Coach Hansie - we chase results together

 Yesterday I was terribly upset about one of the video clips that was displayed on one of the whatsapp groups (saamkuier) that I am a part of. It is a graphically portrayal of how a person attacks and in a sense, force feed an elderly white lady that is in a wheelchair. I just said, "I do not like it" on the group. I should have written, "I hate it and I do not want to see things like this".  There were comments for acceptance and tolerance of differences of opinion on this matter on the group. I had to dig deep to uncover the emotions that I felt in the process and to go past the feeling of anger that was the first one that came to the surface. My first reaction was just to say," I am out of here" (meaning I am leaving the group), which (probably) is not the route to take without expressing myself properly. What disturbed me so much and what were the emotions underlying it? The first aspect is that in my opinion that particular post does not serve the Kin...

 Sue’s story - 27kg  lost. Sue Bernard , a former IT manager, knows exactly what it is like to be in thrall to ultra-processed food. In her case, the problem was late-night grazing. I would have a healthy dinner, and then after dinner I was dreadful. I ate crisps and chocolate and ice cream. It was non-stop. It was a complete compulsion. And I would even say to my husband, ‘Why am I doing this? Why am I going back into the kitchen to open the fridge and eat more chocolate when I know I cannot be hungry?’ It was almost as if I had a fat wish; we talk about a death wish but this was definitely a fat wish. It was as if I wasn’t in control. I was stick thin as a child . We didn’t have a car, I walked everywhere. Until my first son was born, I was nine stone and a size 10. Then I had three children and with each child I put on a bit of weight and didn’t lose it. Over the years I’ve tried different ways to lose weight but none of them worked. The catalyst moment was when I saw a pho...

 The Miracle of Khayelitsha was born out of my first attempts to write something down about my experiences in Khayelitsha. Khayelitsha is an area in Cape Town that was designed for around two hundred or three hundred thousand people and there are one million, some say two million people living in that area. My first impression of the place was that it is massive, and I was completely lost trying to locate a friend there. Eventually he said to me - stay where you are, and I will come and find you. I started writing about Khayelitsha and what I put on paper was so nauseating. that I could not continue with that. I met a young man in a wheelchair who was caught in crossfire that was totally unrelated to him. The bullet caused permanent damage - he would never walk again. There are many similar stories and they left me under this cloud of hopelessness and despair. I realised that I want to write from a perspective of hope, from the perspective of a new city of a transformed city. I kno...