Building for the Future

This week has all been about DIY – having another baby will do that to one!

My list is far shorter than at the start of the week but still substantial. My hands are raw and blistered, my ankle is swollen, and my body aches. Well actually the ankle is as a result of yet another skateboarding accident. This time I almost pulled off a new move, then managed to safely disentangle myself from the crash that should have followed, only to be hit on the ankle bone by a flying skateboard. Grrrr.

Apart from the DIY on the home front, my business partner and I, took the opportunity of some business down time to do some of our own kind of community work. I thoroughly enjoy building jungle gyms and there seem to be no shortage of these things that have been donated to crèche’s in underprivileged areas. The only problem is that nobody can figure out how to put them up again.

Somehow I have managed to rope Brad into this world of poles, threaded bolts, and manual labour. I love being presented with a hopeless heap of poles that bears no resemblance to its former glory, and using imagination to create something new and challenging!

Here is the before and after effort from this week. The picture in the middle shows the strength of our build, able to support the antics of both Brad and the school principle Phelisa!



DIY gives me so much personal satisfaction, something to do with delivering something that works or just looks better. As for jungle gyms, Brad and I have erected many together and hopefully they will ensure generations of smiles!

Life of the Unborn

I read an article this weekend about a woman by the name of Pam Stenzel. She is an American motivational speaker who deals with teenage sexuality, and has been giving talks to South African youths.

She was quoted as saying that she is eternally grateful to her 15 year old mother, who after being raped, still loved her enough to have her and then put her up for adoption.

Her simple statement of fact gave me goose bumps. How many other people have never been, because they were aborted before they even had a chance? Surely her mother of all people had the right to terminate a pregnancy disgustingly created by hate. And yet, the product of that hate is a voice of love...

I find that absolutely incredible. Don’t all lives deserve a chance? Or does looking at the miracle of life from the point of the new life skew the debate?

A Cot for a Babe

My youngest son and I put together the cot today. Yes, four months ahead of time, the cot is now a fixture in the new babies room. Well so far it just contains the cot, a rocking chair, and some semi clean cupboards. My business partner arrived for a meeting and ended up sweating over a number of furniture re-arrangements. Poor chap!

We are blessed to be able to do a bit of house rearranging and find a room for our third child. The new babies room was our old guest room. Living in the Cape, we have had a constant stream of visitors, something that we have thoroughly enjoyed. Now our visitors will be treated to a more unusual experience, as we convert our studio into a studio cum guest room! I think it will end up being something special! It is of course the one room in the house with views!

The cot was an interesting project. It has been lovingly loaned to us by another family together with some detailed instructions. I think it took me longer to work out the instructions than it took me to put the cot together in my own way! Matt was a great help and only too happy to tell me to get a move on. The reading of instructions is not yet one of his strong suits!

Our first baby made us go out and buy all sorts of fancy stuff to cater for his every need. OK, it was the newbie parents in us that made us do that. Baby number two got everything that baby number one had used. Then we donated everything that was baby relevant to people who we felt could really make use of the stuff. Now that number three is one the way, we have been overwhelmed by the generosity of all those that we know. We may have given away all of our baby stuff, but friends have given us all of that and more. We are most thankful!

Life has an interesting way of working itself out! And this morning, the cot is still as solid as ever, many babies on!

Thinking Forward

Most of us will in our lifetimes sit back and think, who would have thought?

Africa as a travel destination has never really interested me much. For some or other reason, I am more a snow bunny, give me -27 degrees Celsius and heaps of snow and I am happy! A useless passion when one lives in sunny South Africa! Yet just this year, I have visited about 10 odd African countries, some more than once. But all of them remote and hardly likely to be on anyone’s must do list.

These visits have been filled with interesting experiences. Saturday afternoon brought another of those, a run with a group of people called a Hash! I was most surprised to find more than 50 people from all the corners of the earth, pitching up at a brewery in Southern Sudan to go for a run. This Hash is one of many throughout the world with a complete set of traditions that predate World War II. The leaders had gone to immense effort to map out a course that ensured the faster runners ran fast and always ended up back with the group, through double backs, dead ends, and group viewing points. It was rather a marvellous way to make a lot of new friends, sing silly songs, and do my favourite, drink some great beer!

I have no idea what I am doing out here in Africa. Our business is growing in leaps and bounds, and that is highly rewarding, and useful! I have yet to find my groove though. I am sure I am on the way somewhere and that in time, it will become clear. I know that I have the most wonderful family that support me wholeheartedly. I am also deeply loved and have much love to give, but how...

I have no doubt that the invaluable experience gained over the last 18 months is preparing me for something very interesting. I seem to have matured in that the destination is no longer all consuming, instead I am finding contentment on the path. Still far to go on the maturity score though! And one day when I look back on a hot afternoon of contemplation in a remote and obscure part of Africa, it will just be part of the natural progression to where I have ended up!

Away from Home

I have been away for the last week. Sunning myself in Southern Sudan! Internet connections are not, should I say, prolific! This post comes to you out of Entebbe in Uganda.

Being away makes me think about the home that I miss so much. So many men relish the chance to get away from home and everything there. I have seen plenty of the ‘what happens on tour, stays on tour’ philosophy as individuals away from home lose their values and morals and do as they please. And they call that freedom....

I must be a strange guy, well actually I am. But I cannot wait to get back home and be reunited with my family, even though it has only been a week away. The living conditions are not tough in Sudan, rather my time here is filled with work. A little loneliness creeps in every once in a while. I would far rather be laughing with my wife instead of sharing sound bytes with strangers over a beer. Just being together and reading our books would be fun! To hear the noisy antics of my children, ruffle their hair, find a lesson in some or other disappointment, stuff I take for granted. I just miss being part of my family.

Home is where I belong. I have been so blessed that my entire life now revolves around home. Even sitting here so far away, I get to appreciate it so much more.

Wet, wet, wet

The heavens opened and it started to rain. It rained solidly for 40 days and 40 nights. No, wait, that’s a completely different story. But the heavens opened and the rain fell, and the land became sea again. Yup, that’s more like it!

The stream in my garden is small and gentle. It usually gurgles over the rocks that litter its path. Frogs croak lullaby’s to each other and our cats drink thirstily from its banks. The Cape thatching grass grows tall, and the bog irises multiply furiously, so much do they love their wet feet. It is calm and serene, the life blood of our garden.

And so it was that it rained and rained some more. Nobody could be found to close the heavens again, and it continued to rain. With surprise and wonder I looked at out the window at my garden stream, now a mere eight metres wide and surging furiously.

Aghast, I waded out in my wellies to survey my new water kingdom. As I watched my wooden bridge was lifted effortlessly and marched downstream where it became entangled in the fence. The bird table without a bird in sight, gave the illusion that it was a concrete disk that could float on water. I waded into the current to rescue it together with the concrete David underneath, who had been holding his breath for some time! The water had already risen another 10cm and was now lapping the base of my half pipe. Oh no! My nemesis was under attack!



Peering over my upstream neighbour’s fence, I was struck by a sense of motion. Their whole garden seemed to be on the move. With my torch cutting through some of the gloom, I realised that their garden was now one with the river. I realised that it was roaring! I silently bid farewell to my halfpipe.

Walking round the block, I ended up on a road just downstream from my house. Here the river was really angry. It had leapt from its banks, overrun the road, and was pouring mercilessly down the driveways of the houses that marked its old territory. The gardens had filled up like swimming pools, the retaining walls that normally kept the river in, now kept it out. Closed front doors did nothing to deter the rampage, inviting as much in as the volumes that swept by them. The sound of big mallets on stone reverberated through the air as desperate owners tried to break holes in walls and let the proverbial plug out of their cold water bath. And still it rained!



This ferocious beast grew bolder and deeper, now up to my knees in the road. After giving what help I could, I walked home, murmuring my prayers for those in shacks.

On awakening this morning, it was all gone. My stream that had become a river had now become just a torrent. A high water mark of debris was all that was left of the beast that had passed our way. The neighbours were nowhere near as lucky.

And still it rains!

More Terror

It is still out there, without a care in the world. Well for one thing it does not like the rain. I feel sorry for it and keep it covered up, snug in an old tarpaulin. Every morning I open my curtains and see it sitting in the garden, lurking. I can feel it laughing at me, yet I know it has no voice. I figure it must be laughing. It has me beat. I’m down but I am not out! It just thinks that I am down. That I am too sissy to come out and fight, brave the odds and do the one thing that has eluded me for so long...

Drop in on my halfpipe!

I am still terrified of it. I have worked hard on that lump of wood. I have spent hours rolling over its smooth surface, up and down, up and down. My turns are sharp, my control ever improving. It is just that one simple act that eludes me. I can even use a plank at the top of the ramp and drop in off it. I just cannot seem to make the leap and drop in off the rail. It is not higher, it just seems infinitely more difficult to me.

I lay on the ramp this afternoon and gave it a good stare. Somewhere in the deep, dark recesses of my mind, I recall Anthony Robins writing about fear, and how one can use their imagination to imagine the right outcome to overcome that fear. I pictured myself dropping in and every time, my mind completed the drop in with me falling and twisting my ankle again. And again. And Again! No wonder I cannot make the leap, I am mentally focussed on failure!

I am not going to give up. Firstly I am stupidly competitive and that ramp is not going to beat me. More importantly, I want my children to see me struggle with my own fears, work on them, and overcome them. I just did not think it would be so hard.... But then again fear only has power when you let it!

Bigger and better

What an afternoon!

I caught the biggest wave of my life! Absolutely incredible! There was swell in our bay on Friday, the offshore was stiff to heavy, and we were at our favourite surf break. Out way past backline, I waited for the set. Rather a silly thing to do when the normal waves were BIG enough. Then a soldier marched out of the horizon. I swallowed, told myself to breathe, and paddled like a man possessed. The offshore gusted up the face of the wave spewing forth clouds of water into my face. With my eyes closed, I gambled that I had actually caught this wave, and jumped to my feet. For a while it felt like I was slipping sideways down the side of the wave, almost like I was side slipping on a snowboard. Luckily for me, I still could hardly see, and yet somehow managed to dig in the rail of my surfboard, feel my stomach fall to my feet, the wind in my hair, and the absolute freedom of riding a bucking monolith of surging water. Seconds and a hundred meters later, I exited the wave before it thundered into splintered oxygen. A mate later told me that it was one of the most insane take offs he had seen, with a heavy wave curling over my head as I dropped into this deep pit. So, it had been better than I had thought! Oh boy!

Three hours and many spectacular crashes later, I wearily paddled my board to the shore. Our local surf break is called Paranoia for many good reasons. One of them being the rocks that line the shore! Using my right leg as an anchor by bashing it on a rock, I managed to exit sans grace. As I limped out of the sea, realisation struck me that me less than perfect surfing at the end of the session was due in part to my foot being completely numb with cold. I suppose 14 degree water will do that to one!

I turned and looked at the break. Smiled! Shook my head! And sighed with satisfaction!

So Busy

I cannot complain. My new company seems to have more than enough work at the moment. And all of that work is keeping me immensly busy! This is my excuse for being away from my blog this week!

Not a good one, but I am sticking to it!

The work is good though - I really am enjoying what I am doing!