As ONE of those seriously unresolved South Africans who longs for “home”, I always promised myself that by the time I’d been in Australia half my life, I would know what I was doing.
I’d commit. Having reached that point, I haven’t exactly done so, but a combination of inertia, real estate and an appreciation of the mundane, among others, keeps us here. Mostly, though it’s because my teenage son is an Aussie who deeply loves his school, home, street and suburb and cares about his football club.
What’s it like? For me, it’s a statement of the obvious: it’s great, if innocuous. I’m lucky, I live with my front door unlocked, my teenager can walk around relatively confidently, I don’t clutch my handbag at all times (though I lose more things out of it than when in Cape Town where I hold on tight) and we don’t get approached by hungry people in the parking lot when shopping for our expensive organic food.
But what’s good is bad: life here lacks edge and interest. It’s like a bubble, especially in the eastern suburbs of Sydney where I live – as do many other South Africans. You won’t find us out in the sticks among the bogans – def: “an uncouth or unsophisticated person”; example: “Some bogans yelled at us from their cars”.
Denne historien er fra April 2017-utgaven av Noseweek.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent ? Logg på
Denne historien er fra April 2017-utgaven av Noseweek.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
Lennie The Liquidator Faces R500,000 Defamation Suit
After losing his cool when his fees were questioned
Panel Beater De Luxe
Danmar Autobody and its erstwhile directors get a serious panel beating in court papers. Corruption and theft are said to have destroyed the firm chaired by Nelson Mandela’s eldest daughter, leaving 200 workers destitute and threatening to kill.
Meet Covid Diarist Ronald Wohlman
Ronald Wohlman – EX SOUTH African copywriter, author, and actor – never dreamt that his lockdown diaries, written on Facebook and followed by people all over the world – would become his “life’s work”.
A Picture Of Peace?
Beware: Appearances can be deceptive
Flogging A (Battery-Driven) Dead Horse
Why plug-in vehicles are not all they’re cracked up to be– and, likely, never will be
Everybody Drinks Corona
I am hesitant to go Into the pub today. Not because it’s illegal, but there is a crème colored 1985 Mercedes 300D parked behind the pine tree. This means the devil is inside; that’s what we call Dr. De Villiers. You don’t know whether you will encounter the good doctor with the charming bedside manner or the violent, bipolar bully. The problem is, most of the time, you can never be sure which it is, so it’s best to always keep a social distance.
Never Take A Hypochondriac To A Pandemic
From Ronald Wohlman’s New York Corona Diary
The money train
Transnet in court battle with liquidators of Gupta-linked audit firm over R57m in ‘corrupt’ payments and invoices
‘He's no pharmaceutical genius, he's a vulture'
Pharma con seeks prison release to ‘help find Covid cure’
Bush school – A memoir
OUR SCHOOL WAS IN THE MIDDLE of the bush, ten miles from the nearest town in the harsh beauty of the Zimbabwean highveld. It started life in World War II as No 26 EFTS Guinea Fowl, a Royal Air Force elementary flying training school and I arrived there in 1954, just seven years after it became an all-white co-ed state boarding school.