The community of Sonskyn is one of those made up of the people who missed the opportunities offered by the old regime and now feel excluded by the new one. The difference is that, while most such communities are black, some others, like this one, are white. Whether segregation among
So you thought that mathematics and bureaucracy have nothing to do with each other. Well, that is not exactly so. Mix them up together and you get an omelette that is often inedible, but sometimes unavoidable. Many, many years ago, decades ago in fact, I was employed by the engineering
“Do you believe in life after death?” I was asked recently by a friend. “Certainly,” I said. “Not only do I believe in it. I have proof.” “Oh, really?” he said, an eyebrow raised sceptically. So I told him the story of my mother’s ashes. “And you imagine that proves
We did our utmost to write a polite letter. We were writing to Eskom and they have a lot of influence in our lives. They are, after all, the people who decide when we will have electricity and when not. This was not about the matter of power cuts though.
Never make friends with a fiction writer. Your supposed friend may base a character in a book on you. And for them everyone is fair game, even his or her mother or grandmother, not to mention husband, wife or children. And, if he does base a character on you, don’t
Criminality is not good, not for the country and not for you and I personally. We probably all agree on that. But real, deeply felt agreement is not reached until we personally feel the effects of criminal activities on our lives. We have a cottage twenty or thirty metres from
The crow first came to visit us one fresh autumn morning. It has to be said though, that autumn is not that big a deal in the Bosveld. Very few trees shed their leaves and daytime temperatures drop by only a degree or two. We have less cloudy weather than
Towards the end of winter our ground dries out. It does not dry out a little. It dries until a handful of dirt, pouring through your fingers, has almost no substance. Water poured onto the earth soaks away in moments while the sun beats down without mercy and without pause.
The Chinese have worked hard at keeping their population growth even lower than more developed western countries. Between 1980 and 2016 the Chinese one-child policy was stringently applied and its effect has been profound. That country’s population growth at the present time is still only 0.1% a year, the same
I have been feeling a bit down lately, but then, I fancy, has most of humanity. I have wondered what ails me and found the answer in what is for me an unlikely place. It was explained to me by a writer in the Essential California newsletter. According to him,