On the 11th of July 2012 this popular meme illustrating the day Marty McFly [from the classic movie, 'Back to the Future'] arrived in the future started flying its way around the internet. You know, cos look out for Marty McFly or something. The only problem being, that it was not true. Back to the Future was released in 1985 and in the movie Marty Mcfly travels 30 years into the future [making it 2015, [...]
Continuing with the conversation about ‘How to be an Ally’ with my friend Alexa Matthews who has a huge heart for this kind of thing and the humility to understand that we are trying to figure it out as we go along: I have sat with this for a little while – and was hoping to send it off before leaving South Africa for a holiday. I am still wrestling with whether I as a [...]
This is a complex one. We don’t presently have a maid/domestic worker but have spoken about the possibility of employing someone in that role. And this is not a witch hunt to try and make anyone feel bad [unless you need to be feeling bad and then don’t feel bad but just change how you’re living!]. A number of months ago i was chatting to a domestic worker at a friend’s house and just hearing [...]
So this past week a picture appeared on my Twitterer of a white girl with a statement written on a board that made me cringe: Suddenly more and more of these pictures were popping up all over Social Media and turns out there was an #IAmStellenbosch group inviting students at the University to write statements about themselves which challenge the stereotype of a typical Stellenbosch student and highlight the differences and individualities of each student. [...]
Following closely in the footsteps of, 'Breaking Bread [with Trev]: Changing Your Mind' comes 'Finding the Words', the second post in a Tandem Blog Conversation piece which sees a conversation of 5x100ish words each, this time on the topic of the languages we speak [or don't]: = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = Brett: My wife and i started learning isiXhosa just over a month ago which is [...]
As a follower of Jesus, this really is my mantra. Love one another. This is how you will be known to be My [Jesus] disciples, if you have love one for another. When i spend a decent amount of time online challenging people about their beliefs and actions, this often comes to mind. After all the church has a pretty bad history of typically being known more for what we are against than what we [...]
My friends Alexa Russell Matthews and Nicole Joshua recently ran a workshop titled, "The 'Colour' Elephant in the Room" which you can read some of a participant's experience of over here. What stood out to me though was this list of what was referred to as the 'Ten Commandments' which was the basis of a commitment to engage well with each other. For those of us seeking to be positively involved in conversation and action in the [...]
In a moment of brave-ity two night's ago i decided to ask the South African internet a question. I was reading a book that pointed back to the idea of South Africa being renamed Azania and i didn't think that was the worst idea. After all 'South Africa' is just a direction, right. What do you think? Who would be okay with a name change and why? i also posted an article by Xolela Mangcu [...]
Growing up in Cape Town in a largely coloured area, the perceptions about white and black people were always negative. So naturally I took that on as the norm (as that was my context). I was only in high school when I was first exposed to white folks. All my teachers were white and they knew everything and seem to have everything. I basically unconsciously just ended up assimilating into that thinking that white must [...]
So this post by my friend Sean’s wife, Kirby, is a little bit different [was an eye-opener for me] as it differentiates between Tantrums and Meltdowns and i would love to hear some response to this from other parents who have maybe never thought about this before. She posted this under the title ‘Moment on Meltdowns’ on her blog ‘Niggles and Giggles’ which i have links to at the end, so go and see what [...]