Facebook Files - Local Events

Having dealt in a skittish sort of way with some of my facebook postings this year concerning international affairs I thought I’d finish this sorry story by recounting some more local postings, peppered with random photographs - 

Snail fit for a main course . . .

Man’s best friend; after Yorick the Cat, 

Hamlet the Dog, and Susan the Goldfish

 - I give you Garry the Ghecko! Highly 

trained Mozzi catcher - non-toxic and 

you don't have to light his coil every night.

Work and more Work

I really do try not to impose work related issues on my facebook page. Why should my mundane issues be any more interesting than anyone else’s? But just occasionally the daily grind, the quotidian plod yields a nugget or two of humour – usually self depreciating of course!

Some days into a fairly dense legal proceeding the 95 or so handwritten pages of notes is testament to the weight of the matter. One of the Attorneys remarked that I am writing in shorthand. “No, not really,” I said modestly, “I just write fast & shorten a word or two here and there.” But on checking my notes I find that I have written in shorthand - but I’m buggered if I know what system I’ve used . . . or who is going to decipher it . . .

I consider myself to be very lucky. As Consultants we deal with a very broad range of projects - in a very broad range of roles. I recently had an enjoyable eight or so days traversing the country in connection with a national housing project. Aside from a Ugandan colleague I was the only non-Swazi on this expedition. One incident prompted the following necessarily long (and admittedly self absorbed) post -

So there I was visiting a rural police station with colleagues to inspect potential development sites.

The station commander introduced himself with excessive politeness by saying “My name is Crocodile – I like to explain my name to non-Swazis.” “Ah Babe Ngwenya,” I responded, quick as a flash and very pleased with myself. “Very pleased to meet you.” My colleagues and the accompanying Top Cop from HQ all grinned, and I thought were almost on the point of applauding my grasp of siSwati, the lack of which had been the subject of some earlier discussion.

Mr. Ngwenya’s two i/c stepped forward and introduced herself. “And I am Mrs. Zebra.” Nonplussed and temporarily speechless my mind went blank until I finally stammered through the ensuing laughter - “Good Morning Make Zebra.”

Hoist once again by my own petard!

I did manage to make a recovery on leaving by saying to Mrs. Zebra "Sala kahle Make Dube." My new found knowledge courtesy of a soto voce briefing from Mr. Crocodile

Nkoyoyo Sunset - from the album
"African Skies"

In contrast to “hard” development issues we also deal with the “softer” social issues, like telling potentially affected people about projects.

It’s been a funny sort of a day. Facilitated a Scoping Meeting this morning. 100 + community members attended. My words of wisdom were translated into siSwati by my colleague JB. I can usually judge the “pause place” to allow for translation, but at the end of one particularly convoluted explanation JB looked at me and said with a grin, “Steve - what was the last thing you said?” and I said “I can’t remember.” He laughed at me, and I laughed at him, and the expectant audience laughed at both of us. I do like this sort of work!

This post was reacted to by Bheki Makhubu who posted the following wonderful nugget -  

Reminds me of a story I have heard of King Sobhuza II speaking to the nation at the national kraal in siSwati and his words translated into English. At one point when the interpreter had spoken, the king leaned towards him and said "angikasho njalo", which means "I didn't say that."

This next posting falls quite neatly into the grumpy old man category and I’m slightly ashamed to include it here, and am equally ashamed to admit that it is true.

Sometime ago I put a box by my office door with a notice over it saying "Please deposit guns and cell phones and retrieve on leaving." The gun threat has receded but other people's cell phones continue to pollute my space. Am I a lone voice? Oh - and I had to take the notice down because people stopped visiting me . . . . .

Of course one is not just a worked in the infrastructure development sector but also a citizen and consumer.

Open letter to the Mbabane City maintenance department: - Dear Mr. Shongwe, as a resident of our fair city I would like to applaud your departments efforts in dealing with all the pot-holes that have popped up following the recent rains; however I do have a question. Why is it that while the vast proportion of potholes are either round or oval, the repairs and patches are always square or oblong? Yours etc….. PS I do hope you respond favourably to my recent friend request.

Pot-holes on the Komati River 

That Other Social Networking Device . . .

In a sort of desperate dream-world I decided to really fling myself out there and sign up to Twitter. Anything for a bit of self advertisement

Okay - I give up! Some time ago I signed up on (to?) Twitter. (Are you allowed to talk about twitter on facebook?). After a couple of months I still don't know what the point is. What do you do? What information are you supposed to get? How do you connect with - and who? And I don't understand the few tweets I've looked at. Am I completely alone in this morass of ignorance - this (apparently) quagmire? And why are 5 people following me and I've done nothing (and I don't know them!) (1/7/2013)

I did get some responses to this pathetic cry for help, principally along the lines of “don’t waste your time with things that are clearly well beyond your meagre intellect.”

So I just received an email from a nice chap (I assume - both the chapiness and the niceness) saying I'd been mentioned in a twitter conversation, which is jolly nice. But the extent of the "mention" is - @SmitchSteve together with a whole list of other similar @so-andso's and no explanatory text.

So –

·         WTF?

·         What am I expected to do?

·         What is it telling me?

·         Am I doomed to be a mere "@" and never a "#"?

·         Is this my planet?

I need help from at least - xxxxyy & sympathy from yyyxxxxy, and anyone else who can be bothered! (27/9/2013)

. . . and Adverts . . .

There is something about the web that induces an asinine fog in advertisement copywriters, or perhaps it is just that anyone can now do it? Either way it’s a rich source that needs to be mined sometime.

I’ve just come across this daft triumphalist piece of advertising on the web page of a well known software supplier:– “HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE, ENGINEERED TO WORK TOGETHER” Isn’t this a bit like saying – “TOOTH BRUSHES – GOOD FOR TEETH” Or, “CARS – FOR DRIVING FORWARDS ON ROADS” Or, . . . . . . . . (25/6/2013)

Mind you the fault often lies with the reader . . .

So I had clicked on an interesting advertorial, and then forgot about it until I got round to looking at the url at the top of the screen but could not for the life of me remember what I had clicked on – until I opened it and then remembered that it was about spotting five signs that you will suffer from Alzheimer’s. I didn’t read any further to discover what the other four were. (13/8/2013)

Starting price for green beans - E3. Managed
to negotiate it up to E6. Always
prided myself on my bargaining skills

. . .  and Blogging . . .

Back the nub of all this – writing! I receive an inordinate number of anonymous comments that the blogging platform is good enough to filter out – but I do sometimes read them and particularly liked this one which I reported on-

A recent response to my blog -

"You really make it appear really easy with your presentation but I to find this topic
to be actually one thing that I feel I might by no means understand. It seems too complex and very broad for me. I'm looking forward on your subsequent submit, I'll attempt to get the cling of it!"

On the face of it a little odd but quite nice - except that the posting in question was another whimsical piece about my cat - not exactly intellectually challenging - and the comment ended with an invitation to a web page about penis enlargement cream. My battered confidence has taken a turn for the worse . . . , but I am clinging to it . . .

Finally, just occasionally, out of the blue comes a bolt of hope.

I was at Waterford Kamhlaba School on the day of the celebration of 50 years in existence and bumped into this chap while I was making coffee for myself in the Development Office, and he said to me: –

“Are you from the BBC?” To which I replied, quick as a flash, “No, not really, at the moment . . .. Why? Who are you from?” (Clever hey?) And he said, “I’m from the Guardian.” To which I said, ...“Oh Gosh! I was brought up on the Guardian. Swaddled in old editions as a babe in arms I was during cold winter nights to keep me warm in my Parents hovel; that was after they’d burnt all the furniture of course.”

“Goodness me he exclaimed – there’s obviously a short story there; maybe even a blog article”! “Funny you should say that,” I gasped at the sheer audacity of the idea, “Aside from being a boring old Quantity Surveyor I happen to be a serial and obsessive blogger.” “Well Gosh”, he rejoined. “Tell you what – anything you write I guarantee I will get published in the Guardian.” “Wow!”, I said. That’s awfully decent of you.” “Not a bit of it old chap,” he said with a grin, unfolded his wings, and lifted off towards the squash courts . . . . . . ., and then I woke up.

But I live in perpetual, if not a little misguided hope.

Yorick woke up this morning to glorious 
sunlight,and thought "God-wot, I seem to have 
missed last Saturday! I'll just hang around until the next one."

Yorick woke up this morning and said "Morning? 
What's good about it? Its wet, windy and cold. 
Forsooth - I'll wait for Saturday."

Facebook Files - World Events

I was a slow starter but once I got going on Facebook I took to it like a mouse maddened by temptingly smelly cheese balanced on a delicately set mouse trap. But rather than posting unappetising photos of my breakfast or passing on soppy aphorisms with underlying threats of death and disease if I didn’t pass them on I have tended to fire off pithy, or thought provoking, or allegedly amusing posts with the sole intent of eliciting responses. Some have resulted in a satisfying flurry of responses, and some have been complete blanks.

Current events of 2013 have of course been a rich source of comment and I also had fun in posting thought provoking photographs.

The Royal Baby July 2013

And we all love a royal birth don’t we? I was glued to this breaking news for two whole days:-

The Times of Swaziland bill board this morning; "Duchess Kate Gets a Boy". Well it was a delivery I suppose . . . . . .(23/7/2013)

Can I just say that I am really beginning to enjoy The Royal Baby Story. It’s as if the entire media world has just slipped into LaLa Land . . . . . (23/7/2013)

According to the BBC Online Duchess Kate's Mum said that her Grandson is "absolutely beautiful". Well she's hardly likely to say "he looks like a frog" now is she? (23/7/2013)

George Alexander Louis - GAL for short. I don't think they've really thought this through - the First Form boys at Eton are going to have field day! (24/7/2013)

Just occasionally you see a sign

that defies further description!

The copyright on this photo is MINE!

8/11/2013

Crime & Security

From East Africa - 

So the Kenyan National Police Commissioner has been sent a severed head in a box with an accompanying message saying "You are next". The police say they are interpreting it as a death threat. Gosh these guys are on the ball!

Our own traffic cops can certainly not be faulted for their dedication to duty.

Dear Commissioner Magagula. I write to you in your capacity as Police Boss, and would like to firstly congratulate you on the fine job your boys (and girls) in blue do in reeling in the criminals of our society. Indeed I was rightly nabbed the other day for the heinous offence (forgive the vocabulary  – but I’ve been spending far too much time with my lawyer ‘friends’ lately!) of having a cracked windscreen. Can I however suggest that the smart place to catch more of us miscreants would be to position your troops at traffic lights so that when the lights change to red the officers can leap out and carry out ad hoc windscreen inspections.  A winning formula providing of course that the officers do not get mown down by all the drivers who regard the green light as “go”, amber as “go before it gets to red” and red as “go faster before it gets to green again”. Is there I wonder a direct connection between the proliferation of cracked windscreens and national colour blindness? In which case well done in catching the problem at its source!

We are no slouches either when it comes to private investigators.

The Swazi Observer today reported a quote from our famed Private Investigator Hunter Shongwe - "I am not like Jesus who said when someone slaps you on the left chick you should also give him the right chick. I don’t forgive that easily" Is this taking being Streetwise a tad too far; or am I confusing this with Kentucky Fried Cheekin?

Bit of behavioural guidance . . .17/12/2012

World Affairs

No – I have not burst into posts about Hollywood Starlet’s and Basket Ball players, but I have commented on even dafter people –

Oh Dear, oh dear oh dear. So Justin Bieber has been rebuked by the UK Office for Budget Responsibility for being a tad economical with the truth about recent economic facts - and David Cameron has been caught out for being a fresh faced turd with more influence than should be allowed to any public personality. No hang on a mo, have I got this quite right?

In August a daft organisational story broke.

So the UK Ministry of Defence has admitted administrative & computer errors leading to the expenditure of 40,000 pounds sterling on phone calls to an automated "speaking clock". There are so many angles to this bizarre story that even my overactive imagination has become overloaded! My initial reaction is thank God I'm not living there - with this level of competence I don't think I would feel particularly safe from a defence point of view. My second thought is that with this level of competence I don't think I would feel particularly safe from an attack point of view! People of the UK - should you not be really very, very worried?

November saw a mouth watering incident in America which should be a rich source of further scatological investigation.

LA Airport is in the throes of "multi patient incident". This, in this instance, is a euphemism for "someone with a firearm has shot a number of people". And I've just realised the true meaning of a "Euphemism". It means something has just occurred that we are actually (yet again) deeply disturbed about but to disguise our embarrassment we are somehow downgrading the severity of the event by shrouding it in mundane and intentionally misleading descriptions. Or perhaps I am being oversensitive.

A new verb swung across my field of vision, one with which I think English Teachers could have an absolute field day. “Potts Minor.” “Yessir?” “Conjugate the following verb.”

I've just discovered a new word - Twerking - thanks to a chick called Miley Cyrus -and apparently it’s gone viral. 'Twerking is a dance move that involves a person shaking the hips in an up-and-down bouncing motion, causing the dancer to shake, "wobble" and "jiggle."' So I'm told by Wikipedia. My cat Yorick - who is also a celebrity - has being doing this manoeuvre with the dogs for months. So what's the news?

A Competition
In November and apropos of absolutely nothing I set a little competition, a geo-photographic quiz, which went like this -

One of these photos is of a slab of rock, and the other is of a slab of landscape; or to put it another way the distance from camera to subject is 1.34km for one and about 1.34m for the other. Guesses? 6/11/2013

Photo B

Photo A

Facebook

Facebook administration is itself also a source of amusement and sometimes intense frustration – if you let it get to you.

I'm getting "suggested posts" on my main facebook page (by "main" I mean the bit in the middle!). These are adverts by any other name - and I don't want them! Is anyone else afflicted in the same way; and is there a way of stopping this? I signed up to be in contact with friends that I have chosen. I have not chosen to be friends with (for instance) “#^>%< Paints” - of whom I know nothing, and what’s more don't want to know about.

This became a bit of mantra.

They're back again - like a rash - “#^>%< Paints”. I keep un-friending them, but they keep bouncing back again. "Who will rid me of this troublesome Paint?" (13/4/2013)

“#^>%< Paints”! They're back again! They're like dandruff on a shirt collar. Just can't get rid of it. Surely there is the social media equivalent of "Head and Shoulders"? (18/7/2013)

No one seemed to be able to help so I went straight to the top and faithfully reported the results

Dear Facebook,

I recently sent the following complaint to you -

"I am getting adverts posted on my news feed. Please remove them – I do not want them. They are intrusive. Of all the changes made to fb over the past two or so years this is the one that would most persuade me to cancel my facebook subscription and find another social network platform. I wonder if you will pick this comment up and respond directly - I somehow doubt it!"

You replied directly to my email address as follows -

"Hi, Thanks for your feedback. We're constantly trying to improve Facebook, and your input is important to us. Unfortunately, we can't respond to individual feedback emails, but we are reading them. "

I do not believe that you ARE reading mine, or anyone else's feedback; but I know you CAN do because Mr Edward Snowden has said so. Now is your chance to prove to me and my fb friends that you really DO read my and other people's feedback.

I look forward to your reply, Cheers! (23/7/2013)

I’m still waiting!

"Good to be heading home" thought the 

Great Turtle of the South as it floated through 

the cool untroubled waters of a Western 

sun-set sky. 21/7/2013

Frames 2

I had expected the old man to listen to our tale and make an appointment for a later date and an insitu inspection, but no, this does not happen. He dons a long beaded necklace with what look like sharks teeth (but aren’t) around his neck and under his arm like a bandolier (frames 1).

He pushes a small enamel bowl over towards me. It is heaped with an assortment of objects, primary among which are what appear to be the knuckles from the spine of a medium sized mammal, each well polished and yellowing and tied round with wire. There are a couple of large shells. He indicates that I am to make a loose fist with my hand and blow through it onto the objects. I do so. He takes back the bowl and gathers the objects in both hands and clutching them together as a large fist thumps his hands hard on the ground a couple times and releases the objects which scatter across the reed mat.

As the objects settle I see a couple of dice, two or three small domino tiles, sundry stones and metal disks and other small bits and pieces. In all there must be fifty or so objects.

The old man talks a lot, Sibusiso listens attentively and my mind drifts.

Here I am sitting in the hut of a respected Sangoma seeking his help in the matter of three missing window frames. A petty crime that the conventional police will not be in the least interested in and one that the community police who are too far away to be concerned with will also be of no use. Besides it would take half a day to get either of them out there. An appeal to the umphakatsi, the chiefs traditional homestead, would be laughable; they have far more pressing matters to attend to, and anyway the property lies betwixt and between two chieftaincies and of course I don’t know where the felons hale from.

Kuthula Cottage from Hawane Hill

My expectation was for the Sangoma to have come to the farm, conducted an insitu inspection and made many loud and very public incantations of a threatening nature to warn off the perpetrators. This is how I understand the psychology of the witch doctors craft. Perhaps I’m wrong!

During my reverie the old man, the Sangoma has been throwing the bones (I have to call them “bones” although this is a misnomer given the predominance of other un-bone like objects). Every so often he takes up a shiny metal tube in the shape of an old fashioned police whistle and gently blows into it giving a mournful kazoo like sound. He reads more information from the bones. He tells us we have lost money from the cottage – which is true, and I am hugely impressed by his knowledge of this incident. He tells us that there are three miscreants, that one of them is female and that they make a living stealing. I want to ask if they specialise in window frames or do they do door frames and roof sheets as well – but don’t, fearing that it might be regarded as a frivolous question.

He throws the bones again and, as he bends over them there is a harsh intervention of a ringing cell phone. My cell phone is on silent and I look daggers at Sibusiso, but it is the Sangoma who delves into his shirt and brings out a small pouch from around his neck from which he pulls out a phone, looks at the screen and answers it. With a shudder of delight I wonder if the spirits have also embraced the electronic age. Or perhaps this is a complainant for whom a love potion has gone pear-shaped, or maybe it’s the wife reminding him to get some cooking oil on the way home.

A Sangoma sitting on my shelf.
With due acknowledgements to the comic genius
of the late Austin Hleza

The phone call is finished and the Sangoma is continuing with the bone throwing. I nudge Sibusiso and murmur that there has been no mention of money and payment. This is something that I am getting a little concerned about. What if the consultation fee is greater than the value of the window frames? I’ll look an utter idiot and will be too embarrassed to recount this story. Sibusiso murmurs back that payment will only be due when we get the frames back, “cash-on-delivery” as it were. I am greatly impressed and the few lingering doubts that I have had about this process are completely dissipated.

The consultation seems to be coming to a close. I sense this, not because the demeanour of the Sangoma has altered in any way, but because he has stopped throwing the bones and is now carefully tearing a page of the Times of Swaziland to make a large square shape. He carefully glances over the classified deaths column before he finally tears off the redundant strip - perhaps to see if he recognises any old clients? He reaches across the low table of sundry containers and selects a deep off-white plastic screw-topped container from which he ladles out two large table spoons of mustard/khaki coloured powder onto the paper, which he then folds into an intricate flat package the size of two match boxes. This process takes about five minutes not for any ritualistic reasons, but rather because he is talking continually with illustrative hand gestures that keep interrupting his actions.

The Sangoma pushes the neatly wrapped muti over to me. He tells me (in translation) that the muti can be used anywhere. I could be in England and use it and it would be just as effective as here in Swaziland. The Sangoma also tells me that he can enter my bedroom when I am asleep, wherever I am in the world. I am suitably impressed and feel ever so slightly threatened. He tells me that after we have used the muti I (and presumably Sibusiso) will see one of the miscreants in a dream. We are then to use the muti again to tell the felon to bring his (or her) fellow crooks to show themselves to us and return the missing frames.

Homestead without a lot of window frames

Sibusiso gestures that we can leave. I say that I want to thank the Sangoma profusely – ngiyabonga kakhulu, but Sibusisio says NO, we do not need to say “thank you very much indeed”. And I start to say I want to at least say sala kahle – goodbye; but Sibusisio says NO we do not need to say “goodbye”. From his emphasis I realise that Sibusiso means we “must not” and not “need not”. I reluctantly acquiesce and we silently leave.

The Sangoma left the hut a minute or two after us as we finished putting on our shoes and there was no contract between us at all. It was as if we to him, or he to us had never had any dealing. We drove away; Sifiso, who had remained outside the hut for the entire time, the younger man who we had first encountered with the Sangoma, Sibusiso and I. We returned along the long ruinous road back through Mpolonjeni where we dropped the nameless “younger man”, back to Nkoyoyo to drop off the helpful Sifiso, and back to the cottage.

 "We need to get containers for the muti so’s we can split it between us”, said Sibusisio. “Did you understand the instructions on how to use it?” I said no.

“You take a pinch of it on your hand and with your heart heavy with the wish to see the crooks you blow the muti away, and you can do this anywhere.”

He said that some time over the next two weeks we should get some sort of a result. He then went on to express his admiration for the Sangoma who has so much faith in his muti that payment will only be due once its results have been seen.

I am light-headed from lack of food and water, driving back along the busy highway to the City of Mbabane. I feel a sense of timelessness. All morning and half the afternoon have been spent on an errand that my rational mind tells me is a wild goose chase. My intuitive mind has however been completely at one with an experience that has no explanation, and I am happier in that state. I will this evening take a pinch from the old soap tin into which I put my half of the muti (Sibusiso got an old salt container), and with a heart raging with anger summon the crooks to appear before me and return my window frames.

And I have no doubt that they will do as instructed.

A soap-tin of Muti