Ja. Edition 10 by Ja. Magazine

19 FEB 2016 EDITION 7

T PAGE DESIG N O NE FR R:

, o ll e H

TA S A K

NDE ( DU R

CONTACT 072 197 4297 FOR ORDERS

Welcome to the tenth edition of Ja. magazine. It’s certainly been a wild ride. You know, when I was thought into existence, that late afternoon in a Cape Town dive bar nearly two years back, it was an exciting and exhilarating time.

I was still just an idea, but I was an idea born out of a reaction to a culture of elitist and exclusionary media and because of that, my very nature – from the content I hold, to the open-source platform on which I exist – is an unruly one. In this regard, I have not always been easy to manage, and my editors wear the perpetually tired faces to prove it. Like many ideas, I was a grand and ambitious one. The plan for me was to champion new narratives, to be a home to all those writers, artists, poets and other wild ones who either couldn’t find a place for their work, or grew tired of navigating the extraneous and back-breaking gate-keeping systems of countless mainstream media organizations. In this way, I have not failed. To date, my 10 editions have offered their pages up to many great thinkers, creators and trouble-makers, from deliberations on what it means to be a black, queer body in contemporary South Africa and long form investigations into the quiet violence of body dysmorphia and depression, to endless rants on the misappropriation of cultures, the erasure of personal politics in revolutionary episodes, and the pervasive nature of rape culture. I have housed smaller stories too, all of which have been equally important. I’ve seen music, art, photography, doodles and more pass through my covers, each of them adding a piece to a vast and ever-expanding narrative. I have also failed in a few regards, I know. By my own calculations and the initial hopes of my editors,

I should have expanded into a print publication by now. I should already be living a full and expansive existence both online and in the hands of a far-reaching audience. I should also have been at a point where I can reward financially, those who contribute to my existence instead of simply – and rather ironically – publishing writing on that very topic for free. “Oh, but there are ways to make this happen” my loftier and more successful counterparts will caw. And yes, certainly, there are ways to monetise my existence, or at the very least, seek out funding to pull me out of the online realm and into print, but I’m not here for that. I have no interest in pandering to the literary world (colonial as it stands), hat-in-hand, peddling stories about young writers and artists who didn’t know an en dash from a hyphen before they turned over their work to be rendered palatable. I may take the work of others and present it in a way that these ancient gatekeepers can better understand, but I in no way intend for the likes of them to read any of it. The truth is, the work I have held has been raw and brilliant, and free of so many of the commonly accepted restraints that so swiftly kill off passion and confidence in those who create it. So yes, I haven’t exactly made it as far as I would have liked, I may still appear as a crude and unrefined thing, and I may swallow more money than I bring in, but there are times that make it all worth it. Like these days for example. The days where I step out into the world with another offering, filled with the inspirational, brilliant and tireless works of contributors from schools, universities, bedrooms, sketchbooks and laptops across the country. There will be more of me to come, that much you can be sure of. I may not look the same, but I’ll be here. And to those of you who lend your eyes to me, thank you. Your support has not gone unnoticed.

As always, happy reading. Ja. magazine

PROFILE

SEISMIC STEPS IN A STOLEN CITY WORDS BY YASTHIEL DEVRAJ PHOTOGRAPHS COURTESY OF FRANCOIS KNOETZE

A towering giraffe lumbers down High Street alongside patchwork humanoids, like creatures salvaged from the shattered fragments of Tataâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Rainbow. Discarded posters from previous National Arts Festivals (NAF) comprise their intricate skins, their flutters slicing razor-blade silhouettes against the mid-July sun.

PROFILE

he magicians inside the machines form Grahamstown-based collective 10 Day Men, and on this day, the seismic steps of their poignant performance art piece, Semi-Gloss, are peeling at the colonial legacies that still grip this stolen town. Born as a collaboration between Monwabisi Dondashe and Athenkosi Nyikilana of Phezulu Stilt Walkers, Ayanda Nondlwana and Siyabonga Bawuti of pantsula crew Via Kasi Movers, and Cape Town-based multi-media Francois Knoetze, Semi-Gloss is a searing reminder that beyond NAF’s “11 days of Amazing!” lie 354 more, fraught with struggle and sacrifice for local artists. In conversation with Via Kasi founder Ayanda Nondlwana it’s clear the same rifts that cleaved Grahamstown East from West two centuries ago have begun to encroach on even the two brief weeks that are meant to sustain local creators. Nondlwana outlines those impositions through weary lips. “At first we had the feeling that Festival is for all of us,” he remembers. “You didn’t have any race because everything was at the centre of town. When everyone was at Cathedral Square you had that feeling of art.” In recent years, however, NAF’s decision to divide the Festival’s then iconic marketplace, Fiddler’s Green, has suffocated any budding sense of unity. To the west – lush marquees sprawl across the Great Field of the University Currently Known as Rhodes (UCKAR), the tents filled with established traders that apparently qualify for some indefinable “international standard”. The Cathedral Square Nondlwana remembers now sits neglected, its traders equipped with claustrophobic wooden huts and makeshift tarpaulin to shield against the wild Grahamstown winter. Fiddler’s Green itself has become a barren afterthought, occupied mainly by a few disused amusement rides and fewer patrons. And in one revenue-fattening swoop, another wall of privilege is erected using the livelihoods

PROFILE

of Grahamstown East residents as its bricks and mortar. “Now it’s almost like they’re emphasising that this festival is for white people,” sighs Nondlwana, arms spread wide to emphasise the scale of his exasperation. “We don’t feel that we’re part of it anymore, because we have such little access”. Most significantly, the chasmic divide has made performing and earning an income at the Festival almost mutually-exclusive for those not backed by vast resources and extravagant advertising. “Now if you want your show to be a full house, it has to be directed by someone known”, he says. Nondlwana, has been involved in three productions at NAF 2016, and witnessed first-hand the rifts emerging in what used to be a far more vibrant and inclusive atmosphere. “This Festival was actually a loss for many of us,” he asserts. “Even if you do get funded, what’s the point of coming here for audiences of four or five people? As a young black performer or director, you have to hope to get noticed by some big fish.” With Semi-Gloss, the 10 Day Men defiantly disrupt Grahamstown’s exclusionary spaces by dancing on, and straight across, the town’s palpable chasms. The flakes of their papier-mâché flesh scrape at the superfluous sheen of The Great Field’s canvas tents. Their shadows accost the poster-plastered walls of the 1820 Settler’s Monument – NAF’s home for the last four decades – expelling the laserjet veneer that annually smothers local creators

lacking the resources to roll-out elaborate marketing campaigns. The Department of Sport, Recreation, Arts & Culture’s (DSRAC) logo emblazoned on those posters is further evidence of the marginalisation of Grahamstown artists, according to Nondlwana. “They claim that DSRAC is best-run in the Eastern Cape, but we don’t see that support here,” he asserts. “They [DSRAC] sponsor so many major acts coming in from bigger cities, but people barely know that Grahamstown exists.” While commercial considerations increasingly narrow the scope of aspiring artists based in Grahamstown, initiatives such as the recently-launched Creative City project are taking steps to support and grow the town’s most powerful capital – its rampant, unapologetically unique creative culture. Creative City, according to Nondlwana, is one of the few efforts being made to provide

year-round platforms and support structures for local artists. “What I like about Creative City is that they encourage independence and assist us in establishing our own careers.” Contemplating the relevance of Semi-Gloss moving forward, Nondlwana is optimistic. “At least we can bring an inspiration, hopefully, for other black artists – because they’re losing their passion,” he says. “People must know how we as artists in Grahamstown struggle, and hopefully the documentary can show that.” Semi-Gloss is accompanied by a documentary contextualising the struggles and inspiration from which its powerful characters were born. The performance piece will return to NAF in 2017, to once again stab stilts through the bulls-eye of bourgeois bullshit that hangs thick like smog in the Grahamstown air.

WORDS BY Tseliso Monaheng Youlendree Appasamy Lumumba Mthembu Dave Mann ILLUSTRATIONS BY Sara Steiniger

WRITING IS...ON MY TERMS

oint me to the fledgling blog owner who

writer’s livelihood, has entered a new phase. It

made money off of the ads they got on

could also be that said industry never existed;

their site, and went on to start paying

that it was a figment of PR ingenuity. Either way…

contributors. Pls!

because of the commodification of writing, people

Titles are enticing, I’ve come to learn. While

who deem themselves custodians of publishing

calling yourself an “editor-in-chief” of something,

platforms – on-line, in print – have chosen to forget

do remember whose words it is you edit.

that writing is normally the last iteration of the sit-

Cats wanna chief edit, CEO and COO the shit

read-think cycle.

outta this life until it’s time to pay. And then the

Also: ‘Only wealthy kids can afford to become

jig’s up cuh; your ain’t-shitness reveals.

writers’.

I wonder, sometimes, what would’ve been had

I won’t point out how insulting that is, but I will

I agreed to such terms. What if I said yes to the

say that from the little I’ve gathered of Bessie

one guy who wanted me to profile jazz musicians

Head – she did nothing else but write. And Bessie

on a model predicated on...well, I’m not sure

had an adventurous life, metaphysically speaking,

because I never stuck around to find out.

you know?!

Listen, writing for next-to-nothing is okay if

All of the above to say this: Writing only started to

you’re still a university student who ‘does the

make sense to me once I decided that it’s labour.

writing thing on the side’. It’s okay if you’ve

And that I should be compensated for my labour.

graduated but have ‘other stuff’ going for you

Not only that, but I should also decide the terms

– like a job or, better, a trust fund. Or a mother

of compensation. I decided to become a writer,

and father who’ll let you figure it out while they

and therefore should decide the terms upon which

support your livelihood. However, the jig shifts

my writing should exist. Writing made sense to

when you decide to make writing the centre of

me when I said fuck being meek and humble, I’m

your livelihood.

gonna go ape-shit, average-white-male on their

Matters change when, instead of suiting up

bloody system. And it WILL reject you, shem. But

and whiling away precious time in traffic, and

you’ll have your mind and your heart -- not to

spending the day among people you’ve to force

mention your eat-sit-thinking time, intact.

yourself to exist alongside, you opt to sit at home

The practice of editors and custodians of paying

the whole day. Sit and read. And think.

platforms deciding your worth for you, then trying

It seems to me that the importance of great

to talk you down to their miserable levels with it’ll-

writing is being undercut. Or that the industry

get-better-we-promise myths is some ol’ bullshit.

that once was, that supported an inquisitive

And it should fade away.

- Tseliso Monaheng 14

WORDS

WRITING IS...R

“Anyway, the force from somewhere in Space which commands you to write in the first place, gives no choice. You take up the pen when you are told, and write what is commanded. There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside of you.”Zora Neale Hurston, Dust Tracks on a Road (1942) (I feel like I’m going to bust) Remember the time you took some shady substances and thought you died and became a ghost? Remember when you wrote in churches, under the smiling beno(violence) of a white jesus looking down on you, because it was comforting? Remember how the first man who groped your breasts was a balding boer surgeon, searching for a tennis-ball sized lump? Remember your beautiful aiya teaching you Tamil and stroking your hair during a thunderstorm? Remember feeling nothing when your favourite cousin died, after being attached to machines for months? Remember the yts who said you speak well? The yts at the Eisteddfod who judged your recitation of poetry as A++? Remember that stranger who said he wanted to kidnap you? Remember eating green mangoes and chili with your cousins under that old tree in Umdloti Drift? Remember the dreams, the nightmares, and the cloudiness following it all? The night-terrors and panic attacks? The blissful blankness? Remember the pride you felt after making tea for yourself before making it for your uncles? Remember the priest reading the stars at your birth? Remember the mundanity of home? Remember the trauma of home? Remember the unspeakable things? Coolie, charou, stekkie - remember. Writing is a love of sorts, and inherent to that love is exposing vulnerability and trusting that people will accept and support you nonetheless. Memory, healing and imagination are all pivotal to that vulnerability. You invite people to your perspective and hope that they like it. Or maybe, they hate it and in that criticism they push you to do better, because you know better. In any case, writing is about opening of spaces and fighting for it if needs be (which in our world is

usually the case). I write because I’m too poor for therapy or a gap year in England. Emotional outlet, catharsis, call it what you want – I’m fascinated by how the past co-mingles with the present to make the future in all kinds of wonderful and terrifying ways. If I don’t write myself into the universe, who will? We here, we exist.

- Youlendree Appasamy 16

REMEMBERING

WORDS

WRITING IS...EA

AVESDROPPING A nyone who knows me will tell you that if Lumumba is not at home or in the office then he is definitely at the bar. This theory was recently put to the test when a couple of rapscallions liberated me of my cellular phone. In order to find me while I was off the air, my friend of eight years, Daniel Lulua, would locate me in one of three places: the English Department, the Rat and Parrot, or Champs Action Bar. What does this teach us other than the fact that Lumumba is an alcoholic (a trait he shares with many writers)? It teaches us that, like many wielders of the pen, from Ernest Hemingway to Jack Kerouac, I am a frequenter of bars and public houses (note that I did not say clubs). Why is this the case considering the fact that it would be cheaper to buy a six-pack, a bottle of wine or whisky at a local liquor store and drink at home? Firstly, writing is an activity carried out in solitude, meaning that when we produce as writers, we are starved of ordinary human contact. More importantly, every wordsmith knows that life does not happen inside four walls. To get material you need to go outside and play with the other kids. I, like many people who cannot afford

therapy, choose to take my problems to a smoky bar where I can work through them with the help of a lonely manâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s best friend: a cigarette. Throw in the fact that it often takes a six-pack to speak the truth and you will arrive at the realisation that some of the best conversations take place in bars. Due to superhuman observational skills, extraordinary powers of recall, and hypersensitive levels of EQ and intuition, men (and women) of letters are serial eavesdroppers. Put them in a place full of drunk people talking, and they will extract experiential gold. The stories we chase as writers are not limited to the anecdotal. Sometimes they unfold in front of our eyes. How can I not write about the night Daniel Lulua was bitten by the bar managerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s wife for no reason? Or the following evening when his friend, Daniel Long, was banned from the establishment for attempting to bite her back? It is for these stranger-than-fiction moments that I find myself on a stool with my elbows on the counter, watching Supersport with a rum-and-cola in hand. This could be an over-elaborate defence of my alcoholism, but then again, that would still make me a writer.

- Lumumba Mthembu

WRITING IS.. riting is so fucking awful. But Growing up in Cape Town, I painted graffiti it is also brilliant. To write can in my younger years. To those in the know, be to give life to something, to we were called ‘graffiti writers’, and in this

unburden yourself, to tell a story, enhance way, I was a writer before I was a writer. it, or create an entirely new one. Writing is To see my name on a wall was a thrilling personal, it is public. Writing is painful and experience – a high of sorts. Nowadays tiresome and exhilarating and it is deeply I’ve traded crudely painted tags for bylines; romantic. Writing is crucial, it is a skill, it a similar high, but one that wares off far is something almost everyone can do, but quicker. I used to want to write on music, and

there are very few who can do it well. Some

writers try their entire lives to form a part like many Model C white kids who banged of that select few, others simply write.

around on keyboards, Rolling Stone was

..NEVER COMPLETE the dream. Rolling Stone South Africa would later destroy itself and I would move onto chasing stories with meaning (whatever the fuck that means). I think I found it for a while, writing on community arts through the foggy lens of social justice. I grew tired of it though – a recurring theme in writing. To write for international publications became the subsequent dream and shortly after that, when the need to find employment began to trouble my mind, I shrank myself and hoped only to be paid for my writing. Nowadays, I get paid to write. Although I wish I didn’t. To write for a living doesn’t leave much room for WRITING – the real good shit that you return to time and time again and think “This is a good piece and it is an important piece.” I find myself wanting to produce WRITING more and more these days. It’s funny though. To some, I do just that. To others, I don’t do that at all. I find myself chasing the approval of ‘the others’ quite often. I don’t know who they are exactly, but I want them to see my WRITING. Surely some of them have. I mean I have two small awards to my name to prove that some of them have, but I often wonder why they decided to give me those awards in the first place. I also have less concrete evidence of my writing – the drinking, the smoking, the rampant self-loathing, and other writerly clichés. You know, when I co-founded this e-zine, part of it was to provide a space for other aspirant writers to hone their craft; to celebrate both their work and the work of others. Now, nearly two years in and here I am, still whining about the craft. By the time you’ve read this, I’ll probably have read it over a million times, promised myself it wouldn’t be published, and then sent it in for publishing regardless. Is anyone even reading this? Is it shit? Fuck it, I’ll never really like it anyway.

- Dave Mann

WORDS

THE THING ABOUT JOâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;BURG WORDS BY DAVE MANN ARTWORK BY MO HASSAN 22

Johannesburg is a beautiful city and it is a hard city. I imagine you could comfortably live here for a good few years and on any given day, without warning, Jo’burg

would

swallow

you

whole. The ‘gritty city’, as it’s widely known, is often marred with

perceptions

rampant

drug

abuse,

crime, and

’ve lived in Jo’burg for just over six months now. Nearly every day, I will descend a few flights of stairs, walk through a few busy

streets and bump into a few bustling bodies. Three cards neatly and rather efficiently dictate my movements about the city. The first, a faded gold card, sees me disappear underground for a few minutes before emerging into a decidedly busier and smoggier end of the city. The second, an orange card, then sees

violence but really, it’s no worse

me take a 15-minute bus ride that’s nearly

than its seaside counterparts

always cramped. The last, a shiny gold card,

in this regard. The thing about

ensures that the other two keep working, and

Jo’burg though, is its tendency

is brought out a bit too frequently for my liking.

to knock you flat on your arse

I do this twice a day, and it takes a combined

whenever it pleases.

two hours each day. As it goes, some days are better than others. On the bad days, one of the three cards (most likely the shiny gold one) will refuse to cooperate, because to live in Jo’burg is a costly decision to make. To live in Jo’burg and feel good about it is even more costly. Billboards seem to rival people in this city, and like Jo’burg’s many people, each one is different. But after a taxing day, the billboards, like Jo’burg’s many people, all fade into one. Clothing! Booze! Insurance! Cars! Houses! – all of them scream at you as you pass by. They tell you that eGoli is a great city, but it can be

far greater if you have good clothes, good booze, insurance, a car, and a good place to live.

“

One day, early on in the year when I was far less accustomed to Jo’burg’s bad

days, I surrendered and bought me some clearance sale adidas tekkies (“they’re sneakers” the cool kids will lament) in the

hopes that they would bring a better day. It was a good item of clothing like the billboard said, but without the other good things (Car!

House!) it fell prey to Jo’burg’s endless

concrete. I still wear the tekkies, although

now they lack their brilliant shine and are without a significant amount of rubber on

the undersides – a message of sorts from Jo’burg, as if to say “Fuck your attempt at a good day and fuck these tekkies too.” I remember late last year, as I packed up

TO LIVE IN JO’BURG IS A COSTLY DECISION TO MAKE. TO LIVE IN JO’BURG AND FEEL GOOD ABOUT IT IS EVEN MORE COSTLY.

my four years of life spent in Grahamstown to leave for a larger and more foreign city, I was listening to a song by Jumping Back Slash called ‘Horses’ off his EP by the same name. High, whiny synthesisers, short and sharp that lay themselves over the rolling percussion of endless drum machines, propelling the listener forward at a great speed. When I interviewed the artist, he had said the song was about drum machines

”

WORDS

and moreover, about “things that run and run and never stop.” I listened to that song often and I remember thinking “I wonder if this is what Jo’burg will be like.” I still listen to the song. Most often when I’m on the 5:30pm bus, tired arms wrapped around handrails and backpacks as an impatient driver takes corners at breakneck speeds. “Jo’burg won’t win today,” I say to myself. “I still have a few hours to write about it all once I’m home. And besides, the day hasn’t been that bad has it?” But then I leave the bus and the train and on the walk home I will dodge the same traffic and bump into the same bustling bodies and on particularly bad days I will see my fatigue reflected in all of them. On days like that, there is no writing. “I’ll try again tomorrow,” I lie. And the city wins again.

Initially, I wanted to write something general on the state of South African education systems that could appeal to our fantastical universal. But to really get into it I had to begin somewhere personal – my former high school in Durban. RICH SCHOOLS,

THE MAN

POOR SCHOOLS

The issue of the Headmaster’s alleged embezzlement of about R5-mil came to the

What’s most striking is the fact that this

fore earlier this year through an audit after

school did not realise that R5-mil was

his early retirement. It troubles me, not least

missing! That they were unfazed, whereas

because I attended the same high school for

the majority of public schools in South

the entirety of my high school career.

Africa, I suspect, would have closed down if

I never liked the man. I always thought he

they had lost even a fraction of that amount.

was smug, arrogant, and corporate, and, as

It makes me wonder how much money is

a qualified educator, I do not approve of how

actually getting pumped into that school,

he ran the school.

and how much is being spent on things that

There is the issue that old-boys and current

have only the most abstract attachment to

learners feel that they have been robbed.

education – holisticism stretched bare.

Parents who worked themselves to the bone

While other kids suffer, the school in

to send their kids to a supposedly high-

question boasts a host of massive rugby

quality holistic school feel they have been

fields, astro-turf, a swimming pool, a hall

wronged and short-changed. The community

that can almost house the entire school

at large feels betrayed, not merely by the

(albeit uncomfortably, particularly for the

Headmaster, but by the institution itself.

grade 8s), smartboards, fish-tanks, fully-

But this is not about one Headmaster – I

kitted science laboratories, an extremely

have wasted enough words, and we must let

well-stocked library and much, much more.

the courts decide and deal with his guilt or

They even had snakes and iguanas during

innocence.

my matric year. On the other hand, there are schools in this country where single teachers lead classes

WORDS BY HIMAL RAMJI

ILLUSTRATIONS BY SANDRO PELLARINI

THE

PERSISTENCE

APARTHEID

of more than 50 children. There have been reports of teachers hosting an audience

So we know what my old school is not. Despite

of about 200. How anyone could do this is

this, parents are constantly struggling to get

beyond me, and I must take a moment to

their kids to school, to pay fees, to pay for

bow at bended knee to these educators.

the colonial and expensive blazers, trouser, shirts, award braids. Success at a South

Many schools lack books, desks, chairs, stationary, often even buildings. Children

African school is a very expensive thing.

have to trek many kilometres, some even

And this period is key: the period referred

having to cross rivers to get an education.

to in history books as ‘the postcolonial’,

Others are forced to sleep in the most

post-apartheid South Africa, the rainbow

decrepit conditions, risking illness, insects

nation, a free and independent sovereign

and snakebites, just for the sake of a decent

state comprising free and independent

schooling. Other children just have no option

human beings all of equal worth, choc-full of

of schooling at all.

dignity and rights and other such man-made wonderments.

There are schools that have been neglected, while schools like my former one are praised

It is a period of rapid transformation which

for their achievements. I describe schools

our generation has played a pivotal role in;

where wonders could be done with a few

where our teachers have often, historically,

thousand rand, whereas this school did not

had questionable roles.

even notice the squandering of R5-mil. I lose

But let me not ponder on who did or did not

myself in the vast array of good deeds that

fight against Bantu education from the 1950s

could have been done with that money, and

until the 1980s, when the inhumane pseudo-

had the Headmaster been black, he would

education system was finally abolished as the

have been scrutinised through a far more

oppressive means to ‘modern’ slavery and

consistent and penetrative lens.

psychological subjugation it was. Let me not let my mind linger on how many teachers at then-model-C schools did not have any will to teach black learners. How many did

THE

not join black students and teachers when

ASSIMILATION

IMPERATIVE

they marched in the 70s and 80s. How many still don’t march with black people for higher wages, or for more money to be pumped into their schools, or even for

In the late 1800s what was given to

better healthcare and sanitation. There is

the Zulus under Cetshwayo, only a few

a disparity, and, more importantly, a latent

years before South Africa became a

racism that exists, is inculcated, and made

Union in 1910, was not an agreement

to thrive in institutions like this one.

but rather an ultimatum. It is similar to

The CAPS curriculum statement, like

what we get at school now: assimilate or

all seven of our White Papers, like our

fail, where failure must be understood

Constitution, boasts such radical humanist

as a metaphorical death – ‘succeed

sentiment as a shared humanity and equal

by becoming one of us, or suffer the

human dignity; ‘Ubuntu’, as is frequently

consequences’.

referenced in the Constitutional court. It

My old school was a place where black

is an extremely progressive move, a far cry

learners would have their hair pulled to

from the recommendations and stipulations

check the length. Indian students would

of the earlier National Christian Education

be isolated and scrutinised to check if

curriculum. Yet, ex-model C schools seem

their adolescent peach-fuzz was getting

indifferent to the democratic demands of

out of hand. They were screened for

our Constitution and curriculum.

gel or as a former Head Prefect joked (rather facetiously) “lotion”. Piercing or tattooing, whether cultural or not, was not permitted. Let us not fall into the trap that in this post-modern dirge there are no cultures that engage in such practices. And culture, whether it be linked to religion or belief or not, is something to be respected and engaged with; not merely, meekly tolerated, but understood. Tolerance, in an age where dialectical thinking is more than

just necessary, is perhaps only, at best, a

were essentially encouraged not to take it

starting point – it is not an absolute end,

if we wanted to do well. Others breezed

and when it is, it serves nothing but the

through Afrikaans.

oppressive ideology from which it is born.

As an aside, my Zulu teacher disappeared

I will always remember the first two days

during the first term of matric; we were

of grade 8 as probably the most abusive

lumped with a “post-matric”, a position at

and psychologically traumatic days of my

these rugby schools to retain sportsman

rather easy life. I still sometimes wonder

and give them a second chance to fix

what good actually came out of those two

their matric marks. This example is telling

days. A friend of mine related a story to me

of the level of African-language teaching

of a similar school in Pretoria where the

at these schools.

Head Boy, during their days of ‘orientation’

To care without reservation was not a

(a sick euphemism), climbed over chairs,

rule, it was an anomaly. Yet there were

screaming, to drag a boy with long hair out

teachers who were legitimately concerned

and lambast him in true all-boys’ school

with the primary goal of any educational

prefect fashion. All of these examples should

establishment: learning. It is they who

be considered violence.

inspired me in a large part to do what I do now in education research, because even in the depths of the racist trench that is

STAFF AND THE

the ex-model C school, there is hope, and

POTENTIAL FOR

there is inspiration.

HOPE

education in this country. Only a fool (or a

There is a massive problem with colonial or imperialist which, in truth, are

Let me conclude on the note of staff.

not much different) would believe that this

I have never had a black history teacher

could be fixed by dealing with schools in

(I now do research in history education in

separate categories. ‘Privileged schools’

South Africa). My Zulu teachers were always

and ‘underprivileged schools’. ‘Black

Indian; the classes were split between Zulu

schools’ and ‘white schools’. ‘Science

speakers (taught by a Zulu speaker) and

schools’ and ‘art schools’. Schools need

non-Zulu speakers.

to – particularly now – work together,

We never had the opportunity to learn from

each other. Zulu was so badly taught that we

resources,

and

ideas.

Wealthy schools have no right to horde their resources, to sit and waste such vast sums of money to the point that they do not realise the disappearance of R5mil. They have a duty to society, to their communities near and far, as wealthy leaders. We live in a capitalist state, and that is unfortunate, but we must make the most of what we have, and the model that schools like this and too many others adopt is not going to get us out of the mess that we find ourselves in.

Dear Pelham, I've been meaning to write to you for a while. I wish I could say that my lack of communication is due to my busy, fast-paced lifestyle, but it isn't. The reason I haven't raised my voice until now is because I didn't want to. Raising my voice meant that I'd have to relive the years we spent together. Raising my voice meant that I would have to immerse myself in the memories , mostly negative, of the four years I had to stay with you. But now? Now I'm at a point where I think you need to be held accountable for what you did to me, and every other person who wasn’t a white male. Let’s cut the shit Pelham, you fucked up. You know, a part of me doesn't always blame you for what happened, because you had a sadistic tyrant to steer you. I'll call him Mr Boss. The man’s man. Bloodshot eyes, peppered hair and a mustache to match. The poster-boy for heteronormative masculinity. And in my memory, he’s the poster-boy for making belittling every woman to step into his domain. He made us feel stupid, weak and generally pathetic. Do you remember that day in 2005? I'm pretty sure you do. We were sitting in assembly, bums numb and losing circulation in our legs. Mr Boss liked to think himself a democratic man, allowing pupils some time at the end to raise grievances and pitch ideas. Three grade 7 girls stood up awkwardly. The stares from the rest of the kids fixated on the girls, willing them to burst into flames like ants under a magnifying glass. 'Sir, we'd like to start a girls soccer team,' they squeeked.

“

WE WERE SITTING IN ASSEMBLY, BUMS NUMB AND LOSING CIRCULATION IN OUR LEGS. MR BOSS LIKED TO THINK HIMSELF A DEMOCRATIC MAN, ALLOWING PUPILS SOME TIME AT THE END TO RAISE GRIEVANCES AND PITCH IDEAS.

”

RANTS

Silence. Mr Boss stares, and then smirks. His smile was always off-putting. 'Answer this question for me,' he stated. 'Do you want to be girls or boys?' Silence. 'Girls, sir,' they said. 'Now tell me. Is soccer for girls?' he asked, arrogantly. Silence. 'No.' What else were they supposed to say? Have you ever had your identity questioned like that, in front of an entire hall of judgemental pre-teens and teachers? In that moment I realised that being a girl at Pelham was not in my favour. But Mr Boss didn't work alone, we both know that. Cue the PE teacher. Let's call him Mr Creep. Mr Creep did the dirty work. He 'taught' classes everyday, so he always had close interactions with us. He was close enough to get us where it really hurt. I think swimming was the most traumatic time, especially if you had a vagina. My grade 6 and 7 years were the worst. My body was developing and it freaked me the fuck out. Most girls at this age are in a state of shock, we don't know who weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re turning into, no matter how many sit-down chats we have with our parents. To top it off, some of us had our periods. Okay, now put all of that together and imagine yourself wearing a tight, black one-piece costume, standing on the ledge of the pool for everyone to see. Your nipples are raised, they may as well be bulls-eyes on your chest. Your pubic hair is sprouting from the sides of your costume, and your first stretchmarks are making an appearance. Would you feel comfortable? I certainly didn't. But that wasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t the worst part. It was worse if you weren't on that ledge. To get out of PE you had to have a letter written by your parents stating why.

years old and I still think about these things.

'Dear Mr Creep,

Please excuse *insert name here* from PE What you did has a long-lasting effect, and you deserve to know. I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t think you'll feel

class today. She has her period.'

guilty. If anything, you'll only be angry at me Humiliating right? Normally there'd be an for shining this light on you. But you deserve awkward glance and the letter would be it. You deserve every bit of backlash for what tucked away, as if it never even happened. you did. Mr Creep liked to mix it up though. Every now and then he liked to let everyone know I can't, however, complete this letter without exactly what the note said. Like a dramatic stressing that there were some amazing reading, if

you will. To him, periods and women in that school that kept it afloat.

general development was a joke. Neither of Without them, you would have been so them saw us as real people with real feelings fucked. And us too. If it weren't for those and real experiences. To be undermined and women, I don't think any girls would get out of humiliated like that is not something you can that school in one piece. So to those women, brush off, especially if it happens relentlessly thank you. for years. To all the girls enrolled in Pelham now, be So, Mr Creep and Mr Boss, I want to say fuck grateful that these men no longer walk the corridors. My heart soars at the fact that you

you.

don't have to experience these men. But, if On behalf of all the girls who you mistreated, anyone makes fun of you for playing soccer humiliated, and made feel less than inferior, or having your period, just know that they are fuck you. You did not create a safe space for so wrong. You are powerful, you are beautiful children to flourish and discover who they and you are going to be great. Pelham is just are. You did not allow for equality. You did not a small speck in your life that you can flick off encourage us. You did not comfort us. All you as soon as you leave. did was make every single person feel like shit for four years. You made us feel guilty for On that note, Pelham , fuck you very much. having breasts and vaginas and for bleeding every month. You made us feel like we couldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t do anything, or amount to anything unless we were mini-versions of you.

- Anonymous Illustration by Jade Brandt

You would never allow anyone to question your masculinity or purpose as a man, so how dare you poke fun at women? I am 22

RANTS

WORDS BY CARISSA GOVENDER IMAGES EDITED BY NIAMH WALSH-VORSTER 38

FESTIVAL FESTIVAL

ith so many Aum signs

about other communities from the

everywhere, it was hard

south asian diaspora in Africa). When

to believe that I wasn’t

there was actually a production that

back home in my grandmother’s prayer

involved South African Indian people, it

room, waiting for her to light the lamp.

was either a Bollywood style song and dance or it was poking fun at Indian

But then the high-pitched shrieks of teenage girls in flower crowns and teensy

people in tired stereotypes.

crop tops passed by and reminded me

In 2013, I watched a show called

that this wasn’t my amma’s house in

Those Indian Guys which was marketed

Phoenix, Durban. If she was anywhere

as an “exploration of Indian identity

near, even a sari that didn’t properly

and culture”. It portrayed a variety of

cover your belly would be deemed

characters, from the Indian single man

inappropriate.This was the National

obsessed with cars and ‘stekkies’ to

Arts Festival (NAF), revered as 11 days

the Bollywood director with his clichéd

of amazing by some and slammed by

romance films, to the bearded Muslim

others for being a space of incredible

air host making 9/11 jokes. These

privilege, only accessible to mostly

stereotypes, built on apartheid and

rich white people. And yet the products

colonial tropes about brown people

been sold at the Village Green, the main

has a target audience (Leon Schuster

trading hub of the Festival, could have

ring a bell?) but that doesn’t mean

easily been mistaken for your local

we need to play to a linear and static

Gorimas or Memsaab store.

representation of the archetypal South

This was a weird experience for me

African Indian. So four years later, I

because after attending the past four

should have been pleased that the

Festivals, it was clear that there was

products of my people were finally

a serious lack of representation of the

here and that everyone was sporting

multiplicity of Indian culture – of any

colourful, shiny bindis and rocking

religious or south asian group (or even

sequinned elephants, right?

“namaste” is how you greet your

Well no. And here’s why.

Instagram followers every morning and Firstly, it was all of the culture and none who preaches the importance of aligning of your chakras without historicising

of the actual people being included.

There were so many stalls with lobaan it, nor understanding the nuances, nor and agarbhatti (incense sticks), Aum power of chakras and their subsequent symbol jewellery and clothing, and alignment. household items adorned with Hindu

Sometimes I would go near a stall

gods – and not a single person standing selling something with Hindu symbols behind the stall and benefiting from on it and the salesman would give me these sales was from the culture they that conspiratorial look as if to say, “Hey you’re Indian, this is totally your thing!”

were selling.

It was my mother’s first NAF and I Except it’s really not. decided to take her to the Hare Krishna

The other thing that unsettled me, apart

tent, promising her authentic temple from the obvious cultural appropriation, was the fact that most of the items on

food by Hare Krishna devotees.

We were met by a white man from offer, and the whole NAF experience in Cape Town, offering us chana magaj fact, was not at all accessible to your (known to white people as ‘chickpea average working class South African fudge’) while also attempting to flatter Indian family. and flirt with both my mother and my

While Think!Fest, the public lecture

very young sister. We eventually bought series of the NAF, included conversations some dhal and rice. The food was fine, on

privilege,

whiteness,

issues

but the experience left a bad taste in representation in theatre, and the decolonisation of the arts, I don’t think

our mouths.

In addition to that strange experience, anyone gave much thought to how other it felt like our culture and religious aspects of the Festival operate. symbols had evolved to suit your The Village Green is not the only market typical vegan yoga fanatic who believes (there’s also Church Square) but it is

â&#x20AC;&#x153;

prioritised, both by the Festival organisers and by those who attend Fest. The Village Green is on Rhodes University property which is quite a distance away from Grahamstown East, so it remains inaccessible to many Grahamstown locals.

â&#x20AC;&#x153;

Aphiwe Ngalo, a writer and Grahamstown local, reflected on the class divide between the Village Green and the rest of town during the Festival. She notes that:

Transformation is visible in the visual arts, music and dramas showcased during these 11 days. Transformation continues to grow in those spaces, but it is time that it hit the streets and became more visible in places of trade. I couldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t agree more. We need to look at places of trade, which remain a huge part of the Festival programme, and see how it privileges some and excludes others. But in addition to the location of the markets and the prices of the products, I think we also need to look at what is consumed and by who.

MUSIC

OPPIKOPPI 22 A BRIEF REVIEW

WORDS BY LUMUMBA MTHEMBU PHOTOGRAPHS BY NIAMH WALSHVORSTER

y biggest fear going into Op- signed with latecomers in mind. The good pikoppi was whether I would be stuff only got going at ten o’ clock with able to catch the Hurricanes-Li- Chambers, who was precise despite his

ons final on Saturday morning. I had been outwardly druggy appearance. The lucky warned about the dust and the “Dutch streak began when the next band, The clowns”, as they were colourfully charac- Tazers, threw a CD into the Bruilof crowd, terised by my mate Illy, but I must say that which floated to my feet with a butterfly’s these two elements were only marginally grace. Khuli Chana was dissed by a Skelhostile to my experience of the festival.

lum Stage allocation, but the KFC ambas-

Upon arrival, the Northam heat immedi- sador delivered a driving display to an ately demanded that I disrobe to my vest audience which burst the banks of the and don some sensible headgear. As a venue. My night could have ended there newbie, I had strategically avoided bottles but Bittereinder had to throw a spanner in but even my aluminium twelve-pack was the works by appropriating Steve Biko and not allowed into the main arena. Fortu- hip-hop to further an Afrikaner agenda. nately, my Levi’s-sponsored cash card en- Alas, there are not enough column inches sured that I was soon in possession of an to expound on this. Day Two got off to an inauspicious start

official squeeze-bottle.

With shoes dusty pretty much upon en- as my beloved Lions were pummelled by try, I waded through a midday programme the Canes. that was so average it was obviously de-

FESTIVAL

“

BITTEREINDER HAD TO THROW A SPANNER IN THE WORKS BY APPROPRIATING STEVE BIKO AND HIP-HOP TO FURTHER AN AFRIKANER AGENDA.

FESTIVAL

I was happy to have seen the game at a bar whose top five rules were:

1) Don’t be a dick. 2) No flexing. 3) No racists. 4) No politics. 5) Don’t fuck around, buy a round. Boxer were not bad at two o’clock but the performance of this year’s festival came from Femi Koya, who blasted the crowd with Afrobeat to earn the gold medal. The runner-up was Riky Rick with an energetic show on the main stage; Urban Village surprised me with the sophistry of their sound; and Reason was humbled by the Northam gods as he tripped and fell on stage. As my feet turned into potatoes on the last day, I was mobile enough to catch another free CD from Panti Thug Mystery, record Ready D’s prize-giving, see Petite Noir for the first time, and hear Yelawolf tell the Oppi faithful that the only time they saw the real South Africa was on their trip from the airport.

THE DAMAGE DIFF HAS DONE AND WHAT WE CAN DO ABOUT IT WORDS AND PHOTOGRAPHY BY NIAMH WALSH-VORSTER EDITED BY YOULENDREE APPASAMY

ll organisations, friend groups and festivals have their internal politics, so it was no surprise to learn of some of the inside chaos of the Durban International Film Festival’s, before it started with the resignation of Sarah Dawson as manager. It was then put in the hands of Peter Machen and the controversy continued as he and the invisible team chose The Journeymen to be the opening documentary – the problem here is that one of the three film makers is a “convicted” sexual assaulter, serving only 65 hours community service. But what happens when such disturbing news is brought to our doorsteps? We give it awards! The double standards we hold for people viewed artists or with special skills is that somehow they are more deserving of our forgiveness, remember Brock Turner? And the #RUreferencelist? These cases popped the bubble of cisheteronormative men who we viewed as

heroic, feminist, star pupils and all the other things rapists supposedly cannot be. It is also interesting to note that we are more willing to fight social injustices when they are far away from us *changes Facebook profile to tinted French flag*. There was an opportunity for learning at DIFF, however, their body of decision makers, saturated in whiteness and parochial capitalism, exploited a young black artist’s position. They instead created a dangerous space that perpetuated rape culture, and continues to do so by not taking accountability. DIFF and The Journeymen makers were given their moment to defend or explain themselves, but have failed to do so and thus failed survivors. The dismissal of the trauma that his victims/survivors experienced is seen in how DIFF managed the whole issue, and causes threat for secondary trauma, which is a one of the big issues of rape culture, there are no “just get over it” lines for this one.

FESTIVAL

Sipho Mpongo, was found guilty of sexual harassment by UCT of one classmate late last year, but with 20 plus complaints that emerged outside a formal setting. He was charged 65 hours community service and is doing some form of rehabilitation back home in his community. My issue with this is that he is already so openly re-accepted back into society and has his work aired, exhibited and celebrated by people who know this fact about him. Whilst I see value in the work he is trying to do, we cannot be so apathetic. Victims and survivors of assault and harassment are shamed from society and families for coming out on a daily basis. We are always quick to protect and forgive perpetrators, however, we continue to side-line those who are hurt, can we forget the Jacob Zuma rape trial and Makhaya Ntini’s case (oh yes, right, we can). The only person(s) who can offer Mpongo forgiveness and a platform are those Mpongo have hurt, and due to nature of rape culture, society will never know how they feel because their coming out and talking in a public platform is far more dangerous than Mpongo coming out and speaking of his journey.

who deal with trauma and rape. The sort of white liberalism that ran the festival has exploited Mpongo’s position and have also hurt him in ways as he thinks the work he is doing is good – but they have left out a lot of steps to get to the one where Mpongo’s journey is more important than survivors.

The festival made no attempt to get consent from the audience nor any content warnings were given to indicate that Mpongo was going to do such at workshops and the opening. The issue here is that DIFF is allowing for what is meant to be a great film experience for its paying audience, a possibly traumatic and triggering one. People can mentally prepare to watch a film given the synopsis informs them, but to then have a perpetrator in the same room as someone who may be vulnerable is really undermining the magnitude of how serious rape culture is and feeds into secondary re-victimisation and trauma.

4 5

DIFF also censored complaints by inboxing people directly their views of apparent none support to Mpongo’s background instead of engaging in the public arena.

The festival claimed to not support Mpongo and said his presence was to “create dialogue.” This dialogue never really happened. Mpongo was prompted at the opening night by acting director, Peter Machen, and at various other workshops to “testify” to audiences of his rehabilitation. This is not a dialogue that is a monologue, there were no professional facilitators at talks nor was there any form of consultation with professional people

In a country with a horrendous amount of gender based violence and where rape and harassment is the norm, we should almost put a zero tolerance on any form of rape culture that is perpetuated. ‘Liking’ a status, watching a film, viewing their work, giving awards, all just sends a message that there are no real consequences for rape, assault and/or harassment. It certainly does not send the message that we believe/care for the survivors story either. We all want to breathe, but why do some get more space to do so than others?

This is bigger than Mpongo’s story, though. It is the culture that needs to be shut down. The message that has been sent by DIFF’s stance and lack of real engagement is that this issue is of no real importance to them. Defending their stance with “we must separate art from the artist” and showcasing Mpongo as a reformed and rehabilitated man is just another form of rape apologism. Had the festival cared about rape and sexual violence, they would have looked into the above, they would have showed a film by someone who is not complicit in such an issue, they would donate money to a rape crisis center; they would not have given his film an award. They would and could have done so much better. This article perhaps is to keep this issue alive, to remind ourselves and other festivals that we cannot sweep things under the rug, and lists why we should not support the film and a possible solution to try and address the damage that DIFF has done.

PHOTOGRAPHY

A PORTRAIT SERIES BY TSELISO MONAHENG

AUTHORS ARE ROCKSTARS

The local literary scene is looking quite good as of late. From practiced writers to musicians turned novelists, weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve seen a plethora of emerging literary heroes filling up bookshelves across the country. Writer Tseliso Monaheng, who also happens to have a penchant for photo making, has put together a series of portraits that celebrate a few of these novelists for who they are â&#x20AC;&#x201C; rockstars.

PANASHE CHIGUMADZI

PHOTOGRAPHY

LIDUDUMALINGANI MQOMBOTHI

PERFECT HLONGWANE

BONGANI MADONDO

PHOTOGRAPHY

PERCY MABANDU

NAKHANE TOURE

PASSAGES

BY OSMOSISLIZA

PHOTOGRAPHY

“Every journey conceals another journey within its lines: the path not taken and the forgotten angle. These are the journeys I wish to record. Not the ones I made, but the ones I might have made or perhaps did in another place and time” – Jeanette Winterson.

he word ‘passages’ literally and poetically refers to incidents, progress, time, movement, access, safe conduct, moving, motion, going, coming, crossing, traveling, the traversal and the traversed. Objectively, my photographs show actual locations – corridors, entrances, walkways, alleys, paths, roads and thoroughfares. Subjectively these photographs speak about how I am in transit of re-identifying with a city I call home. Finding my Durban. I regard the camera as a speaking tool, an artistic medium to probe my emotional and intellectual being to talk about my awareness of my duality, my current social and political standing, which oscillate between past and present experiences of my notion of home. The photographs reveal actual walking encounters, places and spaces, in and around Durban. They act as transparent envelopes (Roland Barthes) of a personal journey where I find resonance and significance through subjects and elements, seemingly not from my inherited culture, which I was told are dangerous and unsafe. The three photographs that make up each triptych seem linked because of

design elements like colour, line, shape or texture, however they speak to one another through their and my social connections and disconnections that lie beyond surface detail. A subterfuge that comments on my physicality, my external whiteness and womanness, the conceptual approach that reveals how I regard myself, more deeply as a citizen of Durban in South Africa. I further take poetic license and use unfamiliar subjects, places and elements as metaphors to talk about my shift of feeling, the self that is and is not displaced and who does and does not feel dislocated with my Durban. A washing line or washed items is a common thread in the exhibition, a metaphor for my transformation and cleansing. These photographic triptychs are also reflective as they reveal how my social, political and cultural identity was reshaped, as I probed my history and dis-ease with my white middle-class upbringing, which was shaped in the apartheid era. I share this virtual exhibition on a Facebook album, through screenshots made of my Facebook posts. I see more potential to reach an audience through cyberspace. Using an online gallery space also aligns to my osmosis philosophy... to make movement in cyberspace through gestures of sharing and exchange, to promote the gradual exchange of knowledge, thought and ideas from one source to many.

GOT THE DEGREE, STILL NOT A PHOTOGRAPHER WORDS BY CAROL KAGEZI PHOTOGRAPHY BY ETHEL NSHAKIRA

PHOTOGRAPHY

ou me

might to

find

write

hypocritical

about

in a physics class – in those lessons about

light and lenses. It is in this class that I

photography

discovered that it was not just about snap-

without having any accompanying

shots but instead about the painting with

photographs. So before you move on swiftly

light and scientific aspects governed by

to the next beautiful piece of writing, I would

laws of physics.

like to remind you that it is 2016 and if you

Some of the visual artists I look up to are

look around, everyone seems to be doing

Zanele Muholi, a visual activist who tries

the things that we all find hypocritical. So in

to create awareness on the importance of

essence, chill and spare a few minutes to

black queer women in South Africa; Mary

ingest and digest my ramblings.

Sibande, whose work explores themes of

Anyone and everyone who holds an account

gender, class and race through a sculptural

on a photo sharing platform; be it Instagram,

representation of her alter ego Sophie,

Snapchat, or Flickr, will in some ways consider

who is dressed in altered versions of the

themselves a photographer. Whether or not

domestic worker uniform; and Malick

you have dope photographs is for you to

Sibide, well known for his black and white

decide and discuss with your followers on

photographs portraying popular culture in

any of the said platforms.

Bamako, Mali in the 1960s.

I took a photography course once because,

It is without a doubt that there are several

like many, I thought I was the sh*t and all I

photographers who are great at their craft.

would be doing in this course was polishing

I however draw attention to these artists

my “innate talent”. Boy was I wrong. Day

(note the use of the term artist instead of

after day, I produced the most boring and

photographer) because they use light to

mundane photographs. I would show you

paint a picture of the social issues of their

my portfolio, but I cannot bare the shame

time.

of putting that out there. Like many, I took

So in as much as there has been a rise

photos of flowers in an uncomfortable squat,

of new-age photographers who take snap

stood on tables to take snap shots of my food

shots of day-to-day life, perhaps a line needs

and curved my spin awkwardly to impress my

to be drawn between these and those that

friends with the “interesting” angles I could

spend time and years constructing and

take photographs from.

creating those photographs that leave a

In class, we were still required to do all of

footprint in the minds of consumers.

this except, to me it seemed like I was back

Is it then fair to refer to them all as artists?

ART

THE DEPARTED

WORDS AND ARTWORK BY LUYANDA MPANGELE 68

’m often told by family that I remind them of my grandfather. At first I thought they were referring to his appearance because my mother apparently looks like him, and I’m said to look like her. But according to them, it’s our unorthodox taste in music that links us. I realised this when my friend had bought a record player and I promised to test a few of my gran’s old vinyls on it the next day. When I looked through the dusty, web-filled pile, I was taken aback by the variety of music my grandmother had, most of which belonged to my grandfather. Picture the Rolling Stones meets Aretha Franklin coupled with The Commodores and a bit of Pink Floyd. We cleaned the records together that evening, and with the dirty soapy water flowed stories about the short-lived romance my grandmother shared with the man she loved. How young she was when they met, and how it came to an abrupt end with his tragic death. My mom was self admittedly a daddy’s girl, which explains why his death affected her the most, although pain is not quantifiable. She was only seven when it

happened, and I was a mere idea, a possibility. Is it possible that she loved him so much that the universe decided to bring a piece of him back to her in the form of a daughter? Anyway, I hear he was a reputable man, a man who put his wife and children first. I also hear how he, at times, succumbed to the pressure for the Xhosa man to be domineering and used his fist to relay a message. I never know which of these to believe. When I decided to write about the topic of encounters, I didn’t think I’d be including people whom I haven’t physically met. Although I think I met him the day I heard the rusty records play. I heard him in the lyrics, and felt him in the unexpected pauses which indicated scratches and was evidence of how many times they had been played in the past. I also met a younger version of my grandmother, permed ‘fro, raspy voice with a cigarette and gin in hand. This painting features my grandmother and her love. The obvious ghost-like distortion speaks of memories, experiences and the events our minds create that actually didn’t happen.

spectrum.za South Africaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s e-zine for black lgbt+ creatives and artists Volume 1 Edition 1 2016

A biannual e-zine for content specifically created by young, black LGBT+ artists and creatives in South Africa. spectrum.za hopes to display a wide and layered representation of life for young, black LGBT+ artists and creatives. This is a platform for navigating, interrogating and celebrating marginalised identities and their narratives in post-apartheid South Africa.

Our generation grew up on the internet. you met the loyl in a chat group. please call “log on” was how you knew a multimix was about to be lit. phonerotica was what you used to figure out this sex thing. you picmix’d you and your crush. you can still hear that dial up code. b.o.p_naja.mp3 played every afternoon on your way back home. R10 airtime was worth more than it is today. youhad fomo for the E250. Technological advancement wasa phone with bluetooth AND infrared. in 2015, partisan politics were overthrown by hashtags. Racist trolls keep blowing up your mentions. Twitter is a middle class luxury and facebook reminds you of a postmxit VGA cousin who hasn’t caught on yet. You still wish there were more stock photos of black people on the net. Only half of the country is

The theme for the first edition of spectrum.za is #URLbantwana - a series of work that explores the various intersections of race, gender, (dis) ability, class, sexuality and digitality in postapartheid South Africa. Send us a story, any story. Send an image, illustration or even a selfie. Send a review, or a thinkpiece about being young and black in this country. Submissions and queries can be sent to submitspectrumza@gmail.com

considered an active internet user.

POETRY

It starts with the breath at rest. Air drawn in smoothly like a bucket from a well: first snapped upright, then the steady pull of rope through hand. With this drawing in the back straightens. The spine pulls, curved but taught shoulders framed, blades close like wings to open chest: The peuplier trees in lines elbows lightly bent to grace each other. Swaying on the balls of feet as wind moves past them not through to keep a farm in quiet shelter. These trees wait, poised in pre-plié. Breath drawn in and held like two warm hands clasped below. Guiding each other while trees and people move aside for the two hands, held tight. On the other side hands slip and the trees bow, plié. ‘Thank you’ exhaled on breath. Too soon, straight backed, drawn up, air in. The peuplier trees in their wallflower stance if only lips had brushed cheeks, the line of trees would have been freed to dance.

IF THE SUN WERE YOU BY NUBLACCSOUL PHOTOGRAPH BY AVUMILE MAGADLA

Then some days the morning wouldn’t rise It would plead, ‘two more hours please’ as it snoozes the east-waking-alarm again, muttering some unintelligible excuse. Thankfully it’s winter, so the dawn can stay in bed until just before hour number seven. Today it would smile brightly, almost painfully like you always do when your face sheds light. With just enough warmth in the room to induce a hazy, drowsy state to my always sober self, Blinds closed, but some fierce rays still pierce through, like bright thoughts of you illuminating onto my darkness. Even after you said I was too much, an overwhelming experience that was a lot to ‘take in’. No Nivea to shield me against the harsh elements of your words. I was humbled like the soil. The sails of my pride torn by the tearing winds of your tone. And it did not help that the seas weren’t calm, My Peter-feet cold to walk on. But the never changing grandma-soup-like warmth in your voice sings melodies of Sotho blankets enveloping me. The fulfilling feeling of being empty, knowing I poured the last of my soul into your spirit, for our love’s sake. We believed in a love that almost lost all hope. I still gaze upon your pictures, the point of focus usually the place where your lips meet, A heart-like shape forms at the middle and I still blow kisses through the gap. If the sun were you, every born son would turn towards every girl child’s shimmering glamour With much honour, Always to be met eye-level, in the light of an all-round equal, and remaining so to its glistening end.

MULTI

TXT1’S ‘RAINY THOUGHTS FEAT. PHILELA SINGAMA’

ILLUSTRATION BY JADE BRANDT

“

Rainy Thoughts is about the challenges we face every day,

the simplicity in our deep insecurities and how we seek to overcome these hurdles.

The beat came about during a typical Cape Town winter’s

afternoon, the distant piano and slight chords just echoing that sentiment of uncertainty, as every day we should know how be ready for what lies ahead.

Once Philela added her input, it just resonated with me, and

became a song of optimism. This is only the start of a larger project moving forward, but so far it looks to be a good place to start.

-TXT1

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SANCTITY IN THE ARCHIVES:

A TRILOGY BY TIISETSO MASHIFANE WA NONI In nearing the end of my undergraduate degree I have been making some thought-provoking deductions for myself. The current structure of secondary and tertiary education requires an individual to absorb a specific database of information that should cater to the diverse group of students that come in and out of the institution. Yet, even now in my final year of varsity, as a woman of colour who has sat in lectures where black female academics get their intelligence measured by students through the ever so reliable information sources that are Google and Wikipedia – I find that the libraries of information available to me echo a male white man’s voice within the shelves. So I ask – ‘Where is the reference for the black female?’ ‘Where is the library of knowledge that reflects people who look like me?’ As a student of theatrical and cinematic arts the knowledge available is not specifically constructed for me and that is why white students have the authority to measure the intelligence of a black female academics and artists. This is where the sanctity of many white students lies –

that they can see themselves achieving and my

amateur

experimental

film

trilogy

striving within these archives whether it be ‘Sanctity in the Archives’. through the art works of Vincent van Gogh, the plays of Athol Fugard or the films of Alfred With

tumblr

websites

such

Hitchcock – there is always a white reference ‘f***yeahwomanfilmdirectors’ dedicated to they can refer to. The same cannot be said empowerment of the few but up and coming for the black female - artistically speaking, female film directors, I decided to pick up a her references or her archive consists of her camera and tell my truth through a trilogy being the object of fascination within the consisting of three reactionary amateur aesthetic archive – she was never making short films that have a common thread – that art for herself and for those who were – they being a woman is an out of mind experience, are very few of them and this struggle to find that a woman is contained, that a woman yourself within the archive is what inspired is a carefully monitored entity that is to be

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controlled. That a female is the influenced to its black and white imagery – I project the and not the influencer.

video against my seventeen year old model to symbolise the literal sexualised image of

The first filmed titled ‘NEOCHROMO’ speaks the black female imposed on to her from to the monochrome aesthetic colour palette a young age. Living in a generation that is of white, black and grey – while replacing driven by what I call a ‘pop-culture-tumblrthe mono prefix of monochrome with the instagram aesthetic’, we are a generation neo prefix that speaks to what is ‘new’ or that evolves quickly because we are so ‘recent’ in interrogating and symbolising the aware, critical, assertive and aggressive and role of Hip Hop Culture within the world of this works to our advantage in subverting the young black female. Using a projection cultural norms such the viewed, functional of ‘Studio’ by American hip-hop artist and sexualised body of the black female as Schoolboy Q (feat. BJ the Chicago Kid) due seen with the work of Trinidadian-American

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rapper Nicki Minaj’s Anaconda and rape culture in tertiary institutions Lookin’ *** *****for example and I, and the steady rise of the working in a more understated manner wanted woman but in order for these issues of the ‘standardised woman’ to be dealt

to do the same with NEOCHROMO.

with – they must be broadcasted. The

second

film

‘Broadcast’

perhaps the most visually direct film With, the final short film, ‘woman on that speaks to the construction of the verge of a breathless complex’ I what womanhood is. Formerly titled examine this idea of a female being ‘Broadcast:

The

Will

Survive’ seen and presented as this ‘weeping,

(inspired by the audio clip featured wasting away and breathless creature’ in the clip ‘The Will to Survive’ by though poetic in speech, I argue that American singer-songwriter Tinashe it reflects the kind point of view of Kachingwe) the short film investigates that birthed social concepts such as the meaning of womanhood in that Freudian Hysteria. I use the motif of it does not mean the same thing to Freudian Hysteria to purposefully a black female and a white female. mistake my model’s emancipatory A white woman’s womanhood is the euphoria as a state of hysteria, social standard and the black female observe her as having a condition she is (in the context of the film – quite is suffering from rather than a state literally) bounded to either performing that she is freely experiencing. She is that womanhood to survive or cease not out of mind and out of control but to exist at all. But in this current day in filming her as a patient to the voice and age the distresses that women of artist Melanie Flash’s spoken text are subjected to are no longer a in the style of Freudian hysteria – it hidden phenomenon, there are means would seem that she is a woman on to publically broadcast these social the verge of something, something ailments as seen with protests about complex and hysterical.

SHORT STORY

THIS IS NOT A SAD STORY WORDS BY JULIE NXADI PHOTOGRAPH BY OFENTSE MOSALA

I grew up young. In back rooms, reading

her veins. 2am on a Wednesday I would

books in the corners of Madams’

stand in our dark bedroom/kitchen/

houses, seen but not heard. My mother

lounge and grind together all the tablets

kept me close. “Read to me” – as she

like the doctors showed me. ‘I hope

hung up panties that were not her own,

they work, I have an oral tomorrow and

smiling at my literary choices. “Julie,

my teacher already hates me because

who is this Stephen King?” Never, ‘Julie

my cursive is so untidy’ I would think

aren’t you too young? ‘

as I fed my mother the potent cocktail.

“Are you ready to work, Julia?” they’d

“I hope they work, Miss Lynn asked me

ask her two days after chemotherapy.

to wash windows tomorrow and she

It wasn’t a question. Sick and tired

is already cross because I have been

she would work. Me; toes at her heels,

away.”

reading out loud. Her; pushed gently by

I grew up young. This is not a sad story.

a parallel frequency where hotels won’t

I see my mother’s strength and humour

let you leave and all black characters

and wisdom in my daughter every time

are magic.

I look at her. My child will get to be a

I grew up young. I had to figure out the

child. My mother said that people are

difference between what I could take

better than they think they are, but they

and what I was taking. My mother would

are also much worse. I never knew if

wrestle death once a month in the bed

she was talking about herself.

we shared. Poison scratching through

BOOKS

ja. YOU SHOULD READ THESE BOOKS South African literature is pretty much one collective fire emoji, with a new local novel taking to the shelves of Exclusionary Books every fortnight. Ja.’s editorial team have selected a few of their favourite local reads that will entertain and educate fiction and non-fiction readers alike. The Yearning by Mohale Mashigo At least 3/5 of the team have read this book and what can we say, we’re all huge fans of Mohale Mashigo’s debut fiction novel. Mashigo has a way of conveying both trauma and mythology through tangible, heart-wrenching, but ultimately cathartic prose. The cover however, does the novel no justice. In the maid’s room by Hagen Engler The only real pull factor about this book is because the main character is known as Disco Dave, “a South African hipster”, which is hilarious to the editorial team as one of the editors goes by discodavemann and it’s cool to make fun of your colleagues. Aside from that, the book is pretty hilarious itself. Completely un-PC and makes fun of everyone in its way. Writing what we like – a new generation speaks edited by Yolisa Qunta Eh, this book is a tad overrated. It received a skeptical review by Kwanele Sosibo in the Mail&Guardian, but remains on the recommendation lists of media sites and book stores across SA. Perhaps its strength then, is that it publishes young voices who tell their own stories – a powerful and vital tool in contemporary South Africa.

Sigh, the beloved country by Bongani Madondo Oh Bongani! Who else could accurately sum up the state of the country and all of its fallacies, intricacies and jovialities by using their own family as an example? Madondo’s writing is clear, elegant and engaging without a hint of verbosity. You’ll learn about music and art and whiteness and blackness, and throughout it all, you’ll feel as if you’re having a longoverdue conversation with a dear friend. Rape: a South African Nightmare by Pumla DineoGqola In Edition 6 writer and sub-editor, Youlendree Appasamy, wrote a pertinent review on Rape. The book deserves repeated acknowledgement as an issue like rape does not go away overnight, and certainly not through a magazine mention. Understanding rape culture and the air that fuels its fire is the first step in ending the gross epidemic.

INTERGALACTIC ANIMALS: A Q&A WITH URSUS&WOLF 88

BY DAVE MANN PHOTOGRAPHY BY ALEX TRAVERS

short while back, two creatures – a bear with quick paws and a wolf with a lyrical jaw – came together to make music. The

union: Ursus&Wolf. The sound: A wild, howling lyrical flow, rhythmic and deft in its delivery which tiptoes along a tightrope of relentless basslines, rolling percussion and a blend of layered, heady, and cosmic synthesisers. Long-time friends, Ursus&Wolf comprises Cape Town-based Nick Trethowan who handles the vocals, and Houston (America) based Justin Olney who handles the beats. To date, the Cult of Maybesigned duo have brought out two EPs, namely What Now and The Remix EP which sees new takes on old Ursus&Wolf tracks by a few local artists as well as by the duo themselves. We caught up with the electronic hip-hop duo for a quick chat about their sound, making music from across the world, and what they’ve got in the works.

FOR OUR READERS WHO DON’T KNOW YOU, WHO ARE URSUS&WOLF? Nick: We’re your friendly neighborhood crime fighting duo! Justin: He means we’re an electro rap group out of

“ “ ” Cape Town South Africa and Houston America. I make the beats Nick does the raps.

N:… together we make one big musical robot that’s half bear and half wolf!

WHEN DID EACH OF YOU FIRST GET INTO MAKING

MUSIC AND WHEN DID YOU START EXPERIMENTING WITH THE URSUS&WOLF SOUND?

N: We started music separately but came together as two emo teenagers (with bad haircuts and ripped skinny jeans) when we were about 14. The first version of U&W came about when we were 16/17 as

a four piece rap band consisting of Justin, myself, and friends, Leechi and Marco called Fear The Badgers.

We were young and just messing around with dynamite

raps about complete nonsense and fat beats to keep

the party bumping. We had a lot of fun performing and in the end had to carry on with High School matric and called it quits for awhile. After that Justin and I

just kind of stuck at it, making music and refining our sound even after Justin left the country. Since then

we’ve been Ursus&Wolf, something a little different, something a little crazy, something a little natural.

J: For as long as I can remember I have been playing

different instruments and can thank my brother for

teaching me guitar initially to get me into music. I started making electronic music around 5 or 6 years

MUSIC

back thanks to a really good friend of ours, Leechi. I remember seeing him messing around with samples and synths in FL studio and immediately got into it. As the years went by I developed a sound and started my personal project Fearbace. Then as Nick mentioned; that turned into working with friends on Fear The Badgers, and

“

now Ursus & Wolf. WE PUT THIS MAGAZINE TOGETHER ENTIRELY VIA EMAIL AND TO BE HONEST, IT’S NOT EASY. HOW DO THE TWO OF YOU MAKE MUSIC FROM OPPOSITE ENDS OF THE EARTH?

N: Social media helps a lot, being able to message each other instantly is a large part of our process. But mostly we condense it to a phone call everyday where we either have a chill and create something, or discuss what we’re doing and need to do. We make it work for us. J: Many of our friends will tell you that I am not great with contact haha, but as Nick said we try to have a chat a day with regards to music and plans and all that good stuff. The hard part is getting the recorded vocal files from Nick, as internet speed

”

and uploading tends to be an issue; but a good 4 or 5… maybe 10 hours later I can get my hands on the files and start mixing the vocals in.

N: Oh the internet process… WeShare file transfers that literally take 12 hours.

Patience is key. For the song Justin and I have been recently working on, it was a

file of about 2 gigs or so, and it was taking forever. So I went about my day, went out thinking the file had sent, to come home to find I had run out of electricity and the

upload had canceled. That’s when you need to be as serene as possible otherwise desktop objects start flying.

TELL US A BIT ABOUT THE TRACK YOU DID FOR ZAKI IBRAHIM. HOW’D THAT COME ABOUT?

N: We were invited to play at a Button Bashers evening, which is a really great music

event in Cape Town which showcases new acts and artists by giving them a week to

come up with a remix of a single that the organizers give the performers. Part of the event was being given Zaki’s new up-coming single before its release. There were

remixes done by the exceptional Leeu and Phizicist alongside our own that came out

MUSIC of the event. South Africa is brimming with this new coming talent; these events are important in giving the stage for people to see it. J: Well from my side, I got a message from Nick saying we have a few days to do a remix for Zaki Ibrahim’s new track for the Button Bashers event. As soon as I got the stems, I picked up my bass guitar and the song took form from there.

“ ”

LOOKING FORWARD, WHAT CAN WE EXPECT FROM URSUS&WOLF?

J: A music video for an unreleased song is currently in the works. Of course, me not being there will be odd, but Nick is normally the life of the party anyway! On top of that, Nick and I are always working on music bouncing ideas back and forth, so new tracks in the form of singles will be released sometime in the near future.

N: Not having Justin here for the visual aspects of the music video and promo images definitely makes it a bit odd, but we think of clever ways around it so that he is still center stage with me. We have some really cool shoots coming up and as Justin said we have a music video in the works that is really exciting. Otherwise on the Ursus&Wolf horizon it’s new music and new shows as our main focus.

A good majority of the ja. contributors grew up in the 90’s and 2000’s. Many as moody, skunk eyeliner and black nail polished emo kids; some as unkempt

“hide

the

gwaai!

Mom’s home!” punks; to sweet (maybe a little sheltered) school girls with boy band obsessions and all the other stereotypes of South African pre-hormone and high school kiddiewinks and teenagers. We asked all the edition 10 creators and contributors what their most influential song, album or artist was from their younger years and why.

NIAMH WALSH-VORSTER, SKWATTA KAMP, MKHUKHU FUNKSHEN (2003) Umoya was the most watched SABC 1 video of my whole grade 5 class. I got this album and to my little preachers kid shock there was a lot of “swear words” and I, being a real ethical child, gave the CD back to my mother telling her my disappointment in the album because of all the bad language. The lesson learnt was that “WARNING: this album contains explicit lyrics” really meant that, plus this album was not made for primary school white girls but I loved it years later when I was in high school. I have been known to request SK any time I have gone out to clubs in Grahamstown.

CHAKA I did not have a South African up bringing. However, I remember constanalty being made aware of South African heritage in Uganda through music by Yvonne Chaka Chaka (Umqombothi, Thank You Mr DJ and Motherland). There is no doubt in my mind that this sparked my curitosy about Sotuh Afrca and let

MANN,

song just fucked my head up for good.

TEVIN TOBIAS, BRENDA FASSIE, MINA NAWE (2002) This album was the most over-played at family gatherings. The rawness of the sound had every one on their feet. Such a good time!

CARISSA GOVENDER, CRASHCARBURN THIS CITY NEEDS A HERO (2007) I’m still jamming to CrashCarBurn’s song Serenade, it’s on my phone and my car playlist. I also can’t leave out Die Heuwels Fantasties’ selftitled debut album which still makes me emotional. I was a pretty moody teenager, so both these albums were

CAROL NGEZI, YVONNE CHAKA

DAVE

I was about 12 at the time and that

FELIX

DONKEY RATTLE (2002)

LABAND,

the perfect life soundtrack.

LUMUMBA

MTHEMBU,

TKZEE

FAMILY, GUZ 2001 (2000) It’s an iconic album if you consider that tracks like Fiasco and Izinja zam were on it. Also, it launched the solo careers of two kwaito superstars in Kabelo and Tokollo. And finally, to secure its legendary status, it is a kwaito gem, a genre that is now effectively extinct. A lot of people though also praise it for its proto-hip-hop experimentation. It was a revolutionary, one-of-a-kind

South African album that cemented TKZee’s status as hall-of-famers, especially considering that Geuzin and Gwyza have since passed on.

ISABEL RAWLINS, FELIX LABAND, 4/4 DOWN THE STAIRS (2002) The South African album that influenced me the most as a teenager was probably Felix Laband’s

4/4 Down the stairs. I remember

my sister bringing music back home when she was a student in Pietermaritzburg. These strange other-worldly sounds were a solace through high school. A soundtrack to a lot of time spent hiding on the outskirts.

HIMAL RAMJI, SIBLING RIVALRY, CONTORTED IZINGOMA (2005) Contorted Izingoma by Sibling Rivalry. Probably the first live band I ever watched and my first entrance into punk music outside Western bounds. A persistent reminder that (punk) music is not only the masters’ tool. Sibling, particularly Matt Wilson (bassist/vocalist), remains a massive influence on what I write, and how I write it. The album still earns me noise complaints to this day, 11 years after its release.

AVUMILE MAGADLA/VERSE, ZOLA 7, UMDLWEMBE (2000) I listened to Zola 7 mostly and his first album Umdlwembe was the trend back in the days also being the era of Yizo Yizo drama. Zola spoke a lot about things that we saw amongst us as kids, so it was easy to relate to his music and he also influenced a lot of rappers who are still in the industry even today. He influenced me also cause I started singing along his lyrics even before I thought I’d become a writer one day.

TIISETSO MASHIFANE, ZAMAJOBE, NDAWO YAMI (2004)

This album influenced my childhood in that

group instead? Sankomota, to me, is the

it was my late mother’s favourite album and

greatest group. And Frank Leepa, their

when travelled in the car to school or the mall

founding member and guitarist, is the

– it was the only album she would play. Though

greatest of composers. I wanna write a

back then I didn’t know what the big deal was

book about how great Sankomota are, it’s

– now, in 2016, Zamajobe’s smooth, easy

that deep.

vocals are something that I cherish greatly.

OSMOSISLIZA,

JULUKA,

ETHEL NSHAKIRA, IDRIS ELBA, MI

SCATTERLINGS OF AFRICA (1982)

MANDELA (2014)

As one of 3 siblings we would fight over the

I didn’t grow up with any distinct South African

earphones, but learned to eventually take

influences but the soundtrack ‘Mi Mandela’

turns, 2 songs each consecutively. It was

by Idris Elba has thoroughly blessed my ears

sheer joy and amusement, turning up the

each and every time I put it on. The harmonies

volume and singing loudly. When a sibling

leave me all warm inside!

had the earphone that was another form of entertainment, the squeaking, high

NUBLACCSOUL,

REASON,

AUDIO

pitches, theatrics and facial expressions

(2014)

whilst lost in song, made me laugh tears.

From the first line on the opening track, I was

It was karaoke in the 70’s when living on

sold.

a farm.

JULIE NXADI, TKZEE FAMILY, GUZ

YOULENDREE

2001 (2000)

KHUSHI KHABIE GHAM.

TKZee Guz, because there is no such thing as

It’s not local but it’s the soundtrack

old school in Kwaito.

to Dezemba good times with family in Durban.

TSELISO MONAHENG, SANKOMOTA I listen to way too many things. Can I pick a

APPASAMY,

KABHIE