Young Black Graduate.

Back in the early classes of education we were told that education is the key to success,I am a graduate,an unemployed one to be exact,Where do i go from here?When applying for a jobb am asked if i have a qualification and expirience.for god sake am fresh out of school,where in the world would i get expiiremce.I mean as a black Graduate i have to pay education loans,society expectes me to be success.

I guess it is safe to say that education has failed me.I mean what is the reason of going to school if am not gonna be able to use my qualification?

The new liquor Act in Gauteng

So the Liquor Act in Gauteng has being reviewed and few changes were made.According to the new Act  bottlestores are not allowed to sell liquor on sundays,*am sure the pastors are happy*
With all due respect if people want to drink bber on sundays ,they will,no law in the world would prevent.We undersatnd that the Mec has good intentions but dont you think it is better to give people the chance to decide other than forcing them to do the right thing,Who said alcohol is the cause of all problems in life?
Sure people get excited when they drink but dont you think by closing bottlestore on sundays you would be taking food on someones mouth?
Instead of closing bottlestores,why dont you introduce ways to deal with whatever problem you have with alcohol.
Police stations will be filled with drunk citizens whilst the real wrong doers are still running down the street.
Do not forget the old english saying : ypu can take the horse to the river but you cannot or never make the house drink thw water.*Just saying*

Child abuse on the rise

Neglecting your child, thinking that they are okay or worse, assuming that they are okay might be the biggest mistake you could ever make as a parent. Statistics shows that children are most likely to be victims of abuse in South Africa. Child abuse is a problem worldwide, and a growing concern in South Africa. Such abuse constitutes a profound violation of human rights, and has been associated with long-term mental and physical health consequences.

Abuse is not only raising a hand towards a child but goes beyond that. There are many types of abuses; physical abuse, sexual abuse, neglect and emotional abuse. Physical abuse can be identified by cuts, bruises, burns, abrasions which cannot be explained. Sexual abuse is when an individual is being abused sexually, forced sex whether orally or penetrative.Sexual abuse is a form of child abuse in which an adult or older adolescent uses a child for sexual stimulation. Forms of child sexual abuse include asking or pressuring a child to engage in sexual activities.

 Emotional child abuse is maltreatment which results in impaired psychological growth and development. It involves words, actions, and indifference.  Abusers constantly reject, ignore, belittle, dominate, and criticize the victims. Emotional abuse can be categorized in the same box as the pull her down syndrome (phd) box. Telling a child that they are not worthy or they are not pretty enough is also abuse.

Kate (18) really hated it when her mom would say: “goodnight baby I will see you in the morning”, because she knew it meant that she will be left alone the entire night will Uncle Patrick. Kate’s mother is a nurse and she works at night. To Kate being left alone with Uncle Patrick meant that she had to play with his private parts and that left her sad and made her uncomfortable.

It all started when Kate was six, when her mother got a job as a nurse and she was forced to be baby sited by Uncle Patrick, mom’s only brother. The night seemed long and Uncle Patrick kept on making Kate touch him and sometimes he would rape her and tell her to keep quiet and Kate being the obedient child that she is, she listened to her uncle.

“Mommy when will you take me to work with you?” these are words Kate often wished she could share with her mother, words so simply yet to Kate they could have freed her from being tortured by her uncle, the monster. Abuse ruined Kate’s life and messed her self esteem and self love.

I remember the first day my uncle made me touch his penis and lick it, it was at night and I was in my pajamas watching TV, my mom had just left for work and he came to me and told me that I was the stupid and that I was not pretty and he knew what I needed, little did I know that he was slowly killing me, tearing the walls of my youth and made me loathe sexual intercourse. How I wished he didn’t touch me, he makes me sick and I can’t forget what he did to me. What he did to me wasn’t right.

I locked my room one night and he called my mom and told her I was being disrespectful and in the morning when she came she was angry. I wanted to tell her what Uncle Patrick what doing to me but because I knew that my mom would not believe me I kept quiet. I let that dog dictate my life, my uncle made me change all that I believed in and lived for.

One day at school Mrs. Williams a Life orientation teacher   asked Kate to remain in class after the class was over and asked her what was going on and Kate being scared of her uncles’ threats lied to Mrs. Williams. Kate wanted to keep the abuse a secret because since growing up her uncle has been telling her to keep quiet and not tell anybody especially not her friends or her teachers. But Mrs. Williams dint buy her story she kept on asking Kate if she was okay until one day Kate broke down in tears and told the whole truth. It was five years later since the Uncle Patrick had raped her. Mrs. Williams told Kate’s mother what was going on, of course Kate’s mother was shocked, they went to the police station and reported the matter to the police. Patrick was arrested for child abuse, rape and was sentenced to 25 years in prison.

This is Kate’s story, not the first and certainly not the last. Abuse is real and it is high time we as people did something. How many children are going to be abused for us to see that it is real? How many children must die before we woke up and heard their loud silences?

Kate is one of many children that are abused daily, if we as a nation stand together as one and reach out to our children and teach more about abuse then we will be a happy growing nation.

Her entire childhood Kate wondered why uncle was doing what he was doing to her; at times she wanted to die. The signs were there but no one except Mrs. Williams seemed to know or care to understand why she was a quiet shy kid, her mother was too busy attending her patients and assumed that her only child was okay.

Abuse messes with your future; you are a different person after you're abused. If you are a victim of any kind of abuse it’s not your fault. It’s not your fault that others hurt you. I can't even begin to imagine the horrific things that Kate had to go through.

Let’s stand together and break the child abuse cycle! Lets Awareness On Behalf Of The Most Vulnerable Members of Society!

THE LITTLE ‘’BIG’’ THINGS WE TAKE FOR GRANTED

Lesedi Mbipha shares a snack of her thoughts on the importance of family in one’s life

Looking at life with an everyday-“I am busy” or “got to get this done” eye can cheat you of the pleasures and beauty that life offers in each day.

While I visited my parents I realised how I allowed myself to focus on all the things I thought were tiring and boring bluntly turning a blind eye to detail. I realised that as I grow there are things that used to irritate me that I miss about my family like those debates my little sister and I dearest used to have while mom drinks her 4pm cup of tea- the 12^th  time of the day if I am not mistaken. Tea also makes a great part of our debates.

“Technology has come to destroy our indigenous way of life” that is how it would usually start, with one incident on the television and there… my sister and I are at it. Poor Ma, she always plays the referee all the time.

She would start on social networks knowing very well that they are a great part of my everyday life. “People no longer read books let alone magazines, people think knowing how to operate computers makes them literate but..” and then obesity follows , seeing that our youngest sister is a little meaty that a person her age is expected to be.

I would defend our little sister by saying she is the most flexible and active kid I know-not that, it would cut the debate any shorter. The intellectual in her is starting to unleash and she is becoming more confident in her facts, I am glad I told her about the debate team when she started high school last year.

The ugly truth about life

They always say: if you want things done right, do them yourself but there are things that not even the highest sitting president in the world has authority over. This brings back the sad memories of a year after losing my father thinking I could have done something to stop him from driving that afternoon, well it’s only when I got to tertiary that I realised that when God wants his way no one can stand in the way.

When my mother remarried I felt she just wanted to replace the one man that I know loved us and respected us so much…after I got hurt a couple of times I realised love is what mattered, after all she had to hang to it after being granted a second chance at it.

I look back and to think one thought this man was a substitute… but hey substitutes are not bad after all, they just missed the first part of the game. However, they are still fresh and have the energy to run till the last whistle is blown.

My pillar of strength  

Visiting home for a week made it all seem appropriate it just kicked into my head the courage that I think I had lost while trying too hard to be what I want to see myself as in the future. “You sometimes don’t have to try so hard, deal with what is in front of you to get to the other side” that’s Ma giving me one of her lines that seem to be engraved in my mind and always pop out when I need her.

Just like her mother, my adorable grandmother she has grown to be the glue that keeps the family together as clichéd as that may sound it’s true. If I could be half of what she is I would be happy. She deals with my not-so-easy to deal with dad who at times makes me feel like screaming, then my little sister who has the lately developed the “I will do it later syndrome”, and then my youngest sister who cries over every little thing and has the energy of an athlete…tiring if you ask me. She still has her job to still attend to the family and well, me.

This to other people is just another family but to me they are my source of inspiration, my rock. My friends have often called me a mama’s baby at times I am glad I am, and when they say I would kill myself if my mother was to pass on, I look at them and say: I would celebrate her life and take with me what she teaches me in everyday.

I do not blame them, my friends, they do not understand to me they are like people who come to console you after you have lost a loved one claiming they understand your pain yet they have never lost a thing not even a pat. I now treasure every moment for there is almost nothing that measures to the love that my family poses for me, except for those days when I am with the apple of my eye.

Black is beautiful……

We live in a society that pressurizes and questions the beauty of a black woman. Gone are the days when wearing your kinky afro hair and flaunt it like a supermodel.

Black is beautiful…unless it’s bedecked in weaves, acrylic nails and false lashes. This is a trending fact in our country. When I told my friend that I was going to stop straightening my hair, she raised her big fake lashes with shock and tried to convince me otherwise. I keep my hair short and natural. A black woman’s brain is constantly bombarded with images of women with Eurocentric looks making them believe that you beautiful with weaves, straight hair, long lashes and fake shiny nails. 

If being black and beautiful at the same time means I have to follow these global trends then I don’t want to be beautiful. I’d rather be me than a product of some money hungry advertising directors’ plan.

Ina recent Tyra Banks show a survey was conducted among kids as young as 4 years old. What part of your body or which feature in your body would you change if given a chance and money to? This question was asked and Kyla a 6 year old girl from Texas said she would change her hair and make it look like Sasha’s(Sasha is a brat doll with long black hair).This beauty myth has become a predominate definition of a woman’s beauty, a black woman’s beauty to be exact.

How do I look?

Don’t get me wrong, it takes pride and esteem to love yourself the way you are. I look beautiful without make-up on. I can go out with my girls wearing my flat shoes and I don’t need Uncle Louis Vuiton’s red high heel to be beautiful. Hell no! “The fact about the mainstream definition beauty is built around White features being an ideal that others must follow in this trend”. (Lerato Mogoathe Freelance Journalist)

It is no secret that African women have the highest rates of being overweight or obese. But instead of fat shaming and finger pointing, how many health activists dissect the emotional catalyst behind our struggle with weight?

Long lasting beauty

Follow these simply steps and surely you will love yourself….Take the time to get to know you and what makes you tick. Take back your power. Unleash the crap that is holding you back and weighing you down. It feels good to come to resolution about things instead of letting it rot inside you.

 You must learn how anxiety and stressful feelings release those toxic stress hormones that cause every other hormone to go out of whack and cause weight gain and other host of chronic disease.

You must pray and meditate in order to stay grounded, to stay grateful, to help manage and banish fear, stress and anxiety and other negative emotions. You need to exercise, movement every day. Makes the heart beat moderately. Mental perspective is everything. It also makes being disciplined and focused more fun. Allow yourself to have fun. Engage in play. All adults’ need more play. Please understand that you have the power to make the changes you want to see in your life. Support yourself and be good to yourself and just do it.

Be whoever you need to be…..

As little girls growing we all wanted to be like Barbie. Nice long hair and gorgeous body, from an early age we have been fed the big lie, Africans are inferior to the Europeans. In fashion sense you not beautiful enough until you look like those skinny European models in magazines.

I’ve watched friends struggling with weight lick the 300-calorie sauce off the bones of barbecue chicken wings while simultaneously complaining about their weight challenges. I’ve witnessed women that know their relationship with food is problematic, but fail to address the emotional dependency on their refrigerator. And all of these women are powerful, intelligent, beautiful, and fiercely independent in many areas of their lives, but often, our biggest obstacles are ourselves.

Being beautiful and looking good is important, but let’s face it not everyone is going to be a size 4, have that killer body and long hair. Sure you can hit the gym, maintain and treat your hair, but what are the chances of the entire women population would be like Barbie?                                                           We Africans, we have curves, Sarah Bartman’s behind. Don’t you think it’s time we celebrated us? Don’t you think it’s time we gave Lerato (An African version of Barbie) a chance?    

 

                                                                Picure by Google

June 16 Youth Day

The 16th of June, is Youth Day, a public holiday in South Africa, observed to commemorate the 1976 Soweto uprisings.

“I was in Johannesburg that day, in Noordgesig. As the children were marching, we were there helping wash the teargas out of their eyes. You couldn’t trust anyone in those days. On June 16 there’s always a function for the youth and we cook for them. Sometimes we get a film on June 16 and it brings back memories. I think it’s very good for the children to see what happened on that very special day.” – "Aunt Koekie" Jeremiah.

As we celebrate this day let’s not forget our heroes, the likes  of Hector Peterson Tsietsi Mashinini,let us not abuse the freedom they have fought for, some with their dear lives.

As u walk on that road wearing your school uniform please remember the cause do not drink in your school uniform, Hector fought for better lives for all not a drunk nation.

The uprisings marked a key moment in South Africa’s struggle for liberation during apartheid: they were a spontaneous, sustained challenge to the racist government from an unlikely source, the country’s youth.

On 16 June, 1976, a large band of schoolchildren gathered in Orlando, Soweto (and other areas), to march against the government’s imposition of Afrikaans as the universal medium of learning. The police arrived to break the protest up, and, during the confrontation, began to fire with live ammunition on the students. Many were killed – including Hector Pietersen, subject of an iconic photograph that is featured at the Soweto memorial where he fell.

Hier Kom die Bokkes!

The Springboks are the current Rugby World Champions. They will be one of the top three teams (according to the IRB rankings) present at the 2011 Rugby World Cup. Similar to 1995, in 2007 South Africa were not the favorites. They did not do really well at the Tri nations that year and besides for Bryan Habana, there were not really anything exciting about them. Pierre Spies, a player that possessed a lot of flare back then was even injured early on in the tournament. These statements might make one think that South Africa stands a good change to go far, if not all the way, at this years RWC.

There are a few differences though in the two events mentioned compared to this year. In 1995 and 2007, the South African coaching staff had it a bit more together. I could not recall the coach and his management being an issue in those cases. On the contrary, the coach was not really in the spotlight and it actually felt like the team did very well as a result of a healthy relationship with thier coach. This year, something that has started in 2010 is hindering the Springboks. That is the fact the Peter de Villiers are not considering his team in his behavior. Since its only the Super 15 at the moment, he does not have a major affect on the boks, but as the Tri nations and World Cup are getting closer his impact, hopefully polished and improved will be felt again.

Stay tuned for some more Springbok analyzing in regards to the next rugby world cup in following posts.