Coup in Tshwane!

No quite. But seeing SANDF members violently protesting working conditions and pay inside the Union Buildings grounds looks a lot like that. You can just imagine how the British media is going to interpret this.

SAPS were firing teargas and rubber bullets all over the show. At our army okes! Hectic. (By the way it's just down the road from my office, so maybe this is a little more exciting for me.).

Cabinet condemns soldiers rampage at the Union Buildings
SAPA	Published: 2009/08/27 11:30:51 AM

Picture: Financial Mail.

Cabinet on Thursday condemned the rampage by soldiers at the Union Buildings in Pretoria, saying attempting to “invade the seat of government is totally unacceptable”.

“Cabinet condemned in the strongest possible terms the illegal and violent protest at the Union Buildings by members of the South African National Defence Union (Sandu),” ministers said in a statement at the fortnightly post-cabinet briefing.

“Defying a court order, engaging in unnecessary violent behaviour, causing damage to public property and attempting to invade the seat of government is totally unacceptable, especially from people who have the responsibility of being the true defenders of the Constitution.” It warned that the protesters “must expect no sympathy from the state”.

Several soldiers and a policeman were injured and police and military vehicles damaged on Wednesday when a protest by 3000 soldiers demanding higher wages turned violent.

Police used rubber bullets and teargas to disperse the crowd when they refused to leave after handing over a memorandum with their demands and taunted officers. They threw a petrol bomb into one car and vandalised others.

Two soldiers were arrested.

Defence Minister Lindiwe Sisulu angrily described the incident as “anarchy” and said it had put national security at risk.

Carrots

Hey kids...
So here i sit in Phutaditjhaba (QwaQwa - eastern Free State) at the very beginning of the second of two training weeks back to back. I have become a big fan of carrot theory and am constantly looking for things to look forward to - faced with three weeks of training in September and very few Sundays to call my own. So from Mcgregor for Womens' Day weekend to Clarens this past weekend, but more on that later....First a little bit about work.

Last week we were in Sterkspruit which is about 70kms east of Aliwal North in the far north of the Eastern Cape. It snowed, it sunned, we sang, we ate and the group was lovely. Such a contrast from the first training week I did - guess experience really is everything. We were working with a group of 30 Community Care Givers and Assistant Nurses and I have to say if the fate of the health system was in the hands of these committed ladies and one gentleman we would all be in great hands! Everyone was so warm and welcoming. It was so inspiring to be part of the week - even if it was complicated and difficult with little reception, delayed courier deliveries and complicated management structures.

having issues uploading some of the pics... so I will have to add them at a later date :)

So... my carrot last week was a weekend in Clarens with some of the jozi crew (Phil, Mez, Helen, Paul and Mamedupi) and it was an amazing escape! Red wine, fireplaces, amazing views, horse riding in Golden Gate National Park, great conversation and catch ups, (a beautful tea set) and, of course, the Monopoly Marathon :)

CLARENS AUG 09

So off to another week of training - hoping it will be good and hassle free (despite its rocky start today) and looking forward to Sunday's trip to Posberg and the flowers on Sunday!! Bring on the Carrots!

yay

Flashbacks, fishing and fucktards

First up, i have to post a little krackah of a track by a voice you may recognise...

I think the divshare thing says it already, but yes! its Lethu! It's really fucking good i think... Anyway, he's in a band called Metropolis, based in Durban. I'd say check them out, but i dont think anyone in Durban reads this blog. I think he does tours in Jozi semi-regularly. Another person you can say you knew when... In fact i think that web page has tour dates on it, so checkidout.

In other news... I took The Kerrigan (or Tin Lizzie) out this weekend. Even caught me a fish (snapper, but below legal size). Sunday was an awesome day to be on the water, even if it is just in a 3.1m long tinnie.

It took a while to motor all over the harbour because we were using a pretty small backup motor - we would have used our new (second hand new, that is) 9.9HP Mercury two-stroke that goes like scalded cat, but the shit-for-brains bogun that sold us the motor in 'good condition' apparently doesn't consider a broken steering shaft to be something worth mentioning in the advert. The fact that said steering shaft is shattered and could result in the engine falling into the water at any time does not justify downgrading the motors condition from 'good' to 'essentially fucking useless until you spend $600 dollars on it'. Apparently.

Anyway, we've been negociating with this spineless ballsack since we bought the motor a few weeks ago to try and get him to take the motor back. I finally cracked on the weekend (not wanting to have to get into a steaming argument and threaten a law suit - a threat i would be unlikely to follow up on) and offered to split the repair bill with him. He said he would think about it, but it would depend on what his wife said. Did i mention that this guy was a spineless sack of shit? Anyway, i'm waiting for his response, but i'm not expecting anything positive. I was almost ready to just let the whole thing go. Swallow the $750 we wasted on the motor and just walk away, BUT it turns out its relatively easy to sue someone in the NSW Small Claims Tribunal (I think i'm allowed to call it suing? makes me sound tough) so if that turdburglar doesn't come back with a positive response by the end of play tomorrow, he can expect to be served with papers (it actually costs more to have the papers served in the flesh, so i might just get them mailed, but still that mu'fuggah gon' get SERVED!). It's not about the money anymore you understand, it's about inconveniencing this fucktard as much as i possibly can. I believe him to be of only mediocre intelligence, so a letter with the a semi-official letterhead may scare him into giving me back my money, but if not, I'll have my day in court I tell ya! I'm hiring A Few Good Men this weekend...

Watch this space.

Acoustic Africa at Bushfire

Just to give you a taste, this is one song from the acoustic africa set that Phil mentioned

Muziks makin' me dans

So highlights from the two festivals I was at recently.

Festival Number One: Bush Fire, Swaziland

1. Acoustic Africa feat. Vusi Mahlasela (SA), Habib Koite (Mali), Dobet Gnahore (Cote d'Ivoire), and the coolest lefty bassist I've ever seen. Truly moving music in a fantastic setting.
2. Busi Mhlongo (SA). Soulful and commanding-on-stage as they come. The whole passing on the baton to the new generation thing at the end of her show was particularly touching. Kinda bummed I've missed most of her career.
3. Some dude named Elemotho and his band from Namibia. Billed as an experimental acoustic set, it couldn't have been much further from that.
4. Jose Mucavele (Moz.). White anvil beard, crocodile skin boots and a guitar-is-optional attitude on a small stage = Portuguese blues like I've never heard before.
5. Sipho Hotstix Mabuse (SA). Only because his band plays that rad song whose name I don't know, and I didn't know his band played that song. A nice surprise to hear I'm burnin' up, all my looooove. Burnin'! Allll my loooove. Over and over for like 15 minutes.
6. Bob and Kenzhero's Michael Jackson and Brenda Fassie tributes, on both nights, after the bands had finished.

Festival Number 2: Oppikoppi 15 - "Smoorverlief"

1. Has to be Koos Kombuis. The Godfather of Oppi still rocks hard after all these years.
2. Lucky Fonz the Third. Huge surprise and probably my personal highlight. Best small stage act I've ever seen. And from de Nederlands nogal! He's playing the Bo on Sunday - I shall be there.
3. Shadowclub. I think the best rock band in SA right now, but the Oppi organisers clearly don't agree putting them on at 1pm on Sunday.
4. Acoustic Africa (again). Everyone was so amped to see them play again so it was a real pity that Habib and Dobet were late and they had to truncate their set. However, Vusi's one-man-show-crowd-pacification-while-we-waited, including a rendition, in Afrikaans, of "'N Donkie is a Wonderlike Ding" made for a true new South Africa moment. Al daai vet boere sing baie mooi, arm in arm, met die swart oke, ne.
5. Balthazar (Belgium). Kinda hipster skinny jean punk rock but tons of energy and attitude, and overall a pleasant surprise.
6. Thandiswa Mazwai. The former Bongo Maffin frontwoman is quite large these days, and I think she was high because she kept interrupting all her own songs, but still, she has a sweet voice and kicks it proper when she's concentrating.
7. aKing. Yes I know melodic rock from Belville is kak. But on stage with 5000 fans they actually moer the stuffing out of you, melodically. Awesome.
8. Fokofpolisiekar. Ok ok they aren't even a band anymore, and they also play stupid doosrok from Belville as aKing (perhaps because they share band members?), albeit much harder, but they've driven Oppi for about 3 years now and the okes still go bos for them in the biggest, most Afrikaans way imaginable.
9. The unofficial official anointment of Oppikoppi as a National Heritage Site. Kak funny but according to those in the know, perhaps not too far from becoming a reality. The whole importance of Afrikaans kultuur and its relationship with Oppi, sort of thing.
10. Foto na Dans. I was told in Swaziland to keep an open mind. I heard them last time I was at Oppi and they actually made me want to go home. This time they didn't. Apparently they don't take themselves seriously, and that makes a massive difference. As much was lost in translation last time. So if you want to hear some self aware Afrikaans opera-rock, give them a try. I won't ever bother though, unless I'm at Oppi. Time and place people, time and place. For everything.

I won't list the supakak stuff. Just a paragraph of advice: Die Antwoord will make your ears bleed. Watkin Tudor Jones is die enigste oke wat nog steets lief vir sy lewe is. But of course him and Yo'landi Visser (yo, yo, Yo'Landi!) still have a large following. Apparently they're married now too? Terrifying kids in the offing then. Pahty Pahty Pahty! (for one whole song, that's all she screeches).

in other words

and this is an image about to be used in my next incarnation of In Other Words, the show I'm redeveloping and taking to Buenos Aires in Oct!!!

fran has inspired me

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Tread lightly Wallabies...

This is where Greg 'Lomper' Abramowitz made his U15 3rd team rugby debut. Hallowed ground indeed!

I am not a macroeconomist

If you have time to read, this is a fabulous - and simple - way to understand the basic macro debates.

Yours in education.
The Doctor

Economics is in crisis: it is time for a profound revamp

By Paul De Grauwe

Published: July 21 2009 22:27 | Last updated: July 21 2009 22:27

There can be little doubt. The science of macroeconomics is in deep trouble. The best and the brightest in the field fight over the most basic problems. Take government budget deficits, which now exceed 10 per cent of gross domestic product in countries such as the US and the UK. One camp of macroeconomists claims that, if not quickly reversed, such deficits will lead to rising interest rates and a crowding out of private investment. Instead of stimulating the economy, the deficits will lead to a new recession coupled with a surge in inflation. Wrong, says the other camp. There is no danger of inflation. These large deficits are necessary to avoid deflation. A clampdown on deficits would intensify the deflationary forces in the economy and would lead to a new and more intense recession.

Or take monetary policy. One camp warns that the build-up of massive amounts of liquidity is the surest road to hyperinflation and advises central banks to prepare an “exit strategy”. Nonsense, the other camp retorts. The build-up of liquidity just reflects the fact that banks are hoarding funds to improve their balance sheets. They sit on this pile of cash but do not use it to increase credit. Once the economy picks up, central banks can withdraw the liquidity as fast as they injected it. The risk of inflation is zero.

Both camps line up an impressive list of Nobel prize-winners to buttress their arguments. Economists have often disagreed in the past, but this time the tone is different. The protagonists do not hesitate to accuse the other camp of ignorance or bad faith. I have never seen anything like this.

So what? Does it matter that economists disagree so much? It does. Take the issue of government deficits. If you want to forecast the long-term interest rate, it matters a great deal which of the two camps you believe. If you believe the first one, you will fear future inflation and you will sell long-term government bonds. As a result, bond prices will drop and rates will rise. You will have made a reality of the fears of the first camp. But if you believe the story told by the second camp, you will happily buy long-term government bonds, allowing the government to spend without a surge in rates, thereby contributing to a recovery that the second camp predicts will follow from high budget deficits.

Most people are not sure which camp is right. They hesitate. One day, when green shoots are popping up here and there, they believe the story warning about inflation; the next day, when the shoots turn brownish, they believe the other story. Disagreements among economists take away the intellectual anchors around which market participants interpret events and forecast the future. Ultimately, all our forecasts use a particular economic model to interpret data and to forecast their future course. The existence of wildly different models takes away this intellectual anchor and this translates into more market volatility.

This conflict matters not only for market participants, but also for policymakers. The two camps of economists have wildly different estimates of the effect of a 1 per cent permanent increase in government spending on real US GDP over the next four years. According to the first camp, the Ricardians, the multiplier is closer to zero than to one, ie 1 per cent extra spending generates much less than 1 per cent of extra GDP, producing little extra tax revenue. Thus budget deficits surge and become unsustainable.

By contrast, the second camp, the Keynesians, predict that the same 1 per cent of extra government spending multiplies into significantly more than 1 per cent of extra GDP each year until the end of 2012. This is the stuff of dreams for governments, because such multiplier effects are likely to generate additional tax income so that budget deficits decline.

With so much disagreement it is no surprise that policymakers are unsure and vacillate. Some countries, such as the US and France, go all out for the Keynesian story; others, such as Germany, put more faith in the Ricardians. Personally I think the Keynesians are right, but my opinion is irrelevant. The point is that the cacophony of analysis helps to explain why policymakers react in different ways to the same crisis and why it is so difficult for them to come up with co-ordinated action.

How to resolve this crisis in macro-economics? The field must be revamped fundamentally. Some of its shortcomings are obvious. Before the financial crisis, most macroeconomists were blinded by the idea that efficient markets would take care of themselves. They did not bother to put financial markets and the banking sector into their models. This is a major flaw.

There is a deeper problem, though, that will be more difficult to resolve. This is the underlying paradigm of macroeconomic models. Mainstream models take the view that economic agents are superbly informed and understand the deep complexities of the world. In the jargon, they have “rational expectations”. Not only that. Since they all understand the same “truth”, they all act in the same way. Thus modelling the behaviour of just one agent (the “representative” consumer and the “representative” producer) is all one has to do to fully describe the intricacies of the world. Rarely has such a ludicrous idea been taken so seriously by so many academics. (Other fields of economics have not been deluded by this implausible idea and therefore do not face the same criticism.)

We need a new science of macroeconomics. A science that starts from the assumption that individuals have severe cognitive limitations; that they do not understand much about the complexities of the world in which they live. This lack of understanding creates biased beliefs and collective movements of euphoria when agents underestimate risk, followed by collective depression in which perceptions of risk are dramatically increased. These collective movements turn uncorrelated risks into highly correlated ones. What Keynes called “animal spirits” are fundamental forces driving macroeconomic fluctuations.

The basic error of modern macro-economics is the belief that the economy is simply the sum of microeconomic decisions of rational agents. But the economy is more than that. The interactions of these decisions create collective movements that are not visible at the micro level.

It will remain difficult to model these collective movements. There is much resistance. Too many macro-economists are attached to their models because they want to live in the comfort of what they understand – the behaviour of rational and superbly informed individuals.

To paraphrase Isaac Newton, macroeconomists can calculate the motions of a lonely rational agent but not the madness of the crowds. Yet if macroeconomics wants to become relevant again, its practitioners will have to start calculating this madness. It is going to be difficult, but that is no excuse not to try.

The writer is professor of economics at the University of Leuven and the Centre for European Policy Studies

Mary's 30th Hoe Down

Ok. So we had some Line Dancing, Rodeo bull riding, more Dancing and dress up.

Jeremy got up to his usual party tricks on the dance floor. Brig exposed her wild side on the dance floor and by riding the bull. (Phil and Paul were too scared) - but Briggie braved it and was rewarded with a slap in the face (and chest) from the bull's horns (but she is fine!). The gay boys arrived to steal the show wearing very little (which got Mez squeeling) and with a special bday message in red lipstick. How they managed to stay in those outfits for the majority of the evening when half the 'venue' was outside in the 2 degree cold - I don't know. They managed to distract Nancy our elderly Line Dancing instructor quite often.

port cities - the start

you heard it first on this blog.......!

Why i love cats and Japan

Some musical tidbits

The TV on the Radio concert i went to see a while back was recorded by the ABC. They broadcast it (well, half an hour of it) on Monday night, and i was hoping the would put it up on iView, but they havent. Philimon gets to watch it when he visits though. Many times. Maybe stoned. YOU however, can watch Wolf like Me below...

Also, you may like this little bit of 80's glory.

Dont front, you know you love the hair.

hauntings at 891 -

just cos they're completely freaky!

New job

Hey Everyone

Thought it was time that I told you all of my big week this week. Somewhat disorientating and exhausting. But exciting nonetheless.

Sunday I decided to resign.
Monday I found new job
Tuesday I resigned & confirmed my appointment at new job
Wednesday I confirmed an early release from old job(My last last day at UCS will be next Monday!)
Today, Thursday I'm sorting out the mountain of admin and feeling a little tired

Next week Wednesday I start my new job with Change Logic at Standard Bank.

Bits n Pieces

while I am on the couch with the plague - and cannot hope to compete with the illness that is the beastie boys revelry - I thought i'd post a few bits n pieces. None earth shattering, just things I have been meaning to stick up for months.

Big news on the laan - well on the straat rather and blinde st to be exact is the arrival of ms youens. This is Paula's new house!! All the furniture is the previous owners still.
Work has taken me to some new places in the past few weeks... most rural and all cold :) So far its been Senqu (far north eastern cape), Qwa Qwa and Amajuba in KZN. All amazing places that it would be fun to go back and actually explore properly, instead of sitting in meeting rooms and getting the plague.


and introducing the little church:
off again on Sunday to ulundi :)

Sabotaging Bobby

Had this photo from our Rwanda trip. May I present Bobby Berkowitz as Officer Rutsomething.


Loving the icanhascheezburger gadget btw.

Lessons from the old school

This interview with Graham Boustred (ex-head of Anglo) was published in the Business Day this morning. It's sure to create a stir, but I thought I'd share it because it's frikken funny. How the world has changed!

Cap'n Sims!

Awesome

Get Ill

For those of you that care (you should all care) The Beastie Boys have re released their watershed album (trying not to use the word seminal) Ill Communication. They have posted a lekker little website to mark the occasion. Go there and Sabotage-ify yourself, like i have. Post pics on blog. Come correct like Anthony Mason (whoever he is).

This picture makes me look like a girl, but whatever.

Shameless self promotion

For those in Jozi...

Rock Stars

As many of you know Paul played his first gig on Saturday night at the Tanz Cafe in Bryanston. The likes of Prime Cirlce, Louise Carver and numerous other South African bands perform there,not many bands that we all support, but famous in SA terms. Paul wasn't that keen on the venue as it doesn't really fit, Shooting School for Baddies, band profile or rather, their gig venue wish list. Nevertheless - they were a great success! All band members were rather nervous, but they soon relaxed and their performance created much foot tapping, wolf whistling and a venue packed with friends, wannabe groupies, locals and even a few parentals. Paul looked like a real ROCK STAR, playing his guitar, with a few little solo numbers thrown in. Well done! We are so proud to see you up on the stage looking so cool (and handsome). Mary has agreed to bring some extra underwear next time to throw on stage. Lara even went as far as making a comment about if she wasn't a lesbian Paul would be in trouble...

The band that they were supporting, the colour eight,managed to empty the room with their bad cover versions of U2 and Michael Jackson. The highligt for me, was when I realzsied that the main singer was in fact an old KTV presenter, who had hosted IDOLs for a while before being involved in some drug scandal.

Tanz cafe have even requested that they return this weekend!

SO keep an eye out for their GIG list - hopefully you can all come and support and share the music!

Lara took some footage from her cellphone - so the quality is not that great and iot sounds as if Alana is really screeching, (she has quite a deep voice). I will try and post it.

Political Apathists!

You can't debate about whether kittens or puppies are cuter and then three people vote neither! Phil and Greg stop fence sitting and vote for me! Stop the political apathy! Save cute kitties - change your votes!

Kerry, Tally and Hels I will not sit on your bed and purr for you. Paul I suspect you are the third fence sitter....

Finally!

Proof there is a god... Swine Flu be thy name.

Living the Australian dream!

Ahoy there land-lubbers!

I am a proud boat co-owner! Yesterday a friend and I 'won' a tinnie on eBay. Some rooster tried to snipe us at the end of the auction, but Tony (nickname 'Suey') was on the ball and we got it for a pretty good price. We still dont have a motor yet (so we can fang it like a scalded cat), and i need a license to ride it on the harbour. Anyway, once i have that stuf sorted i'm going to be on the harbour catching kinfish and flatheads (kingies and flatties) and getting in the way of the ferries and generally being a fisherman larrikin type. I have used a number of Australian colloquialisms in this post to reflect just how Australian this event is. You can have all the sausage sizzles you want, drink VB, watch AFL, and make fun of foreigners, but until you have a boat, you cannot consider yourself Australian (which i don't, but i can if i want to now). 

I want to call her The Kerrigan or The Joustin' Stick, or The Pool Room in honour of The Castle, but i'll have to confer with Suey.

Daily puppy/kitten eat your heart out!

Time have a pictorial of the Annual World's Ugliest Dog Competition on their website. I do however get the feeling that the word World is being used quite liberally in this context... sorta like the World Series. Anyhoo I thought it was pertinent and contextual due to our current democratic issues on hierdie blog.

Gideon Rachman on Twitter

"The problem is that Twitter simultaneously encourages extreme brevity and endless communication. Each shot is short but you can keep twittering all day if you want – and many addicts seem to do just that. If Marx really had lived in the age of Twitter, he would probably not have been sending out thunderous political messages. It is more likely that his Twitter feed would have read: “Just arrived at British Museum. Going for a cup of tea.” "

More here. Good piece.

What is this doing on The Daily Puppy?

http://www.dailypuppy.com/articles/p/how-to-prevent-vaginitis/df1c5e11-4ada-ecc4-8806-05fc61dbf7b9

The daily puppy sucks

IMHO.

moretto thick Italian hot chocolate - for greggles

direct from my corner store - hot drinking chocolate from milan. got to love carlton :-)

City Power se moer; and Michael Jackson

No power at home since about 4pm yesterday. No hot water this morning. Not even at the gym. Was 1 degree at 6am.

Not. Happy.

In other news...


I'm only being nasty because there is no sensation in my fingers.

Feed the fish

Just click on the digital pond.

The rate of change

This is why I'm glad that I work for an IT compnay and that I specialise in Change Management. My theory - I should always have a job, untill people start empoweringthemselves to deal with change, which I suppose is inevitable - either way the stats are interesting and it kinda feels like the planet will explode at some point...

Some things to think about

This is why I hate the French.

Is JZ really that bad?



Bokke!

Hells yeah, it's sad...

... but why does everyone pretend to have been his best friend? As bad as the barrage of child molester jokes and unfunny email attachments that are being photoshopped as i write this, are the outpourings of faux emotion and soulless, inane platitudes that people attach to news articles or set as their Facebook status. Someone i know (but haven't seen in years and don't think very highly of) wrote this little gem as his Facebook status : "

Farewell MJ, a true genius of our ERA, your legacy will live on in our lives, so many memories.

Are you fucking serious? Did you know him? Do you think of him every day, light a candle for him between soap operas? Jeeeeezus! What the fuck is an ERA anyway? Capitalising doesn't make your mindspray any more meaningful. And if you're really mourning, why not do it privately?

It's revolting, people these days have an opinion on fucking everything, even on the death of people they've never met, who's country they have never visited, or who they have never even seen in the flesh, even through binoculars. I blame the Internet. And Facebook. Just because you've been given a platform, doesn't mean you have anything of significance to say. I'm aware that the same could be said about this blog, but everything i say is of significance by virtue of the fact that it came from my lips, so your argument isn't valid.

Anyway, ja, its sad a dude died, a really talented dude at that, and its sad he led such an unhappy and tortured life, but I'm guessing everyone who pretends to be MJ's best chommie now that he's dead made at least 10 jokes about his child molestation case while he was alive, so pipe the fuck down.

Banks' profits: Red and black ink | The Economist

Banks' profits: Red and black ink | The Economist

Shared via AddThis

Ah nuts I thought it would reproduce the whole story and graphic...

If you've ever owned turntables...

... then this will make perfect sense. The Urei 1620 is the mixer by the way. Its a legendary old school disco/early house mixer with rotary knobs rather than crossfaders.

SA Consumers

Some interesting stats on SA Consumers.....

• Half of men, and three quarters of South African women listen to gospel music. Next most popular among men are House Music and Kwaito. Women prefer love songs and ballads.


• 5% of mothers aged 20-34 have attended a movie in the past 4 weeks. For women without children of the same age group, the proportion is 12%.


• 22% of adults (16+) say they do crossword puzzles at least once a month.


• 4.3 million adults attend a nightclub/disco/rave at least once a month. 91% of them agree or strongly agree with the statement 'People should be careful about what they drink'.


• 69% of urban South African adults think TV is a generally believable source of information while only 45% feel the same way about newspapers.


• There are 1.5m adults who participate in running or jogging in South Africa. 15% are heavy drinkers of beer, and 9% are heavy drinkers of energy drinks.


• 71% of South African adults watched SABC1 in the past seven days. 16% watched no TV at all. In 2000, the number of people who said they'd watched Etv in the past month was


• 9.7m. In 2008 it had grown to 20m. On any given week, roughly 2m of these viewers watch WWE Smackdown.


• 76% of urban adults who do not receive an income say they personally own, rent or have use of a cellphone.


• 5.9 million adults send SMS's on a daily basis. 9.5 million send a 'please call me' message, and 0.6 million send MMS's.


• 80% of households that live in shacks have at least one cellphone, up from 42% in 2005

Adapted from source: http://www.eighty20.co.za/, June 2009

Chinese ladies getting game

Why size is everything in China

By Patti Waldmeir in Shanghai with additional reporting by Yan Jin

Published: June 22 2009 17:02 | Last updated: June 22 2009 17:02

Big eyes, big noses, big breasts and now humungous Hummers – China seems to be indulging an obsession with size, just when the rest of the world is learning the virtues of moderation.

In Shanghai, for example, business is booming on eyelifts, noselifts, chestlifts and other surgery aimed at enlarging classically Asian narrow eyes, flat noses and unobtrusive mammary glands. At the Shanghai Time Plastic Surgery Hospital, Dr Liao Yuhua says business is up 40 per cent since the end of last year – not despite the global economic crisis, but because of it.

Half her business is job-related: “Many of our customers are white-collar workers, many have lost their jobs, so they have time to execute their plastic surgery dreams,” says the retired paediatrician, whose genially wrinkled face and ankle socks that bag around her feet hardly seem like anyone’s clichéd view of a plastic surgeon. “They want to be more competitive when they go for the next interview,” she says, adding that famously pushy Chinese parents are very “supportive” of this trend.

Several brought in their children to make appointments straight after China’s strongly competitive national university entrance examinations earlier this month. “Parents hope that their kids can be more competitive in job hunting,” she says, admitting that as an employer, she would “recruit a prettier nurse with the same qualities as one who wasn’t so pretty”.

Graduates leaving college this year are facing one of the toughest job markets in years, and women – who make up three-quarters of Dr Liao’s patients – find it particularly hard to land a job. According to a study recently by the Centre for Women’s Law and Legal Services of Peking University, published in the Chinese press, one in four women surveyed said they had failed to get a job because of gender, a fifth said salaries were cut if they became pregnant and 11 per cent lost jobs when they had a family.

Dr Liao says plastic surgeries have grown by 15 per cent a year since the fad really took off in China about five years ago. But China is hardly alone in using disposable income on facelifts – and even justifying the cost as a career development expense. In the US last year, according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, cosmetic procedures rose among all groups except Caucasians; procedures among Hispanics were up 18 per cent. But the age profile of consumers of plastic procedures – and the parts of their bodies they want fixed – differs greatly from the US to Asia.

At Dr Liao’s hospital, the top two procedures are so-called double-eyelid surgery – which inserts an extra crease in the eyelid to make the eyes appear larger – and inserting a bridge in the nose, using a part of the rib. “Oriental people prefer bigger eyes and bigger noses – everything they don’t have,” she says, chuckling at the irony that, in Chinese slang, westerners are called “big noses” (and it is not necessarily a compliment). Her clients are mostly aged 25 to 35 – whereas half of all plastic surgeries in the US are for patients aged 40 to 55.

Bigger eyes are relatively cheap: from RMB2,400 ($350, €252, £213). Bigger breasts cost RMB60,000 (and clients must sacrifice a piece of thigh).

Zhou Jin Feng is one of the clinic’s satisfied past clients (blackhead removal). This time the 31- year-old nurse – clean-cut yet hardly a wanna-be movie star – wants a double eyelid and more pointed chin. “Young people these days want to be pretty, it’s important for their self-esteem, mainly for job hunting,” she says. Dr Liao says many of her patients are doctors, nurses or teachers: “Beauty is very important for communication in such professions,” she says.

Dr Liao can remember when plastic surgery would have been seen as bourgeois decadence of the first order. Now she thinks it is just a natural consequence of the wealth effect. “When the basic needs are met – a car, a house, food – what shall we do with our extra money? Spend it on beautification.”

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009

Purity Ball

Got this from The Lords of Apathy blog. The caption was (and this is going to offend):

"Yeah, I got your purity balls right here beeyotch!!"

ruski 891

so we're having another russian party.....

Did you know....

Okay team, so this weeks did you know has a recycling theme (for those of you who have been spending time with me recently you will know about my new found excitement and love of PET)....

1. Aluminium cans are indefinitely recyclable and are back on the shelf six weeks after it enters the recycling process

2. 1 ton of plastic bottles (PET) saves about 4 barrels of oil

3. Each ton of recycled paper saves 17 trees, 225 kilowatt-hours of electricity and 22700 litres of water!

4. If you do a life cycle analysis on recycled goods versus good produced from scratch it always saves energy - recycling aluminium saves 96% while glass only saves 21% of energy. 

Therefore it makes economic sense to recycle and you don't just have to be a hippy tree hugger! Not that I had doubts about whether any of you didn't believe in recycling...

Victoria likened to Mexico - as a hotspot...

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25584064-2702,00.html

awesome.

600 or so cases of swine flu in victoria... alone

cough cough

Happy Birthday Helz!!!!

A couple of joumasebloggers and some other stragglers made it out to Magaliesberg to celebrate Helen's 30th with her. It was a great weekend despite one uninvited guest. The food was plentiful, the wine was flowing and the company was excellent. Hel's, thanks for organising it all. We all wish you fantastic 30s. x