Nomenclature

How apt that you should merely motion, saying nothing: for this land has not yet been given a name, certainly not a Latin one; it does not yet exist.

- André Brink, An Instant in the Wind

(Audio)Books I've actually (re-)finished lately: 90

South African English

You say that the title pages of French translations of your books read, Traduit de l'americain. Mine say Traduit de l'anglais (Sud-Africaine).

- JM Coetzee, Here and Now: letters 2008-2011

The Great Man theory of history

Rorke came to South Africa because of a lack of potatoes in Ireland.

- David Rattray, The Day of the Dead Moon

Manliest of the Match

And my Dove Men+ Care Man of the Match is... Dan Biggar.

- Welsh commentator, Wales vs. South Africa

Free ebook!

(now with added typo-humour!!) courtesy of Denis Beckett.

Public Service Announcement

There's an advert out and about at the moment encouraging you to switch your e-mail wossnames over to Microsoft, because Outlook - unlike those corporate monsters at Google/Gmail - won't go through your correspondence and milk every second word for targeted marketing data.

I'm on Outlook [herefore known by the entire world as 'Hotmail', but whatever], and a little over half an hour ago I sent a mail to a friend in South Africa discussing my holiday plans for Christmas in Sri Lanka and his mother's well-being in Cape Town. I now have an e-mail - in my Junk folder, admittedly/amusingly - from an unknown South African travel agent, urgently inviting me to experience the wondrousness of Cape Town this December.

From which we learn:

1) that Outlook almost certainly are reading your e-mails; but
2) they're just not very good at it - otherwise they'd have noticed:

• that I've already booked my Christmas holiday,
• that I will clearly not be spending the festive season in South Africa, and
• that the bulk of our correspondence was taken up with the fact that Denis's mum's place in Cape Town has recently been violently burgled.

Sins of nervous editorial omission?

A postcard from South Africa has reached its destination almost 53 years after it was sent. The black and white holiday postcard has a picture of a South African child on the front...

- from yesterday's Times

Anyone else see what they did there?

Getting Wood

This is a good liberal country where everyone has rights, including the right to pretend you’re recognising everyone’s rights when you’re not.

- Michael Wood nails the New South Africa in District 9