What is the colour of the wind?

Most of us would consider ambition as the most important ingredient of success. Would you not agree that we all need to be ambitious in order to fulfill our dreams? Now take a minute and think about your most desired goal in life; think about all the required steps to achieve that goal.

I may not be certain what your goals are but I know for a fact that your plan of action to achieve them requires a great deal of ambition and its meant to lead to success. I don’t know the key to success but I have learnt that they key to failure is trying to please everyone.

We can all agree that we can’t succeed in isolation; like it or not, we all need the assistance of the others to reach our goals. Some people, if not a lot, will not always be pleased by you and you might be required to adjust your plan to suit their preferences. In that way your progress is most likely to be disturbed.

Trying to please everyone is like trying to identify the colour of the wind; someone will always argue against you because no one knows they right answer. What is the colour of the wind? Don’t waste your time trying to answer this, you will never be correct. The same applies to people’s perceptions of your quest to success; some one will always stand on your way.

Don’t let them!

Alert: Kasis coming to an end!

I made a discovery three weeks ago. Not a very good one and it has been bothering me since. There is a possible end to townships! Are you thinking that’s an absurd claim or I have been smoking bananas? Well three out of five people born and bred in the townships are determined to be super successful, leave the township and never come back!

Wait, before you ask me about my sources, let me confess: that interesting statistic is not really derived from a comprehensive research study by some professor. It’s a little and very unofficial research exercise I conducted by myself.

No, really, three weeks ago I decided to approach five random and, may I add, young people around Khayelitsha and asked them two simple questions: 1. “Do you aspire to be supper successful?”, 2. “When this aspiration becomes reality, do you plan to leave Khayelitsha and never come back?”

I got three very certain yeses for both questions and two “uhmm, Nos” for the second one. Now what does this tell us? In a couple of years to come about 80% our population will be making it big in the suburbs and we will be left with a very skeptical 20 %. Depending on how you look a this, it can be both a good and a bad thing.

I personally think it’s a serious problem. If we get huge chunks of skilled and talented youth leaving our community, who’s going to look after it? Who will nurture young talent and ensure that social development is progressing? And for very obvious reasons, don’t even think about the government, that poor lot clearly has a lot going on at the same time.

This issue has been giving me headaches for the past three weeks. You see, I’m very big on cultivating skills back. An overly obvious reason for the youth to leave and never come back would be the current state that our townships are in. That is crime, lack of ambition and perhaps lack of life sustaining resources. But if not us, who will put an end to this? Think about it.

If I were the boss...

If I were the boss, I would only allow skinny people to wear skinny jeans

If I were the boss, I would make it illegal for dark skinned women to wear a purple eye shadow.

If I were the boss, I would ban people from wearing sun glasses indoors and when it’s overcast.

If I were the boss, I would make it compulsory for balding men to shave off their hair. The same rule would go for bearded women.

If I were the boss, I would prohibit anyone with a questionable weave to enter public places.

If I were the boss, I would ensure that all the potbellied men have a gym membership.

If I were the boss, I would forbid any black person to colour their hair blonde.

If I were the boss, I would not allow any one older that 40 in night clubs.

If I were the boss, I would make sure that all of the above rules are strictly enforced!

Black Girl Problems

In the past few days, Cape Town’s weather has been very windy and quite unpleasant. This has brought two interesting revelations to me: 1) Skinny girls do have cellulite and 2) Girls, particularly black girls, have some serious issues going on underneath their weaves.

Thanks to the media, I had grown to believe skinny people have it all; the confidence, society’s acceptance and are cellulite free. Now I can announce (with an evil grin) that some skinny girls do in fact have, some orange-peel looking parts on their bodies. Well, that’s what the wind proudly displayed to me, with the help of some skinny girl’s itsy bitsy skirt

I have always known that it is almost impossible for black hair to be sleek and bouncy unless of course you relax it using some chemicals. However, most black girls make use of weaves and other hair extensions to achieve this look.

Looking at a weave wearing girl from a distance you would be convinced it does not get any more genuine than that. You would also think applying weave and hair extensions to one’s hair does not require much hassle, but what the wind has revealed states otherwise. I promise you, I did see a sewing thread sticking out of some girl’s hair! I saw missing hairlines that are meant to be perfectly hidden underneath the weave! I even saw patches of glue!!!

Out of all these incidents, this one takes the cake: I saw a girl running hysterically trying to catch her “pony tail” that had been blown away by the wind. At the same time she tried to cover the piece of stockings that was meant to keep her real hair in place. The poor thing eventually gave up and just stood there watching her pony tail disappear with the rest of the trash that the wind had collected. She then dug in her bag, took out a cap and wore it as she walked away. Now that’s what I call a girl with plan B.

Years of weaving is starting to catch up with Naomi Campbell.

Two people come out of a building and into a story

Weddings are most people’s ultimate dream; almost everyone dreams of meeting their soul mate, tying the knot and living happily ever after with them. Weddings are beautiful; they are like an official start to a life long union of two individuals who swear to stick together no matter what.


I personally think that the most special moment of weddings is when the groom and the bride walk out of the church, arm in arm just after they have said their vows and exchanged rings. During this moment family and friends celebrate, dance, ululate and throw confetti at the newly weds as they glide down with serenity.


Have you ever thought about what this moment would be like if two grooms walked out the church arm in arm instead of a bride and a groom? Not only would this look rather odd in the eyes of some people but also it would certainly be a story to tell! It’s been years since gay marriages became legal in South Africa but its still quite an awe to see people of the same sex get married.


Instead of walking out to a group of cheerful spectators and get confetti thrown at them, gay newlyweds walk into a story. They become a front-page article of some tabloid, a feature in a magazine, a post in someone’s blog or just a part of the latest gossip in their communities. Not only do stories of gay couples break out as soon as they walk out churches after getting hitched, they get formed as they walk out of all kinds of buildings.


I still want to get married one day though. I dream of a wedding where I will walk out of a church into a story. This will be prejudice free story that celebrates and embrace my sexuality. I want to walk out into a story that will detail my wedding and explain my happiness as a human being and not as a gay man.

How hard is it to follow instructions?

We all know that smoking is bad; it cripples the proper functioning of one’s immune system, stains teeth and ultimately kills people. Those facts, together with an instruction to quit smoking, are clearly stated on cigarrete packs. Yet, millions of people smoke like their lives depend on it.  

The fast spread of HIV is a result of unsafe sex and therefore people are instructed to use condoms. However, each day sees quite a large number of people getting infected.

Countless media campaigns can not stress it enough that people should not drink and drive. But a very astonishing percenatge of road accidents in South Africa is a cause of people driving while under the influence of alcohol and drugs.

Instructions are there to prevent, to protect, to influence, to guard and to guide. They are all over the place, but why do we still have such a chaotic society?

Guess who’s back!

Yup! Yours truly is back to the exciting (and sometimes demanding) world of blogging. And boy! Has it been long! My last post was made on Sunday, 11 April 2011. That was before I got a job, changed to part time studying and literally started living on the run. 

You, my beautiful follower, may wonder why I neglected you. Well, life happened! Between striving for absolute excellence in my job, finding new love (I will tell you more about that later) and experimenting with eye liner and turbans, time to blog became some sort of a rare luxury. 

However now I’m back with a bang and I promise to never vanish like that again…for my own sake. You see, keeping this blog up and going is part of my studies’ requirements to pass. I am required to create a very prominent existence on social media space. As I am already a bit of a social media junkie, I really can’t complain. 

Oh, please do follow me on Twitter, @SiyaMahomba and I gurantee you an instant follow back!

 

Till next time, cheers

While I was away, a huge chunk of my time was spent experimenting with eye liner and turbans