Nonqaba said ...

Tik Tok and YouTube are the new initiation schools, but there are still some pockets in the world where kids are initiated into their world, determined by the following: Land : is it near rivers, oceans, forests, mountains, prairie or deserts? Food : how to collect food from the above sources. Transport : in the desert, camels are a form of transport. Lesotho is a country full of mountains so kids ride donkeys. I once saw a woman speeding by on a donkey. Locals were amused by my surprise. Games : a tree is a whole town council. In ancient Nigeria, the palm tree provided everything people needed, even palm wine. Trees also provide sticks for boys looking after cattle. That’s where they learn the game of stick fighting. Language : all this is in the language. THE SCHOOL SYSTEM The European system of education is rooted in money. Kids are groomed to being consumers and producers of things to be sold. However, some schools still recognize the importance of traditional systems of child deve

Big olives. Grew up on steroids, are we? Olives. It is one taste I don’t intend to acquire. I’ve acquired a few things in my lifetime because I went to school here and there and lived over there and beyond, against my will most of the time.  One of them is olive oil, but I can’t stand one tiny olive. Is it a nut, fruit or vegetable? Not that it matters, because it tastes bitter. I’ve chewed some olives before, especially when I was with friends who were trying to board the ‘sophisticated’ bus. Yes. Sometimes we acquire certain tastes, just to belong. My tongue refuses to belong to olives. I had to go across town last week to buy sardines. You see, most grocery stores carry sardines and tuna canned in water. Not for me. I love sardines in olive oil. I was surprised when I saw the olives in this blog pic. They look humongous. Are they steroid olives, or are they the natural size found on trees in Tunisia, Greece or Italy? I know the small ones restaurants will put in your drink or pasta.

U.S.A. gymnast Simone Biles, is part of the 2024 U.S. Team that won gold at the Paris Olympics, a few days ago. Privilege and class come from parents, who got it from grandparents who got it from great grandparents. The British class system with the king as the head, is the definitive example. That’s why Britain has something called ‘working class’ because they worked for men who owned land and people in Scotland, Wales, Ireland, Africa, Canada, U.S., Caribbean and throughout the British Empire. The working class was told education can elevate them to some sort of privilege and wealth, despite their accents that instantly define their class, when they open their mouths.  Pygmalion  the book, has been made into a thousand plays and movies. The working class is getting even by acquiring privilege and wealth through sports and entertainment, thanks to television. The internet and its tentacles is a recent thing, but has quadrupled the fame. The new class is nurtured by men and women who m

Venus Williams, has one of the best serves in tennis, in my opinion.  Her sister, Serena's serve is non-returnable, but I like Venus' nonetheless. There are so many things on our mind, all related to body and soul as in rent, mortgage, hydro and pots on the stove. That’s why it’s difficult to keep up with external forces like the English language because it changes all the time. I only understood the acronym G.O.A.T. this year 2023. I kid you not. It turns out it means: the G reatest O f A ll T ime. Sports podcasts love it. They are always looking for the baseball, basketball and football G.O.A.T. I was never interested in what it means because of real goats that bleat while tied to a pole. It is a cry for help but they know it’s useless. They might belong to parents of a son who wants to marry a girl on the other side of the village. His parents will give them to her parents as an introduction, just an introduction of their son’s honorable intention. Watch Yemi Alade’s music v

  New country. New agenda. New freedom. “I’m outside.” “Where?” “Your house.” “Is it raining?” ”No.” “It’s raining where I am.” I have no business showing up at your residence without notice and expect electronic gates and main doors to welcome me with open arms. Yes, we are supposed to be best friends or close cousins, but it’s a new day, a new country, a new agenda and a new dollar. Canadians and Americans have parents and grandparents that come from some where else. They got off the plane or ship with values of hospitality and brotherhood. The original settlers from Europe  share the same policy with immigrants that landed here ten years ago. Policy? Yes. Open door policy because whether it is Europe, Africa, Asia or Afghanistan, we all come from the open door policy of dropping by, unannounced. “I was in the neighbourhood. That’s why I decided to drop by and check up on you,” This is Canada and America. Yes, we were born in the same village in Africa, Italy, Ukraine or India but su

If you speak Technology across the board, you can work from home for a business on the other side of the globe. It has been happening for quite some time. That’s why parents do not understand how sons and daughters prefer to be in tech, and not go to university to become doctors and lawyers. Education is for commerce, to enable kids to function in activities that put food on the table and money in the government wallet. That is why school subjects are discarded and new ones added. Once upon a time, universities taught Philosophy. Apparently, it helped in the thinking process, to reason logically. Latin was once a requirement for law students. What universities did not teach is that Philosophy had its origin in drawing rooms of the upper class, dukes, lords, earls and other titled men who had time on their hands. Men who have never had dirt in between their nails because they had servants. That is why they had time to ponder. Education is for commerce. That is why there are subjects lik

Don't even think about stealing this handbag I've created. It's copyrighted. I also put a code in there to stop factories in China from reproducing it for you. What do they say in the movies? "It's not a threat, it's a promise." Like my creation? Clever are we? Yes I am, if I may say so myself. Seriously though, this unique handbag is inspired by small handbags carried by actresses, movie producers, registered businesswomen, after dark and cash-app  women, new wives of singers, actors, ball players and comedians with ten children and of course, ‘trust fund’ babies. I’m not on a first name basis with these women for obvious reasons, but what I want to know is the capacity of these handbags. From the poverty ground where I’m standing, I think you can only put a cellphone, the car remote and lip gloss in there. I toyed with the idea of adding a small make-up bag, but ditched it. They are too small for that. Don’t get me wrong, I understand that these bags are

Baby boy's bike has those wheels Americans call 'trainers.' New job. New  foreman. New office. New workshop. New route. New uniform. New work vehicle. New safety standards. There is always on-the-job training. It is a fact of life, even for U.S.  Vice President Kamala Harris, despite her business suit pockets, overflowing with academic and on-the-job experience. She seems to be taking the November 5  training, like a duck to water. How about trainers? Who trains new employees? It depends. The Human Resources Manager might take you around. In other workplaces, the manager you will be reporting to trains you or gives that responsibility to the best worker on the floor. The person who has been on the job longer might resent it, but the manager might have his reasons. Maybe the older worker is no longer into his work anymore and has a “I don’t know what I’m still doing here,” attitude. That is not the right person to train new employees. He might indoctrinate them with short cu

Countries like Spain are protesting against the influx of tourists. Property is one of the reasons. Tourists buy houses and apartments and rent them to locals, who cannot afford the rent. Tourists are good business for most cities. In Africa and the Pacific, they check out elephants and lions or waterfalls. Some do niche tourism, like Japanese golfers that fly to South Africa every year, just to tee. Tourists also buy necklaces and other mementos made in China.  In Paris and Rome, they buy bags and shoes with French and Italian names, but manufactured in factories, somewhere in China. Tourists are also a source of amusement for local people because some look sad. They can smell a tourist a mile away. How? Tourists and locals wear the same clothes: leggings, summer shorts, t-shirts with messages, baseball caps, flip flops or hoodies?  Believe me, they do. Whatever you do, don’t advertise yourself by hanging that camera around your neck. Definitely a no, no, in some countries. Most local

Some countries in Europe do not want tourists anymore. I never thought there'll come a time when Europe would resist tourism. Resistance to change is an accusation which presupposes that change has one attribute, good. It’s not good to people who resist it. Therefore, make it two attributes: good and bad. Let’s assume change is good, like when we changed grocery bags from brown paper to plastic. It was a great time for grocery chains because the plastic bag had their names and logo, all shiny and bright. Time passed. Plastic was all over city streets, rivers and drains. It replaced weeds and flowers. City birds pecked the plastic thinking it was food. We are back to square one with brown grocery bags. Change we initially thought was good turned out to be the environment’s enemy. Resistance to change can be personal. Some people do not have cellphones and laptops because they don’t want to be in bondage, having every aspect of their lives regarded as ‘data’ which is used in many way

I was happy to see food produced where I rest my head. Supermarket fruit and vegetables are grown across the sea. Money. Everything has a price tag. Behind every price tag is a country where the dress was made, the mango was grown, the sugar cane was cut, the salmon was fished, pasta was dried and packaged and where socks were made. I was glad to see these tomatoes with a ‘Canada’ tag. Food is a business, whether I like it or not. But it’s still wrong to buy garlic that entered Canada through a group visa: thousands of garlic bulbs from China tightly packed in shipping containers, while Canadian farmers produce the same product. I know they can, because of farmers markets. If Canada has soil, it can also produce garlic. If Canada receives the sun (thank God Elon Musk cannot buy it), it can also produce garlic. If Canada receives rain, it can also produce garlic. No country tag on this garlic. It's from the local farmers' market. Farmers from other countries understand the pligh

What is your favorite summer color? Green. Weeds also love green. That is why they are most buoyant during the summer. They are uninvited guests. They are called ukhula in Zulu. It comes from the verb - khula  which means to grow. Weeds take the whole field but they don’t have a plural in Zulu. They are called one thing u-khu-la , singular. You say the first part like uber , the second like cool and the third part like last. What was interesting about British education in Africa, was being taught about your country through English eyes. The school system taught us that weeds are foreign invasive plants. As Africans, we did not understand the foreign part. Who brought them and how did they travel? We knew about weeds u-khula . Weeds do as they please, that’s why neighbors came together to weed my field today, yours tomorrow and someone else’ next week. It was called ilima , a community agricultural initiative. What we also didn’t understand is that these foreign invasive plants have Lat

Theft can only occur if there is something to steal. There were news reports from one country a few years ago, about thieves that only broke into homes to wine and dine. Well! Not wine. But they ransacked refrigerators, sat down and ate everything that could be eaten without cooking. They left a mess. That’s how owners knew about the uninvited guests. As for my identity, it cannot be stolen because it is empty. It is also protected by my name. There is no thief dead or alive that can pronounce my name and I understand names are the bone structure of identity theft. Bank Manager:  What’s your name sir? Identity Thief:  My name is qo-ngqa ……. (thief twists his tongue. It chokes him to death right there, on the bank’s marble floor). Now, let’s surmise thieves can miraculously pronounce my name correctly, what will they find in my accounts? Nada . I don’t have a kobo to my name   (Nigerian for penny/cent). I don’t even know why I’m wasting my time on possibilities and probabilities because

Cellphones. Who needs a family when we have the internet? It’s amazing how we kill each other because of ideology, religion and borders when we are the same. This day, this minute throughout the world, we are all doing the same thing, in seclusion away from people we live with, to ‘talk’ to our phones. His. Hers. It becomes a war if she touches his phone. Ringtone goes off like waves. Husband answers his phone. After the call she says:   Who was that ? A marriage certificate does not give partners the right to question incoming calls, let alone touch someone’s phone and go through text messages and phone history. I’ve seen many movies where couples go for counselling before they get married. Some churches insist on it, but do they have a module on cellphones? They should, because it can cause friction between the two. I saw one movie where the wife smelt a rat because the husband changed his phone’s password. They used to know each other’s passwords. It was quite a unique arrangement.

We call people we love. The rest we text. It seems as if sending text messages (called SMS in southern Africa), is more popular than hearing a human voice. That would be ironic because cellphones were touted as the best thing since sliced bread due to expected results. More people will have phones. They will call each other more. Communication will be instant and anywhere. No more sitting at home staring at that phone or taking the handset to the garden or garage, because you are waiting for a call. Business was also excited about cellphones’ multiplier effect. How? They would increase the number of people calling to order goods and services. That was the expectation. More of everything, generated by calling more people and service providers like doctors, hotels or stores. In the euphoria of having phones in our back pockets and handbags, we didn’t take notice of the text or SMS feature until, human nature kicked in. We started texting when our feelings and circumstances changed. Love

It’s only fiction, but I’m currently touring a book about fake doctors in a sanitarium. The problem is: residents are not mad. Fake doctors with fake certificates on the wall are giving them drugs to make them mad. It’s only fiction, but does this happen? I suppose it does because people become garbage after a certain age. We don’t want them at work, and definitely not at home, so we throw them out to old age homes and sanitariums. Wait! It’s only families with money that can afford these old age or mental institutions. Mental institutions whose aim is to make a profit, easily get away with inhuman practices because families do not care. They don’t know medication given to residents to make them ‘calm.’ Families pay for room and board to hold old relatives that are past their due date, liabilities to the good life young families are striving for. They are an embarrassment when we have visitors. We condemn cruelty to senior citizens, but we forget that it was their choice. They lived al

Cause of death, passwords? What can I say? These bank cards have the same color so, sometimes I punch wrong passwords and the machine blinks: incorrect password . I’m going to pass out any minute now.    No, I did not have a drink from a bottle of a man called Johnnie or inhaled some medicinal weed.   I’m going to pass out from passwords.  I understand the need to have a password for the bank.   I don’t want loved ones and enemies to know the contents of my accounts, because I don’t have any money contents in there.   What I don’t understand is the need to have a password for anything I want to do online.    Why do crocodiles pretend they are logs in the river, and then yawn and eat me up when I step on the fake logs?   Someone has the answer, but I must sign up to get it. Another password to remember?    I don’t think so.    I can’t use 1-2-3-4 or ABCD.    Such mundane passwords are not allowed.    People with a low I.Q. like yours truly are not encouraged to apply. I forget complicat

What is life? I think it’s about crossing, but it’s not that simple. That is why City Hall made pedestrian crossings, train crossings and traffic lights with green, amber, red. Communist and free (capitalist) countries don’t like each other very much, but they agree on these 3 colors. Maybe life is not difficult per se . We should take the blame because pedestrian crossings are there, but we prefer jaywalking. We also indulge in love, health, budgeting, career and addiction jaywalking. Example. It doesn’t mean that because the speedometer goes all the way to 200, we should let loose and drive at 160 kilometers an hour. There are speed limits everywhere. Even the autobahn in Germany has speed limits, in some sections. We also like health jaywalking, eating and drinking, more than what we can eat and drink. You heard me right. We are also notorious for love jaywalking, being with people and in places that are dangerous for mind and body. You also see us on television holding placards we

You have a million subscribers on the internet. That’s cool, as kids put it, but you have only two people who love you. Something is off. Parents left the old neighbourhood to give you a ‘better life’ which is obvious in the expensive truck you drive at your age and all the digital bling bling. You even have a real recording studio at home, but sometimes you feel disjointed. Maybe spending  the summer with your uncle, might blunt that. I’m not suggesting moving back to the old neighbourhood because it’s not a good idea. Some of us tried it, to show people we grew up with that living abroad has not changed us. We’re still the same, eat the same food, sweep the yard and have not forgotten the mother tongue. They thought otherwise. You can spend the summer driving your uncle across the country, to places where he has been and places on his wish list, but never came to pass. First of all, lets define ‘uncle’ in Zulu, an African language. Malume is uncle, and it means your mother’s brothers

Poker film from Hong Kong. God of Gamblers, arguably one of the best poker films ever made.  What is a poker face? I don’t know what poker face is because I’ve never played poker before. All I know is that it’s a game of cards because Baba (daddy) taught me how to play it. It’s called ‘cards’ where I was born. “Where’s your dad?” “He’s playing cards with the next-door uncle.” Is that poker? I don’t know. Baba taught me the basics. There’s a queen, a king, an ace, spades, diamonds and what? I think I’m forgetting something. These cards have a hierachy with points attached. The queen and king of the castle are important obviously, but that little guy, the ace, is lord of the manor. Yes. The British even have a proverb: he has an ace up his sleeve. Example? Donald Trump has the Supreme Court up his sleeve. A tried and tested winner. I thought Baba was the greatest thing on earth, followed by my mother’s elder brother. One. He was a carpenter and taught me how to design window covers call

Being the first born child is a full-blown privilege. You heard me right. My parents taught me how to read and write, wash, iron, sew, cook, clean, braid hair, handle money, travel to grandparents’ house, take the bus to uncle’s office where he was the newspaper editor, harvest grandma’s beans and sweet potatoes and recite the family’s praise poetry (izibongo). Parents also funnel survival skills to the first born child. My father was a carpenter. That is why I know a little bit about wood, hinges, nails, hand saws, sand paper, paints and brushes. It’s a good thing daddy used to say fetch that, put it there, careful with that hammer, because I find myself ‘aisle shopping’ in hardware stores. It’s partly amusement because despite this digital age, they still carry tools daddy had in his tool box. No. He did not have a whole workshop in the basement like some of the houses I see online. I even know what DIY means. Caught you! You don’t. I’m writing about this because of the internet. I’v

Feeding geese? Those birds are watching you around their kids. Birds of a feather flock together, is an English language proverb that is quite elastic. You interpret it to further your intention, but I can also use it to upset that intention or agenda. At face value, the proverb  is about colors and plumage. The little blue jays have been flying around since the beginning of time because they flock together, give birth, raise children who grow up to be adults and the circle continues. Parrots. Doves. Geese. Ducks. Same thing. That is the literal interpretation of birds of a feather flock together. Sharing the same idea and ideals is the wider interpretation that transcends the forest, trees or rivers where birds live. The same color and plumage presupposes there is no conflict. It assumes that birds from the same plumage think alike. I once thought like that until I saw geese fighting on the river. It left me disjointed about the beauty of nature because it never occurred to me that th