malawian bao

I remember travelling to Malawi as a 10-year-old boy.

On a hot bus trip from what must have been Lilongwe to the shore of Lake Malawi, we passed strips of hand-thatched huts offering crafted goods to tourist buses like ours. We had been told before leaving Cape Town to bring t-shirts to trade, because they were a rare and prized commodity, and we traded through the windows of the bus, urgently passing our t-shirts to upward-reaching black hands and receiving traditional craftworks in return.

I remember when Mr Clements stopped the bus and exploded in fury at the group I was a part of. One of us had taken an item without paying just as the bus drove off, and this had only come to light a few minutes down the road. He thoroughly excoriated that boy — whether by name I don’t remember — for his moral cretinousness, and rightly so. I remember my stunned fear of this roaring, righteously furious man.

I remember snorkelling in Lake Malawi also. The sand flat and patterned, tiny and infrequent silver fish almost invisible against the surface until they darted and the light caught them.

Somewhere along the way, I must have traded a t-shirt and South African rands for a handmade set of Bao, a board game played with beans, because that is what my mother unearthed from a games cupboard this last weekend. We played Bao a lot on that trip and my ten-year-old mind found it weirdly absorbing and sophisticated.

Bao turns out to be a deeply mathematical strategy game, played by rulesets that vary somewhat from country to African country but always take place on the same 4 x 8 grid with special rules applying to the third square from the left on the inner row. I need some dry black kidney beans to complete the count of 64, and then I shall — of course — decimate all comers with my Malawian cultural artefact.

weddings can be better

This is something I need to get off my chest.

Last Saturday was the wedding of a close family friend. The service was at a pretty little church, the reception was delightful and the dancing was fantastic.

And Rev. John Doe [*] gave exactly the same sermon he’d given a little over a year earlier at my sister’s wedding.

The content of the repeated sermon is incidental to the main point (it was a re-run) but it’s worth including here because perhaps it’s so wise that it’s worth repeating, or perhaps not. The sermon was based on the reading, which was also the same reading delivered at my sister’s wedding: Jeremiah 6:16.

This is what the LORD says: “Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But you said, ‘We will not walk in it.’

(Rev. Doe omitted that last sentence from the excerpt he chose — so as far as the audience heard it, the reading ended on “souls”.)

Rev Doe asked us to note, specifically, the verbs, of which, he said, there are six: stand, look, ask, ask again, walk, and rest. (Actually, “rest” is not a verb in this passage: the 6th verb is “find”.) But anyway, a husband and wife should stop (stand) and look (especially within), consult widely (ask, ask again), do the thing (walk the path), and then rest. This seems a harmless and intuitively agreeable proscription to wrench, verb-wise, from the Old Testament mutterings of Jeremiah. I don’t find it tremendously insightful as teachings go, and your mileage may vary, but it’s at least not objectionable.

But content aside — why was it the same sermon?

Paid speakers might assemble a menu of prepared and practiced speeches — and certainly Rev. Doe was paid — but is that really the role of a priest?

I imagine that, in some long-forgotten past, the figure of the priest commanded genuine spiritual rank. Perhaps a priest was actually wise, contemplative, and steeped in doubt as much as faith, and benefited people by their interventions. Perhaps they initiated some people onto their own path of spiritual contemplation, pointing out the beyond wherever it could be pointed to.

Such a priest would have been unable to give a cookie-cutter sermon at a wedding.

Even those negligibly awake to reality understand the uniqueness of any moment, any situation. Thus, not merely a wedding: this wedding. You cannot bless this union of this man and this woman by systematically regurgitating a biblical widget.

How is it that a spiritual teacher in our society is so bound to a conventional form? Why can he not speak what is alive in him at this moment?

Honestly, I feel despair at that. And I felt anger, because the wedding of my sister and her husband was unique to them, and the wedding I’m writing about today was unique to them, and the pivotal officiator of the ceremony should at least acknowledge that.

I have seen very little of the priesthood. But the priests I have seen are not really spiritual teachers. They are more like floating signifiers made flesh, granted conventional status by a parish of nominal faith. That status is partly administrative, partly social — but to the extent it is imagined as spiritual, it is as ethereal as the Holy Spirit.

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P.S. This should go without saying, but it’s worth saying in case it doesn’t. I’ve obviously kept names anonymous but my friends will know of whose wedding(s) I write. While obviously critical of the priest, I wish no offense or sadness to those who were invested in either occasion, especially not the brides or grooms. My post is written with the feeling that the service on each occasion ought have been worthy of the beloved people getting married by it.

on Friday’s impending protest action

I think protest on Friday will achieve relatively little on its own because the government is deaf, the very poor are not involved (AFAIK?) and the people who need persuading are ANC MPs, who are unified only by their lack of spine since 2009.

It is worth doing for the little it will achieve because, as all acts are consequential, there is no possibility of it having no effect (how dig we deep to retain the possibility of hope *cue violins*). I think its likely net consequences are positive, even if small, though I’m not sure why I think that.

Hopefully COSATU and the SACP are sufficiently furious with the NEC rolling over for Zuma that they mobilise hugely on Friday and teach them who’s in charge. Basically praying for miracles but grasping at straws.

on #BlackMonday

It is *extremely* precious to imagine that we as a group (however that group is defined) are going to attain political unity and effectiveness through the exchange of mental fistbumps as we acknowlede the blackness of each other’s clothing. It is an indicator of widespread cluelessness, which is not to say that it’s not meant well, just that it’s inept on many levels.

And it is interesting that such a beneficent impulse can take such an ineffectual form. The weirdness of that combination invites the question of whether it is really so beneficent, since true beneficence would be concerned with the outcome of one’s actions beyond mere virtue signalling. From that moral calculus, it looks like a very pretentious act, the kind of obliviousness that whiteness is made of. (The usefulness of the moral judgement this criticism carries is questionable though, IMO. Education and shaming don’t go well together.)

(Plus, it’s an ANC internal issue that needs solving. The actions of the many have had precious little impact on ANC policy at the best of times, let alone the actions of clueless white people. The ANC leadership know they are fucked and they have done it to themselves by endlessly legitimising Zuma, a runaway train of corruption and theft. It’s infuriating and sickening and that’s the way it is. Change comes, though, inevitably.)

now state

We are not in control of our hearts’ feelings, or the vicissitudes of life that evoke them. That feels immensely sad to acknowledge, because our hearts tend to feel a lot of suffering. The best way I have found of relating with this absurdity is to cease the attempt at control, let the world break my heart and wave a white flag, all as cheerfully as possible.

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I have never really considered myself a determinist because to do so without smoking a pack of Gauloises daily is distasteful and I do not smoke. But I must confess that I do not give rise to my thoughts or to my feelings (watch them and you will see) so how I can be said to give rise to my own actions? If the I — on whose behalf free will is usually claimed — is actually MIA and so clearly not the deliberate originator of feelings and thoughts, then free will is false and determinism follows. This despite the apparent experience of deliberate choice on the part of the I.

This is a fucker of a paradox for my thinking mind.

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Phenomenologically though, what appears to happen (for me) is that while free will is surrendered by the I, determinism is entertained as an equally amusing idea, and not much more. The awareness that sees the “I” as transparent — the awareness of now — is both prior to conceptuality and pervades conceptuality. That is what allows it to see that all concepts are unreal, fabricated. Determinism is obviously a concept, just like free will and the “I”. None exist Now.

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And TBH I wish most dearly to release the fabricated illusions that tie me to the wheel of cyclical suffering. I wish the same freedom for all beings.

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Is this making sense to you?

Why some women might fear being dominant in bed

In our culture, the man is tacitly ‘supposed to’ take charge in most interactions. In the restaurant, a ‘real man’ pays the bill and, until recently, might even order for his female companion. He makes the first move and, when they go to the bedroom, he actively makes love to his partner.

In this culture, young men quickly learn about their own pleasure and desires (which is great). Young women learn about it too, and they learn a way of being sexual within a culture that’s premised around men’s pleasure and desires. But neither men nor women learn very much about women’s pleasure and desires, except insofar as they satisfy male fantasies or closely follow a familiar script.

And how can they? When our culture discourages their taking the lead in sex, how can women actively discover for themselves what they actually enjoy in it? I’m not really talking about who gets an orgasm and in what order and so on, although that also figures. I’m talking about who is really in touch with their own body, their own fantasies, their own eroticism, their own fulfilment.

Who gets to move in the space, and how freely? How intimate are we with ourselves first, that we might be authentically intimate with our partners?

Spraying Away #2: Kelvin Grove’s sprinkler on full force one hour after rain in Newlands

My anonymous accomplice (cue James Bond theme) took this photo today.

Not incidentally, today was Cape Town’s first day of rain in several weeks. Shit got wet, plants got fed. Yet here we are, watering our croquet lawns one hour after the rain.

*nods sagely*

We can all come to our own assessments as to whether Kelvin Grove does or does not give a fuck.

Spraying away: Cape Town’s Borehole Water

UPDATE #1, 12:00 Wednesday 18 January 2017

A friend who lives close to Kelvin Grove visited them this morning with a printout of my original blog post (immediately below this update) and had a meeting with Brian Chetty, the Maintenance Manager. I’m reporting her account of their conversation as faithfully as I can, subject to her edits which may follow in due course.

When shown my blog post, Mr Chetty was at first defensive. He said that Kelvin Grove has a borehole and so is entitled to water its garden with that water. He also said it was a regrettable mistake for the garden worker to have been watering at midday.

My friend then asked him to walk outside with her, where the two encountered a man watering the same flowerbed with a hosepipe, at the same time of my photograph yesterday. My friend remarked that, clearly, this is not an isolated mistake and, in fact, happens daily (they also saw a sprinkler being used on another lawn). Mr Chetty acknowledged this.

Mr Chetty remained confident that Kelvin Grove is entitled to use a hosepipe to water the garden as long as borehole water is used. This is an important point of contention. I have two conflicting sources of information about it. The first is this:

Screenshot of the City’s Level 3 Water Restrictions PDF

The second, conflicting source of information is my friend’s report from a phone conversation with the City water department today, in which she was told that level 3 water restrictions commercial properties with boreholes may use hosepipes at any time of day with no restrictions.

This may well be the case but it seems to contradict the official document. Also, it seems crazy. Why should Kelvin Grove be allowed to use a shared resource so frivolously?

Mr Chetty was understanding in response to my friend’s observation that Kelvin Grove has created the impression of tremendous entitlement and that it doesn’t particularly care about water conservation or the level of our groundwater.

Mr Chetty has my email address and I’m led to believe he will contact me.

ORIGINAL POST

At 11:40 today (Tuesday 17 January 2017) I stopped my car, got out and took this photo of a hosepipe inside Kelvin Grove spraying water into the road.

Soon after I took this photo, a garden worker came and redirected the hose onto the flower bed. He watered the entire length and breadth of the flowerbed along the side of two lawns on which elderly white folks were playing bowls and croquet.

I don’t know whether Kelvin Grove’s water use is illegal under Cape Town’s Level 3 water restrictions, but it looks pretty damn wasteful to me. The water was flowing into the road and down the drain. Keeping a principle of charity in mind, perhaps this can be chalked up to an errant groundsman and not a committed policy of wasting as much water as possible. Secondly, they were using a hosepipe at midday on a very hot day in midsummer, probably the least efficient time for using water to feed plants.

The City has issued alarming warnings that we are using water much too fast and, unless we collectively curb our use, we will run out completely in 100 days. Some enforcement is being done, which seems to involve pleasant old ladies posing with well-meaning members of the South African Police Service. Perhaps our dear friends at SAPS can secure an interview with Kelvin Grove, because the overall impression I get is that they don’t give a fuck about our drinking water or our laws.

A hosepipe at Kelvin Grove in Cape Town sprays water onto the pavement.

incomplete thoughts on doing and not doing

the only real urgency I feel is that of the present moment, to be known

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May this simplistic fabrication serve us: a spectrum with being and doing as opposite poles. Many of us (and I’d argue our culture at large) gravitate strongly towards doing. Being is anyway a given so why not also do — as much as and well as possible?

I have no argument with that, but I do have a few observations.

The simplest is that we value doing for its own sake as much as for its outcomes. We become busy without, if we are honest, a nuanced concern for the social, cultural, biological or internal/spiritual consequences of our actions or our collective course. But doing is only valuable as such (that is, apart from its outcomes) insofar as it occupies our attention, for that is a transient relief from uneasy feelings about our existence and the purpose of our lives — questions with the most difficult answers, if any. Doing for its own sake serves one purpose only: to distract us from the immense question of being.

Again, I have no moral argument with that, only the observation that more optimistic values are possible with regard to the human existential situation than distraction unto death (and this is not even to question the extent to which doing actually effects distraction).

Personally, I also find absorption and bliss in doing. I feel that my actions can improve the lives of others and my own life. And I feel strongly that I should do exactly as I please and no other way — and that if I don’t particularly please to do something, I am cheerfully ambivalent.

I feel my most elevated moments are moments of not-doing. They are moments of simplicity (a simplicity that is tremendous and unspeakable) and a perfectly innocent completeness that contains all, including the incomplete. It is not really a matter of words but of life: reading a sentence about it will probably not convey it, but if you know or have known or intuited the meaning before then you will nod your head at the words and agree. There are many ways to point this out and reside with the experience, but that is another topic.

It is not that I sit and weep at the beauty of reality (though one might well) but that the presence as it were of being or awareness-of-being is the richest ‘thing’ in my life, the highest and broadest principle I have known. Whatever I do, I wish that to be saturated with awareness, because awareness is the goal, much more so than any outcome of my doing. Awareness is vast, utterly spacious, completely unbiased, totally receptive and playfully creative. It is neither joyous nor sorrowful, it simply is, and to me that is itself wonderful, as is the inseparable pouring forth of phenomena both within and without.

Is being a given? From a material standpoint yes: the world and our bodies are instantiated, unarguably so. But from the standpoint of life? Look at us: we are so much of the time wrapped up in frivolous doings that we hardly take the time to appreciate that we are. Phenomenologically, being is arguably not a given, it arises when the awareness of being arises — consequently, someone without this awareness is not, so what good are they or their doing? Hence the cultural currency of the image of the zombie.

watering the garden

My neighbours water their garden with a hosepipe I can hear splashing in long legato sweeps over the soil. Hundreds of litres of potable water. Cape Town will run out of it in 100 days, unless it rains (which, by April, it probably will).

The question of ambition, of doing as I will or as society would have me do. What is my duty to society?*

Collectivist or at least interdependence-ecological thinking is very persuasive and seems critical to any truly optimistic ideal or vision for humanity (where humanity means the internal experience of life by the great seething demographic of the biological species).

So: anxiety over the need to justify sitting and listening and looking and thinking and enjoying and imagining and writing — in terms of status! (That’s what it is. Status anxiety. Holy shit.)

* The question is more heartfelt than conceptual, though. What do I feel to be my duty to society? To love, in the ways I tend to love: exaltingly, playfully, fiercely.

And in chatting with D. yesterday, I said: “All the people who have loved me have said I should write more.”

And that answer from Chuck Tingle about believing in your own voice.