AM I A BOGAN?

A friend of a friend, an Aussie, remarked the other day that some people considered it "bogan" to like Pink Floyd, which got me to thinking...

Here was me imagining the bogan concept to be the Australian equivalent of the American redneck, the Jerry Springer Show fodder on which US TV audiences seemed to gorge as readily as they do their buckets of KFC or multiple Big Macs. 

Did I have it wrong? I mean, I don't like Pink Floyd - I love Pink Floyd.

This required some introspective scrutiny and perhaps a little research on the topic.

Variously, google, wikipedia and the urban dictionary paint a pretty clear picture of boganism which can be summarised as follows:

The typical bogan lifestyle involves wanton promiscuity and copious alcohol intake with scant regard for birth control, typically loud aggressive females, quieter but no less aggressive males who regard a typical breeding season as any Friday night that comes along...

They are regarded to be of low social status, an uncouth, unsophisticated working class, singlet wearing, oftentimes mullet or mohawk coiffured subculture renowned for its hideous bad taste. Old model, muscle Holdens or Fords will be parked in the cluttered driveways while their owners swill beer, talking footy, showing off their most recent home-done tattoos while Cold Chisel, AC/DC, Midnight Oil, Rose Tattoo or any other harder form of classic rock is pounding away in the background.

So far I'm thinking I haven't quite acquired the credentials for boganism as far as the modern understanding is concerned.

But there's a catch - as with the white-trash Zef subculture in South Africa, championed by that potty-mouthed duo going by the name of Die Antwoord (hoozit, Yolandi,)] boganism has ironically achieved an "in" status - it's actually cool to aspire to the style...if you're under 30. If you're older, you flip and look down your noses at them.

Yes, it appears, only stuck-up toffee-nosed snobs are the ones who use the term to derogatorily describe a person supposedly less cultured than themselves, which, by default would make the cultured snobs potentially less cool than the bogans. Does this make any sense to you?

Bear with...

What had to happen here, I mused, was a bogan checklist had to be transcribed wherein I would enter the notations to resolve this dilemma once and for all. I mean, Pink Floyd is at worst psychedelic rock and at best prog rock but it's never been your typical chug-chug, leather jacket and anti-establishment hard rock with anarchic mantras issuing forth (except perhaps momentarily on Another Brick In The Wall Part II - but that was more of an anthem and it was lifted from the autobiographical angst of Roger Waters' troubled childhood.) Syd Barrett and the lads were nowhere near Rose Tattoo, Cold Chisel or even Midnight Oil...but I digress...

1. Dress code: stubbies shorts, singlets, Ugg boots, monkey hoodies, thongs (flip-flops not anal-floss) and home-done tattoos - nope, not even close with the exception of a single, small tattoo up on my right shoulder that I did design but then again, I earned my living as a commercial illustrator for a while in South Africa and the design was rendered by a professional studio in Cape Town so I think that cancels out the home done tat aspect, don't you.

2. Coiffure: mullet, mohawk, long strange looking goatees, single-stranded pony tail, mutton chop whiskers, skinhead - nope again. I have the goatee but it's always trimmed to a No 1 in a kinda designer-stubble arrangement....my hairstyle - traditional shortish with a modicum of product tickled through it - far too metrosexual to be bogan, I'd wager.

3. Mode of transport: Holden or Ford - old model muscle car (in constant state of upgrade and/or modification,) souped up ute - nope. Sad old suburban Subaru Outback station-wagon with auto transmission - about as anti-bogan as you can get, I think.

4. Diet: junk food, predominantly burgers, fries, fizzy drinks, copious quantities of alcohol, particularly beer - oh and cigarettes, often hand-rolled. There may be the occasional spliff involved here somewhere as well - I'm a vegetarian, I don't touch alcohol but do relish a good non-alcoholic beer (ow, I think I got clipped on the back of the head by a passing bogan who heard me using good and non-alcoholic in the same sentence...) and cigarettes - nah, not since 1983. Doob? A bit while growing up but like Bill Clinton - I never inhaled....pfffffttttt...

5. Musical preferences: (As previously noted) classic rock bands from the 70's onward, listen to classic rock stations on the radio and go mental for AC/DC, Rose Tattoo, Cold Chisel, Midnight Oil, Guns 'n Roses and on and on (and, I'm told, Pink Floyd) - now this is where I do, in fact, start devolving into the realm of the bogan as I have a particular fondness for this genre of music into which I would not specifically place The Floyd, however, if this means the bogan virus is in my blood then it's been there for a very long time - over 40 years, in fact, and it hasn't mutated into an all-consuming pathogen that has driven me to meat-eating, smoking, drinking, muscle-cars, dodgy hairdos, a penchant for home-inked tats or the desire to attend family reunions to pick up chicks...

6. Sporting code preferences: footy period - oh and cricket - meh, not me really. I know the story about the argument over what ballgame would win favour on some colonial cricket pitch way back in the Aussie day when they decided after many hours of dispute to combine them all - rugby, soccer, Gaelic football, netball, lacrosse while wearing their wives' shirts and shorts and this strange pastime eventually "evolved" into Aussie Rules Football which holds sway until this very day for reasons that may become known to me over time. But as a buff old traditionalist, I still prefer that pinnacle of ballgames, Rugby Union followed by soccer. Cricket - it's okay but ever since Hansie put the kibosh on the thing with the match-fixing shenanigans, I don't know if you can trust the process any longer. And T20 - that's more about bums in seats and cash in the bank than it is about cricket but hey, what do I know

Conclusion:

So if Pink Floyd fandom or even worship renders me bogan then I think there might be hope for this subculture yet - there must be bogans in charge of some of the radio stations in fair Adelaide such as Classic Triple M, which in and of itself is a very good reason to hang in this wonderful city.

I'll bet you this - nary a Justin Bieber tune has ever aired itself on the stereo of a bogan muscle machine in a tinny-littered driveway and if that remains a trend in the average boganvilla then I think I could happily be labeled a bogan albeit a very, very watered down version of the breed. 

See ya!

Australian Quirks Part II

It's a logical thing to comprehend that at a purely intellectual level one mustn't calculate the Rand AU$ exchange rate in one's head every time you reach for a handful of mushrooms or avocados, packs of butter, litres of milk, tinned goods, toilet paper and, of course, if you're of that persuasion (as most Adelafricans undoubtedly are) meat and grog. In a word - essentials. 
My wife, who's been here for a year already and is earning at some level in the local currency has long since forgotten about the abject horror of this phenomenon: going pale and cold when realising what you'd pay for this or that item in South Africa and hesitating with your hand poised over the supermarket trolley while you play the Adel-newbie mindgame of Is This Essential?
And as illogical as it may be to try and make the comparison, being a newbie, I still do it, especially as I'm not earning local disposable income yet and am effectively paying for stuff with my hard earned South African Rands where the R5 you'd hand out to a car-guard (remember them? The only creatures on the planet, other than cockroaches that are likely to survive a nuclear armageddon...) is just 50c here and doesn't feature as actual money. The fact that the coinage here covers a face value of R20 puts it in perspective - a perspective I am still struggling with when one pays the equivalent of R50 for a cup of coffee or R80 for a bowl of chips...
Yes, I know you can't really do that but I still do. Sorry. I try not to but - well...erm...ja, you know the story - you've all been through it.

Everything - and I mean EVERYTHING - is more expensive here if you work it on the direct comparison basis (and yes, I heard you the first time - I know you can't really do that...) - that is with the exception of one thing that (it would appear) Australians never actually buy - that's right, non-alcoholic beer! 
Oh, and bank charges - I love the bank charges here - far from the usurious  theft that is perpetrated in South Africa. 
And here's the thing - for a society that's so well behaved (for the most part), sticking to speed limits, honouring honesty box type trading (I love that too), paying their fines, not bribing cops - they are very diligent at avoiding the drink-driving phenomenon and cautiously monitor their intake if they know they'll need to drive afterwards.
Which would make you think they'd be all for lighter and even non-alcoholic beers... I personally stopped drinking alcohol way back in 2001 and it was a mission to get non-alcoholic beers back then, very hard indeed. The ethos toward beer without alcohol was much like a business exec's attitude toward their morning java-fix - if it was decaffeinated, what was the point? 
But things have changed since the days of the insipid, watery tasting piddle they tried to pass off as alcohol-free beer - there are awesome 0% beers around nowadays that are wholesome, full-bodied and actually taste like beer and one of them, Birell is made right here in Adelaide by the only Australian owned brewery left in the country, Coopers.
And, even using the direct exchange comparison, it's still cheaper by the litre than any non-alcoholic, or "unleaded" beers we got back in South Africa, all of which, it must be said, were imported.
So why don't they sell it in bottle shops? 
Why don't they sell it in bars? Why don't they sell it in restaurants? 
Why only in the supermarkets or Dan Murphy outlets exclusively? 
It makes no sense. Well, not to me at least.
Unless the only reason for which people think beer was put on the planet was for us to get drunk every time we partook of it and/or be over the legal limit...Surely not? 
Don't people like beer for the taste of it alone?
I know I do. 
I mean, hey - they even got Charlie Sheen on the stuff for pete's sake - and he's got tiger blood! 
But then again, I don't eat meat either so I guess I'm not a real South African or Aussie to begin with. 
Yet even in our anarchic, sort of first-world/third-world hybridised society that is South Africa, most bars had Becks Blue or Cobra zero or Bavaria Malt - there was usually an option but not here.
It amazes me.
When one politely enquires of the beerista (or whatever one calls the accredited retail specialist at the bottle shop or pub) if they might stock any non-alcoholic beers, they regard you as if you've just appeared from a shimmering ovoid interstellar craft and are surely not of this galaxy or perhaps even this universe. 
There is, however, certainly one constant in this shared universe (unless it's Dan Murphy's) the answer to that question is always - no.
What's not articulated vocally perhaps is the: what good is beer without alcohol, mate? 
And so it goes...
As mentioned: in a society where one can encounter a scenario with two old tannies armed with hand-held clicker counters at a local fair, who are monitoring the number of people in the alcohol-serving zone ensuring that at no time would that number exceed 200, you'd think they'd give a little more mileage to a decent, Adelaidian home-brewed beverage that offers a wonderful option to beer drinkers who'd like to have more than perhaps just one....You would think...
Then again, if that's all I've got to worry about, I guess it's not such a bad deal. 
There's a helluva lot to be thankful for and believe me, I am. 
Perspective is always a great leveller of playing fields.
Cheers! 

ON OUR PERCEPTION OF WOMEN

It isn't just the portrayal of women as figures for physical objectification: the whole western cultural phenomenon (certainly where it's progressed/regressed to) is based on essentially superficial validation. The lure of the Hollywood filmstar paradigm and the generally flawed male ideal of acceptable/beautiful female body types certainly perpetuates this.

I love erotica (one man's erotica is another man's pornography) - sensual art if you will - but there is always an energy imbued or conveyed in any image that discerns its essence - that is to say - a creation which can be viewed as collaborative from the perspective of the photographer/artist and the model on an equal footing. In that sense it's not only equitable, it's empowering for both participants and, it has to be said, many women elect to follow such careers without selling out their gender.

Many, of course, don't.

Even with consensual adult collaboration, there can still be abuse on the part of one or other of the participants and, let's be frank, it's usually the man. It is in these instances that the exploitative nature of innate misogyny is evident.

And that's my biggest problem with any of this - exploitation and the perpetuation throughout the world of this unbalanced and misogynistic perception of women, which is, in my view, what's fundamentally wrong with our species.

I do, however, take great solace from the reality that one of the reasons such behaviour is still embraced by so many men the world over, is simply because they feel threatened and are still labouring under the misapprehension that subjugation and physical might is where human empowerment lies when, in fact, they know at some subliminal level that women, the creators of new life, are those who harbour true power and that it's contained within. The tenuous male stranglehold on the planet is slowly but inexorably loosening.

it is evolving in the right direction I do believe albeit slowly - too slowly for my liking. So for women it must be excruciating.

And there is that single word I look to when viewing any relationship between people regardless of gender or circumstance - respect.

We need that in spades and it should be the innate nature of what we're about both through nature and nurture - I think the latter feeds the former even if it's over generations through soft inheritance, which I feel certainly has validity. And even if it doesn't - we should be teaching our sons to be respectful of women, all women, at all times.

Oh, and as an aside - if we were to eat less meat or none at all, I firmly believe our behaviour and consciousness would rapidly and collectively evolve to allow us to view others of our species as something more than just meat suits too - especially women...

Image credit © Jan Saudek "Beautifully Imperfects"

HOME, HAGGIS AND HONEYMOONS - A TASTE OF THINGS TO COME...

The story of our eventual arrival in Adelaide is a very long, bizarre and convoluted one. Suffice to say, it became so strange and, at times, beyond comprehension, that I was compelled to chronicle the events in a book, as yet incomplete, and with the working title, Home Haggis And Honeymoons...

Y'see, I knew that would pique your interest. 

What transpired beforehand, commencing in January and February of 2008, where Australia and more specifically my sister's house in Newcastle NSW and my aunt's place in Ipswich Qld, which were part of a two week visit in a broader six week itinerary that took in Easter Island and Tahiti, culminated in something entirely and inexplicably different.

The upshot of it all was that we never actually reached Easter Island or the Tahitian atoll of Mo'orea where our dream wedding was to take place - this all bought and paid for in advance - no, we ended up stranded in Sydney instead on that most patriotic of occasions, Australia Day. Which, in and of itself, is a short story worth telling.

No matter what we tried to do and how we tried to do it, the universe would drop a very solid portcullis in our pathway and after many attempts at either removing or charging through the obstacle, we grudgingly and oftentimes very emotionally, elected to divert around the impediment and stumble through the doorways that did deign to open up for us.

These impediments, many of them, would manifest throughout the trip items such as botched visas (or lack thereof, courtesy of an inept Joburg Travel Agency) or luggage being sent to a city other than the one we arrived in, wallets being lost in Australia's busiest city on its busiest night then found again and many less significant but no less disruptive or aberrant events.

We felt like pawns being moved against our will on some gigantic chess board where each move contradicted the planned strategy we had already mapped out and try as we did to influence the hand that was poised to pick us up and deposit us on an altogether unfamiliar square, this proved futile. We began to simply accept our fate, stopped fighting the inexorably spinning wheels of the universe and let ourselves drop into the slipstream of wherever the hell that would lead us. Acceptance. Acquiescence. But always the curiosity of why...

I know Rabbie Burns, Scotland's poet laureate would simply say in a sage brogue, "The best laid plans o' mice and men gang aft aglay..." but come on, Robert - what the fuck! 

And coupled to the insanity of recreating an entirely new trip that didn't include fascinatingly mysterious spiritual workshops on Easter Island or traditional island wedding ceremonies on an idyllic coral atoll in the Pacific, we had to deal with the massive time lag between Oz and South Africa just trying to get some semblance of recompense or commitment from our hopeless and, it would eventually transpire, devious, travel agent. We were stuck in Australia. The rest of the trip was in the bin so we'd make the most of it and just deal with the fallout when we got back to Jozi.

And thus, instead of azure oceans surrounding us 'neath swaying palms looking out across an endless horizon over little umbrella-bedecked cocktails, we found ourselves in a camper van (or RV for the more abbreviatedly inclined) in the middle of the Simpson Desert just outside Alice Springs. 

....where, it has to be mentioned, we became intimately acquainted with feral critturs whose reputation precedes them in the great red landmass - no, not wild camels - but flies, millions of the little bastards that would relentlessly pester us whenever we'd venture forth from the RV to explore some exotic location or other.

Ironically, prior to this, we'd been enormously amused, while gazing from the cabin of the Merc Vito, at a stream of tourists emerging from a tour bus, all replete with full-face fly nets like an envoy of some weird beekeeping cult...Apiarists Anonymous? Oh how we laughed at them.

An hour later while sprinting back down the dry river bed at Simpson Gap, windmilling our hands over our heads to beat off the kamikaze fly swarms, oh how we understood them...

As luck would have it, a little while later on the trip, while traversing the West McDonnell Ranges, we came upon some locals who were to introduce us to the that most wondrous of unguents, Desert Dwellers fly repellant, which, we soon found out created some kind of X-Men type mutant energy barrier around you which caused the flies to drop into an attack formation buzz toward you with malign intent then swerve away at the last moment when the Desert Dwellers force field made its presence known. To this day we still have tubs of the stuff from that trip. Although, it has to be said, the city flies are much fewer and further between thank goodness.

I'll save the rest of the yarn for the book, suffice to say we had a magical time driving round the Outback, exploring, getting quietly and spectacularly married in the shadow of Uluru but there was one occasion when the whole trip had just got to me and I spat my dummy while railing at the skies, yelling: "Just give me one, unambiguous sign that what we are doing is okay and we are meant to be here then I'll shut up and accept it all - no more questions asked!"

That was when we saw the sign to Honeymoon Gap, turned onto that road in the middle of the Australian wilderness and saw a huge white painted name on the tarred road surface. It simply said "PAUL."

True to my celestial promise, I made no more profane utterances.

It's pretty hard to argue with that especially when your whole body is awash with goosebumps...

We have photographs of me in the Honeymoon Gap road with this painted graffito in the foreground.

For the rest, I guess I'll just have to finish the darn book...

THE STORY SO FAR...

I love being here in Australia - it's all so new and oftentimes odd....but in good ways, you understand.
It's not that I'm a stranger to the place having visited numerously over the last three decades and having travelled a bit of the vast red continent but there's a quantum difference between visiting and actually living in a country.
I've waxed ad-nauseam on the things I've encountered along the fringes of the eastern seaboard where most of my Aussie family are dispersed but, as fate would have it, Australian Immigration placed us in a State we'd never encountered before, viz: South Australia. In its capital city, Adelaide.
Why?
Well, good question and one we're asked frequently by locals.
"Why Adelaide?"
And it's as if they want you to say you lost the immigration lottery or that Sydney was full or Brisbane had banned Saffers or Melbourne was too expensive for us - like that. They're perplexed (some of them) when you say you've ended up there as a result of a state sponsored work visa that made up the balance of our immigration points shortfall and placed us in this region...
They nod, sagely. Ah, so it wasn't your decision then - that kind of a nod.
"But we love it here," we stress. They pause.
"Yes, we really do. We've been to New South Wales, Queensland, inland to Northern Territory, the desert, y'know - traveled around a bit and to be honest - this place is really amazing - maybe our favourite spot so far..."
It's like Australia's best kept secret - a lot off the beaten track, even by Australian standards. A small city - the twenty minute city - everywhere is kinda twenty minutes from you - the city, the beach, the hills, you name it. It's a low population growth area. It's great.
"Hell," we say, "we lived in the sticks to get away and out of Johannesburg. Adelaide is a nice size - it's manageable...and it's picturesque. It's a beautiful place."
Then they're really pleased that you love their city - they can tell your enthusiasm is authentic. You're not blowing smoke up their asses in the hope of employment, although the thought is never far from my mind right now, it has to be said.
In this enclave we arrived - no family around us, no friends that were known to us prior to our arrival, no jobs, nothing - stark reality biting hard - almost as hard as the exchange rate that eats up disposable cash better than pac man ever did. Eek...
And in sharp contrast to what we see on the wire about insane xenophobia back in South Africa (not that that represents the average South African mindset, we know), South Australians welcomed us with open arms. They're accommodating, they're helpful, they're friendly and they genuinely want the newbies to succeed and prosper here.
It's not that they're throwing jobs at us, no - everything comes at a price and you have to work at it and they are real sticklers for doing it right but hey, after the systematic erosion of standards in the industry in which I worked back in RSA, it's refreshing to have systems that cater for every little eventuality - sometimes, I curse it and hanker for the tacit anarchy of Seffrica, moan that Australia is leaning a bit too far in the other direction - why is everyone so darn well behaved all the time...?
And then I remember why I wanted to come here in the first place - I actually wanted some of that normalcy.
Then there are the quirks that perhaps escape some - like the wheelie bins on display throughout the suburbs. And I'm not talking about just on garbage day, no. There is no qualm whatever about having a well manicured garden fronting the street with your well-washed trifecta of wheelie bins proudly placed in some position of prominence almost as a feature of the facade, their shiny yellow, blue and green lids gleaming in the morning sunlight.
I personally am for having the things behind the gate and fence and only roll them out on the weekday in question to have the squealing, hissing, red-eyed monsters (hated by cats everywhere) embrace them with their precision hydraulic grasp and dump their contents into the confines of the beasts before they rumble up the hill back to their cave for another week. Garbos (no, not the Greta type - the dustbin variety) belong out of sight - erm, no, not really. Or maybe it's just here in Mitcham but I've noticed it elsewhere.
And the routine, the scheduling - it's great. I've become a suburban garbage aficionado - I'm out there with my box cutter on a Thursday evening (every second Thursday evening - they alternate between organic waste and recyclable from week to week) slicing the corrugated cardboard so I can get a little more into the receptacle and ensure no overflow between now and the next fortnight - I know - it's absolutely pathetic. But I love it. Shit works.
I'm a waste management consultant just like Tony Soprano was....not...
I even have two separate plastic bins for the glass bottles and, don't you love South Australia - they still give you back 10c on every bottle you take down to the recycling depot.
I rake the fallen bark and leaves, I whip-snip the grass and clover, I build the mulch pile and I leaf blow (I swore I would never own one of those ever.....) the leaves into manageable piles - all the things I've never had to worry about before.
From the self serve petrol stations to the handling your own credit cards in the check-out card machines in stores, you become a whole lot more independent very quickly and life becomes a well-oiled machine where nothing is taken for granted any longer.
Ironically, we had a power outage here in Blackwood just over a week ago and it did not make me in one iota nostalgic for ESKOM and its rolling national load shedding bullshit... Load shedding - a politically correct euphemism for "we're switching power off because we spent the money and didn't maintain or upgrade the power grid when we should have" I guess "load-shedding" is much shorter and has a less introspective or honest ring to it.
Difference was, I went online and found, instantly, what was going on and when power would be restored and it was. My wife who's been here for almost a year already hasn't experienced any anomalies in the power in all that time - still, I guess, shit happens.
Anyhoo...I'm sure that I shall land a job in the very near future with the correct degree of effort and dedication to that task at hand. We labour under no misapprehensions when it comes to that facet of being here too.
We have no silly expectations and are quite willing to do what it takes (without quite resorting to the Ned Kelly model of personal remuneration) to make that work.
All the while, I'm mesmerised by the flocks of exotic birds (that have not and are never likely to become a nuisance) all around me, the ponderous koalas, the possums, the fire warning klaxons and the general goodwill I always feel when I meet and greet Adelaidians.
We've got a very long way to go but I still feel as sparkly as a wheelie bin lid albeit hopefully not quite as full of shit as those magnificent receptacles might be.
And just for now (perhaps it will change when we become citizens) we shall keep our garbos out of sight until absolutely necessary.

WEAVING NEW MIRACLES

WEAVING NEW MIRACLES

It's strange yet uplifting how life has a way of allowing one to appreciate its layers if we're just paying attention.

Over all the years I've lived here "on the farm" I've always been working, doing my project management thing away from home base and Karen has been the one to have spent the lion's share of time here as a working and studying artist in a home studio.

Consequently I never got to spend that time with any real day-to-day continuity to see the subtlety of nature and little miracles unfolding around me every day.

I've been watching the weavers, the beautiful golden masked ones making new nests for potential partners only to have the mama bird reject a sterling homebuilding effort for reasons known only to her. Tirelessly, the male will chatter to her, accept the verdict and begin the process from scratch on another likely branch and very often in a completely different tree.

But although I have witnessed this process off and on many times, I've never actually seen the relationship drama unfold between the birds themselves; the "conversations," the inspections, the obvious condemnation by the project manager on structural or aesthetic grounds and the resignation of the architect-builder when he is compelled, by unwritten contract, to source a new site for construction to recommence. And that, I thought, would be that - but it isn't.

Once the dwelling has been erected on site B, daddy weaver systematically demolishes the condemned building on site A. There's a whole complex dynamic on the go here. It's sublime to behold.

Yet other weavers are making nests in trees I only just realised had become big and tall enough to safely accommodate them, trees that were nonexistent when we moved here in 2004. This became even more apparent to me when I recently reviewed an old Google Earth map I'd used back then to plot the distance of our perimeter fence. The landscape was almost bleak in comparison to what's grown here in ten years, not least of which has been my spirit and absolute love of this beautiful place. I still get teary whenever I write about it.

I recall the same sensation overwhelming me in autumn then winter when I see the grass yellowing, thinning out and plants shedding their summer foliage - it's akin to artistic self-doubt - will the place ever be beautiful again? Will it recover? What if it doesn't? 

Will I ever be able to paint with words again? Will I find an audience? Will I be good enough to find employment in Australia? What if...?

And lo, the seasons turn, the rains fall, the paradise that is this place I am to leave behind, blossoms into new life, relationships and adventure and my faith in everything is restored, including myself.

And more than anything I experience sublime joy and gratitude for this eternal upliftment into infinite potential.

Whether there be some unseen divine hand guiding facets of life that we will never truly comprehend or whether this is just the great unfolding of an evolutionary yet cyclical order of things, I think the Native American view of observing the primary creative force of the universe through the natural world is perhaps the way it strikes a chord within me as the miraculous presents itself to me every single day of my life when I am savvy enough to experience it.

And now - other, strange, beautiful miracles await to be discovered anew.

I cannot wait. 

FREEDOM...?

Someone asked "what is freedom?" and it appeared that nobody wanted to address the question as it doesn't really have a singular, cogent answer.

And the context in point pertained to "political" freedom.

And that subjectively means different things to people but even so, it's as fuzzy as all hell.

The US Constitution supposedly defines, enshrines and is geared to protect the individual and collective freedom of its citizens through this mechanism we euphemistically call democracy. 

The constitution of my own current country of residence, South Africa,  claims a similar ideology.

And in this context, I guess the most pertinent approach to an answer is unfortunately through comparison - which political system offers its citizens the most "freedom?"

It would be a fascinating find (I'm sure it's been done many times) to come across a spreadsheet showing, by country, what freedoms and restrictions are currently enjoyed by citizens across the world.

And the dilution of this analogy is, as with South Africa, simply: are the majority of our citizens "better off" (more free) than they were under the previous system or in the case in point: are we more "free" in our democracies than those who lived and/or still live communistically? In the conversation where this was raised by an American friend, Cuba was the case in point, understandably, given its geographical proximity and connection with the US. Then there's the Eastern version of communism...another animal entirely.

However, it's a simple question with, undoubtedly, a very convoluted and complex answer.

Using South Africa as an example (I know this dynamic having lived here for over 40 years): the majority of South Africans now enjoy (constitutionally, at least) freedom from discrimination based on their ethnicity (we know in reality that ideology doesn't necessarily translate into desired behaviour, however, that now thankfully pertains only to radical minorities). South Africans are free to say what they want about anybody and anything publicly without ending up in detention as long as what's being said doesn't constitute "hate speech."

We're free to practice any religious expression and, it has to be said, there's currently possibly more opposition here toward the Jewish community (Gaza/Palestine situation primarily) than Muslims which is probably unique in Western democracies, which South Africa, to some degree, purports to be.

So without a blow-by-blow analysis of our theoretical constitution versus its practical implementation, suffice to say that yes, South Africans are seemingly more free than they've ever been. 

But it's bogus. 

If one looks at the prevalent situation here as far as violent crime goes, the majority of middle-class suburban South Africa exists behind walls topped with electrified fences in estates that are policed by armed private security companies, such as the one inhabited by Oscar Pistorius and his erstwhile girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp. So the illusion of safety from the threat of crime is just that - a state of mind. Ironically, Reeva was murdered by one of the trusted members of the inner circle not by some marauding thief from the nasty "outside world."

However you dice it and serve it though: South Africans still live in fear. Almost 200 women are raped every day in this country while the current daily murder trend is around 47. 

So as far as freedom from crime and fear is concerned it really doesn't seem valid.

Freedom is thus an abstract constitutional concept defined by the need, certainly for millions, to exist in gated, secure communities because they believe it isn't safe to live in any other way. That's not freedom. It's a lifestyle, sure. But it ain't freedom.

However, we're not hysterically psychologically hogtied by media hype over things like Ebola as people in the US seemingly are, given the sensationalistic and fearmongering exposure seen in the mainstream media there. South Africans aren't as readily duped by those strategies. No, we are fearful of other more localised and mundane things such as carjackings, rape, murder and home invasions - all insanely prevalent and beyond anything that should be deemed acceptable or normal. Yet that's life in South Africa.

More insidiously, we also have similar cyber-eavesdropping legislation here as in UK, US, certain countries in Europe, Australia etc. 

The rampant corruption that obtains starts at the highest office in the country and there is no accountability even when people are caught. 

The judicial system is a farce and readily influenced by those with power and/or money. 

Whistleblowers are also now being accorded pariah status (as in US, UK, Australia) to reduce criticism of state, again such once-noble and patriotic acts being disingenuously packaged as threats  to national security.

There's no Patriot Act though and a much more benign version of Homeland Security here...so far. 

We can harvest rainwater freely, live off the grid if we so choose but we do have zero-tolerance militant police who brook no compromise if you're a person of interest.

There is much less chance of secret detention without trial now, however, there's no official subversive element that opposes government (such as the outlawed ANC did back in the day with the Nat government). If such movements had to surface, I would bet there would be the same level of paranoia and dirty tricks to emerge as did under apartheid and people would end up in our own local Guantanamo... maybe Gautengamo..?

So how does communism front up to that?

Does your constitution cater for and/or protect you under the listed circumstances:

Can you say what you want anywhere any time? 

Can you create a political party to oppose the incumbent regime without being fatally persecuted?

Does your vote actually count for anything? 

Are you formally restricted in your desire to procreate?

Will your religious convictions cause you to be persecuted, especially if you're Muslim or not a follower of the "state" religion? (Israel springs to mind)

Does your country still enforce the death penalty? And if so, what "crimes" merit that sentence? 

Or are you in a (theoretically) more morally evolved country that doesn't enforce capital punishment? 

Are you, as a minority, persecuted?

Are you, by dint of your sexual persuasion or gender, persecuted?

Are you free to harvest natural elements and resources and live off the national grid without being persecuted?

Is your personal privacy sacrosanct as far as surveillance is concerned? 

Is your sovereignty recognised by all other "free" countries globally?

Does your nationality prejudice you in any way and restrict your ability to travel abroad?

How does government policy affect your ability to produce food sustainably and idependently?

It's all comparative really and begs the question: is covert hegemony, such as exists in the US, South Africa etc. where personal freedom is hobbled by subversive legislation disingenuously presented as augmenting our safety, more just and humane than the dictatorship that overtly outlaws any criticism of state?

In both cases, we're still looking over our shoulders...

The other question: do we exist in a country where playing the system can be construed as a work in progress and we can still collectively bring pressure to bear against government and make changes through civil society  / disobedience without resorting to violent revolution or fearing for our personal safety and freedom by having dissident views?

So, what is freedom really?

For me: Living without fear. And additionally living in joy. And being able to share love regardless of circumstance or the influence of any man-made policy designed to control our behaviour.

We don't have to be angst-ridden or cynical or be strapping explosives to our chests or brandishing placards on Wall Street or convincing others of our beliefs to be making a difference or to be free. But we do have to be actively involved in the process in some way that will help to ensure that we bring about those conditions through peaceful change.