THE RAREST RHINO RUBBING POST ON EARTH.

There is no other like it - not even close.

 Painstakingly crafted by Mother Nature herself over millennia, the rubbing post stands over 70 cm tall with a circumference of 119 cm (28 x 47 inches).
















It has a very interesting history:

The tamboti tree grows extremely slowly - in all likelihood it took this tree hundreds of years to reach its maximum height of 18 meters. It probably died of old age or a lightning strike and was further broken by foraging elephants or more storms many hundreds of years ago.

One fine winter morning some forty years ago I accompanied my best friend and mentor on an extended motorcycle patrol through a very inaccessible and desolate area in the African wilderness. Always on the alert for dangerous wildlife, we leisurely meandered along the tortuous game trails in the bush. Should there be anything potentially dangerous up ahead, one needs to be aware of it in time for evasive action, if necessary. Fortunately the bigger animals will mostly avoid a confrontation unless you corner or surprise them. Mostly it will be a vocal warning, breaking branches or even a mock charge - but don't bank on it. A 500cc scrambler is usually quick enough to get you out of trouble with the big stuff. A four-meter black mamba, however, does not snort, growl or break branches, and as a rule it is only spotted once it rears up to eye level as prelude to striking - and by then it is mostly too late for evasive action. Standard procedure is to simply abandon the bike on the opposite side of the snake. This tends to be a bone-jarring experience, but preferable to near-certain death. Leave the fight to the bike and the snake.

By about noon we came across a small pan that still held some water from the previous summer. Judging by the depleted state of the surrounding vegetation it was probably the only water for miles around. We simultaneously spotted the mud encrusted rhino rubbing post at the edge of the water, and could only stare in awe. Neither of us had ever seen something remotely as breathtaking. Yes, when I first set eyes on the Venus de Milo the magnificence did take my breath away. But this was something else - this was not man-made. This was created by the Gods themselves, with their own tools and in their own time. I had goosebumps all over when the thought crossed my mind that, when Alexandros started chipping away at his block of marble thinking about Aphrodite, right here, in Africa, a single seed of Spirostachys africana germinated. Right here, on the very spot we were standing. Dumbstruck we reverently approached the post and touched it gently on the more recently rubbed areas, where the polished wood seemed to radiate life through the thin film of drying mud. Although my friend Tom never used hard language, I will never forget the first words he uttered in a whisper: "Fok my, Oom Leeu..."

All my life I have been in a close, intimate relationship with Nature and all its children and magical wonders. That day was the closest I have ever been to my Creator, and the most appreciative I have ever felt to all the wonders that surround us every day on this earth.

We fetched our water bottles, sandwiches and jerky from the bikes and sat down right at the edge of the little pan. The silence of the serenity was overwhelming. The picture of that magnificent sentinel in the middle of nowhere will live in my mind forever. Even through the coating of ancient clumps of mud, the elegance in the curves of the many sculptors was clearly evident. Definitely not the work of a mere human mind.

When we eventually got back on our bikes we hadn't really talked about the experience - words would have spoiled the sense of having discovered eternity. "If you are still alive by the time an elephant pushes it over, I want it. I will give you a lung, a kidney and half my liver for it" I said, only half joking.
He merely smiled and snorted. "It will and should probably end up in a museum of natural history where millions can share its magnificence. And maybe learn something."

We didn't talk about it further, but the magic remained.


Some five years later, on my fortieth birthday, Tom showed up at my house in his 4X4 truck. On the back, tightly wrapped in a blanket and resting on a foam mattress was the essence of my dreams.

Apparently an elephant did indeed make its contribution. Tom had leveled off the remaining roots and must have spent a lot of time removing all the mud encased in even the tiniest cracks. He must have gone through a wide variety of wire brushes and stuff.
Then he flattened a small area with a chisel where he engraved the epic words of a song by Koos du Plessis with an ancient dental laboratory drill:

An occasional thin coating of raw linseed oil applied by loving hands (not a cloth), and here it still stands proudly in all its glory. I still draw life and inspiration from it daily.



Author's note:
No-one has ever gotten out of this alive. When you die, do not die with dreams. Die with memories. Do not postpone  -  DO IT NOW!!






 

Dankie vir nog 'n lewe. (Weer!)

Dankie

Op Saterdag 12 Mei was ek teen middeldag besig met ‘n boekpromosie by Exclusive Books in die Llanga Mall in Nelspruit. Net na vyf dieselfde dag is ek in ‘n koma opgeneem in die Intensiewe Sorgeenheid in Pretoria se Kloofhospitaal. Op die oog af het dit na ‘n beroerte gelyk, maar die briljante internis het dit spoedig gediagnoseer as Respiratoriese Nood sindroom, oftewel die RD virus. My kanse op oorlewing is geskat op 15% mits daar geen ander komplikasies sou intree nie.

Van meet af aan het elke denkbare komplikasie sonder ophou ingetree – beide longe het platgeval, etlike orgaanstelsels het begin faal, drie nood-tracheostomies is gedoen, bloedvate in die lugweg het geruptuur en dit was net een krisis na die ander vir weke lank. Weens my komateuse toestand het dit bykans twee maande geduur voor die omvang van die wonderwerk tot my begin deurdring het: by twee geleenthede het die bekwame mense wat vir my lewe geveg het, besef dat hulle besig is om die stryd te verloor, en ons kinders laat kom van die Kaap en Natal om te kom groet. En elke keer het my Skepper Hom ontferm en ingegryp.

Nodeloos om te sê, almal het deurgaans met onwrikbaare geloof gebid, ten spyte van die wanhoop en trane. En ek praat nie net van my gesin, familie en vriende nie – ek praat van ALMAL. Nie net hierdie gemeente nie; die hele dorp, mense van oral, selfs (het ek later uitgevind) mense wat ek gladnie eers ken nie. Ek het geen benul waar al die liefde en welwillendheid vandaan gekom het nie – ou kennisse baie ver uit my verlede, mense waarvan ek in my selfsug en eiewaan lankal vergeet het. Alle eer aan God vir hierdie wonderwerk, en innige dank dat Hy al julle en ons gebede gehoor het.

Dit was ‘n wonderlike voorreg om weer te kon leer om self asem te haal, te loop, en kommunikeer. Die son te sien, die see, die groen van die komende lente… Om weer Jasmyn te kan ruik… Moenie dit ooit as vanselfsprekend aanvaar nie – waardeer elke oomblik daarvan. Wanneer dit verby is, is dit verby. Vir ewig is ‘n lang, lang tyd - dis nie aldag dat mens ‘n kyk-weer kry nie.

Wie nie in wondere glo nie, is geen realis nie.

My innige dank aan God, en elkeen van julle. Om te lewe is soveel meer as om net asem te haal. Moenie ‘n oomblik daarvan mors nie. Weet waar jou heil vandaan kom, en moenie nalaat om dankie te sê nie.

                                                                                                                                Leon Marè

My eerste Afrikaanse boek - op papier

Alhoewel Karma van ivoor eers in April/Mei amptelik vrygestel word (boekwinkels), is dit reeds in boekvorm op die Weskus beskikbaar by Buffelsfontein Natuurreservaat en by Yzerfomtein Spar.

Dit is ook reeds elektronies beskikbaar op Amazon Kindle.

Tom Yssel was senior veldwagter op die Nwanetzi-buitepos naby die Mosambiekse grens in die vroeë 90’s. Die onwettige handel in ivoor en renosterhoring het stropery laat eskaleer tot die vlak van georganiseerde misdaad.

Tom was verloof aan sy ou skoolkys en hy was ‘n gelukkige man, tevrede met sy lewe.

Maar toe kom Linda Crawford, die nuwe prokureur in Nelspruit, soos ‘n dief in die nag in sy lewe ingesweef op die wieke van lemoenbloeisels en mooi bene.

Teen die agtergrond van hierdie eskalerende liefdesdriehoek is Tom en sy kollegas gewikkel in ‘n bloedige stryd met die stropers en die sindikaat.

Tom het meer respek vir die wette van die natuur as diè van mense. Hy is ‘n reguit, harde man met ‘n byna obsessiewe liefde vir die natuur.

Karma van ivoor is ‘n aksiebelaaide liefdesroman waarin die leser ‘n kykie gegee word van wat agter die skerms aangaan – ‘n kykie na die werklikhede, die trane en die vreugde van natuurbewaring. Die hoofkarakter in die boek is geskoei op die van Tom Yssel, my vriend en mentor in die wildernis. Hy was vir meer as 20 jaar senior veldwagter in die Kruger Nasionale Park. Alhoewel die verhaal fiksie is, is baie van die natuurtonele gebaseer op ware observasies en ondervindinge.

Lions - too many, or too few?

Exciting news on the lions of Buffelsfontein!

The cubs being prepared for their journey:

The three adolescent Buffelsfontein cubs (see previous blog posting) have found a safe, caring home at Buffelsdrift, near Oudtshoorn. The owners of the nature reserve at Buffelsdrift have guaranteed Paul Loubser, owner of Buffelsfontein, an extended, dignified life for the three animals. In a combined effort with the well-known TV personalities of  'Groen Namibië' Dr Rudie and his wife Marlice van Vuuren, and under the ever-watchful eye of the KykNet TV director they were anaesthetised, crated an transported to their new home.

Wildlife vet, the good Dr. Willem Burger, arrived well equipped for any eventuality.

Paul was adamant that the wellbeing of the lions would take precedence throughout the whole of the translocation procedure. The minimum stress and maximal comfort of the cubs was infinitely more important to him than getting good TV footage. This is sometimes not easy, but he was adamant.
Fortunately everyone agreed, and the initial filming was done outside, in the family enclosure. Then the lions were enticed into the three small, individual little "hospital enclosures", where sick lions are usually treated. Here they were separately anaesthetised practically simultaneously - infinitely less stress and drama.

Each having had a proper medical check-up, they were individually loaded into their straw-lined, custom-made transport crates for the journey.

 As Paul watched the convoy leave Buffelsfontein, his body language said it all - his children were leaving home for ever. Pretty sad.

But then, on the bright side: a whole new lion colony will be established near Oudtshoorn, in a reserve which does not cater for canned hunting either.

While back in Buffelsfontein the only male in Elsa's latest litter will take another three years before reaching sexual maturity. Ample breathing space for all.

Enough Lions for now...

The Dilemma:

Lions in captivity breed like rabbits.
Wildlife tourists, true to form, want to see lions - the cubs are cute and cuddly, and the adults are huge, magnificent creatures, awesome to behold.

Uncontrolled breeding presents a serious problem  -  this little cutie-pie is going to grow up and would one day like to start a family of his own. My friend Paul Loubser, owner of the Buffelsfontein Game and Nature Reserve on the Cape West Coast does not condone the concept of canned hunting. He would only sell cubs to individuals and reserves where the cubs are guaranteed to live full, dignified lives without the possibility of being hunted.
This prerequisite, however, narrows down the market considerably. Paul tries to keep conditions as natural as possible for his lions, and is therefore reluctant to keep males and females in separate camps. Nature being nature, this co-habitation would invariably result in the population getting out of hand.

Initially the females were put on implanted birth control pills, but this required frequent darting of the animals, and somehow there were still a couple of surprise litters now and again. Sterilising the animals in the usual way invariably results in hormonal and a variety of behavioural as well as physical changes.

So, Quo Vadis? Something had to be done to limit the population increase.

Balzac, the alpha male, did not take kindly to the idea of being castrated - yes, he was growing rather fed-up with a new batch of youngsters pestering him every now and again, but the thought of his mighty roar changing to a timid squeak and losing his manly appeal did not sit well with him.

In fact, it seemed to bring him close to tears.



















But then we gave him the good news which immediately lifted his spirit. Although it would still entail a visit by the vet and some minute surgery, nothing would change - he would still remain the formidable Balzac with everything intact, including his virility. The tiny operation known as a vasectomy entails the removal of a short piece of the vas deferens, or spermatic cord. This is a thin tube transporting sperm from the testes to the rest of the plumbing, where it is mixed with various other fluids to produce the ejaculate. Only difference is there are no sperm in the semen, something you can only spot with a microscope. So the happy family life continues normally, the only difference being that the female does not fall pregnant.

This elegant solution to the dilemma appealed to Balzac, although he was still not all that enthusiastic about the vet.

Due to the general anaesthetic he was spared the indignity of "the shave"...

prelude to "the knife".

From "the first cut"....










...to the "final cut".

Within hours Balzac and his buddy were staggering about with their hang-overs, but converted to full sport(s) models without the usual loss of serious body parts. The big boy can even retain his name with pride.

This is not a permanent solution to the problem, but rather a reprieve. In the most recent litter there is (fortunately) only a single male cub, but it will take him a couple of years to reach sexual maturity.

Meet Frikkie III

THE NEW BOSS.

About two and a half years ago, a pair of wagtails started frequenting my garden. So I got hold of some freeze-dried meal worms, which I put out for them.
A couple of months later they disappeared. Then, last spring, there was a new wagtail. This one became quite tame, coming indoors and feeding at the table in my barbecue room. A month later he started bringing his mate along. Towards the end of winter, they would eat their fill, and then carry off some worms, two or three at a time. Freeze-dried worms are not easy to come by if you live on the remote West Coast, so I started breeding my own meal worms (not as easy as it sounds, either). Somewhere in the bush their eggs had hatched, and those little chicks had huge appetites.

Then, about a month ago, they showed up with their three young offspring. I was as happy as they were, except for the fact that my worm farm was not yet in production. Cape Town is a long way away, but I had no choice - step up the freeze-dried worms.

Initially the five of them would spend their days hanging around on the driveway and, of course, tucking into the freebies. It got to a point where I considered scraping guano off my driveway.

Then the parents decided enough was enough, and they started driving their offspring out of their territory. Two of the youngsters left promptly. Not so Frikkie III - he decided he liked it here, and fought back, feathers literally flying. Some mornings he would pitch up for breakfast looking as if he had been in a bar fight the previous night. He still looks a bit scruffy at times.

Then he discovered the worm farm had started producing fresh, live worms, and there was no stopping him. This went on for about a week before the parents conceded and took off. He is still considerably smaller than his parents, but he's got the heart of a lion and the persistence of a honey badger.

Once king of the roost, he started taking over big-time. When I'm in the veggie garden he would appear out of nowhere and land on my head or shoulder as if we'd been life long buddies. I am having a hard time convincing him to limit his indoor visits to the barbecue room and my office. Monica takes a dim view of him taking over the rest of the house, proclaiming furniture and sofas as part of his territory. How the hell do you house train a wild bird?

We have now settled for a fairly acceptable compromise. When I start working in the early hours, I make sure all the doors and windows in 'my' territory are open. Just after first light he would come zooming in, ready for breakfast.

Having eaten his fill he would perch on my arm and preen himself thoroughly. Then to work: I'm sure this little bugger can read. He seems to check if I have made sufficient progress and if the story line is still to his liking.

After wasting about an hour of my time he seems to get bored and takes off for the wide outdoors.

But he's back every hour or two, even if just for a quick snack or a chat. I simply love the little bugger.

Pizzabraai - easy, inexpensive and simply delicious.

Hands-down the best pizza ever - on a hinged grid (toeklaprooster) over open coals.

First, buy two of those cheapy thin-crust frozen pizzas from your local shop. They usually have hardly anything on them, but the less the better. You are going to build your own anyway.

Next, spray your hinged grid well with Spray & Cook or a similar product to ensure your pizza will not stick to the grid.

In a pan, fry some bacon and pineapple bits. Drain the pineapple well beforehand.

Place the first pizza face-up on the grid, and sprinkle liberally with grated cheese. Add the bacon/pineapple from the pan.

Next, add a layer of sliced banana...

...and top it off with another layer of cheese.

Place your second pizza face-down on this lot, and close the grid.

It is important that you give the coals ample time to cool down - so pour another one and wait.

Then, over very low heat, start baaing gently, turning frequently.

Do not leave unattended while you pour another one - it burns very easily.

You will know you have done it slowly enough if, by the time it looks like this, melted cheeze starts oozing out onto the coals, giving it that extra flavour.

This is basic, and it is the best tasting pizza imaginable. Feel free to experiment by adding your personal favourites, like salami, garlic etc.

Zuma qualifies for Wild Stuff in Africa.

As the name implies, this blog is about wild stuff in Africa, with 'wild' in the context of 'wilderness'.

I don't do politics, but I do feel compelled to take a closer look at what this Wild Man of Africa has just done.

The Wild Man of Borneo was a saint compared to our own President Zuma. In one final foul swoop this despot has now driven a potentially great country right out into the wilderness of the worst banana republics.

There are millions waiting to be raked off in the shady SAA deal, and possibly billions off the even shadier R 1 trillion nuclear deal with the Russians. When our capable minister of finance attempted to put the brakes on the insanity, he got himself fired for daring to stand up to Zuma and Dudu. He was replaced with an unknown yes-man who could not even manage a small municipality.

This resulted in the bottom dropping out of the economy, and the Rand plummeting into freefall. Someone must have pointed out to the laughing man that he had now gone too far, so he started slamming the screen doors on his sinking submarine by getting rid of his newly appointed minister as well.

Maybe Jan van Riebeeck had torpedoed his sub...

Seems Zuma is falling on the Spear of the Nation.

Fields of flowers destroyed at Langebaan.

Who on earth allowed this?!

Who could have given the go-ahead for this

to be ripped up and transformed to this?

While behind me...

...lo and behold the silly sign they had the audacity to put up

An environmental no-go area? (Environ-) Mental indeed - you could get run over by a bulldozer.

Just outside the beautiful town of Langebaan, on the road to the West Coast National Park, this particular hill and valley used to be famous for the floral cloak it dons every spring. Visitors from far and wide annually flocked to this spot to look at the splendour of the floral display.

This piece of land should have been a heritage site, and protected as such. Who gave the final go-ahead for this development? What was the motive? It can only be a politician. This decision will cost him or her one hell of a lot of votes.
Is there anyone out there who can put a name to this person? The time has come to name and shame.

The developer? Developers do what they do - develop and make money. Nothing wrong with that.

But it should never have been allowed on this irreplaceable piece of land! I believe they are putting up sixty residences. How will any of the new owners ever be able to sleep in their new homes. Imagine living on the graves of millions upon millions of wild flowers that are gone forever.

Shame on you, whoever you are. You are a disgrace.

Aliens committing suicide

Rust fungus creating havoc:

During the nineteenth century Acacia seligna, better known as Port Jackson, was introduced to the Western Cape for soil stabilisation. It was also deemed to be beneficial as animal fodder and for fuel wood. It must have seemed a good idea at the time.

This alien tree soon started invading the delicate fynbos systems of the Cape and there was no stopping it. Both physical and chemical control failed miserably as the Port Jackson marched forth relentlessly on its road of destruction.

In 1987 a rust fungus was introduced, which infected only the Port Jackson and no other species. The fungus itself does not kill the plant, but invokes a potent infection stress. In reaction to this severe stress the Port Jackson forms galls, with which it eventually strangles itself.

The spores of the fungus are spread widely by the wind.

The life expectancy of a Port Jackson tree has dropped from fifty years to less than ten...

On a different front a specific weevil which feeds only on the seed beds of these trees has also been recently introduced.

Hopefully the fynbos will soon reclaim these barren areas.

Printed format

For those who still prefer the feel of paper and the smell of glue:

All five the novels in the Sam Jenkins Series are now also available in printed format from Amazon.

Media Frenzy

Cecil who?

I am not a hunter. I don't even like hunting. But I am not a lunatic or a zombie either.
Read a little. Look up some stuff on Google. Educate yourself a little and start thinking for yourself - don't simply swallow everything the media pushes down your throat. It is nothing but opium for the masses.

It never ceases to amaze me how easily the media can whip up a storm in a tea cup, leaving the frenzied masses foaming at the mouth with indignant fury.
All just because someone had given the lion a name. Every single day we are bombarded with hunters posing with their kills - rhino, elephant, leopard, giraffe, greater kudu, you name it. If the 'hunter' is some scantily dressed eye candy there might be a ripple, but otherwise nothing... But make it personal by giving the victim a name, and all hell breaks loose. The righteous masses, most of whom have no understanding of the concepts of 'sustainable use', 'ethical hunting' 'extinction' or CITES, jump on the band wagon with unbridled fury.

Whether this hunt had been ethical remains to be seen, but time will tell.

While everyone is still ranting and fuming, I have a message for you from my friend Arthur:

"The night after Cecil was killed, poachers crossed the border into the Tsavo National Park and slaughtered five elephants in minutes. All five died in a radius of fifty yards. The tusks were hacked out, and rangers found the carcasses and the orphan the next day.
Spare a thought for my nameless relatives."

Did you see anything about this in the media?

Neither did I.

The swear word is "poaching", people. That is where the danger of extinction lies. An elephant is poached in Africa every fifteen minutes.

Now that is something to go ballistic about.

 Do I hear your voice out there?

Killed for a four inch horn!

Some two years ago a friend of mine had all the rhinos on his farm dehorned for fear of poaching.
Removing the horn of a rhino is as painless as a haircut and has no effect on the social structure, feeding habits or fighting habits of the animal. Fighting still occurs with the same frequency and ferocity as before, but serious injuries and fatalities are reduced to zero.
Once the horn has been removed, it starts growing back at a rate of approximately 5cm per year. Just like hair, albeit a little slower.
On a visit to the farm my friend pointed out the remains of a rhino that had been poached a couple of weeks ago. The savages actually killed this rhino for the sake of two year's worth of horn growth. I made it my mission to find and assess every other rhino on the property.
Not one of them had a horn exceeding four inches (10cm)!
Over and above the monetary implications (half a million bucks down the chute for the owner), that was a prime breeding stock cow and all her potential offspring are gone forever.
Bloody savages.

As the old saying goes: if you keep on doing what you've always been doing, you will keep on getting what you always got.

Isn't it time to try a totally different approach? There are thousands of rhinos in privately owned breeding programs in this country. Lift the ban on the trade of rhino horn and the supply/demand balance will collapse. The bottom drops out of the price, and poachers will no longer be prepared to run the risk for a pittance. With rhino horn cheap and freely available, buyers will soon realise that they have been conned all along - the stuff is useless as aphrodisiac and has zero medicinal properties.
The rhinos are happy: they are no longer threatened and keep growing new horns to be harvested from time to time, like sheep being sheared for their wool. No harm in that.
The breeders are happy: at long last their considerable investment is beginning to pay off.

And who knows, maybe the rhino will eventually claw its way off the endangered species list.

I'm just saying...

Missing slideshow

The link to the slideshow in my previous posting has become dysfunctional. Please go to the Youtube link instead:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdgX7JUoK9I

Thank you for pointing it out, and thanks for all the views.

Who will feed them?

...and with what?

I feel I need to expound on my previous post: please download the link http://nas5.kizoa.com/kp/Q/o2jz9z06.mp4 (it takes about a minute to download, so be patient) and have a look at it. I did it this way in order to evade the myriad of ads YouTube seems to be sticking onto everything nowadays.

This topic is something that has has been worrying me since my youth (which was a long, long time ago).
Become hunter gatherers? There will be nothing left to hunt or gather.

Mankind has been transgressing the law of exponential growth for generations. Mother Nature is not the benign old lady she is made out to be. There will come a time when she will bite back.

Death of Africa - the demise of a continent.

Humanitarian Aid in Africa: Quo vadis?

This is not a conscience soother. On the contrary, it is an effort to revive the slumbering concepts of logic and reason, buried deep beneath the media-fueled brainwashing of preconceived ideas and indoctrination.

Have you ever stopped to think about where the tragic road of Benevolence, Humanitarian Aid and Goodwill will eventually terminate? And sure as God made little green apples, terminate it will - this continent is rapidly being pushed beyond the point of 'sustainable use'.

Yes, it is indeed noble to donate mildly in order to feed that hungry little child with the huge fly on his upper lip. Even after 'administrative expenses' and politicians skimming off the cream, there just might be enough left to actually feed the child. Should the child be fortunate enough to survive, what is going to happen once he reaches his uneducated puberty at age thirteen or fourteen?
Yes, spot-on: the strongest drive in all things living will take precedence over all else - the instinct to procreate.
That will in short order lead to ten more hungry little mouths to feed, with the same heart breaking pleas for donations. The begging bowl just got a lot bigger. And this vicious circle will just keep on repeating itself, growing exponentially.

Who will then feed all those children? With what? Who could ever hope to educate them?

Productive farms are being divvied up and given to hordes of to non-productive voters with no inkling to actually produce anything. Once these farms have been stripped of everything edible, the hordes move on to the next one. But a vote is a vote. That is the democracy of Africa.
This once bountiful continent is being stripped and devoured.

And the righteous world is benevolently watching it happen, with consciences soothed by their donations.

The time will come when no amount of money can buy a single bag of maize meal or a loaf of bread, simply because nobody is growing corn or wheat anymore. It is easier to beg and demand than to work and produce your own food.

Then what?

On Statues and Students

V
'Students' ??
A student is someone who attends an institution of higher learning in the hope of being taught something worthwhile; to gain knowledge with which to better his life - to become a productive asset to the community in which he lives, where he can raise a family with a future.
There is only one way in which that goal can be achieved: hard work. The habitat of students is lecture halls, desks and libraries.

The useless louts toy-toying on campuses, defacing and tearing down statues, are not students. They are the delusional idiots who think knowledge can be assimilated through the process of osmosis. If you just hang around long enough and demand vociferously enough, you can walk away with some or other useless degree or diploma.
These 'students' then spend the rest of their mediocre lives breeding and demanding free housing and service delivery, and indulging in 'affirmative shopping' under the guise of xenophobia. Stealing, looting, burning and murder become part of the creed by which they live.

Soon this country will be populated by devolved morons and constipated pigeons.

The Devolved

Now available for pre-order on Amazon Kindle.

   "The first ones who dared to cross were compelled to do so by pressure from the masses behind.

   None of them made it. From the flotsam rose a destructive force that had existed only in their genetic memory for generations. The folklore and superstitions of their ancestors had suddenly come to life.

   The destruction was complete and the retreat chaos."

   For years the Skukuza community had been clinging to the belief that their Utopia could not possibly be the last bastion of civilisation on the African continent.

   Now there was hope, in the form of a vapour trail in the morning sky.

   However, the hope soon turned to despair as a new threat became apparent.

   Man was the apex predator, the undisputed king of all mammals. But now, over the arid plains and through the desolate jungles of Africa, extinction was stalking not only mankind, but all things living. Man was about to pay the ultimate price for years of benevolence and humanitarian aid, which had run out decades ago...

   There is no circumventing the basic laws of nature - a fact that was about to become abundantly clear.

Your blood group displayed on your boat means...

Yes, it means this is a bloody (pun intended) dangerous sport, exclusively for adrenalin junkies with conjones (or similar) of solid brass. Take that to include bra's.

This weekend's boat race at our beautiful village of Yzerfontein proved just how dangerous...


There were several non-injury acrobatics and aerobatics, some of which were executed with a marked lack of grace.

The sea was calm, allowing for maximum speeds all the way around the island of Meeurots.

 A co-pilot being flipped out of her boat was the first injury. True to form the NSRI was on the scene beyond the backline immediately with their jetski.

Fortunately the injury proved to be minor, and she was safely brought to shore.  The next competitor was less fortunate - their boat did a complete somersault with one of the young men sustaining serious injuries.

The NSRI deemed it prudent to transport the patient to the harbour rather than bring him to the beach through the breakers.

Despite being in agony, the young man was none too pleased when the doctor had to cut off his brand-new wetsuit to assess the injuries.

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