I look at you

I look into your eyes but there's nothing there. 
Did you really love me all these years we were together. 
I look at you. 
You look at me. 
Was it al just a dream because I woke up and found nothing. 
Everything we had is gone. 
I look at you. 
You look at me. 
I gave you all my life because you promised me all your love. 
Raw emotions filled with regret. 
Every dream we ever had... 
I look at you... I look at you. 

Diamonds in the Rough

The small dusty desolate community of Roodepan located on the outskirts of Kimberley offers no facilities or opportunities for any of the youth there to skill themselves or hone their talents, there are not even adequate parks for them to go after school or spend time over the weekends. The multi-purpose centre that was once buzzing with activities in its early days has now been reduced to a decaying four walled white elephant. The once busy hall is quiet; the once lush green and well maintained grass is now nothing more than a dust field filled with shrubs and bushes, the building is now windowless, ceiling less and hopeless.
 What happened? Where did things go wrong and why? Doesn’t anybody care that their children who could have been busy doing something beneficial are now loitering about on street corners doing absolutely nothing to improve themselves or their community. With no sports or arts and culture facilities who can blame the kids, when no opportunity is given to them. But, I want to tell the story of a small group of boys who do not let their situation or environment determine their dreams. These boys have a passion for skateboarding even though there are absolutely no facilities in Roodepan to accommodate them, yet they persevere. I personally spoke to a few of them and listened in amazement at their story of how they overcome their challenges of not having a skateboard park or struggling to maintain their worn out and barely functioning skateboards. They salvage parts to fix their skateboards and use the local library as a chosen place to skate but when they are chased away from the library they use the school grounds and if all else fails then they simply just skate in streets. It’s their determination that grabbed my attention, their willpower to not just give up because no one is supporting them or that they lack the needed skating equipment. Their story is unique and today they may just seem like a bunch of boys skating at the library but with the needed support they could be the pro skaters of tomorrow. We have the Maloof Cup that is held in Kimberley every year why should these talented and eager youngsters be excluded just because they are not equipped enough?
We need to motivate our youth to empower and sharpen their skills and talents because a youth that is busy with positive activities will not have time to loaf or be part of gangs and activities that break them and not make them. Roodepan may not be the darling community that it should be and is in the news most of the time for negative things but if you look close enough you will find some diamonds in the rough, all they need is some polish. I urge any good Samaritan to please feel free and assist these boys in any way possible.

When I am no more

When I am no more, who will tell my story...
When my voice drifts away, who will remember what I said...
When my being is but just a memory, who will speak of me...
Please let it be someone who knew me well,
Someone who can tell them the truth about my former self.
let them say here lies a man who stood by what he believed.
A man who dreamed and lived it, a man who saw the world differently.
When I can no longer tell my story, do not let me fade away into the abyss of forgotten men.
Let me live on in your stories because I too was apart of your life story.
 

Goodbye, Ol' Tusks...

For the elephant that paid with its life because of human ignorance. 
I wish to apologize on behalf of all humans for the treatment that animals get from us. Since the beginning of time man believed himself to be the superior species on earth, which we are without a doubt, just look at our achievements, our magnificent marvels we have constructed, the discoveries we have made we are even looking for new life on other planets to dominate. In our rush and excitement to conquer and rule over all, we have forgotten that we were entrusted with the guardianship of this planet and all its other inhabitants. Let me get back to "Tusks", the elephant that was euthanized because of ignorant humans.

Let us say that Tusks was the perpetrator as the Park rangers want us to believe, let us for one moment accept that Tusks was at the wrong place at the wrong time and viciously attacked the innocent and unaware couple. No, they didn't bother him, they didn't violate his space and they did not provoke him. It was the elephant’s fault! What right did it have to go frolicking in path of the unsuspecting tourists. The elephant had psychotic tendencies and was possibly out on a tourist bashing spree. Remember that we humans hunt animals for fun, we abuse and misuse them and to top it all, we capture them and put them in parks against their will so that we can go and view them for our pleasure. Just look at the all the abused animals, the dolphins that are being slaughtered in Japan or the sharks being killed in Australia and the rhino being annihilated in our very own back yard.

So what really happened on this particular day of the horrific event that sent shock waves throughout South Africa and parts of the world after amateur footage was released on the web. Most people vehemently blamed the elephant for what occurred and took the side of the poor helpless tourists. I do feel sorry for the couple who sustained injuries but I feel that they are to blame.

Game parks inform visitors on what to do in such scenarios and what warning signs to look out for. However according to the footage it's clear that this couple was ignorant and stupid because the people in the other vehicle saw what was about to happen and made themselves scarce.
So what do we, super intelligent humans do in the aftermath... We solve the problem like we've always done; we take a gun and blow it to kingdom come. Who will come to the elephant's defense? Who will speak for it? Not only for Tusks but for all abused animals. It's time that we realize that we are behaving more and more unlike the civilized creatures that we like to believe we are and more like an infestation of barbaric alien beings hell bent on killing and destroying anything that's different from us. 

Just like us, animals have the right to walk the earth freely too. Ol' Tusks the elephant paid the price for human ignorance but we too will pay a price one day when our children will have to read about animals in books.

The King of Nkandla

*The following based on characters, living, dead or dying is merely a coincidence and in most cases a miracle. 


The King of Nkandla was sitting on his gold plated throne,
pondering his next move...
Ticking away the minutes with his fat sausage fingers.
The King of Nkandla paid no heed to His wives scuffling on the white marble floor, wigs and nails flying about.
A war erupting over who gets to ride in the royal Rolls Royce.
Just mind the the bronze statue in the corner.

The King of Nkandla was tapping away, lazily eyeing the dog at his feet chewing on a juicy piece of steak.
Princess and princesses tearing up the palace. Distraught servants putting out flames.
A minister appeared, a scrawny rat like figure. Announcement, announcement.
The King of Nkandla just turned his head and attention at the giant flat screen hanging from his chandelier.
Tapping away the minutes with his fat sausage fingers.

Oh, why He wondered, do the plebs complain so much, Why do they weep and curse and mock his name.
They blamed him for all the crime and corruption and craziness engulfing the country.
They accused him of playing the system and gorging himself on the state coffers.
His palace, the privilege and many luxuries.
A sigh, a cough and scratching of royal buttocks.
Plebs, stupid Plebs.
The King of Nkandla was sitting on his thrown, pondering his next move,
Sushi for breakfast or maybe caviar ....

Through your lies

I am digging through all your lies,

trying to find something that was true,

The more I look the less I see,

for all the things you said are now meaningless,

you were just fooling me with empty words,
Distracting me with loving gestures,
I gave you my love, my trust, my loyalty
But you just took it and threw it down the drain.
You left me cold bitter and broken in the rain.
You gave me lies, I gave you love.  

Kaptein, the dog that saved us

South Africa is a country obsessed with race, so much that it's citizens will jump at any and every opportunity to make their fellow man feel inferior. We can turn any argument into a full blown race war, with different races quick to draw the lines and even government joining in at times, fanning the flames by playing the race card when it suits them.

However a few days ago a story emerged that a brown mix bred dog fell into Kimberley's Big hole. The dog was trapped for already 6 days before anyone spotted it swimming around in the deep water filled pit. I heard this from a friend and as a dog lover myself I was immediately drawn to this story, I started following the event on social media, news and word of mouth accounts of what has transpired.

I was actually amazed to log into a social site and read comments about the whole event, for the first time there were no racial slurs thrown about, no trolls on the forefront, fanning the flames of racial divide. No one mentioned anything about whether the owner of the dog was white or black and who should be blamed for what happened, It was as if everyone who commented was drunk on rainbow berry juice or something, black and white people were agreeing unanimously and pleading that the dog be saved, even Kurt Darren allegedly offered to hire a helicopter that could assist with the rescue operation. I was astonished, just the previous month, was Red October that further plunged South Africa into a backwards tug of war about race and now here people of all races were united regardless of their race or creed. When I looked at the footage on the news about the rescue the onlookers were a mixed bag of almost every single kind of South African, some rejoiced others shed a few tears of relief as "Kaptein" was finally brought to the surface. It took a little stray dog from Kimberley to prove to us that we as South Africans can accomplish our goals as one united force and look past our ignorance, we saved the dog but it also saved us because even just for two days we were all South Africans and not a color. Yes we have a History but we cannot forever sit and point fingers at the past, ignore the backwards thinking politicians, ignore the racist groups, and the individuals who want to tear this country's colorful fabric apart.

Let us pull together, stop the blame game, put down the race cards and start to work on our problems. We did it for "Kaptein", now let's do it for our children.