A Legend has fallen...

Since I was 9 years old, Vuyo Mbuli was the first person I saw every morning on my television set.  Almost without fail, he has always been on my television screen first thing in the morning.  I distinctly remember when I was much younger, getting ready for school early in the morning, as I got dressed in the sitting room, in front of the parafin heater, that Vuyo was always talking to me.  Vest first, then the long sleeved white shirt and the green uniform and tie to complete the winter attire, and as I stood there, pulling on my grey socks, Vuyo Mbuli was there talking to me about the issues of this world, issues that back then I simply did not understand.  

You see in my family, as so many will also testify, Morning Live was and will always be, the program you watched in the morning.  Even now in the age of 24 hour news channels, that will give you up to the minute updates on the days leading stories, Morning Live is the business.  With Leanne, Vuyo and Andile “she knows the weather” Masuku, Morning Live was the staple diet, the obvious choice for your early morning breakfast viewing. 

It was my father’s favourite show in the morning.  Even after he retired from teaching and didn't have to get up so early to go to work, without fail my father was up before 6am every weekday to watch his beloved Morning Live.  It was here, for two hours, on most mornings, that we met and fell in love with Vuyo Mbuli.  Even though he was in the SABC studios far, far away in Johannesburg, he joined us all in our living rooms and bedrooms.  He humanised dignitaries, made politicians seem more accessible and with the most genuine spirit, he opened up South Africa to its people.  From small unknown villages, to elaborate celebrations which introduced South Africa to the world, Vuyo Mbuli was there, to guide us through, to ask the tough questions and make you believe that South Africa is truly a great country.

He was the epitome of a breakfast host, friendly and outgoing when he needed to be, earnest and challenging when he was called to be, and for every broadcast, he never forgot to treat all of us millions of South Africans, as though we were just the one person he was speaking to.

I didn’t have the pleasure of meeting him, I didn’t know him personally, but man oh man, I feel his loss.  He was a great broadcaster, highly entertaining, dedicated and he and Leanne just fit in so well together.  In fact I remember the time when Tracy Going left Morning Live and Leanne Manas joined the team. Vuyo just made it the easiest transition for all of us.  

I don’t know what it is about the people we see every day on our screens; why we feel so strongly about them when they leave one station for another, when they leave our favourite shows or when they pass on, that we always feel so affected.

  

I heard today how upset so many people that Vuyo’s funeral wasn’t broadcast live on SABC, that instead it was streamed on the internet where millions had no access to it and I understood why so many would be so angry.  Vuyo Mbuli was ours too and for many, watching his funeral on tv would’ve been their last opportunity to pay their respects.

Now that I think about it, who else is going to insist on saying “Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma” every time the President is mentioned in a bulletin? 

As we, mere viewers of one of the SABC’s best programs, grieve over this great loss, and make no mistake this is a great loss for the country, I think about his children, his wife and his parents during this time, because they knew him so very well and this is the very worst time of all their lives.

All in all though, "Sharp Sharp" has made his final exist off our screens and out of the journey of life and all I can do is to echo the words of so many before me "lala ngoxolo Bhut' Vuyo".

Your work here on earth is done. 

To what end...

It's been a very long time since I did this. So many thoughts and ideas that I've penned on paper, but often, very often, I have been happy to let them settle in my saved documents, gathering virtual dust, as the seeds of "not good enough" continue to grow.

Yet, in all this time, there have been many times where I have listened to great arguments, read articles and blogs from friends and family, to strangers I may never meet. Debates about gender, education, Nkandla, Health, rape, the political landscape of our beloved South Africa and of course the inevitable bitter, anger driven conversations about Racism and apartheid and how it has almost irreparably damaged the future of this country. 

Almost everyday you and I are privy to all these different opinions being shared by people from all walks of life, some seeped with anger and hatred so deep, your ears burn and you're at a complete loss to give any answer that would at once heal some of these wounds.  Some dangerously covered in ignorance and a lack of understanding and compassion which should be deemed inhumane. Then there is the hopelessness and bitterness that flows from those who have lost so much or who feel so intensely about these issues that haunt us all everyday.

Daily, we are bombarded with these views, many of which reflect the same pain and anguish, the same distinct air of powerlessness but often they are just regurgitated thoughts and opinions, told by different people, in different spaces and yet the feelings they leave behind are always the same.  I have heard it all before, debated it all before, cried over it all before and felt the same sense of hopelessness, time and time before.  Yet, as often as I have heard people say that these are isues that we "need to discuss" to "put on the national agenda", that the only way forward is for us to "speak about 'these things' in the open", I have realised that we really do not have any real notion of what that really means.

Think about it, on any given day, there are enough columnists n this country who write about the sad and dark issues which affect this country.  We have discussions with friends and colleagues about the impact of rape and sexual abuse, the rise in unemployment and the frightening crime stats that plague us ALL every single day, and yet nothing changes.  We're having these conversations in our homes, in the workplace, in buses and trains, sometimes even in schools.  The evils of Apartheid, the lack of political will in this country, corruption, our harrowing education system, the deteriorating state of public health, our President who seems blissfully unaware, we ARE having these discussions.  We are having these conversation and yet we continue to say that we need to discuss these issues.  Am I missing something here?

When we talk about needing a national dialogue on issues ABC to Z, what exactly do we mean, what do we want to see happen and to what end.  The last time we had a moment of national dialogue was during the historical TRC but dare I ask whether that really and truly did anything to pull this country out of the pits of darkness, that we still find ourselves drowning in, 19 years later. 

I almost feel like I'm tired of talking, I'm tired of the same old stories.  Now all I want to see is action, real tangible action in our fight against racism, sexism, rape, gender inequality and the many other fingers which continue to tighten their grip and strangle the life out of a country, which still has the potential be great.          In pure frustration from having these self same conversations, I must ask the same question... "now what".  Once all has been said, what can be done.

Spare a thought...

Have you ever woken up to hear the wind howling sadistically against your cardboard panes, rattling against your walls; with fear curling through your body, expecting that this night, tonight, your paper thin fortress will finally come falling down around you?   Have you ever been awoken by the violent vibrations of your home, as the wind threatens to “huff and puff and blow your house down”?  Have you ever?  

I say paper-thin because honestly if your fort consists of cardboard boxes, old rusty zinc slates, hammered against brittle wooden pieces collected from the nearby dump site, then yes, your home is paper-thin.  The place that you come home too every night, has tiny holes peppered across the zinc walls, your ceiling, which is really the roof, is kept in place by mismatched nails and a few large pumpkins, perhaps even a brick or two, that your neighbour pulled from her garden.  This ceiling, covered in black soot which comes pouring out of that old paraffin stove that cooks your food and warms your room every night, is your only protection as rain falls heavily, the noise almost deafening.  Then somewhere in the darkness, you ears adjust to the sound of something small falling onto your floor. The sound comes faster, harder and from instinct, and because you’ve done it so many times before, you jump out of the warmth of your blankets, feel for your worn Plascon paint bucket,  in its familiar spot and you place it just right, under that little hole in your ceiling, where water comes streaming through. 

Climbing back into your bed, you know the worst is yet to come, so you pull your blankets tightly against your body, bracing yourself for impact.

I’m pretty sure that for most people reading this, this is an experience akin to your worst nightmare being realised.  Living in a dishevelled shack, in and amongst an entire community of hastily built informal settlements, that can barely withstand small pockets of rain, let alone, the crash of hail stones as the heavens open up to reveal the true force of its glory.  As we all sit today, in our quiet, neat offices; the kitchenette with that delicious cup of Jacobs just a few metres away, spare a though for the men, women and children, who woke up to this nightmare, as mother nature decided it was time to wash her floors and cleanse her children of the dirt and grime, they are all too well accustomed too.  And if you’re lucky enough to be at home, warm and comfortable, remember that millions of children live in unspeakable conditions, that simple words like “poverty” cannot begin to describe and we, with our middle class concerns, are often simply ill equipped to fully understand.

The days when I made the camera my companion...

A few more photographs I took in studio..beeg thanks to all my models

Photography is my new hobby so here are a few pictures I've taken over the last few weeks..

The Slut Talk

"You are acting like such a slut" "Don't you dare call me a slut" "She is such a slut".

Sound familiar? Well that's probably because at one point or another, we have all heard or used the word "slut" to describe some unfortunate woman whose actions we do not approve of. In fact, a woman is called a slut by people who consider her to be very immoral in her sexual behaviour, a woman that is 'loose' in her sexual escapades - certainly not the proverbial Virgin Mary and as we all know, for a woman, too much sex with too many people is absolutely unacceptable by our societies high moral standards. A society where women fear the sight of their own shadow as they walk through dark lonely streets. Where women are advised to cross the road when they see a strange man approaching - the only problem with this of course, being that every man you don't know, is a strange man. A society where women can be beaten up outside a club, as the patrons look on and where a short skirt is an invitation to violate a person's every right, because "she asked for it". This same society which happily parades scantily dressed women on the cover of every men’s' "soft porn" magazine and on the pages of every Sports Illustrated - because as we all know, a woman frolicking on the beach, in a tiny bikini or skimpy black lingerie, with that "come hither" stare, has a lot to with Rugby and body building. Still though, the objectification of women around the world, has a long history and the fact that women, constantly play into this role in their itty bitty bikini's, is another story for another day but I dare say, if your immediate response to that previous statement is "there's nothing wrong with a woman wearing a bikini", then you are completely missing the point, but I digress.

A few months ago, the Slut Walk finally made its way onto South African shores, a campaign supported by thousands of women around the world as “Slut-walkers” professed that the purpose of their action is to "reclaim the word". The intention of this campaign is obvious and in many ways must be commended, because it is yet another way in which women attempt to take back the power that is so often torn from them during the act of these heinous crimes. To give this campaign the title "The Slut walk", is to stick it in the faces of those rapists who would argue that a woman "asked for it" because of the short dress she was wearing or the way she moved her hips from side to side, enticing him as she walked passed. It is meant to scream at the world that no matter what I am wearing, no matter how revealing an outfit it may be, or how outrageous my demeanour, "no person has the right to take from me what I am unwilling to give". In this campaign, women take back the power in the word "slut", that derogatory word, which has mainly been used to describe women, whose sexual relations do not meet the moral standards of our society. And yet despite all these good intentions, the Slut Walk is a campaign I cannot support. As hard as I have tried, the idea that any woman's actions should equate her to being called a "slut", I find completely unacceptable. One cannot take back the power in the word "slut" or in any statements that a rapist makes about women, because the word and its meaning simply cannot be used in the context of women who are raped because they chose to live out their daily lives. The idea that a rapist can call any woman a "slut" because she supposedly "asked" for it by the look in her eye, cannot warrant a group of women marching up and down streets and willingly call themselves "sluts" for the world to see. Rape is a crime of violence and power and for women then to use this term in describing themselves, then we are simply sending out the wrong message. No woman, especially a woman who is raped, should ever refer to herself as a "slut", because there is no power in this unfortunate title. "Slut" is a derogatory term used to describe a woman whose sexual lifestyle, the rest of society frowns upon and wearing a tight short skirt or a shirt revealing the trimmings of a lace push-up bra does not mean a woman deserves such a title or that she deserves to be violated, but neither does the number of people she chooses to take home with her. Perhaps here the most obvious word is "chooses", because when a woman is called out for her sexual lifestyle, it is a choice she had the power to make, whereas women, who are raped for whatever reason, aren't given this choice and in those moments, their power is taken from them. So I cannot support the "Slut walk" because no woman in any circumstance should find the use of this word acceptable, not even for a campaign paved with good intentions.