It’s UN International Day of Happiness

FACT: More girls have been killed in the past 50 years, precisely because they were girls, than men were killed in all the battles of the twentieth century.

Shocking, ey? Today is UN International Day of Happiness and I am so serious about it that I made an embarrassing selfeo (selfie + video, get it?). It doesn’t contain unicorns or dancing – though there is some glitter. Obviously.

When the optimist fights back

Sometimes the best form of attack is to dance to a happy song. With a feather duster, naturally.

Confessions of an optimist

I am an optimist. Always have been. At one point I used to label my condition as ‘terminal optimism’. It’s not that I was suggesting a positive outlook would kill me, simply that I was committed to being optimistic until the day I died.

And then 2013 arrived. And what a load of kak it brought!

Seriously, I’m the poster girl for the glass half full ‘tude, but 2013 has really pushed it. And November? Well, it’s hands down winner of the ‘month of the year’ award for sheer volume of kakness delivered.

I would love to say my position is based on a broad world view that encompasses typhoons, civil wars, global hunger and the like, but I’m afraid that mostly my whining is all about things that have happened to me, my family and my friends. To be honest, mostly me. There have been unexpected deaths, challenging health situations, frustrating career flat-lines and painful relationship traumas. And while I know that my problems are mere trifles in comparison to so many – in fact I feel almost blessed if this is what constitutes a bad year for me –  still, they are mine, and I end this year feeling somewhat battered.

I know – cue tiny violin, right?

Fortunately it is not the way of the optimist to be beaten and quite frankly, as much as I have a tendency to wallow, I find negativity rather more exhausting than it is worth. And since no doubt millions of new year’s resolutions will take inspiration from the late Tata Madiba, it seems appropriate to remember his words: “Do not judge me by my successes, judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again.”

In fact, if I were feeling generous I suppose 2013’s kak should be thanked for teaching me some valuable lessons about who I want to be when I grow up and reminding me what is really important in life. It’s made me cherish true friends, value supportive family, count my many, many blessings and think about practical changes I need to effect in 2014 to make it a happier, healthier more productive year. And so, with a nod to The Happiness Project, here are my twelve commandments for the new year:

1. Be Jen
2. Be honest – not least with myself.
3. Make time for the people who make time for me.
4. Make time count – and yes, that means less Facebook (it kills productivity and turns relationships lazy)
5. Do more of what I love, and love more of what I do.
6. Read more.
7. Write less – for the wrong reasons and to the wrong people, that is.
8. Cultivate energy – respect my body and Go. To. Bed. Earlier!
9. Be brave.
10. Practice decisiveness.
11. Let it be.
12. Live in the present.

A bit of a haphazard list, but there you have it. I am thinking I might need to appoint a quarterly review board to help keep me on track. A sort of personal performance review. After all, that’s where bonuses come from 😉

Whatever your ambitions for 2014, however big or small, I hope the universe keeps you safe and helps you to achieve them. Love big and live well – Happy New Year!

Small things that matter

Stop phubbing, start talking.

I admit, I can be a bit of a wimp, but I reckon only the exceptionally stoic amongst us would have watched the recent coverage of the terror attack in Kenya without flinching. Me, I had to fight back tears on more than one occasion and you know what, I’m okay with that, because this sort of thing should upset us.

Now it’s not that I want us to be upset, of course not, but I for one don’t think I will ever comprehend how people can be so cruel to each other. What drives teenagers to gun down innocent people in a shopping centre, a mother to starve her vulnerable four year old son to death, and gangs of men to commit violent sexual offences? Clearly in some cases one could argue religion and politics but even then, I just don’t get it. How can any good come from inflicting pain and suffering?

I think in part the problem is that in a hyper-connected, increasingly virtual, world, we have forgotten how to connect with each other as people. We walk around with our heads U-turned into smartphones so that we can tweet, email, and Facebook. We watch reality TV and play life-like video games. We use hashtags for emphasis and emoticons for sentiment, and when we visit a new country, we spend so much time behind a camera lens Instagramming our dinner and applying filters to our photos of the locals, that we forget to experience the moments and the people in them. We see stuff on the news, lots of stuff, from all over the world, so much stuff that looks a bit like reality TV and a bit like video games and a bit like Instagram that it all sort of blends into a big hazy mass of stuff…stuff that’s real, but not so much to me. Until someone gets the balance wrong and forgets that it’s the school fair that’s real, not the weapons of mass destruction.

I appreciate that I am simplifying a very complex problem, and without a beauty queen crown on my head I feel ill-equipped to offer any real advice on securing world peace, but I do think that reconnecting with people and with community has to be a good starting point in the reclamation of humanity. It may be ‘easy’ to fire a gun at the anonymous, but surely not quite as easy if you’ve celebrated a shared football team’s win at your local pub with Mr Anonymous? And certainly child abuse can’t be quite as easy to get away with when people feel empowered by a sense of community to ask questions when in a first-world city, a four-year old is seen scavenging through a bin?

As I say, world peace is not entirely within my gift, but connecting with the people in my community is. It’s why over the past few weeks I have made one very small but very conscious change to my daily routine;  I have made it a rule to always smile, greet and make eye contact with bus drivers. My logic is simple: we’re all human, we all want to be noticed. A smile and a moment of eye contact may not seem like much, but they say something important. They say “I see you, you’re real and you matter.” And once you have that, you chip away at anonymity, reinstate humanity and open up the possibility of community.

It’s a small thing, but then maybe it’s the small things that matter.

Steal our rooibos? The ‘Gaul’ of it!

The real shape of rooibos.

In a case of please don’t pardon the French, the South African Rooibos Council (SARC)  – with only four days notice – had until last Wednesday, 24 July, to prevent yet another French company from trying to lay claim to the name ‘rooibos’. According to SARC co-ordinator Soekie Snyman, until such time as rooibos is recognised as a protected geographic indication – as with Darjeeling tea, Basmati rice and, ahem, Champagne  – the industry body has to keep applying to block companies from registering the name as a trademark.

Rooibos which, though strictly speaking not a tea is – I would argue –  even more strictly speaking, ours, considering it is traditionally grown in the Cederberg region two hours north of Cape Town.  South Africa began exporting rooibos in 1904 and the industry now keeps around 4,500 people in jobs and sends 70%  of its output to European Union states.

Given that this is the second time in less than a year that a French company has tried to nick rooibos, and just eight years since a US attempt to do the same resulted in an out-of-court settlement, one wonders why it’s taken so long for the South African government to wake up and smell the tea and protect one of our most recognisable brands.

But wake up they eventually have and earlier this month the South African trade ministry proposed regulations to protect rooibos under the Merchandise Marks Act, stating: “The name rooibos can only be used to refer to the dry product, infusion or extract that is 100% pure rooibos – derived fromAspalathus linearis and that has been cultivated or wild-harvested in the geographic area as described in this application.”

Take THAT you champagne quaffing hypocrites!

This is obviously good news for SARC which, while not wanting to prevent rooibos-related trademarks around the world, wants the same level of exclusivity bestowed on France’s sparkling wine (yes, that is a dig) to fall on South Africa and our, very much homegrown,rooibos. But whether it comes in time to save rooibos from the French remains to be seen.

Fortunately, I have an idea. A big, blue cock(amamy) idea.

You see Wednesday 24 July was not only the deadline for saving our red bush, it was the day a big blue cock came to roost on Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth. Though German artist Katharina swears her motivation was more phallic than Gallic –  “It’s about male posing, about showing power, about showing … erections! I mean, look at that column!” – one can’t help but laugh at the irony of a 4.7 metre tall blue rooster  (the national symbol of France) right beside a monument to commemorate Britain’s victory over the French.  No wonder Nelson’s back is turned!

So I say, let’s have the South African government give the French the bird. Our esteemed politicians are so good at passing gold amongst friends, you see, and heaven knows they’ve done far more bird-brained things in the past, so I can’t see that anyone would bat an eyelid if they were to present the French with a golden egg. A big one. An egg designed to fit snuggly under the blue rooster. And blast out La Marseillaise. At British tea-time. In eggschange, of course, we would require our rooibos.

I can only see one flaw in my plan which is  the potential outcry from the  homophobic French public over suggestions that their beloved cockerel, by virtue of apparent egg-laying, is gay. But hey, that’s not our problem. Let the French and the English discuss that over tea. Rooibos tea.

**This post also appears under my column for The South African.**

My Mandela

In 2004 when plans to erect Ian Walters’ bronze statue of iconic South African statesman Nelson Mandela on the north side of Trafalgar Square in London were publicised*, I recall feeling petulantly annoyed. Who were the Brits, I sulked, to lay claim to MY Madiba from MY South Africa. Sure, I wanted the world to recognise this man who, not single-handedly but with a singular spirit, changed the trajectory of my home country, but there is honouring and then there is nicking. At the time, this felt like nicking.

This week, as Madiba lies ‘critically ill’ – I prefer to recognise it as age, not illness  – in a Pretoria hospital,  there can be no hiding from the fact that this deified, but ultimately human, man is rapidly approaching the end of his time on this earth. As much as his passing is something  South Africans in particular have dreaded, it is a fact that we – and the world – have generally come to accept. I am ashamed to say that I refer to the world with a degree of reluctance because once again, I can’t help but feel a child-like jealousy at the thought that when the inevitable happens, people for whom Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela will never be more real than a statue, or a poster, or the cover of a magazine, will mourn loudly and publicly.

But then what is real, and who owns Mandela anyway?

For me, the tears that have surprised me over my bowl of cornflakes as I watch breakfast TV updates on his condition, are very real indeed. They stem from a love of my country but also from a very personal experience of meeting Mr Mandela in 1999. I was a 21 year old student in Grahamstown in the Eastern Cape. Mr Mandela came to town to officially open the National Arts Festival and I covered the story for the student-run festival television station. Desperate to meet the man, my friend Ilda and I appealed to various bodyguards and then pleaded with his personal assistant, Zelda, to allow us ‘an audience’.

The day he became MY Madiba. (yes, I know I don’t look like me…)

My overwhelming memory of that meeting is of the feeling of Madiba’s hands. Surrounded by photographers, he singled Ilda and I out claiming that he wanted a photograph with us. Before hugging us both to him, he took my hands in his and I vividly recall thinking how very much like my grandfather’s hands they felt. The same warmth, the same gentle enveloping. From that moment on, Nelson Mandela wasn’t just an anti-apartheid hero, a former president, or a Nobel prize winner, he was someone whose hands I had held. He was MY Mandela.

But I concede this is an experience that has most likely – and wonderfully – been replicated in thousands of ways in hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people, around the world. I may have held his hands, but who am I to say this makes Nelson Mandela any more mine than the musician in Birmingham who recorded a protest song calling for his freedom, or the charity worker in San Francisco who follows a path based on his legacy?

Though admittedly no saint, in many ways beyond my knowledge and experience, MY Madiba has touched the lives of people across the world. I don’t own him any more than anyone else does, and certainly no more than his family, his friends and indeed, he himself. Ultimately Nelson Mandela is, as are we all, his own person, he just happens to have positively influenced more people than most which makes us feel like he is OURS. Like he is real to each of us. This is why it has pained us over recent weeks  to see his privacy and dignity compromised by bumbling politicians and vulturistic media, but also wonderfully why when he does leave us, ours will not be the state-sponsored mourning of the North Korea variety, it will be real.

Who is your Madiba?  Share your reflections in the comment box.

* The statue was finally erected in Parliament Square in 2007 after a 5 year debate over its location. And for the record, I am no longer sulking about it!

Why I run

Meep!

Remember that movie ‘What women want”? The one with Mel Gibson and Helen Hunt? Remember the ad campaign that Helen supposedly came up with for Nike? Well, when I think about running, that’s the campaign I think about. The one that works for me. The line was simply: ‘No games, just sports’.

I don’t remember when I started running, or even why. Quite frankly, I can’t quite work out how I’ve gone from being someone who once baulked at the thought of a 5km fun run, to someone with a drawer full – quite literally – to bursting with technical running gear about to take on one of the world’s most prestigious marathons: ‘London’, as it’s known to the running community. Or even just ‘the marathon’ if you’re a Londoner.

But here I am, the night before the night before, my body an ode to the carb, wondering why exactly I run. Especially since I still do not consider myself to be ‘a runner’.

I don’t run because I particularly enjoy it. Early starts, freezing races, red face, aching muscles – seriously?!

I don’t run for the social life. Apart from race days, I tackle running solo

I don’t run because I’m good at it. Sure, I have serviceable pins that get me around a course, but I’m no athlete. I have no special aptitude for either speed or endurance. Which is why I…

…don’t run to win.

So then, why run?

I run to remind myself what a marvel the human body is  – and what it is capable of. Even mine.

I run to feel part of the human race, not the rat race.

I run to have something to work towards – and something to achieve.

And I run because there are no games, just sports. Running is the one activity that allows my mind a break; that focuses my brain on the present. When I run I can’t over-analyse or worry or scheme. My thoughts are limited to ‘ooh look, what a cute puppy, or ‘eek, mind that puddle’ or ‘just to that next tree’.

In part I run also because I’ve been ambushed. It’s a crafty little critter, the running bug. It sneaks up on you and wham! Before you know it, you’re a runner, addicted to the endorphin rush! I have been very vocal about the fact that not only will this be my first and last marathon, but once it’s done, I expect to pack my running gear away for a long, long time. Yet just yesterday I started thinking about the next race. You see, crafty I tell you!

So come Sunday morning, despite injury and illness, I will be making my way, nervously, to Blackheath to line up for the start of the Virgin London Marathon 2013. I honestly have no idea whether I will make the distance – which I guess is part of the attraction – but I do know that I’ll be running to be part of the human race, to marvel at the human body, to focus my mind on the present and to achieve something. I’ll also be running for charity, for my family and friends and also, quite compellingly, because a five year old girl expects me to show her my medal and I don’t want her to make the ‘L’ sign on her forehead if I cop out!

Wish me luck!

You wouldn’t see Branson selling that

I, like a surprising number of people, am a wannabe entrepreneur. Or at least, I think I am. Admittedly I’m up against an innate laziness but I also know that I was designed for more than this – and that I am entirely capable of achieving this ‘more’ if I just get off my posterior and actually do something. That’s why I dedicated a couple of days last week to attending Entrepreneurs 2012 in London, a 4-day conference headlining former US president Bill Clinton.

 

I went in search of inspiration, motivation, good advice and a swift kick up the aforementioned posterior. And while I did indeed come back with pockets of this, the event left me feeling a bit uncomfortable. Some might blame this on the severe lack of ‘biology breaks’ in the programme but I am going to put it down to ‘infomercialitis’: the feeling that you’ve stepped out of the real world into one giant infomercial. 

 

Now correct me if I am wrong, but has Richard Branson, now or ever, stood on a stage and spent 45 minutes peddling the secrets of his success by way of a three day course payable in monthly installments? What about Bill Gates or Oprah? Have they? Admittedly my research is limited to a swift Google search but nowhere have I come upon the key to Oprah’s media empire success in a handy DVD box set. 

 

Yet at Entrepreneurs 2012, this seemed entirely acceptable, expected even. I will confess to being infuriatingly naive and embarrassingly gullible – not to mention a newbie to the entrepreneurial event circuit – so perhaps my expectation of less sell, more tell was unrealistic. For a time I even questioned my cynicism, trying instead to see the value in having people who have quite obviously done well for themselves sell me their models. I mean, let’s be fair, they’ve made millions, why not pay them a couple of thousand quid to help me get in on the action? No doubt for many this works, but try as I might it feels somehow ethically wrong to me. Possibly it’s my naivety again but I simply cannot ascribe to a view that suggests I can’t do this whole entrepreneurial thing my way with no more than good advice, keen observation, astute networking and hard work. 

 

But wait, there’s more…

The infomercial element aside, there were some great elements to the event. For me the real value came during the final day when targeted selling was replaced by panel debates and keynote addresses. Who knew CEO of mobile provider EE, Olaf Swantee, was so committed to understanding his customers, phoning several personally to understand their experiences? And Bruce Dickinson, he of Iron Maiden fame – what a pleasure to listen to; authentic and open. Professor Dr Maurits Van Rooijen, CEO and Rector of London School of Business & Finance (LSBF), Julie Meyer, CEO and founder of Ariadne Capital, and Jonathan Ortmans, President of Global Entrepreneurship Week, all previously unknown to me, shared some real pearls of wisdom that inspired genuine thought and some further Googling to find out more.

 

The world needs more entrepreneurs

And of course there was Bill Clinton. Despite his obvious pulling power, I did not attend Entrepreneurs 2012 purely to hear Bill speak. But, I am glad that I did hear him because he tapped into something that I wholeheartedly believe: that entrepreneurship is not just about seizing an opportunity to make money, in today’s social, environmental and economic climate it’s also about finding ways to make a unique contribution to improving the state of the world. And it’s so exciting! Just think about all the opportunities out there! If necessity is the mother of invention we are in prime position! We need solutions to the energy crisis, solutions to poverty, solutions to environmental challenges. Everywhere we look there are opportunities to make a difference and make a living!

 

I have a slight aversion to moralistic quotes and soppy verses but there is a phrase that keeps my entrepreneurial aspirations alive. It’s the one that says “find a job you love and you’ll never work again”. I don’t need a ‘once-in-a-lifetime-three-day-course-at-only-£4,799(+VAT)’ to help me find this, I need authentic advice, good role models, the courage of my convictions and the thought that maybe, just maybe, I can change the world. If that’s naive well then so be it. Wish me luck!

The media wars that shape our reality

They say a lot of things, they do. Some are true, some, not so. One of the things they say is that there are two sides to every story. Journalism students are made to be particularly aware of this and reminded constantly that their role is to objectively report on both.

But what if objective reporting is impossible? What if there are more than two sides to a story and what if the journalists reporting back to us don’t even know this – or, if they do, can’t (or don’t) do anything about it?

I’m currently reading People Like us: Misrepresenting the Middle East by Dutch journalist Joris Luyendijk and man has it struck a chord! I confess that though I hold a degree in journalism I’ve never practised in the field and am not particularly diligent about reading the papers or following the news generally. In fact, it is my constant fear that I will be asked a question on current affairs and in attempting to answer it will expose my absolute lack of social and political intelligence.

So along comes Mr Luyendijk to reignite my interest in the mechanics of the media. For me the book is less about ‘the situation’ in the Middle East and more a reminder of the way political systems, PR and media shape our view of the world.

I have never been to Israel, nor have I experienced life in Palestine or Iraq, or spent time in Syria. Hell, aside from one or two acquaintances with a connection to Israel, I don’t even interact with people from these counties. Therefore, my entire opinion of what does or does not happen in these foreign lands is entirely in the hands of the likes of the BBC and The Guardian, who are in turn often in the hands of government officials.

Was I aware of the polished Israeli approach to media briefings following ‘incidents’? No. Within my Western framework, can I even begin to understand the notion of dictatorship and what that means for freedom of expression? Alas, no, because I have no concept of what it means to feel like your every thought is being policed and that this fear determines what one can and can’t tell a magazine reporter or show a camera crew. And what about words, the very things I claim to love? Have I ever stopped to really think about the lexicon used in the news and how this affects meaning? For example, how I react to an army “attacking” verses and army “acting” or “intervening, or to the word “assassination” versus the term “preventive military strike”. You know what, probably not.

In part this is just because I am getting on with my own life and as I don’t have the time to deconstruct the media, I put my faith in the fact that the media I am choosing to consume are genuinely able to provide a trustworthy account of things. I fear this is impossible and because I have no other genuine source of knowledge, I have no way of knowing what I am missing.

It’s scary to think that media coverage is probably the sole informant behind my understanding of ‘terrorism’, ‘fundamentalism’ and various other ‘isms’ that I have no first-hand experience of.

The rise of social media
Social media is, of course, starting to add a degree of balance. The use of tools like Facebook and Twitter, and even Blackberry Messenger and Whatsapp, to share user-generated content and organise normal citizens – as seen in the uprisings in Syria and in the UK riots of 2011 – means that the formal media is no longer the sole source of information. So if I want to verify what I see on BBC, I could turn to Twitter for ‘news on the ground’. Yet dictatorships will still affect who has access to these social media tools and can, therefore, still influence what views spread.

And so the real meaning of a media war becomes clear. It’s not about war and strife being covered by the world’s media and fighting for the best bits, it’s about a war that is carried out in the media and in many ways, shaped by that media. A TV channel that finds it has great footage of an event/ incident, may well decide to headline that evening’s news with the story. Another TV channel which finds its footage lacking in impact may instead choose to run the piece as a minor soundbite only. And so different audiences form different views based on how the media has presented the story and what the powers-that-be have provided by way of briefing material.

It’s scary to think that media coverage is probably the sole informant behind my understanding of ‘terrorism’, ‘fundamentalism’ and various other ‘isms’ that I have no first-hand experience of. This affects what political party I vote for, which charities I support and what comments I make on Twitter. Scarier still is the knowledge that you can never know what you don’t know. Unless you’ve experienced it, you don’t know that the intense loyalty shown by that man on the 8pm news is part of his insurance policy, the thing that will protect his family from harm by his country’s rulers. You don’t know that if the camera had zoomed out of its tight framing around the ‘violent mob’ you would have seen that this ‘mob’ was no more than a handful of people amidst a sea of bemused onlookers.

Even if you decide to carry out some research of your own, your search on Google will deliver different results to what I will see even if we search using the exact same term at the exact same time. This, because Google – and other search engines – will return results based on previous searching behaviour and will therefore decide what you are most likely to want to find, not necessarily what you should find.

Despite the sheer volume of information at our very fingertips, it seems we are as far away from true knowledge – and wisdom – as ever we were. Would it be too cynical of me to say so much for truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

And what time do you call this?!

Surely the best part of the day lies in those few minutes between when the alarm goes off in the morning and when you actually get out of bed. The bed is just the right temperature, your mind is a comfortable sort of hazy, and unless you’ve knocked the water glass off the side table in your fumble for the alarm, nothing has had a chance to annoy you yet. This is probably why I try and extend this time for as long as possible each morning. And why I am constantly late.

Not for everything, mind you, just for morning-based activities of the salt-mines variety. I realised I was probably taking this approach to punctuality a little too far when my arrival into work a few minutes earlier than my usual degree of lateness the other day was met with whoops and cheers. And when my manager, with an overt dose of sarcasm, asked whether I might be able to make a special appearance at normal start time the next day in order to cover a meeting for him, I knew I was going to have to start mending my ways*.

But it’s so hard! Not to mention seemingly ingrained in me. Just last week whilst reminiscing over our childhood, my brother told me off for constantly making him late for school. Really? I honestly don’t remember. I do remember getting dressed for school whilst still in bed under the covers though so maybe that had something to do with it.  Funnily enough I seem to be able to manage just fine on a weekend or on holiday when waking early means treats of the experiential variety!

 I realised I was probably taking this approach to punctuality a little too far when my arrival into work a few minutes earlier than my usual degree of lateness the other day was met with whoops and cheers.

Now that I’ve learned this about myself I wonder whether it doesn’t explain a few other things, like why I sometimes feel I’m just a little bit behind on where I should be in life. It’s true I am stubbornly reluctant to participate in any activity currently being obviously indulged in by the rest of the population.  It’s why my refusal to read anything by Stieg Larsson continues, why I have still not watched The Silence of the Lambs, Basic Instinct or Avatar, and why I will probably only consider buying leggings when they are consigned very firmly to the retro bin. So it stands to reason that maybe it is also why at the ripe old age of 28…okay, 31. Alright, alright, 33. At the ripe old age of 33, I am only now figuring out what I want to do with my life while my younger brother seems to be nearing early retirement as a squillionaire.

But no, ‘worry’ is the wrong term, because I’m not actually that worried, just a bit amazed that’s it’s taken me this long to get here. It’s why I’ve dubbed 2012 ‘The year of Living Bravely’. It’s a year for taking risks, making changes, embracing opportunity and dusting oneself off when the inevitable trips occur. It’s incredibly energising and therefore a fitting first post to this blog for 2012! And if you want to follow one of my brave adventures for 2012, check out my new monthly column in the African Business Journal which launches this Friday, 20th January. Whoopaah!

*Disclaimer: Acknowledgement of weakness with regards to getting out of bed early should not be read as an absolute commitment to improvement.