The Idler, Friday, June 7, 2013

Financial rescue package

 

THE RAND is on the slide. Where does it end? Nobody knows. But a desperate situation demands drastic measures. Surely somebody has the sense to see it's time to bring back pounds, shillings and pence. We need rescuing.

 

Consider. Before we went decimal, a pint of beer cost one shilling and sixpence – the equivalent of 15 cents. A gallon of petrol (a gallon, mind you, not a litre) cost three shillings and sixpence (35 cents). A mixed grill on the beachfront cost four shillings and sixpence (45 cents). You could take a girl out to dinner for a pound (R2) and be left with some change.

 

An American president once declared: "What this country needs is a decent ten-cent cigar!"

 

Well, back in those predecimal days you could get a cigar for a shilling (10 cents). I rest my case.

 

Old coinage

 

THE OLD COINAGE had a musicality and a magic. The "d" in £sd stood for "dibilishi", the Zulu word for a penny. Take care of the pennies and the pounds take care of themselves.

 

Below that were "ufatingi" (farthing - which bought you a toffee) and "isitebele" (halfpenny, the Zulu word derived from "stable", which was the cost of stabling your horse for the night).

 

Then "uthiki" (tickey, or threepence – two and a half cents - with which you could phone anywhere in the country from a callbox and which you could also, at a pinch, use as a small screwdriver).

 

"Uzukwa" was sixpence (five cents – which got you a big bottle of ginger beer). "Usheleni" was a shilling (10 cents).

 

Then came "Uskoshemeni" (two shillings/a florin – equivalent of 20 cents), which had an interesting origin. It means "Scotchman" and comes from a Scottish contractor who tried to cheat his workers by passing off florins (20 cents) as halfcrowns (25 cents).

 

 

The apartheid regime has been accused of all kinds of things. At the time of decimalisation it seemed like cultural damage. But anyone with a smattering of arithmetic can see it also brought in galloping inflation.

 

Bring back those halcyon days!

 

 

 

Twee buffels

FURTHER to yesterday's discussion of long place names – with the Welsh in an apparently unassailable lead – I'm informed that about 200 km west of Pretoria, in North-West province, there's a farm called Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein (Two buffalo shot stone dead with one shot fountain).

Well, there you are. Des Lindberg used to sing about such a place but I always thought he was having us on.

 

The house wins

 

A SECRET underground neighbourhood that housed and employed hundreds of illegal workers has been found under a Moscow market.

Police found a network of rooms under Cherzikovsky market, which consisted of a clothing factory, living quarters, a cinema, a casino and a chicken coop. More than 200 people were arrested.

A casino? Hey, exploitation rides rampant! Sweated labour and then the little you pay them you get back at the gambling tables. Who would be a socialist?

Acclimatising

 

READER Colin Plen says he's recently arrived from Cape Town and he's puzzled by one or two things.

"I saw a place called Bakers DIY Hardware so because I want to make bread and biscuits I went there. And you know what? They sell only ordinary hardware, they don't sell stuff for baking.

"I cannot work out why a place is called Bluff Meat Supply. Either they do or they don't, but why try to bluff?

"Then I saw a business called Biggar Engineering and I drove around the block trying to find Big and Biggest.

"Which reminds me - in Cape Town they used to ask the question, in Afrikaans: 'What are the degrees of comparison' - no, it sounds better in Afrikaans – 'Wat is die trappe van vergelykking van Woes? Woester en Robertson.'"

I think I get what he means, but the good folk of Worcester and Robertson would wax woes indeed to be described in this way. (And who believes Colin bakes bread and biscuits? These Capetonians can be very devious.)

Tailpiece

"YOU'RE an intelligent, successful woman. Why do you play the dumb blonde when your boyfriend's around?"

"Well, for a relationship to work you have to be on the same level."

Last word

It takes only one drink to get me drunk. The trouble is, I can't remember if it's the thirteenth or the fourteenth.

George Burns

The Idler, Thursday, June 6, 2013

Das tapeworm talk

THE GERMAN language has lost its longest word. This was Rindfleischetikettierungsueberwachungsaufgabenuebertragungsgesetz - meaning "law delegating beef label monitoring" which was introduced in 1999 in the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.

But it has been repealed following changes to European Union regulations on the testing of cattle.

German is famous/notorious for compound words to describe anything legal or scientific. They are known in Germany as "tapeworm" words.

What is now the language's longest word? A contender seems to be Donaudampfschifffahrtsgesellschaftskapitaenswitwe, meaning "the widow of a Danube steamboat company captain".

The longest German word actually in the dictionary is Kraftfahrzeughaftpflichtversicherung, meaning "automobile liability insurance".

But you can't beat the Welsh for tapeworm words. Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyll-llantysiliogogogoch is the name of a railway station in Wales. It means "St Mary's Church in the hollow of the white hazel near a rapid whirlpool and the Church of St Tysilio of the red cave". (Nor can you accuse the Welsh of lack of precision). The name is believed to be the longest in the world.

Do we have any local contenders? An Idler predecessor, John Vigor, used to write about a South Coast town called Amanzimbogintwinimpingoburgh, but I fear he was having us on.

We once did have an army parade ground term: Maakasofjulleloopmaarmoenieloopnie! (Mark time!), which was quite impressive, especially the way it was delivered.

 

The sergeant would bellow: Maakasofjulleloopmaarmoenieloop …" and the squad would keep on marching. Then as he finished it with a slightly hysterical, highpitched "Nie!" they would start marking time.

 

But they've long since abbreviated the command and we're no longer contenders for the parade ground terminology section of the Guinness Book of Records. It seems a pity

Smuggler cat

A CAT HAS been caught smuggling contraband into a Russian prison, A guard spotted it climbing the fence of the jail at Syktykar, in the remote northern province of Komi, about      1 000 km from Moscow.

He caught the cat and found it had cellphones and chargers taped to its body, presumably for the use of prisoners – which, of course, is verboten. A cat? The prison authorities are completely stumped. They've never known it to happen before.

Now where is it again that those girls from Pussy Riot have been locked up?

 

Happy event

A SCOTS lass has given birth to her third set of twins. The girls – to be called Rowan and Isla – were born to Karen Rodger, 41, and her husband, Colin, 45.

They are sisters to boys Lewis and Kyle, 14, and Finn and Jude, 12.

The odds against a woman giving birth to three sets of twins are calculated as 500 000 to one.

Karen and Colin say they are "over the moon" about the new arrivals and plan to convert the loft of their house into a bedroom for the girls.

A happy occasion indeed and one that will have the taxman grinding his teeth. He probably considers this another of those dodgy tax avoidance schemes.

 

Green energy

ONE WEARIES sometimes of crying from the ramparts like Cassandra, but a headline on this page yesterday read: "Time to push for a healthier national energy policy". Two campaigners highlighted the dreadful cost, in terms of human health, of coal-fired power stations.

Yet here in KZN we already have an alternative. For 40 years and more, hydrologists, engineers and economists studied the hydro-electric potential of the Tugela Basin. It could produce energy to support several megacities without poisoning the atmosphere or producing hazardous radioactive waste, they said. It could supply energy needs way beyond the borders of KZN.

The Department of Water Affairs had plans for a catchment transfer from the Eastern Cape, to augment the Tugela Basin.

Then things went quiet. Why? Were those hydrologists, engineers and economists hallucinating all those years? Were they smoking their shoelaces?

Somebody needs to start blowing the dust off those Tugela Basin plans. What could be cleaner, and ultimately cheaper, than hydro power?

Tailpiece

 

The graduate with a science degree asks: "Why does it work?" The graduate with an engineering degree asks:, "How does it work?" The graduate with an accounting degree asks: "How much will it cost?" The graduate with an arts degree asks: "Do you want fries with that?"

 

Last word

 

A chess genius is a human being who focuses vast, little-understood mental gifts and labours on an ultimately trivial human enterprise.

George Steiner

 

The Idler, Monday, June 3, 2013

The big tourism push BLAND, Dull and Boring … this is the new tripartite line-up that plans to take things by storm in international tourism. The village of Dull, in Perthshire. Scotland, teamed up some time ago with Boring, in Oregan, in the US, to use their names as an international marketing drawcard. Now the shire of Bland, in New South Wales, Australia, wants to link up with them to promote itself as a place also worth visiting. Shire councillor Tony Lord says Bland has had a lot of fun poked at it over the years but jokes can bring benefits. Nobody has told us yet what is actually on offer in Bland, Dull and Boring, but stand by for some crackerjack announcements. Do we have any locality that could qualify to join this international network? There's Dullestroom, but that name has already been taken. How about De Hel, that place down in the Karoo? Bland, Dull and Boring as De Hel. Yes, it has a nice ring. Real comrade A SNIPPET from yesterday's Comrades Marathon. Sally Bosch lives at the bottom of Field's Hill and every year she pops down to encourage the runners and hand out water. Early yesterday a runner turned back and shouted sincerely: "You too are a Comrade!" "That touched my heart in a big way." Another legend   MORE on Maritzburg College headmasters. Reader Sally Stretch says another College legend was John H "Froggy" Snow.   While he was headmaster during World War II, all the male teachers at the school had gone off to war and been replaced with women who, unaccustomed to dealing with boys, were not coping too well on the discipline front. The boys were getting out of hand.   Froggy's solution was a liberal use of the cane, which resulted in a parent complaining to the Education Department, who wrote to Froggy asking for his comment.   His reply: "I acknowledge receipt of your letter and in reply I quote the Psalm of old: 'Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me'. You have taken my staff - I have only my rod left."   Crooner AMERICAN satirist Andy Borowitz has a piece in the New Yorker in which he has a Republican congressman threatening to impeach President Obama for occupying government housing without paying a dime; also for getting three free meals a day for himself and his family. Then a line jumps out at you. "In keeping with Mr Obama's bloated lifestyle as 'Superstar-in-Chief,' the congressman added: 'The President travels with an entourage of highly trained bodyguards who would put Jay-Z's posse to shame.'" Jay-Z's posse? Is he talking about our President JZ and his siren-wailing blue-light entourage? Has this become such an international talking point that it's made the New York satire columns? No, silly me. Borowitz meant the American rap star, Jay-Z, not our JZ. Anyway, our president is not so much a rap artist as a crooner: "Awuleth' umshini wami …"   Monkey action A TINY macaque monkey named Darwin is the focus of a custody battle in the Canadian courts. He was found lost in the car park outside a Toronto store last year, wearing a miniature sheepskin coat and a nappy. He belongs to a Mrs Yasmin Nakhuda, but it's illegal to own monkeys in Canada. Darwin was confiscated by Toronto Animal Services and has been placed in a primate sanctuary. Now Mrs Nakhuda has gone to court, trying to get him back. One wishes her luck but it's a sad little story all the same. She should emigrate to Durban. Here we most of us own dozens of monkeys, hundreds even. I have them in my garden every other day. Last week I had a couple in my kitchen, tucking into eggs which they first smashed on the floor. They don't quite have the class of Darwin the macaque. They don't wear sheepskin coats and nappies. But I'm sure they'd be willing to learn. Darwin could become an agent of social upliftment.

 

 

Tailpiece

 

Dear Mother-in-law,   Don't teach me how to handle my children. I'm living with one of yours and he needs a lot of improvement.   Daughter in law.

 

Last word

The only thing that saves us from the bureaucracy is inefficiency. An efficient bureaucracy is the greatest threat to liberty.

Eugene McCarthy

 

The Idler, Friday, May May 31, 2013

Unsung Comrades hero

 

I WONDER if the Comrades Marathon organisers still watch Cyril Langlois like a hawk, the way they used to. He's in his eighties now but still capable of springing a surprise.

 

It was on an "up" run back in the early sixties when Cyril achieved glory. The race was to end that year with a lap around the cricket oval at Maritzburg Collegians. Jackie Mekler was well in the lead. It was before the days of television but radio commentary said Mekler was already approaching. He was in excellent time. It could be a new record.

 

Cyril, a convivial Maritzburg fellow of French Mauritian extraction, was in the bar at Collegians. So were a few runners who had dropped out of the race and been driven up to the finish. Their kit bags were stacked to one side. Negotiations ensued. A lift was arranged.

 

Next thing Cyril was pounding the streets about a kilometre ahead of Mekler, in proper running kit. Crowds lined the route and cheered: "Go, Jackie, go!"

 

He reached the Collegians oval (by now panting with unfeigned exhaustion). The crowds cheered him on. He began the circuit.

 

Then, 100m from the finish, he started to totter. He collapsed. He crawled a bit. Then he got up again, tottered forward; then he collapsed and crawled again. It was sensational stuff.

 

The crowd were hysterical: "Go, Jackie! Don't give up, you're nearly there, boy! Keep going!"

 

Cyril swayed to his feet again, staggered on and breasted the winning tape. The crowd were beside themselves. The newsreel man from African Mirror was filming every second of the drama (No TV of course).

 

The Mayor of Pietermaritzburg stood with outstretched hand to congratulate Cyril. But he smacked it aside and ran on into the bar.

 

The Comrades organisers were livid. When Mekler ran in a minute or two later, nobody noticed. The African Mirror man had shot off every bit of film he had.

 

The Comrades organisers accosted Cyril in the bar, threatening to call the police."

 

"The police? What for?"

 

"Trespassing!"

 

"Trespassing? Running down a public road? Running round the cricket oval of my own club?"

 

At which point the African Mirror fellow burst into the bar and had to be physically restrained from assaulting Cyril. A newsreel camera makes a nasty weapon.

 

For years after that a Comrades organiser made a point of dropping in at Cyril's office the day before the race.

 

"Cyril, don't even think about it!"

 

"Who me?" (Only a French Mauritian can fully convey the sense of pained injustice).

 

"Yes, you!"

 

 

I wonder if they're still watching him. We raise a glass to Cyril Langlois, unsung hero of the Comrades.

 

 

Apostrophes

 

ON MONDAY we had mention of a Maritzburg College headmaster of long ago, Septimus Pape, and his deputy, Errol Lammond, conversing in Latin.

 

This reminds former economics professor Gavin Maasdorp of a story concerning Pape that was told to him by a university colleague who had been a pupil and master at College.

 

Pape was friendly with Bill Payn, a College old boy and former Springbok rugby player (and legendary Comrades runner) who taught at DHS. Being rather pedantic, he sent Payn a letter addressed to "C Payn Esq, D'Urban High School".

 

Payn's response was a letter to "S P'Ape Esq, Maritzburg College".

 

Pape apparently was not amused.

 

Chemistry

 

OVERHEARD in the Street Shelter for the Over-40s: "They say love is a matter of simple chemistry. I tend to agree. It explains why my wife keeps treating me like toxic waste."

 

Damn car thieves!

TWO MEN ROBBED a Los Angeles Burger King outlet at gunpoint. But when they made their exit they found their getaway car had disappeared.

Flatfooted and looking rather foolish, the police picked them up without difficulty. Curse these car thieves!

Except it wasn't quite like that. A Burger King employee had managed to slip out undetected while the robbery was in process. Behind the store he found an unattended car with its engine running, the keys in the ignition. Realising this was the getaway vehicle, he drove off and parked it around the corner.

Never leave your vehicle unattended with the keys in the ignition. You're easy prey for honest folk.

Tailpiece

PADDY, Mick and Sean reel in a state of some confusion from the station bar to a train that is just pulling out. A helpful porter manages to bundle Paddy and Mick on board but Sean has tottered off in a different direction and it's now too late.

"I got your two friends on board, sir. You'll have to wait for the next train in an hour."

"Dat's very kind of yez, I'm sure. But dey won't be too pleased. Dey came down to see me off."

 

 

 

Last word

 

Sentimentality is the emotional promiscuity of those who have no sentiment.

Norman Mailer

 

The Idler, Thursday, May 30, 2013

Currie Cup material?

A FARMER in Bosnia survived a bear attack, fighting it off with his bare hands and eventually killing it with an axe. It happened at a place called Vrba.

Blazo Grkovic, sustained serious injuries in the tussle and had to be stitched up in hospital. However, a photograph of him under treatment shows a chunky individual with the build of a prop forward, a steely look in his eye.

A bear-wrestler built like a prop forward? It's too late for the Super competition but the Sharks might cast a bit wider afield to the Balkans in recruiting for the Currie Cup.

Daredevil

SIXTY years ago yesterday, Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first two men to climb Mount Everest. Almost to the day, Russian extreme sport star Valery Rozov became the first person to base jump from it.

He leaped off the north face of Everest from a point 7 220m above sea level, in a temperatire of -18 degrees centigrade, glided in free fall for just over a minute then parachuted safely onto the Rongbuk glacier, as planned.

Barely mentioned is that he got to the jump-off point after a four-day climb up Everest from the Chinese side – something in itself to compare with the feat of Hillary and Tenzing.

He's a bit of a lad, is Rozov. A few years ago he parachuted into an active volcano on the Kamchatna Peninsula, in Russia. Here's another enterprising fellow the Sharks could be looking at.

Cheese chase

AT A PLACE called Cooper's Hill in Gloucestershire, England, every year a whole lot of fellows chase a large, round cheese as it bounces its way down a steep, bramble and nettle-strewn slope.

The cheese rolling competition has begun to attract an international entry. It's quite a spectacle as the contestants stumble and stumble and go sprawling on the 1:2 gradient as they chase the cheese, a 4kg Double Gloucester.

But this year Health and Safety stepped in. The organisers were warned that if anyone were hurt by the cheese – presumably by having it roll over the person – the 86-year-old woman who donated it could be held liable.

So instead of chasing a cheese this week, they chased a lightweight foam rubber facsimile.

No, it's not easy to follow the logic. The Sharks can forget about Cooper's Hill, Gloucestershire, as a recruiting ground. They use a foam rubber ball.

Seafarers

 

READER Anke Breet, of Umhlanga, was taken with last week's "Brotherhood of the sea" piece, she being from a Dutch seafaring family.

 

Her father was in the Dutch Royal Navy for a long time, she says. His cousin was a torpedo-maker at the Den Helder naval base. Her two brothers were at sea, one a navigation officer, the other a radio officer. Two nephews were navigation officers. Her husband went to the naval college in Amsterdam and was at sea for 10 years. Her son trained at Simonstown and was a navigation officer with Safmarine for 10 years. Her brother-in-law sailed for 15 years for a line based in Singapore and a cousin of her husband was a navigation officer with a Rotterdam line.

 

"Methinks quite an impressive list of seafarers in one family. Does any other family have as much seawater in its veins?"

 

Impressive indeed. Zout in den aren.

 

Sea diver

 

MEANWHILE, at St Clement's this week Spyker Koekemoer (aka Pat Smythe) brought the punters a sense of the chill of the Atlantic as he told of an encounter at Port Nolloth, in the Northern Cape, with an amazing fellow named Georgie One-Time, who has made a living for some 30-odd years diving for diamonds in those freezing waters.

 

Spyker showed a film of Georgie One-Time's exhausting and hazardous operation and so impressed was he that he's recorded a ballad about him: ""He's on the old dream maker, the boat - Blues Breaker, just south of Alex Bay …"

 

Hey, great stuff! The raconteur goes melodious.

 

Take care

IRISH drought warning: "Take care. It hasn't rained for 10 minutes."

 

 

Tailpiece

THERE was this dyslexic lawyer. He studied hard for the bra exam.

Last word

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents.

H P Lovecraft