American Incongruity

"The earth, reeling as it is, produces more than enough food to feed plentifully every man, woman and child on the planet. There is enough food; yet, our economic system produces murderous scarcity. A few have more than they can consume, so much that garbage disposal is a critical problem; while millions perish in sight of plenty. One nation, containing a tiny fraction of the earth's population (the majority of whom think of themselves as Christians), consumes half the earth's resources, yet it still manages not to feed its own hungry."

Theodore Jennings, Jr. - Good News to the Poor

and...

Nationals:-
...we lost in the semi-final to my old Joburg team. Drat.
...we were unbeaten in the 6 pool matches though, and i was very happy with how i played. Had a great hammer throw to score against Khaya, and a full length layout score against Disc-functional.
Read the report in the local press here, as well as a podcast with my captain (Brent) and others on the state of Ultimate in SA.
Next up is Worlds in Vancouver in August. We are sending two teams and if i can find the cash i'll be playing for the open team at Worlds. That would be awesome!


CPE:-
If it took more than a week for me to blog about ultimate, then i must be really busy with CPE! I am. It's manic, hard and uncomfortable, but still very good. We had our Mid-term Evaluations last week, and it's amazing to see how far we have all come in 6 weeks.
This weekend i didn't get to rest either, as i was doing a Coma-Care course - how to care for and communicate with patients in comas. Pretty intense! For the rest of CPE one of my wards will now be the neurosurgery ward and the neurosurgery ICU. Wish me luck as i 'chaplain' comatose patients!
It's a pity i don't have time to write up some of my experiences here, as they really are stretching and messy and alive. Maybe i'll take a 2 week holiday when i'm done and let you in on the adventure that is CPE at Groote Schuur.

For now though, it's back to work. I've got a verbatim to write for tomorrow, as well as the daily CPE reflections. Expect a bit of silence on this blog for the next few weeks.

Hooray! SA are world champs!!!

Just so that all my CTS friends know the great news (in case it didn’t make breaking news on CNN):
South Africa are the rugby world champions!

Hooray! We won last night in France in a tough match against defending champions England. There were crazy celebrations all around the country, partying like it was 1995. (in 1995 we won the World Cup for the first time, here at home). I’m especially happy because our captain John Smit, was at high school with me! Hooray again!

Captain John Smit, left, and coach Jake White
with the Webb Ellis trophy [GALLO/GETTY]

Now for the 2010 Soccer World Cup.
(PS - standing offer to all foreign friends - come to SA for the 2010 Soccer World Cup and you can stay with me and experience the whole thing!)

Spot the difference

Recognise this picture?

The world according to: Land Area

And this one?

The world according to: Wealth (GDP 2002)

Something wrong?

The world according to: HIV/Aids prevalence

I recently found a wonderful website: WorldMapper -"The world as you have never seen it before". The map of the world is 'redrawn' according to various themes and data. Have a look around - its rather scary at times. Very telling are the maps of wealth, Aids, military spending and child-deaths. Very telling indeed!
These type of statistics always seem to bring to mind George Orwell's words from his political satire masterpiece Animal Farm:

"All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others."

What i missed in London

I just so happened to fly out of London on Sat Aug 26, which just so happened to be a public holiday weekend, which just so happened to be the Notting Hill Carnival weekend as well as a huge Get Loaded in the Park party in the on Clapham Common on Saturday with big names like Carl Cox et al. Oh well you can't have it all, I had to cross the ocean to get to a baseball game.

2PhunkedUp is the name of Greg and Balt's dj label, and they are making a few waves in the UK house scene. I even have one of their pins! They throw neat parties and if you want go to their site you will find our buddy Charlie in most of the pictures of these gatherings.

London town holiday

SAA don't fly direct to Atlanta anymore (though the inside info I have from Delta is that they are opening a JHB-ATL route in January), so this gave me a great excuse to fly via LONDON! Because it is the modern South African's Mecca, there are a lot of my friends over there, as well as my only Aunt.

I had a great time seeing all of them. I met up with old YWAM friends that I really hadn't seen in 5 years - Rachel, Leah and a surprised of Jurie too! I spoke to Lizzie and Emma and it was neat seeing where the 5 years had taken all of us. We met at Wetherspoons Pub in Sheperds Bush. It was off my Lonon map, so quite an adventure knowing when to get off the bus. As i said - good times!

Then, my 'sis' Bi and 'bruthu' Charles from the good old days of the Hampton Road Home Group. I had lunch, supper, chilled, visited them at work and saw the lights of London with them. Thanks for the Chinese Charlie, and the Pret-a-Manger Bianca. I also had a suprise visit from Nikki and Lezaan - friends from Tuks! yay.

I made the obligatory stop at GAP with my aunt, had great food and conversation with her and Roger, and ran around London on my own too. I didn't really do the sights, but did visit the Tate Modern, shop on Oxford and go to Camden town where i may have got a piercing. But then again i may not have...

5 days was too short, and I caught the tube way to early on Sat and flew out across the Atlantic, sure that i didn't have any liquids in my luggage.