A minibus taxi user guide and more

To hail a minibus taxi just point in the direction you want to go. There are a number of finger signals that you may use that have the same effect, but avoid the middle finger since this signal is reserved for other motorists who have to deal with the taxi's erratic behaviour.

Five outstretched fingers will get you to the main railway station, Park Station and three fingers will get you to Bree Street in Joburg's CBD.


Once aboard the taxi start praying ... even atheists may do this apparently there is a special permit for them to pray in taxis. The standard fee seems to be R7 for a trip on one route. This may go up during the World Cup ... or a dual payment system will be designed to rip off foreigners.


You can pay on getting on or just before getting off. If you are in the back of the taxi, you tap the person sitting in front of you on the shoulder and hand him/her your money.


That person will pass it on to the next and so on until it reaches the driver ... who will briefly interrupt his cellphone conversation to fish out change from the vehicle's ashtray, before sending it back the way it came.


Some drivers expect the front-seat passengers to deal with the money matters while others clearly don't. Surprisingly enough I have seen no disputes over money going missing in this to-ing and fro-ing of money.

Once you have paid start praying again, because by this time the vehicle's obvious defects would be obvious to you too.

Too get off the taxi just shout out the point where you want to do so. Like: "Next robot..." (Traffic lights are often called that here and if you are a World Cup visitor asking for directions you should know that.) Or shout "shopping centre" ... or "Garage" as filling stations are called. You can shout anything really as long as the driver hears you and knows what you are talking about.

When you get off, sigh a deep sigh of relief and think of buying a car. However, millions of people use minibus taxis and survive. Meanwhile a pseudo Frenchman in Fouriesburg told me that communal taxis are the only form of public transport that is profitable in the world. I somehow believe him. I call him a pseudo Frenchman because we spoke French ... it turned out that he is a 'Norman' from the channel island Jersey.


My next blog will be about the different kinds of porn favoured by different nationalities. It is PG18 and sensitive readers must please abstain.

Fouriesburg and a taxi nightmare

Fouriesburg is a dusty three-bar town in the Eastern Free State. You will notice that I base my tourism on the number of bars in a town. If you can count them it is my kind of a place. Fouriesburg has few attractions as town in itself, but it is situated in one of the most beautiful corners of South Africa. It lies between magnificent sandstone formations at the foot of the Drakensberg (Maluti in seSotho) mountain range, about 8km from Lesotho and about 30km from the much more (too) touristic Clarens.

My friends John and Amanda have a weekend house here, so the Oyster Bay crowd, with some new additions in the form of Charli, Hannah and Carol decamped from Joburg for the weekend. For future reference I decided to name everyone here. They are : Jan (previously called the Laughing One), Madelein (previously the Laughing One's Chick), Vince (Writer), George (Fridge Guy), John (Lawyer), Amanda (no previous mention) and me. Charli debuted on my fist blog as the Wannabe Lawyer.

For the outdoors enthusiast Fouriesburg has much to offer. From rock-climbing to horse-riding, day walks, scenic drives ... you name it. Since I'm not much of an outdoors enthusiast myself I quickly ran out of possible things that the typical outdoors enthusiast might be interested in. But there is more outdoors here than you could reasonably shake the proverbial stick at, or in my case wave a wine glass at and I'm sure that there will be something for everyone.

Incidentally, the road between Fouriesburg and Clarens is one of the most beautiful in the country and the world perhaps. For more things to do in Fouriesburg see my guide about things to do in Oyster Bay.

As we speak, my friends are busy engaging with the outdoors. They invited, nay pleaded with me to come along but I said no. I pointed out to Jan that my time is no longer my own and that I have to satisfy the thirst of my 13 blog followers first and not be tempted by the lure of excursions into the mountains on foot. I must admit that I am running out of excuses for not going on these walks. I think last time I feigned a pain in the knee ... I was shot through it remember!

Anyway I walk enough in Joburg, not having a car and being reliant on public transport and taxis to get around.

The last minibus taxi I took was straight out of Stephen King. It had no tread on the tyres, and only the right front brake pad seemed to be working, but the driver made no allowance for this fact at all when it came to the speed he was driving at.

It was also raining and every time the driver braked, it would slide across two lanes to the right before coming to a standstill. When we almost smashed into the back of an oblivious police van, most passengers interrupted their fervent prayers to loudly voice their concerns ... this included me .... the atheist.

I still maintain that minibus taxis converted more people to prayer than any number of missionaries ever could. They are probably the most religious places in South Africa.

After the police van incident most passengers got off when the taxi stopped next. I followed suit and took a municipal bus ... which happened to come along at the right moment. Nobody knows exactly when or where these things run, but they are there. After the taxi it was a pleasant experience. The driver took my R6 without issuing a ticket and I did not mind.

This morning just before waking up I dreamt that I was on that taxi again ... but when I wanted to get off, the driver told me with a grin: "This is like the Hotel California. Once you get on ... you can never get off."

I woke up in terror.

Next time I will blog about a taxi user's etiquette.

Some other stuff 2

Say "Soweto" and most people think of an endless sprawl of apartheid-built box houses. People who have actually been there would perhaps think of the palatial houses rising incongruously here and there between the box houses. Others may think of the vibrant street life and the famous, perhaps infamous, Soweto street parties and the pulsating beer halls called shebeens - but very few people would think of wine and winemakers.

 

But one of the historically most entrenched white-dominated industries is slowly but surely giving in to the pressures of transformation and wine is becoming big in Soweto. Proof of this is the phenomenal growth of the Soweto Wine Festival which is due to host its 6th annual edition in September this year. (Yes, there will be life in South Africa after the Soccer World Cup!) If past growth is anything to go by, the festival is set to become one of South Africa's top wine festivals ... and by virtue of that one of Africa's biggest wine festivals.

 

So who are the people driving this move towards wine in a predominantly beer drinking market. The short answer would be the so-called Black Diamonds ... mostly as wine consumers. They are the emerging class of black entrepreneurs and business people who are making the most of their post-apartheid opportunities. They are mostly, but not exclusively, young, confident and on the go ... and they are going in just one direction and that is up!

 

Joe Chakela (55) and five other owners of bottle stores (as licenced liquor outlets are called locally) became involved in the wine industry shortly after the first democratic elections in South Africa in 1994. Strictly speaking, Joe and his friends are too old to be called Black Diamonds, they deserve a mention because they consider themselves as a  main driving force in bringing wine culture to South Africa's townships, especially Soweto.

 

"Up until then (1996-97), I was involved in the liquor industry owning about 5 bottle stores with my partner, Menzi Kunene. One Mk Malefane convinced me and my colleagues that the time has come now to get involved in the mainstream of liquor making as opposed to being involved in the distribution channel only. We decided to engage Distell (then Stellenbosch Farmers Wineries) to partner with us in purchasing a farm and making wine," says Joe.

 

"The biggest challenge we faced in the wine industry was getting recognition for our brand.  My favourite cultivar is Pinotage not only because it is a pleasure to drink but also , for sentimental reasons, it was our first wine. However, my favourite drink is Tukulu Chenin Blanc as I love sea-food. It goes very well with fish. My personal philosophy and perspective on wine is that to enjoy it fully, do not drink more than three glasses a day," he says.

 

"The accolades, in the form of various awards totalling no less than twelve, received by our wines, especially, Pinotage, Chenin Blanc & Organic Sangiovese have been a source of great pride and achievement for our Consortium and Distell and we look forward to reaping more rewards in future," Joe says..

 

Their initial plan was to launch a new brandy in the townships,  but then Joe and friends developed a taste for wine. Joe stopped drinking beer and switched to wine ... and today he and his colleagues are the proud owners of 55% of Tukulu wine farm in the famous Stellenbosch wine region. The minority stakeholder in Tukulu is South African liquor giant Distell and the venture is considered as an example for successful transformation in the wine industry.           

 

But back to the Black Diamonds.

 

As Black Diamonds go, Ntsiki Bayela of Stellekaya near Stellenbosch is a perfect example ... and she does not even mind being called that. Some of her more urban counterparts, perhaps the slightly older ones, are less than fond of that appellation. The 32-year-old Ntsiki is not only a consumer of wine  she makes the stuff! And judging by the number of awards the wines produced by her estate, Stellekaya in Stellenbosch,  have won since she joined them six years ago, she is a winemaker of note!               

    

Ntsiki's road to becoming a top winemaker was not an easy one.

 

She grew up as an orphan in rural KwaZulu-Natal and was raised by her aging grandmother. Ntsiki says the proudest moment of her life was not winning the scholarship that enabled her to become a vintner, nor the moment when she successfully completed her studies, but when she gave her gran a taste of the first bottle of wine she made. The fact that the old lady,  not a wine drinker, did not really like the wine, did not diminish Ntsiki's joy. She was just happy and proud that the real mother in her life could taste the fruits of her labours she sadly died some years later.

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But how does a black lady from a rural area of a province where wine making and vineyards are unheard of become a winemaker, a white male dominated industry? The simple answer is hard work at school that won her a scholarship from South African Airways. The scholarship was specifically to encourage young black people to become involved in wine making as part of the airline's wine selection process.

 

Ntsiki says they told her she could do something else if she did not like wine making ... but once she started out at the Stellenbosch University she knew that she had found her calling in life. That was despite being the only black person in her class and one of only a few women.

 

"I did experienced a fair degree bit of resistance and mistrust from my fellow students, but I didn't let that get in my way. I focused on my studies instead, and once I qualified and moved into the real world of wine making, meeting older winemakers, it all became Fun with a capital 'F'," Ntsiki says.

 

 "There is not a single aspect of the job, from the vineyard to the finished product, that I can point out as being more or less important or enjoyable than the rest. For me the joy of making wine is the whole process and all the beautiful mystery of it," she says.  

 

Ntsiki's favourite wine of the moment is Stellekaya's Orion, a Bordeaux style blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Cabernet Franc. It got no less than four-and-a-half stars out of a maximum of five, from South Africa's foremost wine critic John Platter                 

And with an attitude like that, expect the awards to keep piling up in her display case. The unassuming Ntsiki is a rare Black Diamond indeed!  

Some other stuff that I wrote ... a bit more serious ... ahem

Opposition politics in Africa often meant the bullet instead of the ballot, and a change of government seldom brought positive changes in governance. It was more often than not just a case of a change of faces at the feeding trough. Fortunately this is changing and in South Africa is leading the way.

   

With the advent of democracy in South Africa in 1994, euphoria ruled. Then Nobel Laureate Desmond Tutu's "Rainbow Nation" seemed firmly on track, but soon enough the 'rainbow' became monochrome and this bedevilled opposition politics in the country ever since. 

   

The obstacles faced by opposition parties in South Africa are many-fold and complex to address. I will just have a brief look at some of the main ones and at the ways opposition parties deal with them.

  
First of all the concept of "loyal opposition" is new to South Africa and as such often poorly understood. This is reflected in the huge majority the ruling African National Congress (ANC) have won in the three fully democratic elections since 1994. That is despite their decidedly poor track record in delivering on their election promises.  

 

That is just one of the obstacles opposition parties in South Africa, as elsewhere in Africa, face. This holds true especially in rural areas where traditional leaders have held sway for hundreds of years and opposition to them meant either death or banishment. The idea of a loyal opposition simply did not exist.

 

Other problems include what I would call the Lure of the Liberation movement and a strong belief in ancestors. These two go hand in hand. It boils down to the following pattern of thought: "I must vote for the liberation movement, because my ancestors fought and died for it, and they would be angry if I voted for someone else." 

 

Then there is a perceptional problem that is unique to South Africa. The official opposition, the Democratic Alliance (DA), is perceived as being a party promoting "white" interests. Whether this perception is based on any kind of reality is debatable and quite contentious, but the fact remains that it exists. The ANC realises this all too well and does not hesitate to exploit it to their full advantage.

 

That was particularly true under the rule of former president Thabo Mbeki who tarnished the legacy of Nelson Mandela by making race central to all his policies. Thus it became easy for him to label all criticism of his government as "racist" and, as such, not worthy of debate. And when the criticism emanated from black quarters the critics were derogatorily called "coconuts" meaning people who are black on the outside and white on the inside. Their criticism could also be dismissed out of hand.

 

DA MP James Lorimer says that the return to race-based politics under Mbeki was a direct result of the palpable failure of many of his policies to provide the "Better life for all" promised on ANC election posters. In fact Lorimer also blames the race-based approach for many subsequent failures of the ANC government. The appointment on racial grounds of loyal ANC cadres to especially the middle management structures of the public service often meant that the most competent person did not get the job. This led to a blockage of service delivery projects at the very place where they were supposed to take final and effective shape.       

 

Now the question remains: Are these very real obstacles insurmountable? South African opposition parties do not seem to think so and they may just be right. 

 

The DA is especially optimistic that South African politics are escaping from "the straight-jacket of race and ethnicity" in the words of Lorimer. Surprisingly, Lorimer credits the emergence of the Congress of the People (COPE), a break-away party from the ANC, for what he sees as the beginning of of a sea-change in opposition politics in South Africa. He says that COPE, despite its organisational shortcomings, opened the first non-racial debate about opposition in the country and this benefited his party enormously.

 

Suddenly it was "Okay" to  vote for someone other than the ANC. In the 2009 elections, the DA had a nett gain of 20 seats against a nett loss of 33 seats for the ANC. But the majority remains firmly in favour of the ANC. They have 264 seats in parliament against the DA's 67, the 30 seats of COPE and the 18 of the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP).

 

The remaining 27 seats are shared by smaller parties like the Independent Democrats (ID) with four seats and the Freedom Front + (FF+) also with four seats. The problem these parties face is once again the perception, in their case mostly accurate, that they serve the interests of small or ethnic groupings. Thus the ID is seen as a mainly 'coloured' (mixed race) party of the Western Cape, the IFP as an ethnic Zulu party and the FF+ as a party serving thee needs of conservative Afrikaners. The general feeling is that these parties are likely to disappear gradually as the South African democracy matures.

 

As for COPE, like many opposition parties in Africa, they face mostly problems of their own making. They started out with much fanfare but even before their first election, they descended into leadership squabbles that cost them dearly. They finally went into the elections with a compromise leader with no political track record. Ever since the election they have been plagued by infighting and organisational disarray. Their future does not look very bright.

 

In contrast the DA is "keenly looking forward to the next elections," says Lorimer. He says that the Lure of the Liberation movement is fading fast as is witnessed by the number of violent service delivery protests besetting mostly the ANC dominated provinces of the country. Although the Western Cape where the DA rules has also had some service delivery protests, it was nowhere nearly as bad as elsewhere in the country. A fact that the DA hopes would not be lost on the electorate. 

 

To sum up then, opposition politics in South Africa are changing slowly but surely and is likely to mature into a two or three party system in the not so distant future.         

 

Another view on Afrikaners ... this time by Clem Sunter

It is an ironic twist of fate that so far the real beneficiaries of the ending of apartheid are the people who were supposed to have benefited from it whilst it was in existence - the Afrikaners.

During the years of apartheid, there was a culture of entitlement among the volk. With a good education you could end up as a Cabinet minister, a top civil servant, head of a parastasal or a senior executive in an Afrikaans-owned business like the Trust Bank or Sanlam. If you weren't so privileged, you could get a job on the railways as an artisan, join the ranks of the army or police or work for a municipality.

After 1994, all these expectations came to an end. Suddenly Afrikaners were out of power. They had to take a leaf out of Steve Biko's book: you are on your own and you will have to fend for yourself. And they have done so - fantastically well. I was told the other day that the fastest growing element of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange are companies owned and run by Afrikaners. The whole coast north of Maputo in Mozambique is now a string of safari lodges and dive shops established by entrepreneurs from Pretoria. The list goes on and on all around South Africa, and increasingly north of the border and elsewhere in the world.

One could call this phenomenon the great trek into business. Adapt or die, John Vorster said. The Afrikaners voted for the first option individually and collectively. Rather like the Jews in America, the Pakistanis in London and the Chinese in Australia, Afrikaners have a collective consciousness which is the spiritual foundation of an effective commercial network. Language, religion, culture and a common outlook on life bind them into teams that are almost unbeatable when challenged by less cohesive competitors. This trait obviously extends into sport as well. It is a form of ubuntu: you help me and I will help you because together we can achieve more. It's just that you have to speak the taal!

This article was prompted by my wife and I staying one night last week at a brilliant place called Bergwaters Eco Lodge just outside Waterval Boven. It was a real pocket of excellence in the Elands Valley. Run by a young Afrikaans couple, it offered everything from a long, beautiful walk to great food to a comfortable bed. But it was the entrepreneurial spirit that impressed me. She wants to give every room the theme of a herb and he has just bought a local hardware store as a second business. Music to my ears. You should always want to improve, no matter what the current state of your business is.

This all goes to show that we need an entrepreneurial state in contrast to a developmental state. California is the sixth largest economy in the world with only 36 million people. There is no sense of entitlement there. Everybody follows the Steve Biko code: you make it yourself. It would be a real shame if, by replacing one entitlement culture with another, we undermine the truly entrepreneurial spirit that South Africa undoubtedly possesses in its population as a whole. The Afrikaners were liberated by creating a level playing field. Necessity is indeed the mother of invention. Entitlement shackles it.

I conclude with a question: why do you think Jews, Pakistanis and Chinese people perform so much better on other people's playing field than on their home grounds? They know the result depends entirely on their own efforts. Afrikaners have managed to make this psychological adjustment without having to emigrate. Good for them. The next job is to liberate our black brothers and sisters in the same way.

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My dodgy connections ... and stuff that I wanted to write

I never get a headache, not even when I have a hangover or babbelas (as the same is called here) but sometimes when I'm hungry, I get a headache to indicate that. Similarly my stomach gets upset when I'm hungover ... a dodgy connection between cause and effect.

This is apparently caused by "Extended Tourette's Syndrome". I put that in parenthesis because I only half believe it. I was once diagnosed with it and put on a diet of Ritalin and Prozac. It did not work. I soon gave up the Prozac and fed my friends the Ritalin. They seemed to enjoy it (like coke they said) and all that it did for me was to give me sweaty palms and suicidal tendencies.

My Internet connection at home is the same. Sometimes it works fine on virtually no signal and sometimes it does not work at all on a full signal. Go figure.

In the meantime here are the blogs that you missed due to my dodgy connections:

• David Butler's must-see show about Herman Charles Bosman at a dodgy place called "Die Blou Hond" (the blue dog)
• A minibus taxi user's etiquette
• Porn and different national preferences for it (PG 18)
• The mating habits of the common milkweed locust

and other stuff ... my connection just died crxetrcvybuni0moiominbvfcxsazzsxdcfvgbnumio,

Hopefully, I will get to them sometime. I must go and sleep. Tomorrow I have a long insert about rhino poaching in South Africa to deal with. Apparently the new myth is that rhino horn does not only give you a hard-on, it also cures you of cancer ... and the F#$$%N market is responding to that. There are two to three rhino killed in South Africa per week ... Another dodgy connection. Go figure.

Then thanks to Amanda Hobson and lmprt for joining ... especially Amanda since I was deeply and speechlessly in love with her for most of my high school days (she knows this now, so don't fret).

My maid Zita and race relations in South Africa

Yes I have a maid. It is a South African thing. Not that I need a maid or even wanted one. I employed Zita out of charitable considerations while I was still employed at the newspaper.


She was a waitress at my networking hub Nuno's, the Portuguese restaurant run by the two lovely lesbians. She needed extra income to pay for her kid's creche. So I employ her because I do not believe that charity does much good to the recipients thereof.


I know because I was also a bit of a charity case lately. My friends refused that I pay for a number of restaurant outings here and in Oyster Bay and although I was suitably grateful, it grated me. We have another friend who lives in Cape Town ... in his car. I pointed out to Jan that once you begin to see yourself as a charity case you are buggered ... and I don't even have a car to live in.


But back to Zita. I employ her and convince Vince that he should do the same. To save her transport money we let her work for both of us on the same day. I am sure she does not work longer than two or three hours per week between the two of us. I live in a bachelor's garden cottage and Vince in a room. Since neither of us cook at home it is merely a question of picking up the clothes from the floor and general tidying up.


As soon as I lose my job, Zita loses hers, allegedly for overcharging a customer. Now Zita is a Xhosa and there is a long tradition of mutual mistrust between us Afrikaners and the Xhosas that started more than 300 years ago with mutual thieving of cattle and intermittent warfare about the same in the Eastern Cape. Vince and I give Zita the benefit of the doubt.


On her last working day before my unfair dismissal case I speak earnestly to Zita about my predicament and tell her that I would have to let her go if the case went badly. She says she will work for me for free as long as I can help her out with transport money. I am touched by her generous spirit and my case goes fairly well so Zita stays.


Yesterday I even convince my sister Emily, who lives on the same property, to also employ Zita. I initially arranged with Zita to come in at 10am because I do not work on Mondays, but now I phone her with the good news that she has another job and tell her to come in earlier so that Emily could show her around.


I spend a fair bit of the night busy with "Internet research" and drinking wine. Zita pitches at 7am. A shouting match ensues, only half in jest, about who said what about time.


Emily clearly forgot that Zita was coming but I pack Zita off into her house and go back to bed thinking that a house occupied by three children and a woman would keep her busy long enough for me to catch up on some much-needed sleep.


I am disappointed at Zita's efficiency when she chases me out of bed at 9:30am. Another shouting match ensues as I refuse to get up and she refuses to amuse herself a bit with more cleaning in Emily's house. She insists that I inspect her work. I tell her that I am a man and that I know from experience with women that I do not know what clean really means.


By 10:30am Zita announces that she is done. I walk up the road with her to draw money for her, but the ATM is not working as it should, so I just give Zita a generous transport allowance and buy her breakfast.


She only eats one egg on toast and when I enquire about the meagre portion, she explains that she needed to be "in shape" for the World Cup ... She plans to make lots of dollars, euros and pounds as a hooker. I just shrug and roll my eyes.


That was my maid Zita and race relations in South Africa in a nutshell ... and the spellcheck tells me that I made only one typing mistake in this whole piece ... By the way thanks to all 11 people who actually took the trouble of becoming followers of my blog. Welcome Simon.