Highlight Moment from my life #48: World’s Most Famous Dolphin – No_bob

Many of you will know of No_bob, the world’s most famous stuffed dolphin. But you may not know the story.

In 2000 i flew to the UK to earn some money teaching [due to an unfortunate police clearance incident i only ended up doing five days of actual teaching which was a high-or-low-light of itself and mostly looked after old people or University professors, who were about equally competent] so that i could join Youth With A Mission in Holland and go and save the world, or something.

Highlight Moment from my life #78: Fish Net stocking tan.

i have cycled the Argus Cycle tour 19 times.

The Argus Cycle tour [now allegedly called something else due to new sponsorship, but it will always be the Argus] is a 109km cycling race [mostly, except when it isn’t!] that is the largest timed cycling race in the world with over 35000 people crazily taking it on every year.

i have finished it 16 and a half times.

the greatest cricket match of all time

i took a moment at lunchtime yesterday to step out of my body and just really take in what was happening in front of my eyes:

a guy busy in mid phone conversation running in to bowl to a batsman trying to play shots with just his left hand on the bat [as he had broken his right hand recently in a sister-encouraged skateboarding incident gone horribly wrong] while South African Sevens rugby player Paul Delport [who my two friends referred to as Thinus Delport the whole time and i didn’t just cos i didn’t know any better altho that was the name i recognised] stood to the side waiting for a catch…

okay it was not quite the 438 SA win over Australia that took place mostly while i was cycling a really enthusiastic Argus Cycle tour on the 12th of March, 2006, which in all probability was the greatest one day cricket match ever, but it felt like it should have been up there with the real sense of surreal that pervaded what was taking place before my eyes…

a moment later my friend MJ [aka Muscle-John, Majay, Michael-John] was writhing on the ground with the agony that cannot be properly addressed or tended to as my other mate [one armed skateboarding Roy Conrad Langhein] had the ‘great idea’ of emulating 2.21m [7 foot three] Pakistan bowling giant Mohammad Irfan by hoisting MJ on to his shoulders to bowl a ball from the same height, not taking into account that the forward motion and energy of delivering the ball might affect the centre of gravity so much that Mj would go tumbling forwards off Roy [altho with bits of him not able to go forward as easily due to Roy’s head being in the way causing said infliction] and deciding to rather appreciate Irfan’s height and bowling ability from the stands.

we ended up sitting two rows behind Paul and he was just such a friendly dude. he spent a lot of time chatting to us about the rugby sevens set up and the first win SA had had in a tournament for a bunch of years which they had just returned from and some of the training schedules and so on. for me this really captured the heart of what test cricket watching in SA has always been about – the vibe and the people and the fun and the chance to unwind and forget for a second about the seriousness and tragedy of all that is going on in the country and the reminder of why it is important to leave the game at the end of the day and take up the struggles of being a part of making a difference in all those difficult areas so that days of cricket can be enjoyed.

the day ended with these two young black kids about ten rows in front of us just picking up the vibe of the beat of the music that was playing and dancing with such life and energy and just seemingly for themselves – we all cheered when the camera guy finally saw them and trained his camera on them and we are hoping they made it onto highlights footage of the day, but they really just seemed to encapsulate the hope and life and energy that exists in south africans and especially the youth of this country and the hope that difference and chance and betterment is possible and achievable and, dare i say it, even likely?

what a day. what a game. what a vibe. more, South Africa, more.

Weekly Photo Challenge: (Geometry)

when i saw the topic for this week’s photo challenge was geometry i quickly ended up at this photo which was the unfortunate consequence of an inspirationally creative idea colliding with a unfortunate forgetting of a necessary tool to pull off said idea…

every year i have cycled the 109km [67.7295 mile] Argus Cycle tour in Cape Town, South Africa, both the largest individual times race in the world and one of the most beautiful in terms of scenery along the way… and for most of those years i cycled in creative costumes, largely involving the use of pink tights [simply because i had them left over from some children’s drama i once did] and this particular year the pink tights were done and i had to get more creative and so managed to convince a friend of a friend of mine to cycle with me in fish net stockings…

we may have forgotten to put on the required amount of sun tan lotion. in fact we may have forgotten to apply any sun tan lotion at all. not a wise thing to miss when you are about to spend 6 or more hours in the hottest hours of the blazing sun while cycling and so this criss-cross pattern was the result and the geometry stayed with us for a couple of months…

which brings me to my second pic and a much less personally painful one taken on a trip to a youth conference in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and this geometry-laden pic of a variety of shapes scattered below the walkway of the Petronas Twin Towers… the circles, triangles and squiggles combining and contrasting helping create what almost feels like a musical kind of symmetry to it…

 

 

[For the previous Photo Challenge on the theme of ‘Foreign’ click here]

orange you glad i didn’t say “river trip”

so tomorrow i join with andrew of vaughan once more (as i did two years ago) and a bunch of youngsters from Christchurch, Kenilworth, to head up to and then down the river of orange (yes, it’s my new thing, deal with it!) and i am very much looking forward to it…

originally we were hoping that the beautiful val would be able to be there but sadly thesising and her old housemate’s wedding will be keeping her away and so we will have to make do with singing and talking and poetising about her as we did last time – when she arrived to pick me up after the previous trip the whole bus of youths felt like she was an old friend and a bunch of them even got out and hugged her…

looking forward to a big reunion with Ollie of Ver who was our river guide, my co-writer and singer of ‘give me hope Johanna people-on-river-trip themed songs (along with daniel of corder who sadly won’t be making it this time) who challenged me (well i don’t know if it was an active challenge but he did it so i kinda had to) to ten pushups which he did on his canoe which i then did (or did we do twenty?) with another guy (andrew winter perhaps?) across two canoes and then he did a headstand on his canoe and i think it was getting late by then… amazing guide, amazing trip, can’t wait…

altho there is this little nagging feeling in the back of my mind that i call stayawayfromthearguscycletourophobia which is the internal wailing scream of “never again!” that one sings to oneself (in a grunge metal combination of merit) for about 103 of the 109km of the Argus Cycle tour due to pain and cramp and wind and what-was-i-thinking (maybe last year’s argus cycle tour was not sufficient training for this one and getting on my bike at least once between races might have helped) and so on. but then a day later someone asks, “so are you going to do the argus cycle tour next year?” and you hear the words, “oh of course yes, wouldn’t miss it” come out of your mouth like some bad twilight zone episode curse…

so there is that nagging feeling… i’m not sure if it was the cold or the wet or the killing my arms by playing gondolier boy to lucy (my most excellent boat buddyess except in the bringing-suitable-snacks-for-brett department) slash showing off or the missing of my future wife or the bugs or the hard floor or the…

oh boy.