LUCKY CHANGES HIS NAME
As I explained at the outset Lucky was not adopted by us, he sort of came to live with us.
Most of our friends thought that we had adopted a little black boy.
This is very illegal. One cannot create the impression that you have adopted a child that you have not adopted. Adoption is a legal process; you cannot just take a child and have him live with you.
We had a black child living with us, we had to presume that it is with his mothers consent because the person that everyone believed to be his mother knew all along where he was, and never made any attempts at contacting him or us after she disappeared.
Lucky was registered at the school as Lucky Mosesane. He became known as Lucky du Plessis among the teachers, his friends, etc.
Lucky liked being called a ‘du Plessis’. He felt it gave him stature among his white friends, at least more than what Mosesane did.
What he did not like was being called Lucky. It did not have the same ‘ring’ as the white names had – at least not in his opinion.
When school started for his third grade Lucky decided to change all of this. We only found out about this three months later.
The teacher read the class-roll, and when she came to ‘Mosesane, Lucky’; he informed her that his surname had been changed, he is no longer a Mosesane, but is now a ‘du Plessis’.
She changed the register. Believing he is on a roll he went for the full house: he also told her that he is not Lucky anymore, his name has been changed to “Pieter” – a good Afrikaans name.
Henceforth, he insisted, everyone should call him Pieter du Plessis.
The whole school called him Pieter du Plessis for about three months before Mariki was talking to the headmaster who was telling her about “Pieter’s” progress. She could not understand why he would be telling her all these details about Pieter, or why he thought she would even remotely be interested. She concluded that he was confusing her with another Mrs. Du Plessis.
When she, politely tried to explain that she is Mrs. Du Plessis, but not the Mrs. Du Plessis who was Pieter’s mother but the Mrs. Du Plessis that looks after Lucky, the whole story about Lucky changing his name came out.
Since we had not adopted Lucky, and it probably was illegal for Lucky to live with us, it would have been very illegal to allow the school to have him registered as Pieter du Plessis. We had the school change all there registers back to the real name.
And so, just as Lucky Mosesane became Pieter du Plessis, did Pieter du Plessis become Lucky Mosesane.
We realised that the issue of adoption is one that we will have to consider, and I will tell you what happened in a later chapter.
But while we were considering this issue we had to also consider the issue of Lucky not wanting to be Lucky – or, at least, not wanting to be called Lucky.
And here we had some really good luck. Mariki saw on the television news that an Italian racing driver was called Lucci, the American announcer pronounced this as Lucky.
She told Lucky about this, and since he was not registered anywhere on any population register, we felt it would be fair to change the spelling of his name. Henceforth he was still called Lucky, it was just spelled Lucci.
So there you have the story of how Lucky Mosesane became Pieter du Plessis and Pieter du Plessis became Lucci Mosesane, and how there is a black South African named after an Italian racing driver who does not know that a child has been named after him, and there now exists a black child with a named spelled Lucci and pronounced Lucky.
LUCKY’S GREATEST TALENT
God gave everyone a number of talents.
The picture below shows Lucky’s major talent – or the biggest one we identified at the time.
If you look closely at the picture you will notice that Lucky is holding the book upside down.
Don’t be mislead into believing that Lucky’s talent is that he could read upside down at an early age.
Lucky’s great talent is that he can sleep any-where, any-time, in any position. Lucky has to be a contender for one of the world’s greatest sleepers!
Like any gifted person with a great talent, Lucky did have certain preferences for when he exhibited this talent. So, despite him being able to sleep anywhere, anytime; he had a great preference for sleeping when he should be doing his homework.
Mariki decided that rather than allowing him to develop this talent, she would ask him to do his homework in the dining-room. Here she could occasionally wake him.
The story behind the above photo is that Mariki showed me how Lucky is doing his homework – i.e. sleeping on top of his book. I fetched the camera and took the photo below of Lucky doing his homework.
The flash woke him, he grabbed his book and seeing us next to him contrived to appear engrossed in his homework. Unfortunately he had grabbed the book upside down, and I was able to get the picture showing Lucky demonstrating his ability to learn from an upside down book.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Exercise 8: Lions and Springboks and 2007 world cup
Twenty Two superior men, wearing the colours of South Africa (Springboks) and the Lions (England), facing each other ready to do Battle, edged on by their supporters.
This is how we cultured societies do WAR.
The principles remain the same: choose your best youth, train them in the art of battle, send them to maul the other countries best youths and cheer them on. They become national heroes if they win. Like in the old days they get honours bestowed on the, titles, money and statues are erected.
If this event at Parc deFrance in the 2007 rugby world cup is reminiscent battle before countries became cultured, then think of what it would have looked like before that – on the plains of Africa.
Imagine you are a Zulu and coming over a hill you notice in the plains below 15 lions and 15 springbuck squaring up with a leather covered cow bladder between them. They have fenced of the area so that no-one can get away from the other. They are obviously going to do battle over the bladder!
You might briefly think that this is going to be a slaughter of Springboks – a type of genocide they have allowed themselves to be tricked into.
People that live in Africa will tell you that they have never seen this, but they will also tell you that there will not be a genocide. At least not as much as there was in Parc de Franche.
What will happen is that the lions will lie around in the shade looking at the Springbuck. The Springbuck will be grazing sort of keeping an eye on the lion.
At some stage the male lion (there will only be one) will call over the she-lions and tell them to get him a springbuck.
The she-lions will ignore the bladder, as the springbuck has, and start to circle the springbuck, which will start to shuffle around with a bit of unease.
Once the she-lions have identified the weakest of the species among the springbuck they will quickly rush it. If they have been wrong and it is not the weakest, it will run away for a short distance, the she-lions will give up, the springbuck will continue grazing – as most of the other would have while this is all happening.
The she-lions will identify another one as being a most likely meal, rush it, and if they get it they will kill it. The male lion will wander over, smell the kill and have some meat. The she-lions will rest in the sun until he is done. He will then go to sleep, and they will have their bit.
The springbuck would have moved away a save distance, about the distance from the half-way line to the 22 meter line on a rugby field, and continue grazing, knowing they are save. They will probably even go to the same watering hole as the lions.
The principle of nature is that:
READ MY PRVIOUS BLOG ON THIS ISSUE!
This principle holds because no lion will run around when it is not necessary, and therefore no springbuck needs to run around when it is not necessary.
This is nature.
Humans evolved to the extent that we declare war. We have been doing this even BC. However, those wars were fought with very little preparation. The young men that were around were collected, send to a place where there was going to be a battle, edged on by the rest of the tribe.
The battle would mostly be short, comprising of people throwing things at each other or swinging sticks or swords at each other. One side will win. The other side will run away – for a short distance because no-one was really following them. This was very much like the lion and the springbuck.
This running by the losing side really relied on you being a bit faster than the guy who is following you. He is probably not putting much effort in running after you because he is as unfit as you.
In any case, why would he want to catch you when he is out of breath? You might just turn around and fight? So you know that he is running more to impress the young women of the tribe who are sitting on the nearby hill cheering him on.
So even in a less cultured (ancient) society than ours the principles of battle remained very similar to that of the lion and springbuck.
Then we evolved to the stage where we could really kill each other over long distances using guns and cannons. Once again there was no real reason to be able to run long distances fast. No matter how far you can run, or how fast you can do it in, you will never outrun a bullet or cannon ball.
The problem was that the rules have changed from the ‘rules of nature’. While the springbuck know they only have to outrun a lion for a short distance, maybe once or twice in their life, the modern soldier knows that no amount of running will get him far enough away.
The problem is of course that the women and old folk that sat on the hill cheering their young men onto great feats of heroism are now also got shot and bombed at. Suddenly things were not as much fun as before.
After the last big flings in Europe (WW I and WW II) countries realized that going back to the old ‘rules of nature’ is best. Don’t do battle – do Rugby, Soccer, Olympic Games, Wimbledon, etc. All of these things did not really exist before the World Wars, and all became big rapidly after the two wars.
So we are going back to the ‘rules of nature’.
Most of us have now seen what a real ‘civilised’ war would look like. That Hiroshima was really just a test market for such a very civilized war.
BUT, while we recognize how far wrong our progress into civilized war has been, and the benefits of a more ‘nature like’ war; we have not recognized how we have formed our visions about how we should be treating our bodies.
Much of what we propagate we should be doing to our bodies is a civilized and harmful as civilized war is. Possibly because we are holding up the Olympians and Spartans as role models of what we should all be. We forget that they trained in what was a most uncivilized and unnatural endeavour: To kill, on demand, for other people’s pleasure.
This booklet is about:
Thinking about being ‘natural’,
Thinking about what nature requires of us,
Thinking about what is really natural,
Using the examples nature gives us about what natural is.
Even a great white shark does not exercise to becoming a super-fit killing machine, seldom exerts itself, only kills what it wants to eat, and only trains up to that required level. Mostly it does not care about what the other sharks think of it.
In writing this book I have found many examples in nature of how we can live a natural life. In fact, I have yet to find examples in nature that replicates our health and fitness fanaticism.
I use the word ‘fanaticism’ wisely. I am not writing about the real fanatics, although I write about that too, I am talking about all of us – including you – that have some of this fanaticism in you.
My major concern is that this little bit of ‘fanaticism’ you have makes you worry about your level of fitness, and this leads you to be depressed by your body not being the body you are taught that you should have.
Knowing that you will never have such a body makes one depressed. The Dutch call it (Gemoedsbekak). This word describes your mood attacking you (like the words ‘a heart attack’ describes your heart attacking you).
Look at nature. How many animals do you see that have their mood attack them? Very few and very seldom, and mostly the cause is easily identifiable. Maybe we should be like them.
This is how we cultured societies do WAR.
The principles remain the same: choose your best youth, train them in the art of battle, send them to maul the other countries best youths and cheer them on. They become national heroes if they win. Like in the old days they get honours bestowed on the, titles, money and statues are erected.
If this event at Parc deFrance in the 2007 rugby world cup is reminiscent battle before countries became cultured, then think of what it would have looked like before that – on the plains of Africa.
Imagine you are a Zulu and coming over a hill you notice in the plains below 15 lions and 15 springbuck squaring up with a leather covered cow bladder between them. They have fenced of the area so that no-one can get away from the other. They are obviously going to do battle over the bladder!
You might briefly think that this is going to be a slaughter of Springboks – a type of genocide they have allowed themselves to be tricked into.
People that live in Africa will tell you that they have never seen this, but they will also tell you that there will not be a genocide. At least not as much as there was in Parc de Franche.
What will happen is that the lions will lie around in the shade looking at the Springbuck. The Springbuck will be grazing sort of keeping an eye on the lion.
At some stage the male lion (there will only be one) will call over the she-lions and tell them to get him a springbuck.
The she-lions will ignore the bladder, as the springbuck has, and start to circle the springbuck, which will start to shuffle around with a bit of unease.
Once the she-lions have identified the weakest of the species among the springbuck they will quickly rush it. If they have been wrong and it is not the weakest, it will run away for a short distance, the she-lions will give up, the springbuck will continue grazing – as most of the other would have while this is all happening.
The she-lions will identify another one as being a most likely meal, rush it, and if they get it they will kill it. The male lion will wander over, smell the kill and have some meat. The she-lions will rest in the sun until he is done. He will then go to sleep, and they will have their bit.
The springbuck would have moved away a save distance, about the distance from the half-way line to the 22 meter line on a rugby field, and continue grazing, knowing they are save. They will probably even go to the same watering hole as the lions.
The principle of nature is that:
READ MY PRVIOUS BLOG ON THIS ISSUE!
This principle holds because no lion will run around when it is not necessary, and therefore no springbuck needs to run around when it is not necessary.
This is nature.
Humans evolved to the extent that we declare war. We have been doing this even BC. However, those wars were fought with very little preparation. The young men that were around were collected, send to a place where there was going to be a battle, edged on by the rest of the tribe.
The battle would mostly be short, comprising of people throwing things at each other or swinging sticks or swords at each other. One side will win. The other side will run away – for a short distance because no-one was really following them. This was very much like the lion and the springbuck.
This running by the losing side really relied on you being a bit faster than the guy who is following you. He is probably not putting much effort in running after you because he is as unfit as you.
In any case, why would he want to catch you when he is out of breath? You might just turn around and fight? So you know that he is running more to impress the young women of the tribe who are sitting on the nearby hill cheering him on.
So even in a less cultured (ancient) society than ours the principles of battle remained very similar to that of the lion and springbuck.
Then we evolved to the stage where we could really kill each other over long distances using guns and cannons. Once again there was no real reason to be able to run long distances fast. No matter how far you can run, or how fast you can do it in, you will never outrun a bullet or cannon ball.
The problem was that the rules have changed from the ‘rules of nature’. While the springbuck know they only have to outrun a lion for a short distance, maybe once or twice in their life, the modern soldier knows that no amount of running will get him far enough away.
The problem is of course that the women and old folk that sat on the hill cheering their young men onto great feats of heroism are now also got shot and bombed at. Suddenly things were not as much fun as before.
After the last big flings in Europe (WW I and WW II) countries realized that going back to the old ‘rules of nature’ is best. Don’t do battle – do Rugby, Soccer, Olympic Games, Wimbledon, etc. All of these things did not really exist before the World Wars, and all became big rapidly after the two wars.
So we are going back to the ‘rules of nature’.
Most of us have now seen what a real ‘civilised’ war would look like. That Hiroshima was really just a test market for such a very civilized war.
BUT, while we recognize how far wrong our progress into civilized war has been, and the benefits of a more ‘nature like’ war; we have not recognized how we have formed our visions about how we should be treating our bodies.
Much of what we propagate we should be doing to our bodies is a civilized and harmful as civilized war is. Possibly because we are holding up the Olympians and Spartans as role models of what we should all be. We forget that they trained in what was a most uncivilized and unnatural endeavour: To kill, on demand, for other people’s pleasure.
This booklet is about:
Thinking about being ‘natural’,
Thinking about what nature requires of us,
Thinking about what is really natural,
Using the examples nature gives us about what natural is.
Even a great white shark does not exercise to becoming a super-fit killing machine, seldom exerts itself, only kills what it wants to eat, and only trains up to that required level. Mostly it does not care about what the other sharks think of it.
In writing this book I have found many examples in nature of how we can live a natural life. In fact, I have yet to find examples in nature that replicates our health and fitness fanaticism.
I use the word ‘fanaticism’ wisely. I am not writing about the real fanatics, although I write about that too, I am talking about all of us – including you – that have some of this fanaticism in you.
My major concern is that this little bit of ‘fanaticism’ you have makes you worry about your level of fitness, and this leads you to be depressed by your body not being the body you are taught that you should have.
Knowing that you will never have such a body makes one depressed. The Dutch call it (Gemoedsbekak). This word describes your mood attacking you (like the words ‘a heart attack’ describes your heart attacking you).
Look at nature. How many animals do you see that have their mood attack them? Very few and very seldom, and mostly the cause is easily identifiable. Maybe we should be like them.
Friday, June 5, 2009
Exercise 7: The natural way to exercise
THE NATURAL WAY TO EXERCISE
Over the past 50 years there has been an increased trend in lifestyles toward a more ‘natural’ lifestyle. This is quite obvious in the changes in eating trends, the increased general popularity of jogging as a pass-time, the rise in shops selling ‘natural’ things – from natural foam baths to natural herbs, the activism against smoking, etc.
There is general agreement that natural is better than synthetic. This book does not question this assumption.
What this book does is to question whether much that goes under the guise of being ‘back to nature’ is really back to nature. Too many things are being positioned as being natural when they are totally unnatural, but no one seems to question the assumption that these things are natural and good.
We will look at aspects of modern lifestyles and test these against the ways of nature to see what nature has to say about things.
Obviously one has to start of by inspecting nature, a bit, if one wants to evaluate activities in terms of whether they are more natural than other activities.
The best description of nature’s ways comes from an African saying (and who can deny that Africa is still the continent closest to nature).
The Rule of Africa:
In Africa every lion, when it wakes up, knows that it has to be faster than the slowest buck,
And every buck, when it wakes up, knows it has to be faster than the slowest buck.
There is a lot of wisdom in this saying about nature, and we will come back to this often throughout the book to demonstrate points about what we now call natural lifestyles if only to prove that what we call natural is mostly very unnatural.
This African saying is, of course, a very concise summary of Darwinism.
Darwinism is often described as ‘survival of the fittest’, but even Darwin never used the term because this is not want Darwinism is about. Darwinism is about the non-survival of the weakest. Darwin does not suggest that the best gene pools ultimately survive, but that the bad genes get weeded out.
If one then considers what ALL animals, without an exception (in Africa at least) do between waking up and going to sleep then the answer is: MOSTLY NOTHING!
One does not get to see a springbuck, kudu, lion or elephant wake up, do a few push ups, jog a few miles and then during the day go to the gym. In fact one seldom sees them trying to impress the girls (or guys), this is a special activity that they embark on only when it is necessary – breeding time.
It is true that sometimes one sees them running, but when they do run there is a reason for this. Either they are being chased by something, or they are chasing something.
On odd occasions one does see them jogging toward water. Especially cows do this in the evening when it is homecoming time. It is possible that they are running to work up a good thirst, but somehow this seems to be unlikely. It is more likely that there is an incentive to be among the first to reach the water before the others trample it full of mud.
Whilst it is true that animals mostly do nothing this does not imply that they do absolutely nothing. They walk to where they can graze. Those that have homes (birds, bees, ants, snakes, aardvarks, etc.) will build, or dig, or construct their homes. They might even be trekking to an area of veldt where there is a better supply of food (be it grazing or meat). They will be doing guard duty. Many will indulge in grooming activities (monkeys, birds and elephants), but this is not aimed at making them look better only to rid themselves of lice and parasites. Grooming is a matter of hygiene.
In human terms all of these activities can be considered to be work. They are working to eat, sleep, remain healthy and have the occasional sexual exploit.
Nature only runs when this is part of survival – either to eat or not be eaten. In other words running is classified under work, not pleasure.
What does nature do when it is not working? What does it define as pleasure?
Sleeping, dozing or napping comes very high on the list of what nature defines as pleasure time. This is true for all of nature whether it be animals, reptiles or birds.
There appears to be the occasional romping by especially the youngsters. These are always just short spurts of energy. For most of nature even this waste of energy stops when it reaches some maturity.
Some people theorize that this playing is really just a way that nature’s children acquire their hunting skills. If this was the case then one should classify this behavior as not being pleasure, but work – i.e. like going to school.
It is unlikely that the young in nature romps because they feel a need to learn. After all, how often will an average springbuck be in a real fight? If it has to fight a lion or leopard it is going to lose irrespective how much it has learned from romping and it would be a lot better of if it runs away – this skill is not really improved by romping with a few friends.
The animals that are general thought of as developing their killing skills by romping are parts of the cats or dogs families. Even here, if one considers that male lions seldom join the hunt and therefore do not really need to learn a killing skill, it is questionable whether the learning of hunting skills is a major objective of romping. In any case snakes, crocodiles, falcons and many others do not exhibit romping behavior but remain very effective killers.
This very short exposition, based on the Rule of Africa, leads us to a number of learnings about nature’s way:
RULE 1: Energy is only expended to get to food, shelter or sex.
RULE 2: Energy is only expended to get away from danger, and then only to the extent of being faster than the slowest buck.
RULE 3: Energy is sometimes expended by the very young for short bursts of energetic behaviour.
LEARNING 1: Nature NEVER indulges in behaviours that require energy unless it is for the objectives of Rules 1 to 3.
LEARNING 2: If nature indulges in an energetic behaviour that is not in compliance with Rules 1 to 3, then it is only for a very short time.
Over the past 50 years there has been an increased trend in lifestyles toward a more ‘natural’ lifestyle. This is quite obvious in the changes in eating trends, the increased general popularity of jogging as a pass-time, the rise in shops selling ‘natural’ things – from natural foam baths to natural herbs, the activism against smoking, etc.
There is general agreement that natural is better than synthetic. This book does not question this assumption.
What this book does is to question whether much that goes under the guise of being ‘back to nature’ is really back to nature. Too many things are being positioned as being natural when they are totally unnatural, but no one seems to question the assumption that these things are natural and good.
We will look at aspects of modern lifestyles and test these against the ways of nature to see what nature has to say about things.
Obviously one has to start of by inspecting nature, a bit, if one wants to evaluate activities in terms of whether they are more natural than other activities.
The best description of nature’s ways comes from an African saying (and who can deny that Africa is still the continent closest to nature).
The Rule of Africa:
In Africa every lion, when it wakes up, knows that it has to be faster than the slowest buck,
And every buck, when it wakes up, knows it has to be faster than the slowest buck.
There is a lot of wisdom in this saying about nature, and we will come back to this often throughout the book to demonstrate points about what we now call natural lifestyles if only to prove that what we call natural is mostly very unnatural.
This African saying is, of course, a very concise summary of Darwinism.
Darwinism is often described as ‘survival of the fittest’, but even Darwin never used the term because this is not want Darwinism is about. Darwinism is about the non-survival of the weakest. Darwin does not suggest that the best gene pools ultimately survive, but that the bad genes get weeded out.
If one then considers what ALL animals, without an exception (in Africa at least) do between waking up and going to sleep then the answer is: MOSTLY NOTHING!
One does not get to see a springbuck, kudu, lion or elephant wake up, do a few push ups, jog a few miles and then during the day go to the gym. In fact one seldom sees them trying to impress the girls (or guys), this is a special activity that they embark on only when it is necessary – breeding time.
It is true that sometimes one sees them running, but when they do run there is a reason for this. Either they are being chased by something, or they are chasing something.
On odd occasions one does see them jogging toward water. Especially cows do this in the evening when it is homecoming time. It is possible that they are running to work up a good thirst, but somehow this seems to be unlikely. It is more likely that there is an incentive to be among the first to reach the water before the others trample it full of mud.
Whilst it is true that animals mostly do nothing this does not imply that they do absolutely nothing. They walk to where they can graze. Those that have homes (birds, bees, ants, snakes, aardvarks, etc.) will build, or dig, or construct their homes. They might even be trekking to an area of veldt where there is a better supply of food (be it grazing or meat). They will be doing guard duty. Many will indulge in grooming activities (monkeys, birds and elephants), but this is not aimed at making them look better only to rid themselves of lice and parasites. Grooming is a matter of hygiene.
In human terms all of these activities can be considered to be work. They are working to eat, sleep, remain healthy and have the occasional sexual exploit.
Nature only runs when this is part of survival – either to eat or not be eaten. In other words running is classified under work, not pleasure.
What does nature do when it is not working? What does it define as pleasure?
Sleeping, dozing or napping comes very high on the list of what nature defines as pleasure time. This is true for all of nature whether it be animals, reptiles or birds.
There appears to be the occasional romping by especially the youngsters. These are always just short spurts of energy. For most of nature even this waste of energy stops when it reaches some maturity.
Some people theorize that this playing is really just a way that nature’s children acquire their hunting skills. If this was the case then one should classify this behavior as not being pleasure, but work – i.e. like going to school.
It is unlikely that the young in nature romps because they feel a need to learn. After all, how often will an average springbuck be in a real fight? If it has to fight a lion or leopard it is going to lose irrespective how much it has learned from romping and it would be a lot better of if it runs away – this skill is not really improved by romping with a few friends.
The animals that are general thought of as developing their killing skills by romping are parts of the cats or dogs families. Even here, if one considers that male lions seldom join the hunt and therefore do not really need to learn a killing skill, it is questionable whether the learning of hunting skills is a major objective of romping. In any case snakes, crocodiles, falcons and many others do not exhibit romping behavior but remain very effective killers.
This very short exposition, based on the Rule of Africa, leads us to a number of learnings about nature’s way:
RULE 1: Energy is only expended to get to food, shelter or sex.
RULE 2: Energy is only expended to get away from danger, and then only to the extent of being faster than the slowest buck.
RULE 3: Energy is sometimes expended by the very young for short bursts of energetic behaviour.
LEARNING 1: Nature NEVER indulges in behaviours that require energy unless it is for the objectives of Rules 1 to 3.
LEARNING 2: If nature indulges in an energetic behaviour that is not in compliance with Rules 1 to 3, then it is only for a very short time.
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