of housing and need

I've been thinking a lot about housing lately.
It all started with the Isandla 10th anniversary celebrations where Tokyo Sexwale, Minister of Human Settlements, spoke about his perception of the housing problems we have in this country. More importantly, he came to listen. Unlike so many of the government ministers, who arrive to drop "pearls of wisdom" and then leave in a hurry, Sexwale was very aware that the development practitioners in the room were the real experts.

“I don’t think it should come as a surprise that we are changing the way we are doing things,” Sexwale said. “We are seeing the end of denialism.

“We are looking at the situation of RDP houses that are dotting the landscape of this country: they are expensive, they take arable land, they’re ugly, they look like barracks. We take responsibility for them. We have provided unos that are worse than the Apartheid-era four roomed houses. We’ve done even less for our people. Our ministry is busy about attending to that. We need to look at other forms of housing and rented stock.”

But why are we actually providing houses for people? And are their needs really being taken into account?

At a recent meeting with Rene Moodley, a development practitioner working with the German funded Support for Local Government Programme in the Eastern Cape, I learned the importance of asking people what they want and need. In one of the areas that Rene works, for example, the men are emasculated by having the houses built for them. It is culturally important for the men to build the homes for their families.

It highlighted two things for me. One is that people need to be asked what they need, and the other is that blanket solutions are never the answer.

The work that Rene is doing centres largely around finding ways to ask the right questions so that the answers are revealing of the actual issues that the people face. I learned of a community, for example, where rows and rows of government houses had been built, but because no one had asked the old people, no one knew that the houses were directly in the path of the 50 year flood...the last one was around 48 years ago.

And I heard about the community who said that their biggest need was for a new clinic. By asking the right questions, the people who Rene had trained discovered that the need was not for a clinic at all, but for a doctor to be on duty in one of the three clinics that already served the community. Without a doctor, no prescriptions can be written.

Mokena Makeka, architect and head of the Isandla Institute Board perhaps summed the situation in South Africa up best:

“In some respects there is a poverty of imagination because we don't define space from a human perspective, but from an engineering one. We need an enabling environment where entrepreneurs, of all ages, can create their own destiny. The current status quo will not allow us to survive.

“We are creating a context where voices are being hidden. We are creating spaces where gangsterism can thrive. We need to be incorporating a clinic, a library, a market into our plans. At present development is around the containment of anger rather than the unleashing of people."

where there is a will there is a way

I asked Will King for some tips for entrepreneurs. His answers make inspiring viewing. As you can see, I'm still learning about videoing... don't miss the Adams Family hand that floats over the couch about half way through!

I always find it interesting to meet people who have succeeded in business, and to find out more about their attitudes to their success. In my time as a journalist I have met quite a few successful entrepreneurs and their behaviour has been as varied as their personalities.

Some are brash and loud, the kind of people who would have earned a disdainful sniff from my mother, and a comment of "you can always see new money".

Others, like Will King, the founder of the hugely successful shaving empire the King of Shaves, turn out to be absolute gentlemen, and a pleasure to meet.

When his parents decided to "take me off the payroll," after he finished his degree in Mechanical Engineering, he found a niche for himself in sales and marketing and did very well until the recession hit in the 1990s and he was made redundant.

"It was a traumatic experience," he said. Enough to make him decide then and there that he was going to be master of his own destiny, and to run a business was based on a product that he could sell.

The product which turned out to be the one that would bring him success was a shaving oil. The inspiration came to him when he was watching a girlfriend using baby oil when she shaved her legs and he realised that the oil may be a great way to prevent his sensitive skin from reacting so badly to shaving.

"People said the King of Shaves idea would never fly," he told me, but when you see his passionate belief in his product, you realise that if anyone was going to make it work, it would be Will King.

And, in keping with his royal name, he decided that the first customer that he would persuade to stock his product would be Harrods. Well, why not?

"I got hold of Mohamed Al Fayed's personal fax number," he said. "And eventually persuaded him to buy a small consignment."

That word "eventually" is key. So many would-be entrepreneurs fail because they give up too soon.

"I knew if Harrods stocked it, I could persuade Boots to take it too," he said. And the British pharmacy giant did just that in the following year. Then came Super Drug and Tesco and an endorsement from Will Carling - then British rugby captain - and Target in tne US and a host of stores in Australia and New Zealand. His products are now being launched in Clicks stores in South Africa.

By the end of the '90s, King of Shaves was the number 1 shaving preparation brand. It was a real David and Goliath story, but it wasn't enough for the intrepid Mr King.

"Most men only shave once a day, so our growth could never be exponential," he explained. So he launched a range of men's skin care products and found himself in the vanguard of what was to be a booming trend towards men's grooming.

Next step was the launch of the Azor, his revolutionary razor which is causing more than a few backward glances from the people at Gillette, who have discovered that their top spot in the worldwide shaving market is not quite as secure as it used to be.

Five years in development, the Azor is "the first eco-sensitively manufactured razor" King says. I have my husband and my son trying it out, so watch this space for their reviews.

Will King is also a enthusiastic disciple for social media... twittering as kingofshaves and blogging here. It's a great example of how social media can really be harnessed to increase a company's profile.

little and large

This past weekend was the Swartland Agricultural Show.
It's lots of fun to visit, especially if you like farm animals (which I do)



These are some of the prize winning cattle, lined up according to their breeds. I loved the handlers in their red overalls and white boots.



Our friend Christina came to visit because she'd never been to the skou, and it turned out to be a day that was all about transport.



she went for a ride with Greg on the Harley



she got to sit in some really big harvesters



and I mean BIG!





but some were more her size.



Some of the vehicles were more old fashioned. Eight horse power seems much more exciting than the 1800 in our bakkie (pick up truck)



Some were very elegant



And some reminded us that we are all inordinately proud of hosting the world cup soccer next year.



But, when all is said and done, it is always the cute girl that steals the show!

60 squares

My eldest son, Simon, came to lunch on Saturday with his girlfriend Larissa, and spent some time helping to take out the last of the lapa poles. See how the pole has rotted away in the concrete? We are really so lucky that the whole thing didn't fall down on our heads.



So now that the lapa is down, we are full of plans and ideas about what do do with the space.
(Yes, I know I used that pic in my last post. Yes I know it's my garden and I could go outside and take another (different) one. But I don't want to.)

We're back to square one, but as Seth Godin says, square one is an under rated place. So we need to make sure we enjoy being there.

Do we just cover the space in shadecloth so that we can escape the summer heat more cost effectively?

Do we build a big room onto the house? With an extra bathroom and a fireplace and windows all around? The area we are looking at covering is 12m long and 5m wide. The lapa had the same surface area (but a different shape) but somehow it didn't feel like a fixed space because it was open on three sides.

Our house is a very old (by South African standards). Typical farmhouse style... a long passage down the centre and three rooms on each side. So part of what we would want to do if we do build a solid extension would be to make sure that we don't ruin the look of the house, or its old fashioned feel.

Do we sell the left hand half of the bottom of our garden to help pay for these grand plans? (because anything that is built there ... down behind that green water tank in the distance ... doesn't interfere with our view). Or do we build something there ourselves, and boost our income with the rent (once we'd paid off the loan we'd have to take out to pay for it).

What would you do? How would you fill sixty square metres of space?

its gonna be a long, hot summer

We live in a place where the summers are blisteringly hot and dry. A place where, if you are lucky enough to have a swimming pool, you think twice before dashing outside to cool down.

So we built a lapa... a wonderful thatch construction, built with sturdy bluegum poles and a thick thatch roof. It was close to 60 square metres in size, and winter or summer it became the place where we lived. It was a place to do projects. It was a place to share food and laughter. It was a vital part of our home.

Until, sadly, we realised that it hadn't been built properly and it was beginning to shift away from the house. The first construction company had vanished into the wild blue yonder, so we got another company... a family business with three generations of thatchers... to come and fix the lapa.

Sadly, they were not any better than the first company, and earlier this year when a third roof pole suddenly snapped, we realised something had to be done.
So we did the logical thing, and contacted our insurance company (Standard Bank) who had sent an assessor to approve the original construction.

And they, being more interested in taking premiums than paying out policies, refused to pay because the construction was unsafe. (Yes, we told them their assessor had approved it).

Now we are trying to get the ombudsman to acknowledge our presence, but that's a whole other story.


So last week, Ollie came to help us take the thatch off.


He didn't realise how much there was!


Getting the concrete off the roof without it landing on anyone's head was pretty scary


Reuben and Ernie and Rauan came to help this weekend to take the structure down. I made lamb stew and lemon meringue pie and lemonade and stayed out of the way.


Getting the last few poles out was hard work, even though they were totally rotten under the ground.


Once the poles were out, they were stacked in the garden for use in the next big project.


And the space outside is big and empty.

But, like I've said before, there is always a silver lining...

Greg sees it as a blank canvas for the next structure. Looks like it will finally be a chance for us to learn some straw bale building skills. So watch this space.

(but I still feel bereft)

Happy 19th anniversary, Brian

Brian Keenan was an Irishman working in Beirut when he was kidnapped by Islamic Jihad. He was released four years later, on August 24, 1990.

I will never forget his words when he was released. He described being a hostage as like "a man hanging by his fingernails over the edge of chaos, feeling his fingers slowly straightening".

I wonder if he spent time in prison, planning his release soundbite? I'm sure I would have. That's not intended to sound cynical, especially as I read An evil cradling, the book he wrote about his experiences, and was moved by his raw honesty and brutally truthful descriptions of his life as a hostage.

I remember when he said those words as he arrived back in Ireland. It was a crafting of words that felt like a sword, stabbing sharp into my mind. And as a journalist it made me remember all the times I'd asked the inane questions that journalists do, interviewing people who have gone to hell and back: "So, how do you feel, are you happy to be home?" Usually I've been met with less than honest replies from people saying what they thought I wanted to hear. Here at last was a raw, shocking statement that really put things in perspective. I wish I'd been there to hear it in person.



This picture by Jann Arthus Bertrand of tourists at the Iguazu waterfalls in Argentina, made me think of Brian Keenan, and also made me think about how thoughtless we as a species can be. We often wander, oblivious to the precipice below, forgetting to be thankful for every moment that we are still breathing.

(The picture is from Jann Arthus Bertrand's free wallpaper collection. Really worth a look)

blog connections

Julie at Moments of Perfect Clarity calls them "blog crushes" and I've had a crush on her blog for a while. It's even developed into a connection. I wanted to say friendship, but although we've sent emails and even gifts, I feel a bit like its still very much a surface friendship... kind of like the connections you make in your first week at a new school (yes, I can remember that far back).

Another of my blog connections is Meri at Meri's Musings. She often comments on my posts, and I on hers and I think our lives have taken some similar paths.

Some of the blogs I read are people whose lives are totally, enviously different to mine, like Chinua with his stunning photography and incredibly beautiful children.

(My children are incredibly beautiful too...)

Others are going through different life stages to me and I feel connected to them and their experiences. Helen is like that.

Others, like Jack, I have "met" on other forums and in other places (all virtually) and I've been watching his garden grow for years.


The idea of blog connections is pretty interesting. I often wonder if I am feeling connected to people who I may not have anything in common with in real life. I subscribe to piles of blogs, mostly because I follow meandering paths from one to another and find something that is interesting. I don't always visit again regularly... sometimes its months between one visit and another.

And, of course, I wonder about the people that read my blog. Some show themselves and become followers (thank you!) and others stay hidden, or are just random visitors. I wonder about those of you who keep coming back. What is it about me that resonates with you? And is it the real me that you are "seeing" or are your own interpretations or cultural expectations colouring who you think I am?