternoon I went to the LG Arts Center again, this time to watch yet another dance performance. Jung Young-Doo, founder of the Doo Dance Theatre, choreographed probably one of the most beautiful performances I have ever seen. I truly feel that my soul was enriched from this performance. The production is called "Forethought: Prometheus's Fire". The ticket sales website reads: "Forethought - Prometheus Fire is an interesting reflection on Prometheus who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to mortals in Greek mythology. How has mankind interpreted and utilized this special gift? What have we lost and gained from it? Are we happier and liberated with the power? JUNG Young Doo will look into these questions exploring human evolution and civilization."

After the dance performance I quickly went to see a friend of mine who owns a lounge-disco in the area. On Sunday nights they have an informal church service, basically just a group of friends coming together to worship. Because I live rather far and had been away from home since 8am (and it was after 8pm already) I didn't stay for the whole service, just for the praise section. I was really impressed. I particularly liked the name of their "church", namely Sinner's Church. Here we have in the middle of Gangnam (yes the neighbourhood made famous by the infamous "Gangnam Style"-song) a small group of self-confessed sinners having worship in a nightclub. I liked the unpretentious, honesty of it all.  These are just friends, people that work or hang-out together, who also happen to want to share God together. It was a nice break from the formal church setup that has become the custom. The Sinner's Church is much more inline with the apostolic movement that Christ and the apostles established -- informal congregations that met in houses, rather than temples. If Sinner's Church had an English service, or if my Korean was better, I would definitely have joined them as one of the ways for me to "dance" with God.

The Group

I try to think the best of people. I'm sad to admit that it is not always easy and not something I have always done with a fair amount of consistency, but I'm glad that I'm improving. As Joyce Meyer is fond of saying: "I'm not where I ought to be, but thank God I'm not where I used to be!" So at an interpersonal level I can say that I'm not really a judgemental type of person. I try to accept people for who they are regardless of their religions, creeds, and what not. It is, I think, partly this reason why I have so many diverse friends, ranging from atheists to religious folks; from Catholics to Protestants to followers of Islam or Wicca or Buddhism; from artists to mechanical engineers to philosophers to artisans. 


Yet while I can love diverse individuals, I often find myself much less optimistic of humanity as a whole, and of political powers in particular. I see humanity as innately selfish, and politicians (as the figureheads of groups) as inherently power-hungry mongrels that ought to be distrusted. There is therefore a peculiar paradox at play: individual humans I accept, but groups of humans banded together I mistrust. 


Why exactly this is the case I do not know, but it is a motif that I recognise in myself as something that is taken over into various contexts. I enjoy individual sports, but not group sports. I enjoy intimate social moments with friends (one, two, three people), but am not very fond of big parties. I value individuality and praise people that dare stand out from the crowd, but am disappointment with all the "sheeple" that just follow the popular streams. 


My distaste in the "group" may have started very early. I remember for example instances when I was still at school and having very civil and pleasant one-on-one conversations with a fellow schoolmate, just to have this person turn into a bully when in a group -- a type of menacing wolf-pack mentality that brings out the worst in a person. Think of football hooligans who are often separately nice individuals, but turn into crazed bastards when they are part of the mob. For similar reasons I distrusts fraternities, political parties, religious groups, and so on. Any congregation that creates a homogeneous entity where the individual is assimilated into the group and the group becomes the new grand organism makes me feel uneasy.


Yet, with all my aversion to the group, I know that the group is not all evil. Sometimes groups are good: People do sometimes come together for a shared altruistic goal. I love music and music is often the result of people working as a group together. It is of course significant that I should especially love jazz music, where the individual musicians never give up their individuality, nevertheless, there are positive groups, of which music and the arts abound. I know of groups of people that raise money for charity, to build houses for the poor, or schools or hospitals. Spontaneous groups of people that come together in times of crisis to help one another. 


What should be the difference in these altruistic groups, and those other groups? In part, I guess, it is the we-against-them attitude that so often occur with a group. What makes a group a group is that the group-members should share something, some identifiable trade. Something that makes the group different from people that are not part of the group. This focus on difference is often the cause for the antagonism against anything that is not the same. The magic of an altruistic group seems to be an outward focus, rather than an inward focus. A group that comes together to build a school in a rural community is not focussed on themselves and what makes them unique, but is outward focussed. Their goal is altruistically other-focussed. Unfortunately my disapproval of groups is based on the fact that there really are so few altruistically other-focussed groups. Most groups are formed with an inward focussed attitude and selfish goals.


As an outsider living in a group-oriented society like I do (here in Korea), one gets to perceive the interesting nature of groups. One get to see the ugliness of groups, but also the encouraging characteristics of groups. Like is often the case in real life, groups are not all evil or all good. I often say that I have a love-hate relationship with Korea, I guess in part because there are aspects of Korean culture and society that often irks me up the wrong way, but then there are other aspects of the culture that is heart warming to see and experience. 


Although it will still take a very long time before I get over my near reflexive distrust of the group, I am slowly learning to accept that groups can be forces of good, that groups are not necessarily always the sandboxes of devils. The spirit of a group may very well be guided by angels, by altruistic principles, too.

Jack Parrow, Katie, Mmê Emily and The Help

In a recent post about Afrikaans rap and Hip-Hop music I mentioned how I'm not a big fan of the Afrikaans rapper Jack Parrow. But let me not be a spoil sport for others that enjoy him. Someone just now showed me the video below of a help (maid) in South Afrika, most likely working for a white family, and listening to the Afrikaans rapper on television. Watching her do her work with that amount of enjoyment she derives from Afrikaans rap will bring a smile to anyone's face and is possibly the best marketing for popular alternative Afrikaans music I can imagine.



It also made me think of Koos Kombuis' Afrikaans song "Katie", in memory of the maid that worked for his family and helped raise him. In the lyrics of the song he proclaims that their maid "was not merely a maid / but also a mother" [my translation] to him. In the video below Christo Wolfaardt does a rendition of the song "Katie".



This song by Kombuis is one of his most famous, probably because it resonates with so many white South Africans that grew up with an "Ousie" (Afrikaans word derived from "ou suster", meaning older sister, and used to describe a maid or house help). For many white South Africans of around my generation "the maid" was more than just another worker; for many of us, our Ousie was a second mother.

Me and my "mother" Emily.

Mine, was definitely a second mother. She worked for our family for 27 years. Her name is Emily but I often called her "Mmê Emily". Mmê is Sesotho for mother. She is actually ethnically Zulu, but the area we lived in was predominately Sotho, so she spoke Sesotho to me. The name I use and which all my family and friends use is a Sesotho name and was actually given to me by Mmê Emily.

She is retired now and currently lives in the Sebokeng-area, Vaal Triangle. The last time I visited her was in 2008. I hope to go visit her again next month, God-willing, when I visit South Africa.

Recently I watched the film The Help (2011), based on the 2009 début novel by Kathryn Stockett. The Internet Movie Database gives the following synopsis: "An aspiring author during the civil rights movement of the 1960's decides to write a book detailing the African-American maid's point of view on the white families for which they work, and the hardships they go through on a daily basis," and gives it a rating of 8 out of 10. The American Film Institute listed the film as one of the ten films of the year. For people like myself, coming from a white family, who grew up with a nanny who is a person-of-colour, the film was particularly touching. Although the set-up in America and in South Africa worked differently, the similarities are enough for South Africans to also appreciate The Help, and appreciate our helps, as I appreciate my Mmê Emily.

Shaking Hands

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I don't like shaking hands. Hands are tools and tools get dirty and exchanging tools is the same as exchanging germs. I am all too aware of where I put my tools, the places I scratch, the things I touch. For this reason I spare you the exchange of microbial spores and other germs -- please spare me from your filth too.

I really don't know why the ritual of shaking hands is still such a common practise. Personally, I'd rather hug somebody than shake hands with them. During a hug, there are layers of cloth separating actual skin-to-skin contact. Truthfully, it is not really the contact with another person's body that bothers me. It is touching someone else's hands. As I said, hands are dirty. It is our major manipulative tool. Even a cheek to cheek hug or a kiss on the cheek is more hygienic than a hand shake.

Image Source

Sometimes I clench my teeth and just shake hands. Overly eager and super friendly people thrust out their hands at you for a good ol' shake, so in order not to offend, I oblige. Not accepting the offered hand could signal an insult. But I cringe all the way to the washing room and cannot wash my hands soon enough.

In Korea there are many an opportunity to share hand germs. In subway stations, escalators, buses and the like, are hand-bars to hold on to. I refrain from touching these at all cost. (My balance has improved tremendously!) Elevator buttons I often press with my wrist or the back of my knuckles. Doorhandles I open from behind my jacket, or with my knees. I push the handle to flush public toilets with my feet or with toilet paper wrapped around my hand.

Whenever I enter my home, practically the first thing I do is wash my hands.

A few months ago I gave a public speech on "Two 'Profitable' Things for a Christian from Romantic Poetry." For most the public speaking would be their worst fear. For me it was the idea of shaking hands with all the people afterwards. Even now I cringe at the thought.

One thing I appreciate about Korea is the bow. Bowing is not always a substitute for handshaking, but one can often get away with a bow instead of shaking hands. When I was in China recently, I was distraught that they don't bow.

To my friends, rather give me a personal hug, than shaking my hand. Or if the hug is too intimate for you, how about the fist-bump. With the fist-bump there is little exchange of germs and it looks cool to boot. Or let's bow. A friendly broad smile would equally suffice.

Aliens

If you could send a message to aliens (of the extra-terrestrial kind), what would you say to them? I like the letter by Hank of the Vlogbrothers to aliens. He does a really good summary of the human species.

 

If you are living in a foreign country, like myself, then the term "alien" is applied to you. My identification card in Korea states "Alien Registration Card".

So recently a fellow alien was videotaped while he was shouting in a bus and beating up an old Korean man. The video has gone viral in Korean online video sites like Daum TV-pot and has also made its way onto YouTube. The man apparently misunderstood the Korean guy who was saying something along the lines of 내가 여기 앉아, meaning "you can sit here." 내가, which means "you" is pronounced "nega" which sounds a little like "nigga", i.e. "nigger." So the African-American guy apparently thought the old Korean man was calling him a nigger and went bonkers. This is an apparent case of cultural miscommunication.

But not so fast. The African-American dude shouts back at the old man in Korean 개새끼야, which is the equivalent to "fuck you!" So this guy took the time to learn very offensive Korean swear words, doing it with perfect pronunciation, but he cannot understand something simple like 내가 여기 앉아?! Let's assume that this is true, that he doesn't know what 내가 means, but knows what 개새끼야 means, what does that tell us about his character? For him it was more of a priority to learn to cuss in Korean that to learn the simple pronoun "you"?

Don't tell me its because black people experience racial discrimination in Korea and so that excuses his behaviour. Just two days ago I again experienced racial discrimination myself on the subway. I went to take a seat next to someone in the train and immediately this Korean person got up and went to sit in another seat. I've experienced this enough times to see it for what it is -- racism. Yes, some Koreans are racist and not only towards black people. Still, even though I felt offended by the woman's behaviour I didn't shout 개새끼야 at her. Why? Not because I didn't feel offended -- I do -- but because that is not the kind of person I am. Let's, for the sake of the argument, assume that the Korean old man did call this African-American guy nigger. Does that really warrant that kind of rage and violence? Seriously, this guy needs some Jesus-Love to heal his heart, for he must have experienced the worst kind of racism, oppression, hatred and torture for that word to trigger such a reaction.

 

In one easy swoop this "tough guy" has reinforced the stereotypes of foreigners in Korea being unmannered, disrespectful and uncivilised. His actions has strengthened the stereotype against black people as violent and barbaric, and he has made my life and the lives of all other foreigner teachers in Korea much more difficult. I'm ashamed on behalf of all foreign residence in Korea. I feel serious pity towards all black foreigners that this guy is representing in the eyes of Koreans. Not to mention another stereotype, that of Americans as arrogant and bombastic also strengthened by this loud and dirty-mouthed individual.

Onto another alien: Lady Gaga. She came out with a rather nice country music-influenced song, "Yoü And I". Did you see the music video? Disturbing and sexy in a mermaid-fetish / Frankenstein-fetish / necrophilia kind of way. Apart from a secret mermaid fantasy, not really my kind of thing. I like, however, the cover by Korean-American David Choi and Lisa Lavie. Not two voices that I would have imagined to go well together, but they pull it off pretty well.

 

The most beautiful part of the song is that line: "muscle cars drove a truck through my heart."

An all time favourite "alien song" is Sting's "Englishman in New York". "I'm an alien, I'm a legal alien, I'm an Englishman in New York." I sometimes choose this song when I'm singing in a noraebang (karaoke).

 

A random post on random thoughts about random aliens would probably be incomplete without a list of some of the aliens I find most attractive: Leeloo from Fifth Element; Neytiri from Avatar; Sil from Species; Seven-of-Nine / Borg from Star Trek; T-X from Terminator 3; Leela from Futurama; Alien from Alien; and Captain Jack Harkness from Doctor Who / Torchwood.

Hallelujah!

I wish I was there.



Better yet, I wish I was part of this.

Archaic

(This is the post that wouldn't publish.)

I asked an assistant at my department to dub me an audio tape that I need for one class. I gave her the original and an empty audio cassette. She looked at me with a blank face and finally said that she had no idea how to do it. So I took out the double deck cassette player, put in the original tape in the one deck and the empty tape in the second deck, pressed play for the one and record and play for the other. I asked her to please bring me the tape once it is fully recorded.

Today I used the recorded tape only to find that it is only recorded on the one side. Once the original tape was finished playing Side A, the assistant never turned it over to record Side B. That one have to actually dub both sides is something I’ve taken for granted and neglected to tell her.

This, of course, makes me feel terribly old. This girl grew up when audio cassettes have become obsolete. She has never copied a tape before. The closest she comes to anything remotely as archaic as dubbing a tape is to burn a CD. Her audio life concerns copy-and-pasting from her PC to her MP3-player and setting up playlists.

What does she know about making “Love Tapes,” a whole night’s hard work of selecting your favourite love song, chosen with much care for their (subliminal) messages and edited together on a tape that you bought from the Indian’s store? Burning a compilation of the latest pop-songs that you downloaded from the Internet just doesn’t compare.

The Lack of Originality in the Afrikaans Music Industry: The Snotkop Case Study

Read about my recent (July 2014) run in with Snotkop fan girl "CALL ME CRAZY!! @Mignon_Devitt

Since this post is primarily about Afrikaans music it would be logical for it to be in Afrikaans. However, since I’ve been critical of Korea’s copying-culture on numerous occasions on my blogs and wrote about it in English, I think it only fair to write this post in English as well. In a previous post I commented on how the Korean bands like G-Dragon copied – i.e. plagiarized – the music of established Western artists. One blogger referred to it as Korea’s “culture theft” habit.

Well, I’m sad to say that the Afrikaans music industry has taken up the same ill practice. While in South Africa, I heard this new Afrikaans artist, Snotkop, perform his song “Kry jouself by die werk” (“Get Yourself to Work”). Unlike the Korean bands that seem to use American songs and build and improvise on them, Snotkop’s “Kry jouself by die werk” is practically a direct translation of The Offspring’s “Why Don’t You Get A Job?” One could argue that it is a cover of The Offspring’s song, in which case it is terribly bad cover.





Listen to another of Snotkop’s songs, “Shutup en soen my” (“Shutup and Kiss Me”):



Now compare the beginning of “Shutup en soen my” with Suzanne Vega’s “Tom’s Diner”:



Embarrassingly similar, isn’t it?

It is sad that all Snotkop’s “better” songs seem to be bad copies of other well established artists. For instance the song “Ek wens” (“I Wish”) sounds very similar to something by Evanescence. Unfortunately the use of Auto-Tuning does not cover the fact that he doesn’t have much of a voice.

The rest of his music, like “Parappa” and “Katrien” is that kind of pop music that betrays superficiality of culture and taste. Boer-in-Ballingskap made a true, but very disconcerting, comment: “Die ligte Afrikaanse pop, is ook maar ‘n refleksie van die volk se smaak” – Freely translated: “The light Afrikaans pop music is in essence a reflection of their taste.” Sadly this seems true as it is this kind of tawdriness that is void of any originality that seems to be selling the best within the Afrikaans community.

The truly unfortunate thing is there are many talented artists performing in Afrikaans so that we need not be satisfied with such low quality music. As long as people are satisfied with fast food, quality cuisine will not become the standard; it is similar with music. While people are drunk on cheap pop music, there is no room for quality original music, which need not be the case in Afrikaans music as we do not suffer from a lack of original artists.

Take for example Riku Lätti:

Enter the Ninja, Bobby van Jaarsveld and other South African explosions

During my recent visit in South Africa I found myself in the middle of a number of new cultural phenomena sweeping the nation. The most disturbing of these were the new band Die Antwoord ("The Answer"). This Hip Hop band is the latest greatest fad among teenagers since the somewhat more interesting, albeit more existentialist Fokofpolisiekar. (To be honest, it seems that calling Fokofpolisiekar a "fad" is a misnomer. They have some really good lyrics and have established themselves as serious social commentators.)

Back to Die Antwoord and their song "Enter the Ninja". When was the last time you saw something this disturbing? I’m still trying to figure out what disturbs me the most. Is it the terrible English pronunciation with the heavy Afrikaans accent? [I'm a lecturer in English, after all.] Or the flashes of someone with Hutchinson–Gilford progeria syndrome (“aging disease”) with his Hip-Hop culture mannerisms? The white trash exhibitionism and the lead-singer's shaven chest? The peculiar black and white drawings? Or the strange Yo-Landi Vi$$er in her school uniform singing: “Ayaya, I am your butterfly / I need your protection / so be my samurai"! 



(Ek stem saam met Boer-in-Ballingskap.)

What Die Antwoord is trying to achieve I don't know. I do know that they've identified a market and will be making lots of money spewing out hardcore white trash (or "zef") sentiments. They are clearly serious business people judging from their professional website. Sorry kiddies, this, like Marilyn Manson, is all an act. Let's hope, that like Marilyn Manson, the music quality improves with time.

Knowing that I like to stay abreast with trends, a friend suggested I look into Jack Parrow -- an Afrikaans rapper. Below is a Parrow song: "Cooler as Ekke" ("Cooler than Me").



I'm not much into Hip-Hop, and if the lyrics are lacking in substance I'm not going to waste my time listening to it. The last proper South African Hip Hop band I listened to was Brasse Vannie Kaap.



Unfortunately, after the death of Mr. Fat (Ashley Titus) and thus the end of the Brasse, I think it will be some time before we can expect intelligent Rap again.

While such "alternative" musicians like Die Antwoord and Jack Parrow are having the sub-cultures buzzing, on the magazine pages another singer is stealing the hearts of young girls and old "tannies" (aunties). This blond, green-eyed, honey tanned boy is riding the waves of popularity.



Afrikaans pop music is flourishing. I heard Gerhard Steyn's "Baby Tjoklits" a couple of times even though I did not spent time listening to the local radio stations. I must have heard it when visiting people or in stores.



I really hoped that I would get to know about a new Afrikaans band worth listening to, like last year when I discovered Wasserfall.



I wasn't so lucky.

I was, however, able to get the album "Ibokwe" by Xhoza singer Thandiswa Mazwai that I wanted.

Korean Condoms

This puzzles me almost as much as the missing taegeuk in the palgwae depiction in my previous post. This is a photo of a packet of strawberry flavoured Korean condoms. Depicted on this packet is what appears to be a happy little penis, with a condom on his head, surfing. A surfing penis -- even after seeing it illustrated, it still boggles the mind.

I do not know what "Zzimong" means. The "z"-sound does not even exist in Korean. Above "Zzimong" there is written in Korean characters "cham sarang", which literally translates as "true love."