Nonqaba said ...

PHOTO BLOG  Red River, Winnipeg Canada.

Complaint. Where are the apples in this pineapple? Photo credit, online pic. What’s holding up the grocery store line? Someone is complaining. I stopped complaining about change many moons ago because of embarrassing moments, where cashiers had given me the correct change. I’m bad at math. I can’t count, period. Some people love complaining. They’ll complain that oranges they bought are not sweet; the pineapple has no ‘apples’; there’s no chicken in the chicken risotto; there’s no 20% off the detergent as advertised (customer picked up wrong brand); you name it. Department stores seem to understand the need to complain. That is why they have set up cashiers that deal mainly with online returns or exchanges. Ironic isn’t it? You bought them online to avoid driving to the store. Here you are, at the store. I suppose customers will complain about things like colours. Maybe it’s not the orange they saw online. How about:  I don’t like it anymore. Stores hear that regularly . What is funny

Dr. Therese Tam, Canada's Chief Medical Officer. Photo credit, online pic. In 2020, we appreciated nurses more than ever before, because a health crisis called COVID-19 descended upon us. Nurses and all health care workers globally, shelved personal plans to work around the clock taking care of us. COVID-19 is still skulking around at a lesser extent, but nurses continue to give us 100% care. Virus or no virus, we should appreciate health care workers more than Elon Musk because they hide our shame. We know about doctors’ Hippocratic Oath, but not nurses’ oath. It must exist somewhere, especially in these heady days of posting everything online. Our shame is our lifestyle, which sends us to the hospital. Yes, motor accidents and attempted murder are also responsible, but how we live and what we eat is the major reason. Nurses know the real us. Most of the time, they don’t recognize us because we don’t have any make-up, hair is in its original state and we don’t have any clothes on.

We used to cause Mama pain when we ate a few spoons and stopped. Reason? We told her the food was not delicious. Why? No salt. She used salt, but sparingly. That’s why we couldn’t taste it. She didn’t scorch meat and vegetables with salt, something I later realized when eating at someone’s house. Wedding and funeral food can also be very salty. It never occurred to me that we seldom complained at grandma’s. We helped her harvest sweet potatoes, washed them thoroughly and boiled them. We never said they had no salt. Same with the corn harvest, straight into the pot, without shaking a salt cellar. Cattle don’t use salt because they eat grass raw. Is grass vegan? Who knows! We are so used to adding salt, we use it in food that doesn’t need it. Carrots are carrots, very self sufficient. Peas also. When the doctor told me to slow down on the sodium, I discovered peas, very sweet. Come to think of it, all vegetables don’t need salt. It kills their uniqueness. Food labels. The previous ‘me’ n

Yul and May Edochie. Yul Edochie is a famous Nigerian movie star. In April, he introduced to the world his one year old son with his second wife, Judy Austin. May Edochie, his first wife is not happy about it and anonymous advisers like myself are either mad at him or praising him for polygamy. Those angry with Yul Edochie point out that May Edochie has four kids, a girl and three sons. They mention the sons because they are the preferred gender in Nigeria. Women are blamed for giving birth to girls. That is why tradition allows a man to take a second wife with the hope that she gives birth to a son, ‘the heir.’ NIGERIAN MOVIES AND ROMANCE May Edochie will get over her husband’s new son, just like thousands first wives before her. She did everything right. Loves her in-laws. Looks fantastic for a mother of four. It is nothing personal. Men with money did it and will continue to do till the end of time. What fuels anger at Yul Edochie, is what we see in ‘love movies’ where men propose i

Hmm! I cut this garden tomato with a knife not kitchen shears. Learning sign language? The tomato ‘sign’ turns the hand into a knife and chops a tomato. I’m terrible at finger spelling but I can’t forget that sign because that’s how we cook, cut tomatoes. That is why I was shocked when a recipe book said ‘cut tomatoes using kitchen shears’. Is it possible to cut them without touching? I even steal a piece as I cut, especially during the summer because those indolent garden tomatoes are juicy to my soul. Am I missing something? Are we into no touch cooking now? Cutting tomatoes with shears means we are into long distance cooking. I’m familiar with long distance driving and relationships, but hands off cooking? Naaa! Cooking involves both hands. It needs concentration while peeling vegetables and washing meat. Hands tell you if tomatoes are over ripe, and cannot be used.  So how do we prepare a green salad, use kitchen shears? I don’t get it. Cooking is therapy. It takes you away from th

Delroy Lindo, British actor seen in projects such as Romeo Must Die. Moving to Hollywood from Africa, China, India, France, Italy, U.K. or any other country that produces films is not a wise move. Why not? Because the Hollywood story is static. It doesn’t change. Disney for example. It can steal an idea here and there, garnish it with what sounds like foreign music, but the story remains American, Anglo-Saxon American. Nobody knows that better than African Americans, the  race some politicians don’t regard as American. Black Panther directed by Ryan Coogler minted money for Disney/Marvel so well, it’s easy to forget that it is a Hollywood story, told exceptionally well by a black cast and crew. Actors from other countries who think that moving to Hollywood will enhance fame and fortune must think twice. In fact, they should learn from Aishwarya Rai Bachchan who is celebrated in the U.S. and Europe, but still lives in her country India. Moving to Hollywood is risky because there are no

Kids are very busy on their phones and tablets discovering and creating new things. Grandparents understand that, but kids should also understand that basements have old things that gave birth to new things. Kids will think grandparents have completely lost it, if they say things on their phones and computers are old things lying around in the basements. I can imagine kids saying: Grampa, you must be kidding right? Grandparents clear the basement because they are selling the house. It’s too big since the other partner died or they’re moving to a place with no stairs to climb. It might be hard for kids to believe that things in their phones are old things that can be found in their grandparents’ basements, but phones and computers have all the evidence. Icons in their devices are right there in  the basement: files, clipboards, magnifying glasses, paintbrushes, flash lights, erasers, printers, floppy disks, rotary phones, you name it. There’s nothing new under the sun, just re-painted a

Stores and banks create consumer addicts when they flood us with  ‘ hurry offer ends soon’  alerts. Society doesn’t like drug addicts, especially those in street corners.  It’s easy to condemn them because they are not protected by big mansions, such as addicts we live with.  We also call drug addiction a habit. A habit is a self-induced. It’s something we do unconsciously . We don’t have to do it. It’s not a must, like eating when we are hungry or quenching thirst with a glass of water.  Hurry offer ends soon , is habit forming. I cannot afford to miss those bath towels at 50% off although we have ten new towels we’ve never used. Habit forming is when i must buy something to accumulate points on my credit card. I don’t agree, you rightfully point out. Adults are adults. Nobody forces them to respond to ‘ hurry offer ends soon’ alerts . We are solely responsible for shopping addiction whether it is peer pressure or shopping because we are bored. However, banks and stores are also to bl

Most parents don’t know what kids are doing online. One thing for sure, they want to be rich and famous, like yesterday.  ‘Show me the money,’ is the script they know by heart. Parents should instill at an early age that things are written down in business, and the ‘cool’ way to do it, is writing emails that make potential business partners take you seriously. Electronic mail is basically writing a letter. It is still an effective business tool despite all the platforms brought about by the digit present. Parents can supplement what kids are taught by teaching them how to write an e-mail, especially rich kids because they have laptops. Most kids are hungry for easy money brought about by online opportunities. They download stories of teens that drop out of school to run profitable business ventures. If it is business, it needs communication. If it’s communication, it needs e-mail. If it’s business, it has certain ways of doing things, a culture of some sort. In the film  Boyz N The Hoo

Use your YouTube Channel to make movies people have never seen before. I want to be a movie producer, but I don’t have money. No problem, the internet makes it possible but there’s a good and bad side. YouTube has taken the means of production from Hollywood, Nollywood or Bollywood, CBC, BBC or Netflix to you and I, simply by having a YouTube channel.   The bad side is that ordinary people like recycling old stories about love at first sight, candle lit dinners, donating kidneys, maids that sleep with the boss, or friends that steal husbands. How many music videos are on YouTube? Millions. The ones that stand out have made money for musicians. You can also make unique movies without a bar scene or bedroom scene like Nollywood and Hollywood. Here are the basics: l  Script, which is the story .e.g. women barbers like The Barber, a Nigerian movie from Uchenna Mbunabo Productions. l  Camera, a good video camera. Cellphones are good but sound has an echo. l  A powerful mic. Electronics stor

Photo credit: online pic, one of many abandoned train tunnels in the world. Everyday should be Earth Day.   Kids growing up on farms understand the earth much better than city kids who were born and raised on concrete streets and playgrounds. But both do not understand what holds the earth together, a sort of glue, construction cement or grout used for floor tiles. Trees hold the ground together, stones and rocks too, but they get in the way when ‘civilization’ wants to mine gold or build train tunnels, shops and new houses. And the solution? Dynamite is brought in to blow up the earth, which gets dizzy when stabilizing forces like roots and rocks are gone. It becomes like you getting dizzy, because you haven’t had anything to eat the whole day. We don’t know much about the glue or cement that holds the earth together because we don’t see it. We only know the upper part, trees and plants. Dynamite physically removes them, but it destroys a whole natural system that feeds off each other

Certain famous actors and actresses do not send their kids to school because they are wealthy. Education prepares kids for the labour market but why bother? Mum and dad have money so they will never lack anything. But skipping school, deprives kids of certain life-giving steps, obscene bank balances cannot buy. Life is like a flight of steps, although it is not perfect and equal like steps in double-story mansions, a block of flats or office buildings. Bringing up kids is helping them handle handrails until they can walk up and down the stairs unassisted. There is some resistance because kids don’t want help, but a tumble here and there teaches them that life has sharp edges like steps. In so-called ‘primitive’ societies, kids learn about life in circumstances that give them food. There’s no supermarket. Therefore, kids learn to smell rain at an early age, so that they can hurry home with the cattle. They know the habit of the ocean so they know when fishing is dangerous. Kids that liv

Call it gambling or gaming, casinos will always be gambling dens.  I don’t have enough money, we always moan.  It is cause for alarm when it shouldn’t be. There is never enough money because it was not meant to be. The ‘enoughness’ is an illusion because money has no value. Believing that we can ever have enough money leads to despair, even suicide in some cases. You’ve seen the despair in gamblers’ faces in  Las Vegas Nevada, Atlantic City New Jersey, Biloxi Mississippi or Sun City South Africa. Men and women sit at those slot machines and pull levers, not for a few minutes but hours. If it wasn’t for bathroom breaks, they’ll be glued to them till casinos close for the day. Some addicts even get attached to certain slot machines. They only play  machines they believe are productive. Isn’t that superstition? Some gamblers feel suicidal when they sit at a machine for a long time and finally give up. You come, sit down and the same machine rains coins. BAD EFFECTS ON FAMILIES Women in So

Photo credit, online pic. Ava DuVernay Selma director and other projects. You are a producer first, and blogger second. Same thing with video projects. What is a producer? The person who never sleeps, thinking about the where, what and how of the next blog or video. I’m a general blogger because the world is my oyster. I write about anything, anytime and nothing at all, when writer’s block is visiting. I respect single-issue bloggers and video producers, because it is stressful. Let’s say, you have a weekly podcast about GRASS. To me, grass is either green or yellow, but as a producer you have a better insight. Does that mean you have something new to say about grass on every weekly video? There are potholes ahead if you don’t think of yourself as a producer. You’ll run out of ideas. You’ll end up stealing, because the internet is a den of thieves, where plagiarism or photo-shop is called ‘trending.’ Lifestyle blogs are popular because of the belief they will end in rich marriages, fam

April 22 is Earth Day. It digitally asks us to get off the phone for a minute and appreciate that all things come from the ground we walk on. Trees for example. We regard them as a nuisance because we rake leaves. Trees are cute in the fall, with their pretty leaves, but ugly in winter, naked and brown. Earth Day is meaningless to farmers. Everyday is Earth Day. They are at nature’s mercy. The earth doesn’t produce when the sun preens itself for months. Rain doesn’t bring relief if it finally arrives in the form of floods. We, who live on concrete streets call the earth dirty, something we avoid at all costs. It smells poverty. Can you imagine walking to school or work on dusty roads, and kids playing with no shoes on? That’s under development. We must send them our old clothes full of bed bugs. It’s difficult for us to appreciate the earth when everything else is against it. Proverbs don’t like it. She treats me like ‘dirt’. There’s hope though. Our opinion doesn’t matter. Kids in cou

Photo credit: online pic, garbage can shows how much paper we waste.  The office printer is lonely these days because of e-mail attachments, and technology such as Cloud. There is nobody waiting in line to use it. Well! It depends where you work. Some offices are still paper based. For example, courts and lawyers need copies of evidence and other kinds of documents. Real estate contracts must be signed before houses can legally pass from sellers to buyers. Government wants you to sign on the dotted line before they give you money for being laid off. The office printer might be lonely because it is not churning out documents but, what it misses the most is human drama. Workers used to huddle around it and gossip about the boss, his haircut, kids and wife. They also consoled each other about not getting the promotion or retrenchment. What the printer doesn’t miss is the push pull about replacing paper. In some offices, secretaries have that special job of pulling the paper tray and refil

Photo credit: online pic. In our resolve to preserve old country atrocities, that brought us to Canada, we forget to say thank you, for the shade provided by your tree. Immigrants, both European and recent, find fault with Canada from time to time.  We forget that we came here because we lived on cabbage and potatoes all year round in the old country; couldn’t sleep at night dreading that knock at dawn when secret police came for a member of the family never to be seen again; scared that jealousy will brand us witches if we are successful or couldn’t marry certain girls because we were regarded as untouchables. We also fled to Canada because we were at war with ourselves over politics and religion. Unfortunately, we still harbour these differences despite Canada being a rolling pin. You roll it over the dough when making pizza, cookies or scones. Canada is like that. The evidence is there in the cleaning industry: shopping malls, hotels, hospitals everywhere. People who tortured each o

Have we done anything new in 2022? Zero. I must think outside the box. The year ‘22 is forcing me to upgrade myself. How? Tik Tok. I think I can tik and tok pretty well, although I don’t have any dance skills. That’s right. The digital landscape doesn’t sleep. Digital roads, cars, trains and planes change all the time, while I’m asleep. Excuse me, I need some shut-eye. It is not acceptable to continue my fog-like existence online. Interested parties cannot find me because I’m only on one highway. What’s wrong with that? How many Autobahns am I supposed to use?  I tried Facebook, or should I say I was forced to sign up. I wanted to write a book. I didn’t have an agent, which meant no publisher. Friends and family said who needs them? Self publish and sell it online. Never listen to friends and family. Mama was a stickler for cleanliness, always doing spring cleaning even in winter. Years passed.  I took a broom and soap, cleaned up reasons why I was on Facebook. Strange people found me.

Pic: Nonqaba waka Msimang. Mothers. They are not trending because they don’t have social media accounts. But the sun never sets in their kids’ eyes for many reasons. Mothers watch them eat, knowing full well there’s nothing left in the pot for themselves. Tampopo , a Japanese film is a comedy, but the most painful scene is a starving family waiting for the father to come home. He rushes in, gives his wife the little food he was able to hustle. She is thin as a rake, obviously very sick, but gets up and tosses something in the frying pan. She watches her husband and the kids eat with a smile on her face. She slumps and dies. Mothers suck bones because they give the best chicken pieces to their kids. They give them all the rice and eat the burnt stuff in the bottom. They divide one orange among kids and don’t set aside a piece for themselves, because there’s no piece to set aside. Mothers go to moneylenders so kids could go to universities or cities to try and harvest money supposedly gr

Means of payment. No cash. Stores told us they prefer digital payment because of COVID-19, the virus that crash-landed on us in 2020. It sneaks in everywhere. Stores were scared it might attach itself to $10 or $20 dollar bills. We swipe or tap bank and credit cards. We even tap with phones. These digital means of payment have also changed questions, friendly or hostile cashiers throw at us. They used to say: Cash or cheque? Not anymore. They see cards in our hands and say: Debit? Credit? We seldom use cheques, but banks still issue them with outdated details. Take the back for example. There’s a line for a signature. Cheques are stale news for two reasons. One: companies pay workers, suppliers, mistresses, traffic tickets everything by direct deposit. Whoosh! The money goes straight into business and personal accounts. Secondly, even if they do, the automatic banking machine at the mall takes cheques and you don’t have to sign them. You punch your account number, select the destinatio

My mother was all that, and more. Architect. Chief Financial Officer. Human Resources Director. Land Surveyor. Customer Service. Chef. Relationship Consultant. Doctor. Dentist. Professor. Security. Counselor. Make that a billion mothers. We observe International Women’s Month to salvage the guilt, that persons that carry life in the womb for nine months, deliver it to the world, nurse it, school it and eventually plan its wedding doesn’t have an auspicious job title. What is fascinating about corporate Canada, America or European Union is title creation. You probably understand, because you once found yourself among six or more managers in a boardroom, debating what to call a new position they just created. Weight. The title must have substance, to justify why they created it and its medal, the salary. The title should trigger awe and respect, when the manager hands out business cards. Women who bear children only have one title: mother. It is mama, in many languages. It is not accorde

Old house renovated into apartments. As you know, how you keep your home determines its price when you put it on the market in 10 or five years’ time. Your grandparents stayed longer because they believed in putting down roots. In 2022, homeowners buy property for a home address and also for investment. How much will we sell this condo/ house for, when we move to another city, get married or be forced to sell due to unfortunate circumstances, like retrenchment or bankruptcy? Keeping your home clean, painting the exterior regularly unless it is brickwork, fixing the fence, keeping the backyard free of old cars, chickens and motorcycles is all part of investment maintenance. Well and good, but food you cook all the time can make or break the selling price. When I’m cooking fish, you can tell as soon as you come through the door. Imagine if I cook it everyday. The flavour will be like a second skin to room air. How will that affect the price? Buyers will offer a lower price because of coo

Renting newly built condos, flats or apartments, instead of 50 year-old ones has its advantages. They might be smaller, walls thin, neighbors’ toilet flush a constant sing song and have open plan, but they do not have tenant left-overs.   Landlords must paint before new tenants move in but unscrupulous landlords don’t. Despite the fresh coat of paint, previous tenants leave certain details behind. They forget re-directing mail to the new address, so bills give the new tenant some clues. The previous tenant was Sean or Susan, Hassan or May Ling. Mail delivery also shows their credit cards, schools they attended, political and religious affiliation. But, a new tenant doesn’t know why birds peck on the kitchen window ledge, even when it’s snowing. It's because the previous tenant used to buy bird feed for his extended family, but didn’t say goodbye. A new tenant might not understand why someone throws stones at his window on Fridays. It happens so often, he finally gets it. The stone

Pumpkin is a hit or miss. You might buy a sweet one. You might get a bland one. Add a teaspoon of sugar if you do. Pumpkin is either a side dish or main course for vegetarians. It is normally steamed or boiled. You can also make pumpkin curry to eat with rice or naan. 1.  Slice pumpkin or butternut into small pieces. In countries like South Africa, Canada or U.K. you can get it already cut-up from the supermarket or food mart. 2.  Cook onion, tomato, slice of ginger, red chiliz and little salt in olivoil for 6m. 3.  Add sliced pumpkin, tablespoon water and cook in low heat for 8. Pumpkin has a lot of water. 4.  Taste, add sugar if pumpkin not sweet. 5.  Serve with rice or naan. You can also eat it with roast chicken, lamb curry of grilled beef.   By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.