Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas!

Thank You For Your Support

I'd like to take this opportunity this festive season to thank you all for the support you've given me in my projects in the past year.

• Thank you for joining conversations initiated on this blog. 
•  I learnt a lot from you. I made new friends. And it's always nice to feel like someone is listening to you when you blog;  not talking to an empty room.
• You continued to participate in discussions on the OneLove web site. You helped me see things in a different light, taught me about people and relationships so I can better blog about the subject.
• Read SA membership has grown to 1 523 members this past year. It wouldn't have happened without your help and support.
• Many of you joined the Shukumisa campaign and also contributed to the 16 days blog party.
• Some of you referred potential clients to me.
• Or you took on work I could sub-contract when I was too busy.
• You supported me through the tough times.
• And celebrated with me during the good times.

So.  Thank You. And enjoy the festive season.

See you next year!

Freelance Gigs/Publishers Who Welcome Submissions

If you're a writer or blogger looking for potential markets, check out these two sites. Journalists and editors looking for fulltime work should also monitor the sites, as they offer some really good opportunities:

Write Jobs
Offers freelance writing jobs that pay at least $10 per page, paying markets and free writing contests

Writers Afrika

Offers writing opportunities for African writers or writers of colour.

Good luck!

Letters Of Rejection Every Writer Must Read

Check out author Richard de Nooy's pre-emptive letters of rejection. Here's a sample:

Dear Paris Review,

Although I am honoured by your request to contribute to your magazine, I regret to inform you that I must cordially decline as it has come to my attention that you have long preyed on the gullibility of those ignorant enough to believe that you are based in the French capital, when indeed you are little more than a colonial rag, buffing up and serving somewhat outdated quotes to your friends on social networks. That said, I wish you the very best of luck in your further endeavours.

Yours in writing,

Richard de Nooy

LOL! Read the rest of the letters

So who's Richard? He's one of my favourite humour writers, that's who. "Met" him online through READ SA. As for his credentials, he's grew up in Johannesburg, but has lived in Amsterdam for more than 20 years. His first novel Six Fang Marks and a Tetanus Shot (Jacana, 2007) won the University of Johannesburg Prize for Best First Book. It was published in Dutch as Zes beetwonden en een tetanusprik by Nijgh & Van Ditmar in 2008. De Nooy was awarded a grant by the Dutch Foundation for Literature to write his second novel in Dutch. Zacht als Staal will be published in August 2010. He is currently working on the English edition of this novel.

Learn more about Richard and his writing
Join READ SA's Facebook group.

Business Is Listening To Your Online Chatter

A week or so ago I blogged about a situation where a 3at1 service provider chose to refund me, rather than redoing a printing job. I was disappointed, because the refund left me in a lurch to a find another printer quickly. And some of you pointed out the many reasons why the decision to refund was not good business.

When I blogged about the situation, I didn't expect anything to come out of it. I'd had my say, and if by some miracle some search engine led the owners to the post, I didn't expect them to do anything about it.

I was pleasantly surprised. This morning I received an email with a gracious apology from the company, with a promise for better service in the future. And weirdly, it turns out the owner and I belong to the same small business forum. Small world, huh?

So what business lessons did I learn from this situation?

1. The internet is a powerful medium and what we say on our blogs and forums etc matters. Business is listening to you  as a customer.
2. Smart business owners listen to their customers. So while I was initially unimpressed with the printer, I respect the fact that she's using new media to enhance her business communication.
3. Smart business owners take action when customers complain, if it is on a blog and not in person.
4. If you respond to a public complaint ( say on a blog), do it with class. The emailed apology was very gracious and made me rethink the service provider. She didn't argue the fine points of the issue; she didn't try to defend her initial decision. All she said was, we're sorry, we've taken steps to make sure we do better in the future, come back and we value your business.

So what do you think of this new development? If you were in my shoes, would you use the service provider again, if only to give them a second chance and reward their listening to an unhappy customer?

Monday After

African funerals are long, tedious affairs that take days of preparation. Then there are events that happen afterwards - family conferences, the ceremonial changing to mourning clothes and the shaving of hair for those required by tradition.

In general, we're OK. Baby arrived in Joburg on Sunday morning. So I carted her off to Phokeng to stay with Mma. I think my mother needs a reminder that the next generation is thriving ( following the death of my cousin) and Baby needs a reminder that not everyone close to her will die too soon. Some people do get to enjoy their twilight years.

As for me, I  still have a lot of work to catch up on before I close for Christmas. I had to cancel a few meetings and ignored some admin tasks that help my business tick over late last week. Now I'm catching up with them. 

Donate Books to Bookery

By Megan Voisey-Braig

ReadSA appeals to you to donate books to Equal Education’s Bookery. Equal Education is in particular need of primary and high school books, non-fiction and reference books. All donated books should be in a satisfactory condition please. Any books in Afrikaans and in Xhosa are most welcome too, as are any other books.


Equal Education also needs assistance with helping the school libraries acquire Libwin Software, for cataloguing purposes. Volunteers are always welcome to help sort out and catalogue donated books.

Address to donate books:

The Bookery 20 Roeland Street Cape Town.

 From the building of school libraries to the giving of a book, Equal Education needs you in their community!

About Equal Education and Bookery

Equal Education is a community-based organisation. It is vigorously campaigning for quality and equality in the South African education system and we engage in evidence and research based activism for improving the nation’s schools. We promote the constitutional right to equality and education, with the firm belief that these will enable the poor and working class to an equal opportunity in life.
The campaign for School libraries. Only 8% of public schools in South Africa have functional libraries. These are almost entirely situated in former Model C schools, which continually have the resources to stock and staff these facilities. Approximately 20,000 schools are without libraries, thereby denying their learners access to regular reading opportunities.

The Bookery is the home of the Equal Education’s campaign for school libraries the slogan (1 school, 1 library, 1 librarian) was adopted for it, the campaign started in 2009. Most of the children in poor communities only have their first access to a reading book that they can take home and read for themselves in a school library.

Research shows that student performance increases by about 10% and 25% when a library space is adequately stocked, and properly staffed within a school.

The Bookery is where we collect books, sort them, cover and catalogue them to a computer software that allows the school to manage the books once they receive them. We work on giving 3 books per learner “ if the school has 1000 learners they get 3000 books.”

From the moment we have identified the school we will work with as partners, the process takes 4 weeks until the opening of the library. We gather support and regularly visit and monitor the school library, until they are ready to take on the library on their own.

We have opened the 3 school libraries this year. We opened the first one in Khayelitsha Thembelihle High School, Lavender Hill High School in Retreat and our third was opened last Friday Masiyile Secondary Khayelitsha.

For more information on Equal Education, please visit their website

With thanks, Read South Africa and Equal Education.

Speed Bump!

Yesterday did not  start well. My sister phoned to tell me that my cousin, who kept house for me and took care of Baby for more than 5 years, passed away after a short illness. The funeral is on Saturday. I didn't even know my cousin was sick, so I'm in shock. My body feels sore and heavy. Thank God I’ve already planned a holiday (going to Durban with friends). I really, really need a refresh.

Spent most of the day writing content. I want to give the client I’m doing a web site for as much content as possible before they close on the 15th December, so she can review over the hols and we’d be ready to load it right at the beginning of 2011. It give me good start for the year. Yeah, I considerate like that, ruining the poor woman's holiday with work:-)

P.S. Today is the last day of the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence. Check out our blog party commemorating the event on the Shukumisa web site.

Women's Day - what about a day for men? By Moira Richards

Women's Day - what about a day for men? That is the most common comment I hear about Women's Day. But I want to say that our menfolk really don't need to feel neglected because Women's Day actually is a Men's Day. It is a day for men to look back, and to celebrate how much their quality of life has improved over the last century:

Men no longer need to shoulder the burdens and responsibilities of government alone, now that their sisters also have the right to vote, and to hold public office.

Fathers can be assured that their daughters will achieve their full potential because they have better access to education and training than they ever did before.

Men enjoy a higher standard of living because their wives can now earn good wages.

A man might no longer worry that his grandchildren might starve, because there are laws in place to ensure that both parents feed and clothe all the children they produce.

A son need not look on as helplessly while his mother is beaten, kicked, or stabbed, because domestic violence has been acknowledged to be a punishable crime.

And real men can rejoice that society is at last speaking out against the rape of their girlfriends, and the sexual abuse of their baby sisters.

Women's Day is an internationally celebrated day. In South Africa, we celebrate our National Women's Day on 9 August every year and our men will have plenty of reason to celebrate it as a day especially for them.

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Follow the campaign:


Day 1: http://www.redroom.com/author/moira-richards

Shukumisa: http://www.shukumisa.org.za/

Damaria Senne’s Blog Party: http://damariasenne.blogspot.com/

Day 15: http://damariasenne.blogspot.com/

Meet Efemena Agadama

Playwright and poet Efemena Agadama left this message on my Facebook page, after we connected:

No matter how laudable our words might be
No matter how evergreen our vegetation of words might seem
There are some paths too noble to paint with words
And there are people too amazing to honour with words
...you are one of such paths
...you are one of such people
Thanks for being a literary light

Beautiful, hey? And such an honour to be regarded like that! Sooo..... I thought I’d introduce him to you guys. He’s a regular contributor the Amnesty International blog. He has also written guest posts for a number of pubs including Little London Observationists.

He wants to “meet” other South African writers. So please guys, introduce yourselves if you’re a writer? My impression was that he likes to talk about books, so I think those of you who occasionally talk about books and writing on your own blogs will be happy to introduce to share some online conversations.

A Unique Experiment By Moira Richards

On the night of Friday 9 March 2001, the Colombian city, Bogota, tried a unique experiment. The mayor, Antanas Mockus asked all the men to stay at home for the evening, and he invited the women to enjoy a night out on the town.


When he first suggested the idea of banning the city's men from the streets for a night, there was much discussion about it. Not least on its legality - and of course on the extent that it might violate the constitutional rights of the men.

In the end the male curfew was not compulsory, but the men were asked to stay home voluntarily. Many, although of course not all, complied with Mockus' request and they minded the kids whilst their womenfolk went out.


News reports quote the following crime statistics for Bogota:

40% of the men do not 'allow' their wives to go out alone at night.

85% of alcohol-related traffic accidents are caused by men.

88% of violent deaths are committed by men.

90% of the people arrested, are men.

40% of the women admit to being a victim of domestic abuse.

The mayor had conceived the idea of the curfew as a way to highlight the above statistics, to draw attention to men's role in the perpetuation of domestic and community violence, and to prove that crime would be less on a night of male curfew. He hoped that the evening would be a time for serious reflection on the gendered nature of crime in the city.


And the crime rate was indeed significantly lower in Bogota on Friday night, the 9th of March, and the mayor declared the experiment a success.

I've read a few news reports on the 'net that covered the story. In them, mayor Antanas Mockus was described variously as 'eccentric', 'goofy', 'clowning idiot', 'crazy philosopher', and the story was also featured on a 'legal humour' website.


Men of Bogota were quoted as saying;


“We own the street”

“What about a female curfew?”

“The city can only take one night of this”

“We have high unemployment, we have social unrest”

“We have a lot more important problems to worry about here”


The mayor declared the night dedicated to educating 'men, who have much to learn about peaceful attitudes' a success. Me, I weep.



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Follow the campaign:


Day 16: http://www.shukumisa.org.za/

Shukumisa: http://www.shukumisa.org.za/

Damaria Senne’s Blog Party: http://damariasenne.blogspot.com/

Day 14: http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/12/08/day-14/

Not My Problem!

Yesterday Moira Richards rocked me out of my comfort zone. I was reading her post on how witchcraft is used as a tool for women abuse and my first response when I saw the intro to her piece was, “surely that doesn’t happen in SA anymore?”


I grew up in rural South Africa, where accusations of witchcraft against a member of a community were very common. No, we didn’t burn the accused on the stake. At least, not physically. But word spread in the community, reputations were destroyed and some poor women were isolated/ shunned because they were believed to be witches.

In other parts of South Africa, most notably Limpopo and Mpumalanga, some women were not so lucky. Yes, we did go through our period similar to Salem. And it was not too long ago (less than 20 years). But, as time moved on, I convinced myself that we as a society have moved. We don’t burn witch-accused anymore, do we? Moira’s reminded me not to be complacent.

Question: Do you feel that sometimes it's easier to disconnect yourself from particular societal issues and to go"Thank God that's not my problem!" because as individuals, we also have our own life issues to deal with and that's more than enough? Are we getting numb to the damage people can do to each other?

P.S. Read Moira's series of posts on the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence.
Follow Shukumisa's blog party commemorating 16 Days of Activism Against gender violence

Fight To Deliver Or Know When To Quit?

I didn't want a refund.
I wanted the job done properly.

Yesterday I sent a client document to a 3at1 print shop near my home. I needed 5 full colour copies, bound.

My client had a presentation at nine this morning and it seemed like a simple thing to send someone to drop off the electronic copy and then pick up the documents a couple of hours later.

And it was as easy as that. Except, when I got the documents around mid-day, I realsied the document had a number of pages upside down.

At first I was angry. Didn't the person doing the job actually check to make sure the pages were in the right order before binding them? So I took the documents to the shop. Luckily I found the owner of the shop, who looked at the document and understood what my complaint was. She agreed to redo the job and gave me two hours to come back.

I was killing time shopping for odds and ends when the call came. No, they didn't finish the assignment quickly. In fact, they never started on the job and could I please come back to take my refund?

She was very apologetic about it. But the bottomline was that, she felt her business was going to lose money if they redid my printing job, which was five copies of  an 11-page document in full colour.

I'm still not sure how I feel about the whole thing. Other than the fact that her quitting left me stuck late afternoon to try to find a print shop that would take on the job at such short notice, it was my first time  using the shop. So you can bet your two cents I won't be printing my client documents there again. But I also had to admire someone who could look at a difficult client situation and know when it's not in her best interests to get involved.

What do you think?

13 December update: The owner of the printing shop read the above post and sent me a very gracious apology, with a promise to do well in the future. I was impressed. I may even try them again.

Here are the new lessons I learnt from their apology.

16 Days of Activism Posts

Here are today's posts for the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence:

1. Johannesburg Child Advocacy Forum says this year the 16 Days of Activism campaign has seen a resurgence of the child advocacy remniscent of 18 years ago.

2. Gaynor Paynter talks about why you should fight abuses in your life.

3. Moira Richards talks about a horrific massacre of 14 men which took place on this day, 21 years ago so as to strike a blow against the empowerment of women.

4.  On Thought Leader, Jennifer Thorpe talks about Child Brides, HIV and Cultural Rights.

The Benefits Of Hosting Blog Parties

In case you're wondering, yes, blog parties are an effective way to promote your cause, web site, organisation or company. Here are some of the benefits:

1. It creates space for a concentrated discussion on the chosen issue/theme.
2. Increased traffic on the web sites of the participants.
3. Your blog party participants help you to connect with new people who may not have previously known about you. Some will join in the dialogue, others will even subscribe to your web site so they can continue the discussion after the party period.
4. It creates interest from media and other stakeholders. BTW, so far in this party, I've received enquiries from:

• one national newspaper, which did a feature article on the organisation and the cause
• one radio station, which interviewed my client for 15 minutes on the issue and the case
• one researcher who's going to profile my client as a case study on the use on online social nmedia
• one writer who's due to release a second edition of a book on small business and is going to profile my business as a case study for the new media element of the book.
• one organisational blog has asked to profile my client about its 16 Days blog activities.

And keep in mind that the content we have created will be available on the sites long after this party is finished, providing users with information and resources. Not a bad deal, hey?

Moira Richard’s Commemoration of 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence

These posts will be updated as the campaign continues...

Day 1

http://www.redroom.com/blog/moira-richards/day-1

Day 2

http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/11/26/day-2/

Day 3

http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/11/27/day-3/

Day4

http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/11/28/day-4/

Day 5

http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/11/29/day-5/

Day 6

http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/11/30/day-6/

Day 7

http://damariasenne.blogspot.com/2010/12/10-reasons-why-its-easier-for-man-to.html

Day 8

Day 9

http://www.redroom.com/author/moira-richards  

Day 10

http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/12/04/day-10/  

Day 11

http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/12/05/day-11/ 

Day 12

http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/12/06/day-12/  

Day 13

http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/12/07/day-13/

Day 14

http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/12/08/day-14/

Let's Talk About Domestic Violence By Moira Richards

Domestic Violence has become a nice 'safe' term to use when we talk about this kind of women abuse. It rolls too easily off the tongue and no-one stops to wonder at the irony that two such disparate concepts - 'Violence' and 'Domestic' - can slip so comfortably into the same phrase. It is a sanitized term that protects us from having to think too deeply about all the ugly deeds that hide behind it. Let me tell you some of the things that you are being told about, the next time you encounter the term ‘Domestic Violence’.


In physical abuse a man may punch his wife with his fists, or kick her if she has fallen to the ground. If she is pregnant, he might kick her in the abdomen. Weapons are also used in physical abuse - sometimes he will beat her with a stick, or stab her with a broken bottle, or shoot her with a gun. Or else he might just threatened her with these weapons.

A woman might even have none of those things done to her, but she might instead, find herself pushed or chased out of her home and locked outdoors in the middle of the night. Perhaps it will be raining or cold or unsafe outside, perhaps her young children will be locked out with her, by their father, or perhaps they will be shut inside with him and unable to reach her.

If a woman has to have sex with her man, whether she feels like it or not. If he makes her sleep with his mates. If he comes home late at night, drunk and disgusting and forces himself inside her. If he commits any of these all too common crimes, he is guilty of a form of Domestic Violence known as sexual abuse.

Domestic Violence also includes emotional, verbal and psychological abuse. In this kind of abuse, a man may always be insulting his wife in public, or humiliating her or rudely ignoring her. Perhaps he acts overly jealous or with rudeness when she talks to other people, and in this way, exerts his control over her social contact with others. He may bruise her face or lock her in the house to prevent her from getting to work, and to try to make her lose her job. He may even 'love' her so much that he will threaten to kill himself whenever she tries to leave him and make herself a new life without him.

And there is economic abuse. A man may take control of all the family finances, and refuse to let his wife know anything about their financial situation, or allow her to help to manage it. He might keep all their joint income to himself and just give her a small allowance. He may take her wages from her and spend her money on alcohol or drugs for himself, or sell her possessions so he can get money.

Domestic Violence can also include a pattern of 'innocent' behaviour that is intended to bother or terrorize a woman. Her ex-boyfriend may just lurk all the time near her office or home. Perhaps he or his mates pester her with anonymous telephone calls or clog her mail with repeated nuisance email messages.

I’ve just tipped the ice-berg here. The men who abuse the women whom supposedly they love, hide more atrocities behind Domestic Violence than I could bear to know.



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Follow the campaign:

Day 9: http://www.redroom.com/author/moira-richards

Shukumisa: http://www.shukumisa.org.za/

Damaria Senne’s Blog Party: http://damariasenne.blogspot.com/

Day 7: http://damariasenne.blogspot.com/

10 Reasons Why It's Easier For A Man To Pass HIV To A Woman By Moira Richards

This guest post is part of the blog party we're hosting to commemorate the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence Campaign. It's the 7th post in a series of 16 posts by Moira Richards, published in the Red Room, Book SA and the Shukumisa web site.

It is easier for an HIV positive man to pass the virus onto a woman during sexual intercourse than it is for an infected woman to pass it onto a man. This is due to various biological factors that I won't discuss here. Besides this biological susceptibility, there are a number of social and cultural factors that make it even more difficult for women to escape the deadly virus. I've counted ten factors that I've listed below, but maybe you'll come up with more...

1 MALE POWER - Usually it is the man who initiates sexual encounters in a relationship. The woman might get to say Yes or No, but rarely does she feel empowered to negotiate safe sexual practice. Not many a woman is able to sit her prospective lover down and negotiate with him the use of condoms, a monogamous relationship, or HIV screening before they first slide into bed together.

2.  PROTECTIVE DEVICES - A female condom is one that a woman can wear to protect herself from sexually transmitted diseases. Unfortunately, they are neither as cheap nor as readily available as male condoms. There is also relatively little information disseminated to women to publicise the existence and the life-saving capabilities of female condoms, or of the other protective measures that might reduce their risks of infection.

3. PARENTAL POWER - Many cultures expect unmarried girls to be ignorant of sexual matters, and often allow a girl's parents to decide whom she must marry. This means that these young girls don't know about the HIV/AIDS risks that their husbands may bring to them. They are also unable to choose for themselves, a mate that they can trust not to infect them.

4. SLAVERY - Sometimes girls are sold by their families into sexual slavery. They must then have sex with whoever their 'owner' orders them to have sex with. No chance here for them to insist on safe sexual practice.

5.  ECONOMIC - Many, many women have to turn to prostitution so that they can earn money to eat. Their poverty is so dire that they are hardly in a position to insist that their clients use a condom. If they do, they are likely to lose the client to a competitor. Sometimes a client will offer to pay a prostitute more for unprotected sex and so the women are enticed by money to take life-threatening risks.

6. RAPE - Our world's atrociously high incidence of female rape exposes women more and more to HIV infection, as well as to the trauma of rape.


7.  CHILD ABUSE - As HIV/AIDS becomes more and more of a risk to sexually active

men so does their demand for virginal young women and girls who present no risk to them, increase. This means that very young girls are targeted as the victims of men who travel on sex holidays.

Little girls, toddlers and babies even, are often raped by HIV positive men in some countries because the myth abounds that they can cleanse themselves of the virus if they have sex with a virgin.

8. INSTITUTIONAL POWER - Various sites on the internet store articles that deal with the sexual abuse of nuns by the Catholic priests. Relevant to this article is the argument of some of these guilty priests. They say they need to obtain sexual favours from the nuns because otherwise they will be obliged to have sex with the local village girls and risk contracting HIV/AIDS from them. Therefore, it is much safer for the priests to use the nuns to satisfy their sexual needs.

9 FGM - Female Genital Mutilation has its own story of tragic repercussions, and not least among them is the increased risk of contracting HIV/AIDS that its victims suffer. These operations are often performed under primitive surgical conditions and a whole groups of teenage girls are circumcised together. Rarely is the piece of metal or glass used, sterile. Great are the chances that the bloodied knife that cuts one HIV positive lass, will be used again immediately, on the one lying next to her, and on the one next to her too...

Often, the genital mutilation is of such a nature that the girls bruise and bleed every time they have sex thereafter. These types of open wounds in the genital area will increase significantly their chances of contracting the HIV virus from an infected partner.

10. SPOUSAL PROMISCUITY - In many cultures, women are expected to be virginal before marriage and to have no other lover than their husband after they have married. In these same cultures, it is also usually acceptable for men, both single and married, to be sexually promiscuous. Therefore, even a woman who lives a sheltered and monogamous life, will be at risk of infection from her husband. Perhaps she can only pray that he practices safe sex outside the marriage, or perhaps she is just blissfully unaware of his infidelity.



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Follow the campaign:

Day 8: http://www.shukumisa.org.za/

Shukumisa: http://www.shukumisa.org.za/

Damaria Senne’s Blog Party: http://damariasenne.blogspot.com/

Day 6: http://moirarichards.book.co.za/blog/2010/11/30/day-6/