BOOKS!

Here...

I have Atlas Obscura on order, should be delivered second week of Jan 2017. I am going to pick up Never Split the Difference, I heard it is outstanding. Cant wait to dive into this book :)

And add Empire of the Summer Moon into the list! 

Because reading is sexy!

I don't wanna make you nervous baby....

But this part of the world exists!

So Rick Ross in one of his albums records a story of two dope bitches learning tolerance in a world overrun by, according to them, basic bitches. They talk of differences separating dopeness from basicness. And speak of Fundi furs and Hermes Birkins! These are worldly possessions, or rather otherworldly; the most expensive material possessions unattainable to 99% of the people on earth:

Basic bitches make me nervous. Yes. They make me nervous. If you're a boss, this stack right here falls out of your pocket, you don't even got time to pick it up. You keep walking. You don't got time. You keep going. It's probably not worth your time. Your minutes cost more than the stack. Keep it moving. 

Keep it money baby!

People fucking throw rose petals at me when I walk by. They throw Belaire Rosé

Cause I'm a fucking boss!

Now have a listen to the anonymous dope bitches:

To myself. To you.

It is a scary thing. To be a woman, to be a mother, to be in this world.
It is a scary thing to change, to grow, to let go, to give up, to hang on.
I'm sorry I couldn't be a better lover. To myself, to you, to you because of me.

 I bought these plants, I water them everyday and I bought plant food for them. I think its a bunch of chemicals that you mix with water. Maybe I should have just gotten manure. Its healthy, organic.
I go cycling on the promenade, and think how awesome if we were doing this together. I take beautiful pictures of the sunset and wish I could share them with you. I decorated the new apartment beautifully and I sit on the mat and imagine us making love here.

I'm sorry I couldn't be a better lover, to myself, to you, to you because of me. I am softer than before you came. I know I was loved. So I am thankful.

What makes you so magical? #BlackGirlMagic#

So what makes you so magical black girl?

Well, first of all, look at this ebony skin. Come on, it doesn't get more magical than this?

Its my hair, like a plant, it grows to the sun!

I know how to please...

Black drinks the sun and draws all colors to it. Isnt that magical?

I'm getting my fourth degree OK, a second MSc degree,  despite the fact that I grew up in one of the worst slums in South Africa, went to a fucked up high school but still managed to pass my matric with Merit, raised by a mother who was sewing clothes and selling them on the streets to feed me, and a dad who couldn't be there for me. Because when I asked him why he disappeared, he told me of the ''hard knock life'' no opportunities and trying to survive, and still trying to survive. Should I tell you of how I bumped into him and he couldn't even recognize me? ''Baba, it me Zoe, ingane ka Bonisiwe'', I had to remind him. Wait, my own father didn't recognize me, how fucked up is that? Well, if you hadn't seen the man since you were young and only 2 or 3 times when you were a teenage years, and he promised to buy you a school bag but you never saw him again, of-course hes not going to recognize you. 

You see, stay is a very sensitive word, we wear who left and who stayed in our skin forever. Couldn't he have realized that?

See, I could be here all day and tell you my story, my parents story, my grandparents and  forefathers stories, what we have survived... for you to see why we are so magical...

FIRDAYS

I don't want to be in Obs

I don't want to be in Long street

I don't want to be in my room.

I want to get out of the office.....

LOST!!!!

Love me. I'm organic

If I were married to myself...could I stay with myself?

Hmmmm......
My house would be  quiet. frightening. wild. boring. fun. I would want to leave. I would want to stay. I would be scared. How confusing...
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Who am I?

I don't know who I am, because I was never encouraged, even expected to be different?  I am confused,  have no idea how to be myself. I grew up being told how to act by people who were told how to act themselves and they had never mastered it right anyway. How do you teach a child to be themselves when you cant even be yourself? Aren't we a reflection of our parents? So does this mean they made me like this? Fuck! I'm confused!!!I guess in a way yeah...but I guess you also get to a stage where you get to chose if you want to be that person or not! But who do I want to be? I want to be myself, and no idea who ''myself is''. So I re-invent myself....

I just want to be happy okay...really really freaking happy! But do we really become happy? Or do we just become OK?
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What is happiness to me?
It loving myself unconditionally, loving what I do and doing it best, its being alone and being totally content with myself. Its swimming in the sea naked, its travelling across Africa, the world and swimming in all the seas of the world. Its experiencing being outside your country for the very first time. Its dipping in the cold ocean and getting a shock of your life but feeling so alive afterwards. It meeting amazing people and sharing those feelings with the each other. It making love and experiencing multiple orgasms, for the first time, and again and realizing that someone can take you to another dimension, another universe and you can go multiple times till you are satisfied. Happiness is being loved back, having been loved, loving someone and having them love you with their all.

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What were the happiest times of my life?
When I was experiencing life on my own terms!

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Whats the biggest lesson on love and life I have learnt so far?   When you meet that person, one of your soulmates. let the connection, relationship, be what it is. It may be five minute, five hours,five days,five months, five years,a lifetime. Let it manifest itself the way it is meant to. It has an organic, natural destiny,that way if it stays or if it leaves, you will be softer, from having been loved this authentically. Let things happen naturally.

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One of the best feelings?

 Is learning something wonderful about yourself and wondering what else you have been hiding

An orgasm.... multiple orgasms

Being loved

Acceptance

Accepting your self

Falling in love, with yourself, with your life, every aspect of it

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Do I want to live in a movie? No, I want to live in  a book!

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Who are the coolest people?
I think people who change the way we look at the world are the coolest. They must have the hardest time in life. Because they are being themselves in a world that is constantly trying to change them. I think it takes a lot of energy, guts to be that person.

I'm gonna look for my glory yeah

I'll be back real soon.

Cape Town anyone?

A small apartment, like the size of a matchbox is around R 5000.00 and more in Cape Town. The sourthern suburbs, the city and going further north. This would be closer to table mountain, loins head, devils peak, Hout Bay, False Bay. To stay in these places you would have to earn 3 times the rent money. I mean, most people would love to stay in Cape Town, but once you move there you realize how ridiculously expensive it is to stay here. The place is just buzzing with tourists with money to spend living in these places. So you end up realizing to stay in a decent place you would probably have to consider sharing...I hate sharing!. The dreams of having your own apartment and the freedom of walking around naked in your own spacious place with a glass of wine remains just that, a dream. Are you going to spend most of your hard earned money on rent? Not me, because on top of PAYE, I still have to pay black tax.  

So I have decided, living in Cape Town is not worth it. Yes, its a very beautiful city, but for rich people. Because they are the ones who get to see the beauty anyway. Most of the "not well of people" have been pushed to the ''crappy places''like Bellville and the townships of Cape Town, the ''forgotten places''. Nobody visits there, because its dirty, dangerous and sad. Full of coloreds and black people...of-course!. Some of these people have lived in Cape Town almost all their lives but never even climbed the beautiful Table Mountain...what the...! 

So what a black, relatively conscious young professional like me to do?

Be mad!!!!

''But I try not to let the anger build up
I'm too high, I'm too better, too much
So I let it go...." 

Lil Wayne

You

“You deserve the best, the very best, because you are one of the few people in this lousy world who are honest to themselves, and that is the only thing that really counts.” 
― Frida Kahlo


Loss is a part of life, but what we really need is the intelligence to cope, keep moving forward, keep swimming. Loss doesn't only mean someone close to you dying. It could be separating from someone who has been such a big part of your life. There is something very strange about knowing the person who was so close to you is living their lives, and you are no longer a part of it.
I guess...its a different kind of loss.

Hey, remember Solange?

Yeah, Beyonces sister. She had an album that came out 2013, remember it? Oh, and shes got killer style too.

This video is from one of the songs from the 2013 album. The video was actually done in Cape Town, Langa township area. Tourists come to Cape Town but they hardly experience places like these. Most visit only the most well off places in Cape Town, the most expensive streets. You never see anybody on social media posting a picture in the Langa Township. I get it, its one of the most dangerous townships in South Africa. Someone dies everyday. But this is the reality of South Africa, even though apartheid is ''over'' there is still such a huge gap between the poor and the rich and you should see how people live in these places. Some of the worse off conditions, believe me I know. And if you really want to experience South Africa and learn about the culture and its people, don't just go to Clifton, Camps Bay, the Waterfront etc. 

Okay, back to Solange...

Well, she got a new album, and its amazing. Album is available on YouTube already! My favorite songs already are: mad, cranes in the sky, don't touch my hair and just all the rest.

Did I mention what killer style she got?

Creative

This is the coolest cap...made out of Kapulana, an African print fabric.

When you find something amazing!

I love that feeling, when I find an amazing artist :) :)

This woman...Y'koto

That never get sick of you kind of love...

Its so easy to fall inlove

But its not easy to keep it together

I wonder how people who have been together for 50 years do it

How do they do it?

The old couple down the street

They represent the impossible you might say

The" never get sick of you" kind of love

How do you do it sir?

How do you do it miss?

Do you just say yes a lot?

Can I have that?

The never get sick of you kind of love

The alternative reality

In my mind I dream of unknown places. See, I dream alot. I dream of fresh flowers, beautiful sunsets, very cold winters, a place far from here... Part of me is stuck in an alternate reality, in a fairytale book or a sweet song, where no one gets hurt, and everything is perfect and gets resolved. I'm in love with the idea of love. It didn't take a boy, or an unforgettable kiss to make me realize this, it took long conversations (mostly over some wine sessions)... with very good friends.

 To me love is much more than loving an individual, or even loving yourself. It's about loving life, loving this earth that we inhabit, loving the spirit that fills our soul (whatever that may be), and loving being alive. The most frustrating thing about love is that no one can give you that love of life, not any self help books, or therapists, or even religious figures. (...though they may help.) It's something you find within yourself. I finally realized that a while, I was afraid of living I was just existing.

 I want to LIVE. Not just experience the joys of life, but the pain too. I want to LOVE. Not just have a perfect relationship, but have flaws too. I WANT to be hurt, I want to be a complete mess (just like I was yesterday), I want to live in a foreign city where I know no one, and they don't know me. Because anything is better than feeling nothing. Nothing is lonely, nothing is cold. Nothing is giving up. I vow to live and to love from this day forward. To love myself, to love life, and the earth we inhabit, to love the spirit that fills my soul, and to love being alive. 

This is in Mozambique, Vamizi Island! Sun sets above the ocean...the earth is too amazing, too beautiful! Photo by Erwan 

"Its a brand new day, a brand new life and Im feeling good"-Nina Simone

"she said she usually cried at least once each day... not because she was sad, but because the world was so beautiful and life was so short" 

-Unknown-

I wonder

Sometimes I think I act like some kind of pseudo-psychologist. Deep down...I know I'm insecure, and I'm naive, and I think most times I give it all away up front.

Sometimes I feel stupid (mostly cause I wear my heart on my sleeve)...but I don't feel stupid around you. I don't feel like the girl in the "before" picture. I know you don't kiss all the girls like that, or maybe you do. maybe I don't give a shit either way (yeah I'm trying to say this with conviction but the stupid little heart on my sleeve is giving me away) I know when you dream, you dream of yourself but better, and not an asshole.

I wonder if you walk around naked on the beach laughing and so free with all the girls, I wonder if you skinny dive with all the girls, I wonder if you make love on the beach with all the girls! I wonder if they all know how wonderful you really are!

I wonder if Im special, but for the first time in my life not because my daddy ran away and boys wouldn't look at me that way and I never got asked to dance and I never had an ipod and I''m shy and didn't wear thong underwear and I was always embarrassed or hurt or worried and I need you to tell me that I'm pretty and funny and witty and smart and a fantastic dancer even though Im terrible at it and that I "get" you and it's me and you against the world!

I want to know if I'm special so that I can get a good nights sleep because  as independent and confident as I want to picture myself, I still want to know whether I matter to those I care about. . I want to know because the unknown hurts more than the truth.

Like...

Life is easy...if u give yourself a break

paint...

looooove it...

i gotta paint

Living is easy with eyes closed

and yes i want this too...with you

wAY OUT IS EASY?????

Sometimes I just wish I could take the easy way out...work as a barlady somewhere, waitress, cashier in some supermarket n wait for a rich man to come n marry me! it so easy to have a dream...we all have dreams! But making that dream become reality is a wholenether story! I feel like Im so close...yet so far!

Best Ever

Sometimes...as much as you know the difference between a book and reality, you always try to make your life a little like your favourite book or movie, cause you have to give it a shot somehow! Sometimes there are people who come into your life and make you feel like the main character in the book they are writing...Special!

They will do things that will make you smile so hard you will wonder why your heart hasn't burst and bled out all over your chest yet! 

Simple and effortless things...but to you they become invaluable treasures kept safe in your heart to cherish!

  

My boyfriend went on a trip with his dad and brother, somewhere in Moz

On the beach he drew a picture of me on the sand as if I'm lying next to him 

 And the words next to him say: "I wish you were here"

So babe...you are just the best ever! You have taught me so much in the five months I've known you...in a way I've never experienced before! Yes I dont know what will happen in a month or a year but I just hope you know how much I will always appreciate you being a part of my life!