Hello again, long time! (As if anyone is actually reading this!) Just realised how utterly and downright boring this blog is, really!!! Why am I trying to sound sweet and flowery? What possessed me? I am generally a totally fruity, nutcase, most people take in small doses, and quite ironically I am most funny when something is really pissing me off.
However I have had the blind stupidity not to have chosen to write about any of this, because of a sense of ...'concern'?...that someone might actually be offended. As if I really know anyone who may be reading this (my counter value shows as a very motivating almost-zero so far)
So henceforth I shall spew my daily drama in all it's glory and give you, my non-readership, what every other joe blogger is and has been doing all along. Here goes.
Events that piss me off regularly:
1)My so-called boyfriend, who is only known as my boyfriend because he hasn't exactly left my place on the few hundred occasions I have almost thrown him out, because he is too lazy to find another place to stay. He would currently be defined as more of a confused flatmate, with no where else to go and I am a really nice person for letting him stay. (Or just plain insane, I might throw in the towel and him out at some point)
2)Idiots in London. They breed them exceptionally well, some are even foreigners, but they eventually follow in the moronic footsteps of the locals.
3)The lack of: any kind of customer service or expectation of value-for-money for anything you purchase or choose to purchase.
4)The visa situation. I would have more luck surviving if I was a starving, illiterate refugee on the brink of croaking wihout a successful drug-trafficking career, than the decent taxpaying, law-abiding, commonwealth-country professional that I am.
5)My flatmate's parents, who have attempted to adopt me as their future daughter-in-law despite the obviuos fact that it is very clear to all that my relationship with their son is not working out. They insist on including me in every self-centered plea for attention, they call socialising, and into their unbelievably dysfunctional gripes and arguments.
6)Work colleagues who have to constantly reinvent themselves, trying to live up to the Jones's, play the political game, back-stab another colleague and ruin another's reputation because they feel threatened by that person...without any realisation that they may actually be losers fighting to keep their decade-long, dead-end jobs without which they would be seriously screwed.
7)The lack of anything decent on TV when you need to wind down
8)The sub-standard quality of food in restuarants that still cost as much as a nice, new trench coat and tastes about the same. And the overall lack of fresh food in supermarkets. This, my dear friends, is why we are fat. Fruit is costly. Cheesy, unhealthy burgers are cheap. Something has to give. And if you think this is obvious, it was not so back home.
Now, I don't have the energy to fill you in on the annoying things that have happened today so it will have to wait for another time. But I will deliver!
Until later
Saturday 15 December 2007
Sunday 11 November 2007
Happiest Feelings
The most intense feelings of happiness I ever had were as a young child. Before I was ten. For so long I thought everyone else had deep feelings like that in their earliest years until I started asking around and realised it was just me.
I seemed to discover love, guys and feelings which I can only decsribe today as being on a natural ecstacy-like high when I was around guys I was attracted to, at a very early age. It wasn't exactly sexual, but rather more incredably exciting, like I was about to be taken to some exotic paradise and shown the treasures of the world. Sounds so cheesy, but really those feelings were sprinkled with golddust.
What ever happened since then? When did I put on synical glasses and start accepting a more morbid love life? I've accepted it so much that I had forgotten how deep those old feelings were until today when I found an old song that I hadn't heard in decades. And the feelings came flooding back. What a feeling!
Puts you completely out of perspective with todays world. As if today is so cruel, harsh and grey. And in the video the male singer has so much charisma despite being an average looking guy for that decade. He is confident, and flirty and even slightly feminine without feeling awkward about it. It's been a while since I have seen anyone like that. Am I living in the wrong area? Maybe it's just the 60'sish vibe that dominated people back then, i dont know.
If i can figure out how to attach a you tube video, i will, if I have enough courage to risk being criticised that is!
later
I seemed to discover love, guys and feelings which I can only decsribe today as being on a natural ecstacy-like high when I was around guys I was attracted to, at a very early age. It wasn't exactly sexual, but rather more incredably exciting, like I was about to be taken to some exotic paradise and shown the treasures of the world. Sounds so cheesy, but really those feelings were sprinkled with golddust.
What ever happened since then? When did I put on synical glasses and start accepting a more morbid love life? I've accepted it so much that I had forgotten how deep those old feelings were until today when I found an old song that I hadn't heard in decades. And the feelings came flooding back. What a feeling!
Puts you completely out of perspective with todays world. As if today is so cruel, harsh and grey. And in the video the male singer has so much charisma despite being an average looking guy for that decade. He is confident, and flirty and even slightly feminine without feeling awkward about it. It's been a while since I have seen anyone like that. Am I living in the wrong area? Maybe it's just the 60'sish vibe that dominated people back then, i dont know.
If i can figure out how to attach a you tube video, i will, if I have enough courage to risk being criticised that is!
later
Monday 22 October 2007
Well done Bokke!
When SA won the rugby world cup in 1995, I couldn't imagine the country could party in such harmony. That was the first major international game, in the new, post-apartheid SA.
For one day, race, culture and class divisions were gone. Where once you were afraid of walking down a street for fear of being mugged, people were hooting their horns continously and stopping their cars to hug strangers with uncontained joy. Flags, banners, music and excitement everywhere. They all seemed as if they were headed of to various entertainment spots, while taking their time and sharing the celebration with everyone they met.
I never thought I would ever see Jo'burg like that. Indescribable unison. And for the first time in my life I considered myself not by race or culture, but as South African. And was proud to be one. Radio stations around the country for weeks thereafter echoed that same patriotic sentiment amongst so many other South Africans.
That night we went to, what was then, the recently opened Randburg Waterfront. It was packed and buzzing, and one of the most momentous nights of my life.
Well done to the boys for doing it again! I hope SA is partying like it was 1995.
(London is understandably quiet this weekend.)
For one day, race, culture and class divisions were gone. Where once you were afraid of walking down a street for fear of being mugged, people were hooting their horns continously and stopping their cars to hug strangers with uncontained joy. Flags, banners, music and excitement everywhere. They all seemed as if they were headed of to various entertainment spots, while taking their time and sharing the celebration with everyone they met.
I never thought I would ever see Jo'burg like that. Indescribable unison. And for the first time in my life I considered myself not by race or culture, but as South African. And was proud to be one. Radio stations around the country for weeks thereafter echoed that same patriotic sentiment amongst so many other South Africans.
That night we went to, what was then, the recently opened Randburg Waterfront. It was packed and buzzing, and one of the most momentous nights of my life.
Well done to the boys for doing it again! I hope SA is partying like it was 1995.
(London is understandably quiet this weekend.)
Friday 19 October 2007
Stuck in a period
Have you ever felt stuck in a certain period in your life, when you can clearly see that everything around you is changing, yet you can't change yourself? And your actions and your mindset remain intranced in some era. You still dress the same, still enjoy the same songs and want to watch more of the same drama that was on in that time.
That's me right now. Im stuck in about 2000-2001. I bought a load of Dark Angel and Dawson's Creek dvd's and repeat-watch them, along with cd's and music from that time.
I feel like I should actually still be in college and seem to have forgotten the years that have matured me since. I just can't seem to move on. I hope this isn't some getting older sign that unites people who can refer to 'the good old days' or something.
I dont know if it's just me or if everyone seems to be in transit at the moment. It feels that way. Like life was, and will be, but just not quite now.
I'll give it some further thought.
Until later
That's me right now. Im stuck in about 2000-2001. I bought a load of Dark Angel and Dawson's Creek dvd's and repeat-watch them, along with cd's and music from that time.
I feel like I should actually still be in college and seem to have forgotten the years that have matured me since. I just can't seem to move on. I hope this isn't some getting older sign that unites people who can refer to 'the good old days' or something.
I dont know if it's just me or if everyone seems to be in transit at the moment. It feels that way. Like life was, and will be, but just not quite now.
I'll give it some further thought.
Until later
Tuesday 16 October 2007
Gleneagles Road, Greenside
The first area I lived in, when I moved out of my parents home, was Greenside. Just down the road from the beautiful sun kissed Emmarentia Dam. Granted, it didn't always have a reputation for being safe (or beautiful for that matter), but there was something special about it for me. Not the least of it's attractions was the sparkling water view at night. From a parked car on the roadside. Something I did often when I needed a moment alone. It had that kind of Dawson's Creek sentimentality to it.
Just up the road, the now famous Gleneagles road used to be quaint and lonely back then. Just a small, closed supermarket, a few stores and a pizza place that amazed me by continuing to exist for so long, despite being constantly empty.
I used to secretly meet a friend on that street. On weekend nights. We had a relationship that wasn't quite defined as yet. I'd get all dressed up and park the car in a specific spot and wait. Excitedly. And wonder about the lives of the people that lived around there. The owners of the antique shop, the people that lived in the apartments above the shops. There was something a touch romantic about that street too. I can't quite tell whether it had something to do with the smell of the canopied trees that lined the road or the silence that made it feel residential.
At one stage, a small, cute coffee shop opened up and remained open for a few months. I had breakfasts there on Saturday mornings. Fresh coffee and hangover headaches.
A few years later a friend of a friend opened up a somewhat upmarket restaurant there and ever since, the street commercialised. Restaurants opened up all over until it felt like Melville or Parkhurst, with traffic facilitators trying to point out a parking space when you drove past.
One of the restaurants was called The Inferno. The food was very good and the two male waiters who were studying music and training to be opera singers, would give a rendition of something familiar when the owner felt like honoring a table or creating some atmosphere.
I went there twice. The second time was with the friend I used to secretly meet there. Years later. It was pure nostalgia.
The waiter tried telling us something nice about the street at one point and didn't notice the smiles on our faces.
We felt like ghosts of the past, wondering how this quiet, romantic street could have been transformed into something so different, so vibrant.
I believe it's still going strong today.
Just up the road, the now famous Gleneagles road used to be quaint and lonely back then. Just a small, closed supermarket, a few stores and a pizza place that amazed me by continuing to exist for so long, despite being constantly empty.
I used to secretly meet a friend on that street. On weekend nights. We had a relationship that wasn't quite defined as yet. I'd get all dressed up and park the car in a specific spot and wait. Excitedly. And wonder about the lives of the people that lived around there. The owners of the antique shop, the people that lived in the apartments above the shops. There was something a touch romantic about that street too. I can't quite tell whether it had something to do with the smell of the canopied trees that lined the road or the silence that made it feel residential.
At one stage, a small, cute coffee shop opened up and remained open for a few months. I had breakfasts there on Saturday mornings. Fresh coffee and hangover headaches.
A few years later a friend of a friend opened up a somewhat upmarket restaurant there and ever since, the street commercialised. Restaurants opened up all over until it felt like Melville or Parkhurst, with traffic facilitators trying to point out a parking space when you drove past.
One of the restaurants was called The Inferno. The food was very good and the two male waiters who were studying music and training to be opera singers, would give a rendition of something familiar when the owner felt like honoring a table or creating some atmosphere.
I went there twice. The second time was with the friend I used to secretly meet there. Years later. It was pure nostalgia.
The waiter tried telling us something nice about the street at one point and didn't notice the smiles on our faces.
We felt like ghosts of the past, wondering how this quiet, romantic street could have been transformed into something so different, so vibrant.
I believe it's still going strong today.
Sunday 14 October 2007
First Post
I can't believe that I am only just starting my first blog today. I usually leave a trail of writing debris where ever I go but for some reason I wasn't quite sure about blogging. I feel like an old virgin.
I started this blog to write about my memories of that beautiful city Jo'burg, where I grew up. I have been away from it for about 5 years now and often find myself in a mental escape, reminscing about the loves and haunts, sights and sounds of the place.
Today I just remembered frequenting a club called Millenium (it was 1999 when I was last there). The club was actually in Midrand. Girls got in free before 10 pm and my best friend and I would go there on Friday nights to dance away the weeks work pressures. We were slightly older than the majority of teenagers that frequented the place back then and we certainly felt it. We were so shy, we would spend about 2 hours on the booze before we got gutsy enough to hit the dance floor but once we were on, we boogied with no conscience until about five in the morning. I had a habit of popping by at an ex's place after that and spending the morning there.
He lived in Troyeville and I'd pass the Ponte on the way to his place. Beautiful building. It was such an iconic landmark of those clubbing days, a direction pointer, and it consistently gave me the feeling that I was in a really buzzy city and that exciting times were lurking around the corner.
I notice that they are considering renovating it now for occupation again, and doing up the inner city. That would breathe some life back into the place.
I'll have to move back soon to experience that.
I started this blog to write about my memories of that beautiful city Jo'burg, where I grew up. I have been away from it for about 5 years now and often find myself in a mental escape, reminscing about the loves and haunts, sights and sounds of the place.
Today I just remembered frequenting a club called Millenium (it was 1999 when I was last there). The club was actually in Midrand. Girls got in free before 10 pm and my best friend and I would go there on Friday nights to dance away the weeks work pressures. We were slightly older than the majority of teenagers that frequented the place back then and we certainly felt it. We were so shy, we would spend about 2 hours on the booze before we got gutsy enough to hit the dance floor but once we were on, we boogied with no conscience until about five in the morning. I had a habit of popping by at an ex's place after that and spending the morning there.
He lived in Troyeville and I'd pass the Ponte on the way to his place. Beautiful building. It was such an iconic landmark of those clubbing days, a direction pointer, and it consistently gave me the feeling that I was in a really buzzy city and that exciting times were lurking around the corner.
I notice that they are considering renovating it now for occupation again, and doing up the inner city. That would breathe some life back into the place.
I'll have to move back soon to experience that.
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