In Search of Consciousness

September 2010


I had never heard of CQ until recently. When I first came across these two letters in the Business Times I thought it was a new eau d’cologne. But I was wrong. CQ is the abbreviation for consciousness quotient, the corporate world’s new buzz word, and if HR practitioners and executive search consultants are to be believed, the key to future job success.

Now the question of consciousness is an area that has troubled philosophers and great thinkers for at least two thousand years. They have battled to come to a satisfying explanation of consciousness. In the last century alone volumes have been written and a plethora of neuro-scientific explanations have been forwarded all trying to make sense of this complex issue. Consciousness is a huge subject which covers areas such as feelings or emotions, belief, values, the mind, sensory stimuli, perceptions, thought, reason, experience, widely differing accounts of reality, intent and finally brain processes or neural activity. Scientists and psychologists even speak of streams of obtuse consciousness whatever that means. One thing we all agree on however is that the brain and not the anus is the seat of consciousness. It is by no means a field of study to be taken glibly or superficially.

How do we begin then to demystify the notion of consciousness? What is it like to have a consciousness? Some experts say it is simply a matter of heightened awareness. Another definition offered is that “a conscious state is a mental state we are conscious of being in.” OK so far so good. So for example I am presently in a very agitated mental state. Lightning has fried my DSTV decoder and I am seriously pissed off with my son for playing games on my laptop and infecting it with viruses. Being conscious of something then is merely a matter of firstly being awake, then mentally responsive to sensory stimuli or having some or other thought, feeling or emotion about it. If there is no thought we cannot speak of a mental state being in existence. Or when we speak of conscious experiences do we mean physical happenings as well?

The feint stirring Hugh Hefner sometimes feels in his loins when one of his scantily clad buxom bunnies walk past him, that is surely both a heightened state of awareness and a physical happening or is there really no physical sensation at all but merely his brain playing tricks on him. Either way he is thinking about them in a lusty way so he is presumably in a conscious state and will eventually regress into a highly distressed mental state because he cannot remember where he put his Viagra tablets.

The fact that an intelligent explanation of consciousness has eluded great minds has not deterred the intrepid talking heads of the corporate world who have fearlessly stepped into this minefield. There are clinical psychologists, HR managers, recruitment specialists and other consultants who no doubt do sterling work and do their bit for the improvement of humanity. Then there are the bottom-feeders among them, struggling to stay relevant who pass the time by inventing new jargon or corporate gobbledegook and live off the occasional scraps that indulgent bosses throw at them.

We all know what IQ stands for (in case you are wondering Mr Malema it stands for intelligence quotient, something which unfortunately seems to escape you) and we are all familiar with the term artificial intelligence. Artificial intelligence Julius is the type of instantly erased nanosecond intelligence commonly found in goldfish, algae and in Playboy Bunnies when they stick out their fake boobs, tilt their head to one side and pretend to know the answer to a question they have already forgotten.

We’ve had emotional intelligence or EQ thrown at us, as a must have for great leadership and there is even something called moral intelligence or MQ, which appears to be completely lacking in certain businessmen and politicians in South Africa and Greece and among bankers especially those working for Goldman Sachs. Now we have CQ or “consciousness quotient” as the new management fad to throw into the play pen. Psychologists tell us that there is an obvious link between inner states and human behaviour. Fine, easy enough to understand even for Julius. He ruptures a tyre and crashes his car in one of the many cavernous potholes his construction company should have repaired on the roads of Polokwane, a case of divine justice or fortune being a capricious mistress. He feels angry, stupid and unloved so he lashes out at a BBC journalist who asks him a clever question.

Psychologists define consciousness quotient as: “the general level of being conscious or aware throughout a day in regular life conditions.” Apparently what these geniuses have figured out is that CQ like IQ and EQ has a very important influence on the ability of employees to work and interact in an office environment. This is groundbreaking research and revolutionary thinking.

According to the experts who have invented this new CQ fad, we as human beings have a unique ability to be conscious of our own consciousness! And in a work environment, employees not only need to access certain information but once they have obtained this information or knowledge, it must also lead to a state of consciousness. What a profound thought! What a revelation! What else could it possibly lead to, a decision maybe or perhaps an involuntary bowel movement?

I bet the great thinkers and philosophers never thought about this one. How does one accomplish this unbelievably difficult task of having information at ones disposal and simultaneously being conscious? How about simply saying to someone, stop for a minute and think about what you are doing before you act. Or as some corporate coaches like to advise their clients, when in doubt call an SOS, an acronym for stop, observe and strategise.

It’s no wonder CEO’s are reluctant to part with shareholder’s money and are calling this new field “spiritualist mumbo jumbo” and other unprintable names. Advocates of CQ reply that consciousness and putting the “soul” back into business or doing as they put it “soulful business” is what it is all about. Most CEO’s have so much volatility, uncertainty, change and risk to worry about they have understandably never cared much about the soft stuff. They say talking about souls in the cut-throat and competitive business environment is a huge waste of time but as a result they are often labelled unenlightened and unevolved dinosaurs.

Apparently in this new age business environment you now need to show that you not only care about the soul of your clients but also the soul of each employee as well. How does one achieve this? Maybe we should ask Google. I can see emails circulating on the company’s intranet saying “Good morning everybody, please take note as of next week casual Friday has been replaced by soul Friday. Please remember to come to work barefoot and bring along your favourite pillow.” The next bank advert may well be: “We care because your soul matters to us!” The confessional has finally made it into the business environment. We’ve had ethical business, ubuntu in business, eco or green business, wellness in business, petro-dollars, pink dollars and now we have soul dollars. What next? I’m as confused as the next person.

HR experts now say we need to take CQ and “soul” into account when recruiting people. I’m not quite sure how you test for “soul” or “consciousness” but it seems the traditional methods or battery of tests, including aptitude, character, personality tests, learning styles, academic or technical qualifications, career history, work experience, past track record, relevant skills, CV, testimonials, integrity vetting and lie detector tests are no longer sufficient or even reliable indicators of success or suitability for a position. Dare we say that you need to do a whole lot of “soul searching”, so that you can determine whether the person you are employing is actually soulfully conscious and not some sleepwalking zombie with their eyes open.

Consciousness tests are not to be confused however with tests of conscience although the two words are related. Tests of conscience have proved successful to gauge feelings of guilt and the extent of remorse found in war criminals but found completely ineffective when applied to investment bankers. The deeper question to ponder is how do you conduct business and make money without losing your soul? Maybe Logan Pearsall Smith (1865 – 1946) had it right when he said: “Most people sell their souls and live with a good conscience on the proceeds.”

At first I struggled to understand the need for this new type of CQ testing or assessment. But on further reflection it slowly dawned on me why it is necessary and very important especially in South Africa. Think for a moment about some of the civil servants and employees working in government departments, municipalities and para-statals such as ESKOM, SAA, ARMSCOR, etc. There is no doubt that some of the people working in these organisations at every level, even in the very top or senior management echelons are overpaid, useless and grossly inefficient to the point of being negligent. You would hesitate to employ them as potato peelers in your local fish and chips shop.

This malaise is costing the country billions in fraud, wastage, inefficiency, delays, failed or stalled service delivery and non-implementation of policy directives. Up until now experts thought that these systemic failures were caused by employees either being ignorant or just plain stupid. Some employees may lack the requisite level of competence because there is no supervision, guidance, coaching and mentorship. As a result they lack the proper skills or on the job training while others are just plain lazy, wilfully obstructionist or corrupt.

But now another more serious condition has come to light. When we speak about consciousness we also need to take into account its opposite state namely, unconsciousness. Alarmed experts have now discovered that a far greater group of government civil servants and municipal employees are in a deep and heightened state of unconsciousness. According to government spokesperson, Prudence Mpondo-Williams, the government is taking this issue very seriously and is prepared to spend billions to rectify this problem so that it can meet its strategic policy objectives or targets.

The South African government has employed the services of the prestigious Geneva based Neuro-Scientific Institute at great cost, to run a battery of tests on these helpless state and municipal employees. After conducting exhaustive experiments they have found that these civil servants, municipal employees, Julius Malema and even George W. Bush have a lot in common. In all these instances and persons there isn’t a proper sequential firing of the neural triggers. Which means that at a very basic level, as in the case of a brick or a lavatory door, there is an absence of a clearly identifiable brain process, therefore we cannot speak of consciousness being present.

Once the state of unconsciousness is confirmed, the Institute uses a variety of secret techniques and therapies to reverse the condition and to bring these floundering employees out of their unconscious state and back into the real world of hard work, service, pride, responsibility, accountability and integrity. The aim is to bring all the unconscious incompetents into progressive phases of conscious incompetence until they are so ashamed by their inadequacies they strive to reach the final and desired stage of conscious competence.

According to a disgruntled former therapist who worked for the Institute, these techniques and therapies involve a combination of electro-shock therapy, deep level hypnotism, hot and cold water immersion therapy, childhood regression therapy and once they emerge out of their unconscious state, intensive neuro-linguistic programming, walking on hot coals, group wailing and chanting of repetitive mantras in a drumming circle under the stars next to a raging bonfire.

The problem is that these techniques and therapies have proven to be quite successful. Once brought back into a state of consciousness employees want to immediately regress back into their unconscious state. It’s akin to the shock and post-partum anxiety new born babies experience when they leave the warm comfort of their mother’s womb they start crying and want to go back into the safety of the dark. The employees soon realise that in a fully conscious state they need to be responsible, they need to think, make quick decisions and act. All this is hard work. It’s much easier to be in a permanently unconscious but eyes open state where life is reduced to performing simple or menial tasks, like grunting, scowling, sneezing, scratching, coughing, breathing, eating, swallowing, resting, sticking things in your ear and picking your nose to name but a few of our most basic bodily functions.

If we look further afield we’ll see that the word has even crept into the consciousness of the international political arena. In response to the Greek financial crisis German Chancellor Angela Merkel recently said: “Germans should not pay for the consciously flawed fiscal and budgetary policies of others.”

A valid counter argument of course is that great intelligence and even a state of consciousness are not essential prerequisites to be famous, in a position of power or to hold high office. For a start it’s a debatable issue whether consciousness arises solely from brain activity as suggested before. A part of the brain can be irreversibly lost, dead or damaged yet you can still be said to be conscious. In the case of Ozzie Osbourne his brain was permanently cooked and altered by various chemical substances.

Let’s examine for a moment a few of the colourful individuals who have held the most powerful position in the world, POTUS or President of the United States. The detractors of President Gerald Ford said that he was so dumb he could not chew gum and fart at the same time. President Ronald Reagan was not in a conscious state because he was barely awake most of the time. He was labelled “the amiable dunce” and served two terms in office “sleepwalking through history.” As a B-grade actor, Ronnie could somehow remember and deliver his lines effortlessly every time, finding new ways to repeat himself any which way you wanted to the delight, appreciation and rapturous applause of his handlers. He would occasionally be prodded out of his slumber by his dear old friend Maggie from across the pond who knew exactly where to tickle him much to the annoyance of Nancy. George Bush junior although sober was incapable of coherent language or any thought and he was not even aware or conscious that he was conscious, let alone could he even attempt to spell the word. Look what happened to the world as a result.

In conclusion if you don’t want to be treated like plankton and want to succeed in the workplace or life in general, speed up your IQ, by minding your P’s and Q’s, so that you can improve your EQ without compromising your MQ to fully maximise your CQ. To reach that heightened state of awareness but not arousal, to achieve that desired plateau of conscious competence you must become very conscious of your search for consciousness.

And finally to satisfy any CEO’s focus on the bottom-line and to take a leaf out of the American school of pragmatism, we may well ask, what is the “cash value” of this idea? Well despite what the sceptics say, if organised religion can turn saving souls into a profitable business then so can business when it comes to caring about them provided of course you remain conscious.

What is an Actuary?

According to Kathleen C. Miller, an actuary is a real flesh and blood person who "passes as an expert on the basis of a prolific ability to produce an infinite variety of incomprehensive figures calculated with micrometric precision from the vaguest of assumptions based on debatable evidence from inconclusive data derived by persons of questionable reliability for the sole purpose of confusing an already hopelessly befuddled group of persons who never read the statistics anyway!"

The Day Sepp Blatter Visited Our Pavement

2 July 2010

It was a late Thursday morning. I had just returned to Pretoria from a road trip travelling from George and Mossel Bay to Port Elizabeth through the Garden Route with stops at Knysna and the Titsikamma Forest along the way. I encountered many visiting English, American, Uruguayan and South Korean soccer fans on my brief trip. Like me they were basking in our glorious winter weather and enjoying our golden beaches, magnificent scenery and our legendary hospitality. There’s nothing like a road trip to remind us that we live in a truly spectacular and awe inspiring country. I once again marveled at the beauty of our coastal towns, our roads, our well run hotels, guest houses, our stadiums, our modern and efficient airports and the openness and friendliness of our people.

The World Cup has also reminded me of what Alan Paton wrote in Cry the Beloved Country. Living in South Africa at times, is like being on a giant emotional roller coaster ride. One minute we are plunged into the depths of fear and despair because of some callous crime or idiotic utterance and then in a heartbeat our spirits soar again with boundless optimism and euphoria. It’s a very exhilarating but schizophrenic existence. A lot of negative things have been said and written about living in South Africa but at least one indictment that cannot be leveled at this country is that it is boring. Despite our many serious problems and Bafana’s early exit from the World Cup, many of our foreign guests visiting our shores for the first time have discovered an unexpected friendliness, warmth, resilience, energy and vibrancy in South Africa that is hard to find elsewhere, especially in a distant, debt-ridden and distracted America and a weary, ageing and equally bankrupt Europe.

Back in Pretoria, I decided to pop into Bicccs, my regular coffee haunt for a quick cappuccino, a chat and a glance at the morning newspapers. A weak winter sun gently warmed the pavement. The usual suspects were there as expected, sitting at a high table, holding court as is the daily custom of all dedicated pavementista’s. It was not a full quorum but a learned trio of veterans were present and in session. Coach, a well read and well bred professional golf coach with a very pleasant and polite disposition, was discussing the intricacies of golf with Alfonso, an ex-corporate high flier who has swapped his pin striped suits for casual boulevardier attire, of jeans, a tracksuit top and loafers. Alfonso is a bit of a renaissance man who now finds the rough manners of miners and the incessant demands of the corporate world tedious, life sapping and as exciting as boiled shins. Trained as a CA, he is good with numbers but prefers the more humane pursuits of writing, cooking, travelling on cruise ships, driving fast cars, entertaining slow but passionate women and drinking copious cups of cappuccino with his friends on the pavement. The third pavementista present that day is affectionately called Captain Chaos apparently because wherever he goes chaos follows even though in his private life he is a very orderly, conscientious, disciplined and organized man in everything he does. He is a very experienced senior pilot and airline captain nearing retirement who restores WWII Willys Jeeps in his spare time when he is not flying big four-engined jets all over the world.

The interesting thing about Bicccs is that you don’t have to travel far and wide to meet interesting people from all walks of life or to bump into the odd well travelled Contessa, the rich, the famous or the powerful. If you’re patient, the world comes to Bicccs including, Blue Bulls rugby players, the Springbok rugby team, champion SA swimmers, assorted ambassadors and beauty queens, diplomats, spies pretending they are diplomats, the Secretary General of Cosatu, who dressed in his tracksuit, once sat at our table on the pavement and the Governor of the Reserve Bank who pops in occasionally for her coffee.

The pavement is an interesting forum and meeting place, a place to exchange ideas like the agora in ancient Athens. And it’s an egalitarian place. Seasoned pavementista’s will not ostracize you because of your political views or affiliations. Pavementista’s don’t care how much money you have, what clothes you wear, which car you drive or what your education level or social standing is. Pavementista’s know that things like money, status, power, material possessions or comforts, even talent are at best fragile and fleeting in nature and not a true measure of a person’s worth. Many people may pay lip service to this noble idea but how many actually believe it?

Then lurking on the fringes of polite pavement society, you’ll find some ego driven individuals, mostly competitive thirty-somethings who try too hard to make their presence felt. They don’t quite know or understand the unwritten rules of the pavement. Some of them crave recognition and desperately want to be noticed. They flaunt their money or their expensive flashy cars. That’s often the problem with too much new money. Like a persistent cough, it cannot easily be suppressed. Then there are younger apprentice pavementista’s who feel they need to apologize for the small or “inadequate” car they drive or they divulge too much information and gory details about their latest sexual conquest. The pavement mostly forgives them for their youthful excesses and ignores them along with the fashionistas and hip designer types who try very hard to remain trendy.

There we were minding our own business, sipping cappuccino, shooting the breeze, when two official-looking black cars drove into our neighbourhood shopping centre and parked nearby outside Ritrovo Restaurant. Imagine our surprise when none other than the much maligned FIFA President, Sepp Blatter climbed out of one of the cars and started walking past us. By then Coach had excused himself and was on his way to check up on some of his junior golf students. Coach must have spotted Sepp Blatter as he was leaving because before we knew it, there he was in the middle of the parking lot towering over the diminutive Blatter. Coach stopped the Blatter entourage dead in its tracks and after an animated exchange of words and greetings somehow persuaded Blatter to come over and pay his respects to the assembled Bicccs pavementista’s. Blatter was accompanied by two petite blondes dressed in black power suits. I’m not quite sure what their function was but I can only presume that such a busy and powerful man needs the support of two executive assistants. Blatter’s solitary bodyguard lurked in the background. He had a twisted telephone wire dangling from his left ear. He sported a droopy moustache as favoured by policemen of old but otherwise looked deceptively relaxed and friendly.

I stuck out my hand as Blatter approached our table, shook hands with him and thanked him for placing his faith in the ability of our country to host the World Cup. Blatter was friendly, all smiles and eager to chat. He looked happy and was disarmingly polite even charming and appeared relaxed in a slick Capo of World Soccer kind of way. He wore a navy blue suit, navy tie and light blue shirt. A small gold FIFA badge was pinned to his lapel. He kept looking at my scarf and jacket for some reason, as if trying to glean some vital clues or measure who he was up against. I sensed he must have been wondering what all these middle aged guys were doing hanging out at a coffee shop on a late Thursday morning.

But many things can happen on an innocuous looking pavement. Just ask the wise guys who hang out on New York’s and Brooklyn’s finest pavements. History has been written, revolutions have been started, overweight family Don’s have been popped getting in or out of their cars, coup d’ etats have been plotted and minor island countries overthrown on pavements. The world is full of surprises and strange twists and turns. And there we were, a harmless bunch, a most unlikely gathering, chatting to old Sepp as if he was somebody’s favourite uncle.

This is a man who understands the power of sport and especially soccer to stir very strong human emotions. In fact he loves using the word “emotions” in his everyday talk whether it is to soccer administrators, politicians, fans or ordinary folk like us. He said he had just been to see the “Head of State.” The meeting at the presidential guest house must have gone well because Blatter was beaming and spoke about the “positive emotions” experienced by all, with the World Cup being hosted in South Africa with the help and participation of the FIFA Family.

I for one confess that I have never been a huge follower of the beautiful game but now readily admit to being totally hooked to soccer at this level. I know that I have been postponing or delaying reality for a few weeks but maybe reality is overrated after all and as Alfonso maintains living with ones illusions, fantasies and sport is better. I have temporarily shelved my cynical disposition along with my diminishing inclination to work and find myself caught up in the enormous goodwill and the feel good factor generated by this event. Emulating our affable President, JZ, I proudly wear my multi-coloured SA scarf and have watched most of the games either at home or at Bicccs with friends.

President Zuma in turn said he was pleased at how well the World Cup was progressing. Blatter told us that general crime levels were down as a result of the extra security measures and police presence required for the Cup. Blatter was very complimentary about the friendly and warm welcome extended by all South Africans to the visiting soccer fans and teams. He said that South Africans were very tolerant and open minded people unlike the G8 protesters in Toronto. I offered that it was a case of African warmth and the power of ubuntu. He said that he was well received in South Africa but admitted that he was not as popular or well liked in Europe. I wonder why? JZ told Blatter that at the G8 and G20 sessions in Toronto, David Cameron and Angela Merkel sat next to each other during the England Germany match. Proceedings were temporarily halted to allow the heads of state to watch the game and the two were constantly looking at messages on their phones as the game progressed. More proof if ever we needed it, of the power of soccer to eclipse uninspiring matters of state. But Sepp Blatter has known this all along. He also knows that he has one of the best jobs in the world. He is treated like a head of state wherever he goes in the world without the tiresome burdens of trying to run a country.

Blatter was scathing towards the G8 protesters in Toronto. He said they had it too good, were far too wealthy and comfortable. He added that they should visit South Africa to see real poverty, hardship and people living in shacks. Well said Mr. Blatter but then how do we justify spending R50 billion give or take a few billion to build only our stadiums, for a short lived dose of distraction, euphoria and heartbreak, over the more pressing and legitimate needs of unemployed people living in shacks and dying in our provincial hospitals. Imagine if for the next six years we could allocate the same energy, funds, dedication, professionalism, tight deadlines, project management skills and accountability utilized to build the stadiums, the Gautrain and to host a successful World Cup, towards solving our low cost housing backlog and our dysfunctional education and public hospital systems. We have been anaesthetized for now by the inherent escapism of this spectacular event but I fear this will soon wear off and once the love fest with the world is over, we will have to face a form of post coital depression.

In parting, Captain Chaos threw Sepp Blatter a curved Jabulani ball and asked him to predict which team was going to win the World Cup. Blatter ever the skilled negotiator and cautious diplomat replied carefully that his position did not allow him to comment because if he did pick a team and that team went on to win, then people could say that he had rigged the outcome. Gavin one of the Bicccs proprietors asked the FIFA President to sign his autograph on a Bicccs menu with a blue marking pen. Blatter then shook hands with all the waiters before leaving to enjoy a leisurely lunch at Ritrovo next door.

Whether he has a God complex or not, hubris is always an omnipresent danger waiting in the shadows ready to pounce on the powerful to bring them to their knees and teach them humility. In Sepp Blatter’s highly organized world nothing is left to chance so he is holding thumbs and praying to himself that the remaining games go smoothly. There were so many hard questions we could have asked Blatter but this was neither the time nor the place to put the man on the spot. As a student of applied ethics and without irony, I could have asked him about the inner workings of FIFA’s ethics committee but time did not permit such fanciful excursions. There were a host of technical questions we could have asked him about referees decisions and video camera technology. I could of asked him why soccer experts and legendary stars like Eusebio are complaining that fewer goals are being scored in this World Cup yet many more goals are being scored off the field of play by fans including some spectacular own goals by countries gutted by the early failure of their teams.

Speaking of own goals, Blatter is about to give both Nigeria and France red cards for their political interference in soccer in their respective countries. Goodluck Jonathan, the new President of Nigeria, a man who needs all the luck his name can muster to rule his vexed and fractious country, has decided to punish the poor performance of the Nigerian soccer team by banning them from international competitions for two years. It’s an ill-considered and idiotic decision by an educated man who dresses like a rap artist, who is possibly pandering to the masses for political reasons and reminds me of the kind of insane utterances and behaviour of that infamous homicidal buffoon, General “Big Dada” Idi Amin of Uganda. FIFA rules dictate that national federations face suspension from world football if they do not manage their affairs independently of political interference. Blatter has said that FIFA will deal with any kind of political interference regardless of the size of the country. It seems only FIFA has exclusive rights to political interference.

Goodluck has 48 hours to come to his senses. It will be interesting to see how FIFA deals with rogue state, North Korea. Back home, it appears North Korea’s soccer team is presently undergoing rigorous reorientation exercises in the deep recesses of a coal mine, working on improving their endurance levels and upper body strength.

Meanwhile on the same day, the war of words between Argentina and Germany was escalating ahead of their quarter final showdown on Saturday. Bastian Schweinsteiger, whose surname means “he who climbs pigs”, said that the Argentinian team used intimidation and showed no respect towards referees and other players. He even accused the Argentinian fans of invading and occupying the seats and spaces of other fans and then refusing to move. I thought that invasion and occupation was a cherished German pastime especially at hotel resorts when German holiday makers get up early before everybody else and put their towels on all the sun loungers.

Turns out the young German side, many of them from immigrant backgrounds refused to be intimidated by Argentina. They not only neutralized the threat posed by Lionel Messi but in the process they outclassed and outplayed Argentina. It was a demolition job and must have been extremely painful for Maradona to watch and endure such humiliation. In the end, his crazy antics, his hugging and kissing of his players and his attempt at a German accent, was not enough to inspire his players. The German side came out in their very smart black and gold kit and if history is anything to go by, you just know that when the Germans dress in these colours, things are about to get ugly. Chancellor Angela Merkel, the saviour of Greece, sat in the VIP section, wearing her favourite red party jacket. She stood up and clapped every time Germany scored. She had every right to giggle and behave like an excited schoolgirl. This was no time to show restraint. Eventually barely able to contain herself she walked up to a clearly delighted JZ; hugged him and planted a big fat kiss on him. Relations between Germany and South Africa have never looked so good. Perhaps we can look forward to more arms purchases to bolster our small fleet of corvettes and submarines? Maybe an aircraft carrier or two is what we need not only to boost German exports but also to protect our sardines and the new wave of German burgers expected to set up residence in the Cape.

As for Sepp Blatter, I admit that I have been critical of him in the past both in conversation and in writing but last week on a fine Highveld morning he had willingly but unwittingly ventured onto our revered pavementista turf. We were his hosts at Bicccs and as good hosts you never insult or criticize a visiting guest in your own home. Under a warm African sun we chose rather to radiate humaneness and extended to him the warm embrace of an ubuntu welcome. We were prepared to receive Mr. Blatter at our table with courtesy and respect. And finally, following Madiba’s legendary example of reconciliation and forgiveness, we chose to forget Mr. Blatter’s sins for a brief shining moment and instead offered him redemption in coffee and true friendship on the pavement.

Costas Ayiotis
Pretoria

Soweto: Boere with Vuvuzelas

2 June 2010


Last week my friend Jan, a very talented photographer and fellow pavementista, told me over cappuccino at Bicccs, our regular morning coffee haunt, that he had gone to Soweto to watch the Super 14 Rugby semi-final match between the Bulls and the visiting Kiwi Crusaders team at Orlando Stadium. Jan waxed lyrical. He said that the vibe was fantastic and that it ranked as one of the best experiences of his life. He socialized with the incredibly friendly and welcoming local residents, drank beer in several shebeens and took over two hundred photographs.

I had visited Soweto before on two previous occasions, once as a law student in the mid eighties as part of a forensic medicine group, to attend an autopsy at Baragwanath Hospital, not a very pleasant experience and then again in the early nineties to escort a visiting American who wanted to drive through Soweto with obligatory stops at a shebeen and a spaza shop. I had never attended a major sporting event in Soweto and being a rabid rugby follower, I was keen as mustard to watch the Super 14 Rugby final between the Bulls and the Stormers.

I need to state at the outset that I am neither a Bulls nor a Stormers fan. I am a long-suffering Lions supporter who lives in eternal hope each year that my team will find the magic which presently eludes them but which they once had in bucket loads under the likes of Gerald Bosch, Paul Bayvel, Gerrie Germishuis, Ray Mordt, Garth Wright and Kobus Wiese to name but a few Transvaal and Springbok rugby stars of old. I grew up on the East Rand and played my school and club rugby in Kempton Park and at Wits. My team lost every game they played this year in the Super 14 but I still love them and support them. You don’t suddenly switch sides or allegiance when things go badly for you. Things will eventually turn for the Lions as it has for the Bulls and the Stormers.

To mark the historical significance of the occasion, I did what was once unthinkable. I bought a Bulls rugby cap for R60 and wore it. I reasoned, everybody loves a winner and now being a resident of Pretoria, no harm done to recognize the success and outstanding achievements of the Bulls team both on and off the field and to congratulate them for seizing the initiative and for having the foresight to choose Orlando Stadium in Soweto to host the semi-final and the final. A move admittedly forced by necessity but an inspired move nonetheless. Why didn’t my own team the Lions think of this? Orlando Stadium is literally in their back yard. Now they’ve suddenly woken up and debating whether they should host a money-spinning rugby test at Soccer City.

Rugby is like a religion in my life. It is the only sport I loved playing and the only sport I now love watching as a spectator and arm-chair critic. Like many other men I know, I live for Saturdays so that I can decline boring dinner and birthday invitations and watch rugby instead. Cardiologists may disagree with me but there is nothing to beat a weekly diet of salted beef biltong and blood sports to satisfy our most primal and atavistic instincts.

Soccer may be acknowledged worldwide as the beautiful game but I only have eyes for rugby. This is an anomaly in my culture because most Greek men I know are soccer mad. Rugby is an unashamed tribute to the virtues of testosterone. It is a celebration of sheer brute force and physicality. Nothing can match the controlled savagery of a rugby match in the toughest rugby competition in the world played between the teams of the world’s three leading rugby playing nations. Only rugby manages to combine the speed, efficiency and accuracy of the rapier with the brutality of the bludgeon. With their scrum caps, their strapped, bandaged and taped hands, arms and thighs, rugby players look more like modern gladiators than sportsmen. In comparison far too may soccer players behave and look like indulged, pampered and spoilt prima donnas.

You won’t find rugby players and their coaches demanding to have special hands-free toilets and bidets installed in their hotel rooms. Show a rugby player to a bidet and the chances are he’ll rinse his gum guard or wash his socks in the damn thing. Some of the venues hosting the visiting FIFA World Cup soccer nations have gone to great lengths to ensure that each soccer player’s room is identical down to the last, minute detail, lest an oversight hurts their feelings and affects their performance. When did soccer become like this? Soccer players usually came from poor families and were tough, determined individuals who knew how to survive and rise above the challenges in their gritty, crime-ridden neighbourhoods. As one Greek commentator put it, soccer was the ballet of the working class. Now the empty cult of celebrity and far too much easy money has ruined them.

By Tuesday morning I had given up all hope of going to the final. Several friends went to Computicket but all the tickets had sold out. I called a few friends who had contacts in the rugby fraternity but they were not too optimistic about our chances of securing tickets. Then on Friday night I got a call from my friend Louis, a devoted if not fanatical Bulls supporter with the good news that he had a ticket for me. I was ecstatic. We were going to the final.

On Saturday morning we queued in the mild autumn sun at Supersport Park in Centurion to board the line of City of Tshwane municipal buses waiting to take us to Soweto. The Bulls faithful were there in all shapes and sizes. A sea of blue in full battle dress, some faces looking like Avatars with horns plastered in blue war paint carrying campaign flags and battle ribbons at totem pole height, wearing their Bulls jerseys, caps, blue leather cowboy hats and scarves of their beloved team. Some mostly male fans looked like urban Vikings, wearing their blue plastic construction hats with massive bulls horns attached to either side of their hard hats.

On the fashion front and with winter upon us, “Puss in Boots” season has finally arrived. It’s that time of the year when women all over South Africa do the unthinkable and start behaving like lemmings. They do their utmost to look alike by tucking their jeans into knee high boots. The Bulls female boot brigade was represented in significant numbers. They wore tight jeans with sequined bottoms and flat soled suede boots, boots decorated with straps and tassels, shiny black leather boots to make any Gestapo officer green with envy, lethal looking sharp toed boots and boots with dangerously high stiletto heels resembling miniature Eiffel Towers. Some of the more stylish and original thinking female fans had their hair held back with Alice bands adorned with small flashing blue devils horns.

The drinking started early. Some beefy fellows were clutching what looked like giant plastic pitchers filled with a dark brew of sorts. As soon as we got onto the bus, my travelling companions cracked open and downed a few cans of cold Klipdrift brandy conveniently pre-mixed with Cola for such occasions. The buses we travelled on looked new and were very clean but the seats were far too narrow and completely unsuitable for larger South African physiques. They were clearly designed for tofu eating Japanese train gropers and not for burly pap, boerewors en vleis Bulls supporters.

Our bus driver pulled off the highway twice en route to Soweto, the first time to get directions. It seems we had a black bus driver who had never been to Soweto before. A few minutes later a car flying South African, Bafana and Bulls flags pulled over in front of us and another black man handed a map to our driver. Then we waited for more flag flying buses to pass us and we joined a convoy of buses headed for Soweto.

We stopped again at the side of the highway just before the Rivonia off ramp for what we use to call a “piss parade” in the army. A dozen or so men quickly scrambled off the bus and climbed up a steep grass embankment. Here they turned their backs to the bus, lined up almost in formation and relieved themselves overlooking the Woodmead golf course and the Sandton skyline beyond, in full view of the other motorists on the highway. A few even found a free hand and the time to light a cigarette while they were doing this. I marveled at their dexterity. This was all new to me and some of the females on the bus cheered them on and even took photographs of their men folk with their cell phones. Someone needs to brief FIFA and the soccer fans visiting us from abroad that this is a time honoured local custom like braaivleis adhered to and enjoyed by all races and something you cannot exactly do in Sydney or Zurich. Once you have experienced how liberating it is to pee in the great outdoors under an African sky you’ll be hooked forever and return to Africa for more fun and occasional violence.

Under a pale blue Highveld sky we drove past the caked yellow soil of Johannesburg’s distinctive mine dumps and then turned off the Golden Highway and drove the final stretch into Soweto. The bus pulled up outside Orlando Stadium. For most it was their first time in Soweto and I heard someone comment with surprise in Afrikaans that the place didn’t look too bad. We headed straight for the beer tent to down a few quick cold lagers and to take in the unfolding scene. A stylishly dressed young black man stood next to us beside his pretty and petite kugela girlfriend. She wore expensive sunglasses and like her white sisters from Pretoria, she too had tucked her jeans into shiny knee high boots. He wore a black plastic hard hat with the skyline of Johannesburg and the SA flag carved in front of his hat. He wore a Bulls flag, draped proudly around his shoulders like an ankle length cape. He smiled and posed for photographs.

Another altogether less stylish young white man wore his Bulls cap back to front and had taken the trouble to sew a very long, stuffed, homemade blue penis complete with attached testicles onto the back of his cap. He looked very pleased with himself as it dangled and bounced in front of his eyes. I was tempted to call him Mr. Dickhead but thought better of it because he looked very fit despite being completely plastered. My travelling companions were a very agreeable, polite and hospitable bunch probably because they were educated at the University of the Free State, the home of all pleasant and moderate Afrikaners and the team I support when not shouting for the Lions. They shared their food, drink and biltong with me and insisted on speaking English to me even though I replied in fluent Afrikaans. There was a constant exchange of good natured banter, rivalry and jokes between the Bulls fans and the handful of Stormers supporters standing at the Castle watering hole. SA Breweries must be smiling after Saturday.

The most remarkable thing about Saturday was to see Afrikaans speaking Bulls fans from Pretoria adopting the vuvuzela as their own and the Sowetans embracing the Bulls as their own team alongside Orlando Pirates and Bafana Bafana. I have no doubt that the Bulls now have a larger black fan base than all the other Super 14 rugby franchises in South Africa. Here were the Boere, an endangered rugby mad minority adopting the symbol and customs of the majority and of a sporting code they don’t much care for. People carried vuvuzelas of various sizes and colours and blew on them continuously like seasoned soccer fans. The noise in the stadium at times was deafening and some Stormers supporters sitting in front of us wore ear plugs. They were not a very friendly bunch. An elderly woman, somebody’s grandmother back in Belville showed my friend Louis the finger when he jokingly told her to sit elsewhere.

Some size obsessed individuals wanting to impress the locals, brandished two metre long vuvuzelas on steroids. My friend Louis handed me a yellow vuvuzela courtesy of Liberty, with a sticker “Own Your Life” stuck onto it. I immediately tore off the sticker but kept the vuvuzela. The suits and actuaries at Liberty have yet to figure out that it is far better to live your life than pay Liberty to help you own something which is yours to start with anyway. This was the same company that refused to pay for my son’s delivery on a technicality after we had paid them premiums for a year. We fell out of their acceptable prescribed window by two weeks. Their share price is not doing too well.

We left the beer tent in search of more beer and fun at the Wonder Bar and shebeen across the road from the stadium next door to the Tsotsetsi Tuck Shop where they sell a quart or a 750ml bottle of Black Lable beer for R14. The bar is situated next door to the Tsotsetsi Tuck Shop. A few young black boys gathered around us and decided to hold an impromptu vuvuzela blowing competition. We promised them that there would be prizes for the best vuvuzela player. They blew their hearts out and all walked away winners clutching R10 and R20 notes. One little guy had somehow missed out on all the action and felt excluded from our spontaneous largesse. He tugged on my friend Louis’ sleeve, who stands over two metres tall and asked him for money. Louis asked him: “If I give you R10 what will you do in exchange?” “I’ll give you R3 change,” came back the cheeky reply.

Another enterprising young lad who could not have been much older than twelve or thirteen was trying to sell a pair of blue plastic devils horns. One of my drinking buddies thought he heard the boy ask for R50, which he would have paid had the boy not corrected him and said with indignation, “No sir, R50 is far too much, the correct price is R30.” Then my friend told the lad that he wanted to buy a back pack. The lad replied in perfect English that he was in charge of “merchandising.” He would go back to his “associates” and return with the back pack. This young boy has a bright future ahead of him and could teach MBA’s a thing or two.

We headed back towards the stadium to take up our seats, to avoid the last minute rush. A tall blonde man walking next to me, a complete stranger, spoke to me in Afrikaans and told me that the last time he had visited Soweto it was on a police township patrol riding in the back of a Casspir. I smiled and nodded. This time around he was far more welcome in Soweto but I somehow wonder if the significance of his return meant anything to him. It does however show that South Africa has changed for the better and come a long way since the dark days of the state of emergency in the mid 1980’s.

The rebuilt Orlando Stadium does not look like much on the outside. Compared to Soccer City, its flashier, larger and more expensive counterpart nearby, it looks very serious and utilitarian with its steel roof cladding. But once you step inside it is a beautiful stadium, with no sharp lines or edges. It is an intimate, enveloping stadium, with good seating and a perfect pitch which brings you closer to the action. It has excellent, clean facilities, wide passages and entrances for easy access and exit.

As for the match itself, it was a fast and furious final, a classic derby between two worthy adversaries and traditional rivals. There was drama, bone-crunching tackles galore as players put their bodies on the line and much blood letting as there always is in these fiercely contested encounters. In the end the Bulls had the composure, the experience and the big match temperament to win. It was a historic match at a historic stadium at a significant time in South Africa’s young developing democracy. The Bulls took the trophy but South Africa won on all other fronts. South Africa will continue to surprise and confound its harshest critics as it matures. South African’s are wonderful, talented, dynamic, resourceful and resilient people when we are not killing each other over a car, a cell phone or a farm. Our farmers, plot dwellers and home owners rightly feel that a genocidal war is being waged against them by callous criminals and nobody in our government cares enough to do anything to stop the killings.
All the usual high-ranking politicians attended the final. They sensed a photo opportunity and were quick to proclaim a turning point. They tried in vain to find something new and meaningful to say but mostly all they managed was to try and bask in the reflected glory of an event much larger than themselves. In the end their words were empty rhetoric and they were rightly eclipsed and reduced to an irrelevant side-show by the magnitude of the event. President Jacob Zuma was there, as was the leader of the DA and Premier of the Western Cape, Mrs Helen Zille. Trevor Manuel and his wife Maria Ramos sat snuggled closely together, looking like a happy couple enjoying the event.

After the match and once out of the stadium it took only five minutes to board our bus, this time a luxury coach with comfortable padded seats and a black bus driver who was listening to Classic FM before he switched to a more contemporary music station for his passengers. The metro police for once did something useful and with blue lights flashing escorted a convoy of slow moving busses onto the highway and all the way back to Centurion. It was a very well run logistical operation from beginning to end and it was good to see things run so smoothly in South Africa without major incident.

Ben Trovato in his recent Sunday Times Whipping Boy column compared Orlando to the new Saigon, a comparison with the Vietnam War which somehow escapes me. He wrote about the event in unflattering and offensive terms as “the day rugby forced hardened racists to mingle with hardened criminals.” He says he is going to make a movie about the day and call it “Convictus.” This portrayal is neither fair nor accurate even though it is written in jest. The one good thing to emerge out of FIFA’s occupation of our country is that it forced the Bulls to host the final in Soweto but they could just as easily have decided to stage the match at Ellis Park or in Witbank for that matter but instead and to their credit they chose Orlando Stadium.

I don’t usually enjoy large crowds and stadium experiences but last Saturday in Orlando gave me hope of a promised and long awaited normality in our relations with other South Africans. It made me proud and happy to be a South African. More than one person said that they would gladly return to Soweto. Soweto is the matriarch of the old townships with impeccable political and struggle credentials. It has always been a far more cerebral and celebrated place as the home of South Africa’s pre-eminent black political, cultural and economic elite.

And I’ll wager that given a choice a black township resident relates more and places greater trust in a gruff, no nonsense, straight talking and sometimes abrasive Afrikaner than a patronizing but polite Anglo liberal. They have a greater chance of finding common ground. At least the Afrikaner is more honest. Some people criticize them as being boorish, crude and unsophisticated but there was a time when “sophisticated” with its roots in the Greek word “sophistry” was not a very flattering term.

Afrikaners are the unrecognized and uncelebrated backbone of this country. They are the whites who will stay because they have no choice but to make this country work. They are the people we turn to when we need the leak in our roof fixed, our body, car or computer repaired. We are all crippled by the racist baggage of our past which we need to acknowledge and then hopefully discard our collective guilt so that we can move forward. Nelson Mandela was right when he said that sport has the power to build bridges and unite us. Some cynics say that Saturday’s event changes nothing and it is premature to talk about national unity and forging a national identity. Admittedly we still have a long way to go before we can fully normalize race relations in our country but Saturday’s final was a very good start and the more such events take place the better our chances to succeed.

We can all learn from the fine example of the people of Soweto. Sowetans understand and live the ancient Greek concept of philoxenia, the very appealing, inspirational and aspirational idea that to be fully human we need to welcome and embrace strangers with warmth, friendship and hospitality. In Soweto they call this ubuntu. Ubuntu is all about goodwill and celebrating a shared identity and common humanity regardless of colour, religion or political affiliation. Thankfully South Africa has always had religious tolerance but as Clem Sunter points out we need a lot more social harmony and cohesion, an emerging national consensus if we are going to achieve long term success as a country.

Graeme Hoskens writing and reporting for the Pretoria News got it right and summed it up the whole experience in one word, ubuntu. He said that he was “overwhelmed by the sense of true friendship” he felt. He wrote that the event made him feel that “we all have one thing in common. We are all proudly South African filled with the spirit of ubuntu.” Other people had similar stories to tell. The residents of Soweto were pleased and happy us whiteys were there. Cape based Ben Trovato is out of touch. He got it wrong this time because he wasn’t there. Maybe it’s a case of sour grapes coming from the Cape.

I now know that I can return to Soweto any time to watch my favourite rugby games in a tavern or a shebeen. I know that I will be warmly received and welcomed like a friend especially if I wear my newly acquired Bulls cap. It will probably be safer, cheaper and a lot more fun than sitting in Waterkloof. In time I may even convince them to install a cappuccino machine and put chakalaka on my panini.

I’m happy to report that ubuntu is alive and well in Soweto. You will make faster, genuine and more enduring friendships in Pretoria and Soweto than you ever will in Cape Town or Perth. The next time there is a major rugby match or test I shall hold my clenched fist in the air and shout:

Amandla!
Awetu!
I’m on my way to Soweto!

Costas Ayiotis
Pretoria

Football Fever

April 2010


The volcano in Iceland continues to blow its top, belching dense columns of fine ash and superfine glass particles several kilometres into the upper atmosphere. Alarmed scientists report that the only thing denser on the planet is the IQ of some of South Africa’s members of parliament. While Iceland’s Eyjafjallajoekull volcano grounds international airlines bringing large parts of Europe to a virtual standstill, South Africa continues with its frantic last minute preparations to host a major international sporting event featuring the beautiful game. The navy has been placed on full alert and prostitutes in Johannesburg, Bloemfontein and Durban are following the fine example of their colleagues in Cape Town and brushing up on their German vocabulary and other foreign languages.

In case anyone was wondering, this is “The Family’s” soccer tournament, not South Africa’s. South Africa is merely the host country, privileged to foot the bill as it were. But what’s a few billion rand between friends and family. And we all know that relationships within families are often fraught with difficulties especially when money is involved but South Africans can at least console themselves with the comforting thought that we are now members of a small elite club within the global football family.

A quick look at all the badges, posters, flags and banners also confirms however that we are just the supporting act in a much greater production. The promotional material refers to the organising body and South Africa is merely mentioned next to the numbers “2010.” And as in any parasitic relationship, for example untreated malaria, when parasites are left undisturbed to live in the human body, be it in the brain, liver or bloodstream, the parasites run roughshod over everything, take over and eventually kill the host. But let’s not get too carried away and become overly pessimistic about our future survival prospects after the tournament, when the winter of our discontent sets in, the visitors have come and gone, the parades have passed, the noise subsides, the Vuvuzela’s are silent, the drums stop beating, the dancing is over, the lights finally go out and the coffers are empty.

Most governments and politicians especially in Africa are not known for their concern about the welfare of their citizens. They are happy to line their own pockets and buy expensive toys rather than focus on meaningful socio-economic upliftment programmes. Spending funds on education, health, housing and job creation to improve the lot of your people sets a dangerous precedent and people complain and are so ungrateful even at the best of times. Treat people too well and your citizens may reach a level of maturity where they start thinking for themselves and eventually they bite the hand that occasionally throws scraps at them from the feeding trough. They become so informed and empowered that they vote you out of power if you fail to deliver, so it’s far better to make idle promises and keep them dispossessed and downtrodden. That’s the African way. So when the mob occasionally gets restless, like the emperor’s in ancient Rome you give them “bread and circuses” to distract them from their daily problems.

But let’s focus on the present for a moment. So, on a lighter note I would like to inform all the sceptics out there that South Africa is most definitely ready to host this particular “circus.” I know this because I have become an unofficial and self-appointed football spotter. I have personally seen several giant soccer balls with their distinctive black and white panels, sliced in half and affixed to the sides of buildings. There’s a giant soccer ball stuck on the side of one of the main parking buildings at O R Tambo International Airport as you approach it from the south. Soccer balls have been stuck onto trains, busses, taxis, on the roof tops of delivery trucks and SUV’s. Pretoria being the nation’s capital has a giant but complete soccer ball wrapped around the Telkom tower. If we ever needed a sign that South Africa is ready to host this major event after spending R63 billion, this has to be it.

The organising body or Football Family as they like to call themselves are very excited that this phenomenon is gathering momentum as it not only creates great excitement, anticipation, goodwill and enthusiasm for the prestigious tournament but also generates extra fees and royalties for them. The choice of the word “family” is an interesting one. What did they have in mind? A traditional family in the old-fashioned, shared-identity, wholesome, meatloaf and picket fence sense of the word or “family” in the other more questionable and decidedly less friendly sense of the word?

In any event, this particular Family is involved in legitimate enterprises, they are masters in the art of persuasion and they have an army of lawyers at their disposal just in case things don’t go their way. The Family is encouraging all South Africans to stick or attach either complete or sliced in half giant soccer balls onto any surface they deem appropriate. The giant balls are available exclusively from the Family’s local offices and made from a special indestructible, weatherproof and rocket resistant type of Kevlar manufactured in a secret facility in Israel disguised as a kibbutz. All you have to do is apply to the Family for the necessary permits, pay the sliding scale licencing fee which varies according to the size of the balls chosen and the significance or prominence of the desired location and finally you have to meet all of the Family’s stringent technical and aesthetic specifications.

Pythagoras said there are three kinds of people who attend the Games. You get the competitors or players, the spectators and finally you get that special breed who come to buy and sell under the stands. The Family have been in the event-business a long time. They are shrewd and wily old foxes who know how to work with other people’s money and turn a quick buck. They are only really interested in the last category of people and therefore understandably focussing all their attentions, vast repertoire of skills and considerable resources on them.

Just ask the unfortunate South African entrepreneur who invested several hundred thousand to manufacture and market metal key rings depicting the SA flag and the letters “2010.” He registered his product in SA and got all the necessary local permits, patents and approvals but he forgot about the Family. In the process all he managed to do was to unnecessarily upset the Family. They feel aggrieved because he was disrespectful and excluded them. After all the trouble they have gone to, to stage such a world class event in our country, the least he could do was let them wet their beaks a little. The Family claim that the key ring initiative is nothing less than a flagrant case of “ambush marketing,” and accordingly is suing the hapless man, costing him hundreds of thousands of rands in legal fees.

Mr Norbert Munchhausen, head of the Family’s technical services department recently contacted senior management at SAA and made them an offer which he believed they could not exactly refuse but which he found out to his surprise they did not really understand. Then Mr Munchhausen became brutally explicit and direct as Europeans are wont to do when they don’t get their way in African countries. He explained the terms of the generous offer. He proposed that the Family would be very pleased if giant soccer balls sliced in half were stuck onto the tail sections of Airbus A340-600’s and Boeing 747-400’s, using the special glue NASA uses to stick heat resistant tiles to the body and fuselage of the space shuttle. Reliable sources confirm that as part of their contingency planning the Family had procured several containers of the special glue directly from the USA and were now not quite sure how to best put it to good use. Selling the glue along with the giant soccer ball idea to SAA was an elegant solution to their problem. The giant soccer ball on Telkom Tower may also be a prime candidate for repairs using the NASA glue. This giant soccer ball was an early prototype before the Kevlar was introduced and is now showing early signs of distress including rust and unsightly cracks in its facade.

After lengthy consultations with SAA senior management, the pilot’s association, SAA technical services and the SAA safety office, Mr. Munchhausen was politely reminded that a Jumbo jet is not a giant Airfix model and that his proposal was not only technically unfeasible but downright idiotic and dangerous. They added that it would destabilize the aircraft and pose a serious safety hazard which would interfere with the aerodynamic design, capabilities and proper handling of the aircraft which could endanger the lives of passengers.

Undeterred by these safety concerns, the intrepid Mr Munchhausen then suggested that a giant soccer ball be affixed to the nose section of the Boeing 747. Again the pilot’s association had to remind him that if this were done, it would block visibility out of the cockpit and the pilots would not be able to fly the aircraft. The paint shop at SAA technical services then came up with a solution. They cleverly pointed out that a far better option would be to spray paint giant soccer balls on the fuselage and tail section of the aircraft. SAA would be happy to oblige if the Family paid for the cost of this very expensive special aircraft paint and the costs involved to re-spray or restore the aircraft to their original colours or livery, once the tournament was over.

In the end, in the face of such withering objections, Mr Munchhausen had to drop his pitch to sell the special space shuttle glue and the idea of the giant soccer balls to SAA. He has subsequently been redeployed. He now works as the Family’s representative in Libya. He is now trying to sell the space shuttle glue to the Libyan Air Force so that they can patch up their ageing Soviet-era MIG fighter jets.

The Family’s co-ordinator of GAF, Giant Artificial Footballs in South Africa, Frau Fifi Schlepperkopf has confirmed that licencing and marketing opportunities are still available to erect and affix giant artificial footballs in several prominent landmark locations all over South Africa but time is running out. Applications to place giant soccer balls on Robben Island and on the top of the Voortrekker Monument have been rejected by the Family due to local sensitivities.

There is an exciting opportunity to install a giant soccer ball on the top of Table Mountain which will be visible from outer space. Objections by the mayor of Cape Town, Mrs Helen Zille have been overruled by the Family. On a smaller but equally impressive scale there’s an opening for a fully lit, giant rotating soccer ball to be erected on the Bluff at the entrance to Durban harbour. In picturesque Hout Bay, two locations are available, one on Klein Leeukoppie above Sol Kerzner’s estate and the other on the Sentinel guarding the entrance to Hout Bay harbour.

In Pretoria, an opportunity exists for a suitably qualified and accredited BEE female franchisee to erect a giant soccer ball on each of the twin domes or cupolas gracing the east and west wings of Sir Herbert Baker’s Union Buildings, to bolster and improve the carnival atmosphere which already exists at the seat of government. Experts say it is a fine balancing act but it can be done without endangering the lives of the occupants because the building already has a high rate of absenteeism.

Costas Ayiotis

Disclaimer: The events and persons depicted in this satirical essay are entirely fictional and bear no relation to any organisation or any persons living or dead.

The Perfect Crew

12 May 2010

Last month I spent fourteen wonderful days onboard the MSC Sinfonia with my family. The Sinfonia is a well-appointed if not luxurious Italian cruise liner that did an admirable job of floating with effortless ease and transporting us safely and in style to several Indian Ocean islands. We covered well over 3700 nautical miles or close to 6800 kilometres with stopovers in Mauritius, Reunion, the east coast of Madagascar and Maputo. It’s a very civilized and sensible way to travel and see the world and I’m hoping that my next cruise will include Mediterranean stopovers in Istanbul, the Greek islands, Dubrovnik, Livorno, Venice, Naples and Malta.

After the cruise and back on terra firma, I had problems adjusting to life ashore in an overcast, wet and chilly Pretoria, the city of butchers, fanatical rugby supporters and Jacaranda’s. All I had to look forward to, was sinking my teeth into the sweet firm flesh of some magnificent end of season Heidi mangoes, truly the king of fruit. I turned on my car radio and Radio Jacaranda FM, the favourite radio station of housewives, barbers, car thieves and nail parlour owners was running a promotion or competition, to as they put it, “lift” the mood for the month of April. The excitable radio jock spoke of “an uplifting” experience for some lucky listener. But the “lift,” the creative geniuses at Radio Jacaranda had in mind had more to do with bags of silicone than mental well-being. They called their promotion the “boobs and bags of cash” competition, a very original and thoughtful sounding strapline. Their marketing spin is that this has never been done on radio before.

At first I thought they were airing a delayed or extended April fool’s joke, but no, I soon realized that the fake boobs offer was for real. All some lucky female or possibly even male listener had to do to stand a chance to win two free size “D” cup, breast implants, was send an SMS with the word “boobs” to a certain number. They were offering a free chest upgrade or boob operation and a bag of boodle, presumably to spend it on buying new bras and a new wardrobe.

This got me thinking for a moment about our obsession with inflated breasts. The British author Martin Amis asked the pertinent question: when women desire fake boobs and men admire them, what are we worshipping? He said all we are really worshipping is two bags of silicone. And he’s right. I shook my head in despair. What next? A free lobotomy perhaps for the head of the marketing department? Cape Town columnist and satirist, Ben Trovato cleverly defines marketing as “the unspeakable attempting to fool the unsuspecting into thinking they need the unnecessary.” When the forces of globalization, branding, marketing and consumerism collide, we get polluted, confused minds and disposable goods that quickly end up on some festering garbage dump.

Seeking escape and relief from the banal mediocrity of the airwaves, I turned off the radio and started day dreaming again. My thoughts turned back to the uncomplicated and blissful life on board the cruise ship. A modern cruise liner is like a mini floating UN, crewed and staffed by nationals recruited from several dozen countries. So I wondered what the ideal crew and staff complement would look like on my ideal cruise ship. I risk offending certain countries with gross generalizations and by reducing what they do on board to exaggerated portrayals of national stereotypes, so I apologize in advance and beg forgiveness for the sins I am about to commit. If you have a sensitive disposition, are very patriotic or you are easily offended, please don’t read any further.

On my ideal cruise ship, the captain and ship’s deck officers would be drawn from the ranks of the Royal Navy. The Royal Navy has a proud and illustrious history going back to Sir Francis Drake and Lord Horatio Nelson. British officers and men in the Royal Navy Reserve are all gentlemen and true seafarers who would know how to fight pirates, the scourge of the seas, who now in our more lenient times have made a comeback. Once upon a time using primitive but highly effective methods, pirates were mercilessly hunted down, rooted out and hanged in metal cages, their rotting corpses and skeletons on display at every harbour. Today with the combined might of several powerful naval fleets at our disposal, the attentions of guided missile cruisers, shipboard helicopters, modern technology, unmanned aerial reconnaissance vehicles and satellites we seem unable to stop them.

An added advantage of ex-Royal Navy officers is that they would focus on the job at hand and be oblivious to the charms of the cruise ship’s showgirls and dancers unlike like the Greeks and Italians who would flirt with them at every opportunity. In keeping with the finest traditions of the Royal Navy, British naval officers are also rather fond of the customs and practices of Ancient Greece. They are used to working, living and playing in small confined and sweaty spaces such as submarines, men’s locker rooms, public lavatories and shower cubicles. I would avoid employing Italians and especially Greeks as officers because they have a habit of rushing to the life boats first and abandoning the ship without telling anyone.

The Germans are not known for their spontaneous outbursts of jollity or their people skills. They would be the ship’s engineers and technicians, kept confined to the control room and engine department where they don’t have to deal with people and their incessant demands. They would sit in front of their computer screens and monitor the proper functioning of the ship’s diesel electric turbines, the ship’s machinery, equipment, electricity generators and winches. Being stern and serious minded; the Chief Safety Officer and the Chief Maintenance Officer would also Germans, the former in charge of emergency evacuations, fire prevention and fire drills, the latter in charge of the maintenance and proper functioning of the ship’s toilets, elevators, air-conditioning plant, air-fresheners, water plant, Frankfurter dispenser, sewage system and refuse disposal systems.

The Swiss are now behaving like hairdressers and talking their heads off to anyone wielding a bigger brush than they do. They can no longer be trusted with the money of tin-pot despots, assorted African dictators, American and German tax dodgers so they would forfeit the boring but important banking and accounting function to the Finns, apparently the least bribable or corruptible people in the world. The Swiss would be the official rat-catchers on the ship because it takes a rat to catch a rat. They would be placed in charge of overall hygiene, fumigation, infestation and cleaning up operations like getting rid of vermin & cockroaches, washing the decks, scrubbing the stairwells, removing rust and painting the exterior of the ship while in port.

The bicycle friendly but otherwise shrewd Dutch, as pursers would order all food, dairy products, fresh fruit & vegetables, drink, other general stores and supplies and generally be in charge of all bedding, clothing and uniforms. They would negotiate with ship chandlers and suppliers ashore the best possible price for all food and drink items stocked on board but without adding on generous markups or commissions for themselves. They would work on lists and quality controls provided by the Italians and the French. The Dutch however would not be in charge of the ships food stores, pantries and cold rooms because of a past tendency to want to sell the food to the kitchens at exaggerated prices based on increased demand during peak cooking hours.

The Italians and French would jointly run the galleys and provide the chefs and line cooks, with the Italians in charge of antipasti, pasta and risotto dishes but the French would run the boulangerie and patisserie section. Italian baristas would run the coffee bars and gelateria’s. The French and Italians would have shared control of the cheese larder but under the mediation of UN trained Norwegian peacekeepers to prevent skulduggery, chicanery and ugly flare-ups. There would also be a Thai restaurant run by Thai chefs and a proper Japanese sushi restaurant run by Japanese chefs. The dolphin-friendly Japanese chefs and waiters would have their own karaoke bar and “comfort” ladies to keep them happy and stop them from molesting and groping the milder natured Thai’s.

The medical team, including doctors and trauma nurses would be South Africans as would the ship’s butcher who would be recruited in Pretoria. Not for nothing is Thailand called the Land of Smiles & Happy Endings. The Thai people understand the art of relaxation and how to pamper people, so they would run the spa and beauty centre on the ship. The Chinese with their fondness for steamy, unsavoury environments and with their particular set of nefarious skills would not only operate the laundry but also wash money for the ship’s Sicilian owners in the casino. The Indians would run the tailoring and mending department and all the duty free shops.

The ship’s gymn instructor, aerobics and fitness trainer would be a bisexual cross-dresser called Johandri, short for Johan-Dries and would hail from Klerksdorp. He will eventually fall in love with the ship’s cruise director, a rather flamboyant, multi-lingual and multi-talented bronzed Brazilian babe called Esmeralda who used to be a Rio Carnival samba dancer called Ambrosio before undergoing a sex change operation.

Some ex-Mossad Israeli’s would naturally take care of passenger screening, profiling and all security matters including manning the water cannons and catapults to repel pirates. The Americans would run showbiz, the awards ceremonies, and the entertainment and stage productions but would leave comedy to the British. The lead female singer would be a former lounge singer from the Hilton Hotel in rural Minnesota, a Celine Dion lookalike but with blonde and pink highlights, enhanced breasts and better teeth. The show girls would include several Ukrainian gymnasts and pole vaulters, the entertainers and musicians would be drawn from all over the world because talent knows no borders.

The Cubans would supply and run the cigar lounge and the free rum rations. Devious Greek waiters and even scheming island gigolos have been eclipsed in recent years by those drawn from places like the Philippines, Bali in Indonesia and Thailand. These are countries where the locals understand the meaning of hospitality, friendliness and excellent service with a smile.

The Greeks would be kept well away from the ship’s show girls, the ship’s pumps, bilge tanks, drainage valves and the accounting department. They would be given a token position near the pool deck running a small souvlaki stand under strict supervision and in the permanent presence of a German fire warden with meat provided by the South African butcher approved by the Swiss hygiene inspector.

The Greeks would also be volunteered in lieu of blow up dummies as live victims in the fire evacuation, first aid, man overboard and rescue at sea drills run by the Germans. Because of unresolved anger management issues and safety concerns raised by the helpless Greeks against the competent Germans, the German engineers would be kept well away from life threatening equipment and sharp objects such as harpoons and hooks.

There would be no Canadian or Australian crew members on board mainly because of their insistence on the use of politically correct, non-offensive, legally vetted, UN sanctioned, non-sexist, non-racial, equal opportunity, gender neutral, court approved, ethically correct, culturally sensitive and universally applicable terminology and commands at all times even during extreme emergencies.

Costas Ayiotis

Greece and the European Web of Debt & Deceit

8 May 2010


Over the last few weeks the newspapers, TV news channels, Bloomberg and others have been full of endless gloomy reports about the Greek financial crisis and the risk of contagion spreading to other countries in Europe. The spotlight has fallen mostly on Greece and everybody seems to blame the country for the resultant fall-out, the weakening of the Euro and the ensuing instability in the global markets with sharp declines in European, American and other stock markets. A panoply of pundits, all of them futurists, speculate that the Greek crisis may lead to the possible future dissolution of the eurozone and could even cause the eventual unraveling of the entire EU. Images of violent riots and protesters flooding the streets of Athens have not helped matters and there must be legitimate fears about the longevity of Prime Minister George Papandreou’s socialist government. Greece is lined up in everybody’s sights as the first euro zone country to potentially default on repayments on its old debts.

It must be pointed out however that Greece is not the cause of Europe’s and the world’s present financial woes but merely the catalyst. Greece is not alone. 25 out of 27 European countries are currently running deficits in excess of 3% of GDP. According to the Economist France is over 8% and even Germany is close to 6%. Now the EU has announced a new loan plan of just over a hundred billion Euros and further steps to support eurozone countries in distress. A closer examination of various cross-holdings and the much higher debt burdens of other euro zone members, puts the whole issue into perspective and may hopefully, cast a different light on matters. Greece’s total debt is the lowest at $236 billion, Portugal is next at $286 billion, Ireland $867 billion, Spain $1.1 trillion, Italy carries the highest debt burden of $1.4 trillion. The grand total is a staggering and incomprehensible $3.689 trillion in debt, excluding the debt of newer EU members in eastern and central Europe. The “delinquent” euro zone countries were until recently referred to as the “PIGS”, or if you exclude Ireland the “Club Med” countries. Now the politically correct term for these countries is “SWEAP” (South West Euro Area Periphery). You can have a lot of fun in Brussels inventing new names and acronyms for all sorts of things. There must some well-staffed and well-paid department at the European Commission HQ which takes care of these things. Why not take it a step further and recognize Spain and Portugal’s insistence that their situation is different and lump them into a separate club called the “chorizo belt.”

The Italians and especially the haughty Spaniards, who since the Spanish Inquisition have taken themselves far too seriously, will remind us with some disdain that their large economies are more diverse, better managed and cannot possibly be compared with a struggling minnow like Greece. The first part is true; the last two parts are complete rubbish. Spain has an unemployment rate running at 20%, much of this stemming from the real estate bubble bursting and the collapse of the overheated construction and property development sector. Italy owes $511billion to French financial institutions. French Banks are the most exposed with close to $900 billion owed to them. Runaway debt is runaway debt no matter how you cut it. A man who earns $10 000 per annum and owes $100 000 is in the same position as a man who earns $1 million and owes $10 million. The principle is the same. This is clearly a sovereign debt issue which is not going to go away for a long time to come.

The diagram clearly shows that this is a European debt crisis and not simply a Greek tragedy masquerading as a debt crisis. Greece has been used as a convenient and easy scapegoat to drive down the value of the Euro which ultimately favours German manufacturers and businesses, the world’s second largest exporters of goods and merchandise after China. In a way Greece opened itself up to ridicule and condemnation when Prime Minister George Papandreou spilled his guts to all who would listen and admitted to the corruption, fraud, duplicity and lies of past Greek governments. He meant well and naively believed that his television confession and this new type of transparency would be well received by the international community. Unfortunately it wasn’t. Alarmed Greeks and several leaders of other European countries privately thought that Papandreou had gone mad. Let’s hope the poor man survives in what must rank as the worst job in the world. He won a poisoned chalice and took a job nobody else really wanted. But he should have known better, and learnt from the mistakes of his grandfather and father, both former prime ministers of Greece. In Greece politics is a viable and lucrative family business. It’s about creating dynasties with the Karamanlis, Papandreou and Mitsotakis families taking turns to compete for the honours. George junior should have learnt from the sins of his womanizing and corrupt father Andreas that in politics even though there are leaks, everybody talks or might suspect where the skeletons are buried, nobody openly admits it to the world. Every country like every family runs on a few secrets. Some matters like marital infidelity are best kept in-house as own affairs. Papandreou no doubt influenced by his US upbringing and education, thought that by coming clean, he could beg for forgiveness in public, in the full glare of the lights and cameras, just like Jimmy Swaggart the tearful American pastor and televangelist did, when his sex scandal involving prostitutes and strippers made headlines. In both instances the world was neither impressed, convinced or in a conciliatory mood. It’s a case of being damned if you do and damned if you don’t. As a former Greek Socialist politician and economic advisor pointed out, Greece has never been trusted since the Trojan Horse incident.

There is no question however that a succession of past Greek governments, socialist and conservative must bear the responsibility and partial blame for getting Greece into this mess. The money was spent mostly on the bloated public sector, to give jobs to cronies, to pay unproductive Greek civil servants and to buy arms including submarines from Germany. It’s a strange irony however, worth mentioning that Germany calls for strict measures and financial discipline to be imposed on Greece while at the same time lobbying for new weapons sales.

Jean-Claude Trichet is the President of the ECB, European Central Bank. The immediate problem here is that nobody is really sure what he does or for that matter what the ECB does, but he has tried to reassure the markets that a default is out of the question. The markets are not convinced. The EU has a foreign minister of sorts but does not have a Treasury Secretary like the USA who can print as much money as he likes. Messieur Trichet blames European governments for failing to impose tougher budgetary controls. Fair enough but in all this, nobody blames assorted European banks for flooding Greece and other European countries with cheap and easy credit from 2001 onwards. All the countries in the flow chart below borrowed at ridiculously low interest rates. The behaviour of the banks was reckless or negligent to say the least and they must also bear part of the blame for this unfolding European catastrophe along with the profligate governments.

The behaviour of the banks was akin to giving children truckloads of cash and then letting them run amok in toy and candy stores at the local mall. Where were the Eurocrats in Brussels in all this? Why was there no regulation? The Eurocrats obsessed with the flawed idea of building an empire turned a blind eye. Any attempt at regulation in the early years of this decade was killed at the outset by EU countries including the big boys, France and Germany because they too were busy breaking the rules and playing with deficits themselves. It was politically expedient at the time for France and Germany to allow this to happen. France had visions of glory and envisaged a leading role for herself in a greater European state while Germany needed to rehabilitate and absorb East Germany at enormous cost. There was active finessing and collusion between political and economic forces. It’s not surprising then that as a result political, financial and corporate elites all over the world are facing a huge crisis of legitimacy. Ultimately the Euro favoured Germany the most with its value-add export driven economy.

It is only since 2008 that Nicholas Sarkozy jumped on the regulation bandwagon, seized the idea and attempted to make it chic again. Financial sanity in Europe gave way to the myth of political unity. And when political unity proved to be elusive among so many countries whose citizens in reality only wanted to preserve their own culture, identity and autonomy, then at least we’d have the Euro to bond and unify us. Like a business which grows too fast, the single currency idea went too far, too big, too quickly allowing in countries like Greece which did not really belong in the euro zone heavyweight division alongside an industrial giant like Germany.

At the heart of the problem in this ambitious idea of a greater Europe, were two conflicting philosophical ideas about what a united Europe should look like. The thinkers and writers at Gavekal, Charles Gave & Anatole Kaletsky explain that the first being “the Roman Empire Model”, favoured full integration under centralized state control, eventually leading to a giant highly interventionist European Super state run by technocrats in Brussels. The second they call the “Catholic Christian Democrat Model” which preferred decentralization, less intervention from the centre; allowing diverse political systems and structures to co-exist alongside each other without surrendering too much of their national sovereignty.

Where does this leave Greece? For a start you cannot cure old debt by getting deeper into new debt at astronomic interest levels of 15% demanded by bond markets. It seems however that Greece has more of a structural problem and less of a liquidity problem with a very weak economic sector outside tourism and shipping. The Greek tax system unfairly rewards the banks and the rich with their inventive schemes to dodge liability and disproportionately penalizes the poor. The vast wealth of the church also needs to be taxed. Greece cannot solely rely on implementing the 38 billion Euros in tax hikes and unpopular spending cuts to solve its problems. Greece has been in an undeclared tax revolt since Ottoman times. Back then it was a matter of survival and the patriotic duty of every Greek to defy the sultan’s tax collectors but today it’s a different story even though a succession of Greek governments have squandered public money. The present government has to find ways to reverse this culture of defiance, crack down and collect the 30 billion Euros lost annually to tax evasion. Greeks at all levels of Greek society, in all trades, professions and occupations share the blame and responsibility. The mechanic, dentist, doctor or lawyer who charges more if he/she is asked for a receipt and writes it in the book and the civil servant who agrees to pay cash and does not ask for a receipt. Greece is a classic example of the destructive power of the “slippery slope” argument at work. This is what happens when not just a small minority of people but an overwhelming majority of citizens collectively decide that the rules and laws do not apply to them.

The 110 billion Euro joint IMF and EU “bailout” plan may buy Greece some time, a year or two at the most but it does not solve the underlying problem the country faces. Is the Euro a viable lifeline for an economically weak country like Greece now that Euro subsidies have been misspent and dried up? One suggested strategy calls for Greece to stop clinging to the Euro. US analysts continuously talk of the euro zone being forced to “cut Greece loose” rather than risk sinking the whole EU system. Maybe this is not such a bad thing. Greece will either exit the Euro on her own volition, revert to her own currency like the UK as a last desperate act or Germany will lose patience, flex her political and economic muscle and force Greece out. There is even a remote possibility that Germany decides to go it alone and leave the Euro if that is what German voters decide in the future. In any case a schizophrenic duality has always existed about the whole European concept or question. Greece became an early member of the EU in 1981 long before Portugal and Ireland, yet before and even after this happened, the Greeks always believed that Europe was something separate or apart from them and their Balkan neighbours living in a rough neighbourhood. They somehow felt inferior and everything European was considered smarter and more sophisticated even though “Europe” is a Greek word. Will the EU collapse as some predict? It seems doubtful in the short to medium term because for the time being at least, Germany and France have vested interests. They need the system to work with or without Greece. No doubt further expansion of the club will be delayed and in time we may see that the smaller and weaker states are included politically as junior partners but excluded economically because their markets or contributions are deemed insignificant and not worth the trouble.

Greece is not the real risk here but an early symptom that is scaring the markets in anticipation of a much larger calamitous event or collapse. Markets are forward looking. Looking at the debt levels of the other SWEAP’s, if I were Greece I would try to get out of the Euro. But at this stage it is clear that Greece’s sovereignty and autonomy has been severely curtailed by the bigger members of the club. On the downside of the whole scheme, lurks the crippling burden of trying to pay back not only the older maturing debt but also the new top up debt which together with the governments spending cuts will kill any prospect of economic growth. This will push Greece into a deep and protracted recession if not outright depression with some less sanguine estimates predicting a 25% contraction in economic output or activity.

Greek civil servants are worried about their pensions, and complain about pay freezes and cuts of their 14th cheques and bonuses. An estimated 51% of working Greeks are employed by the unproductive public sector. It’s not them we should be worrying about. The remaining 49% of mostly self-employed Greeks run small and medium sized family businesses. This is the economic backbone of the country. It is this group we should be worrying about. These people or businesses will be the first to fold under the new austerity measures. It’s a double edged sword. Tax revenues will fall further and Greece will have no choice but to eventually restructure or delay its debt repayments.

The Greek public has a right to feel outraged. There is public pressure on the Greek government to walk away from subsidiary debt to banks which is being converted into sovereign debt. It may set a bad precedent but ordinary citizens everywhere always lose out when dealing with large institutions and corporations like banks, insurance, health care and petro-chemical giants. Legitimate protest is a democratic right. Too often the public is cocooned in the dangerous comfort and apathy of complacency. It is wrong however to set buildings alight and kill innocent people. The mob has again been allowed to hijack and discredit the process. It is plain stupid to attack policemen and close down essential services like hospitals.


So as the experts at Gavekal point out, the question for Europe should not be how they can get a highly indebted and unproductive country like Greece to service its debt. It may prove a pointless exercise to throw good money after bad. Rather the question should be how will Greece achieve an improvement in its income statement? One way is to drop the Euro. The solution Gavekal propose is to allow the exchange rate to fall to a level where Greek assets are cheap for foreigners. But unlike the USA and the UK, Greece is trapped inside the Euro straitjacket and cannot devalue its currency nor can it print more money to buy itself out of trouble. Iceland has devalued the Krona and now claims to be in a better position than Greece. An added advantage of this strategy ties in with the one sector that if properly revived, offers some hope or salvation for Greece to emerge out of its troubles. Greece should do all it can to become a viable, affordable and competitive tourist destination again. After 2001 when Greece dropped the Drachma and adopted the Euro, the cost of living soared for most Greeks and the country became too expensive for tourists. Greece is a country blessed with beautiful islands, each one with its own unique character. The country has magnificent beaches, safe waters, no pirates, no malaria, a long and varied coastline, rugged mountains, beautiful villages, lakes and rivers in the interior. The Greek weather, easy laid back lifestyle of sidewalk cafés and taverna’s is ideal for tourism. The country offers museums, ancient sites, history, treasures, monuments and archeology. But more importantly a change in attitude is also needed in the country. Greeks need to revive and embrace the time-honoured traditional Greek values of filoxenia, the legendary Greek warmth, enthusiasm, curiosity and hospitality towards strangers.

The only salvation really is for government policies and efforts to remove obstacles and free up the vital tourism sector which has been crippled by red tape and a lack of adequate world class facilities at market friendly rates. Red tape chokes the life out of every initiative because everyone has a finger in the pie, from entrepreneurial priests to corrupt local politicians and mayors. Even billionaire developers with unlimited resources at their disposal and lots of political clout, spend 15 to 20 years to see a project or resort with huge tourism potential come to fruition. As a result Greece loses out to its immediate neighbour Turkey which offers a similar product and superior service at more affordable rates. Greece needs more world class golf resorts, health spas, hotels and marinas built in an environmentally friendly or sensitive way to attract mid-level and up market visitors and not the beer, ouzo and retsina swilling (often simultaneously) Scandinavian backpackers of the 1980’s. Greece also needs to learn from the mistakes made in Spain where rampant or unchecked property developments, with cheaply built apartment blocks and housing estates now lie empty. Greece should have the confidence to say “local is lekker” and offer a first rate, authentic Greek experience and not third rate misspelt English breakfasts. The true spirit and patrimony of Greece is not found in the cities but in the countryside and mountain villages where people celebrate festivals, dance in the plateia, bake their own bread, make their own wine, olive oil, cheeses and sausages, and grow their own fruit and vegetables.

For Greece being a member of this European club is not everything. Old enemy Turkey next door does it alone and has a booming economy. I’m not in favour of rewarding bad behaviour and critics will cry foul, citing “moral hazard”, but what Greece needs right now is partial debt forgiveness or write-offs, not new unsustainable levels of debt which will most certainly enslave the country’s citizens even more for generations to come to foreign interests. The critics and there are many will say, you brought this upon yourself. That may be true but Greece had a lot of outside help to push her into the abyss from the likes of Goldman Sachs and other predators seeking to make a quick kill from the endemic weakness of the Greek system. The situation is dire but all is not lost. It’s not the end of the world. Argentina, Russia and the Asian countries had defaults and faced similar challenges. They not only survived but even came out stronger with bull markets. Greece can learn and take courage from their example. Greece understands hardship and adversity more than most countries but unfortunately in its difficult history Greece has also sometimes been a willing pawn of the big powers and danced to their tune to her own detriment.

As governments all over the world run out of options and print more and more money in a vain attempt to delay the inevitable day of reckoning, the flight to safety makes gold increasingly look like a viable option for many global investors. In a previous article I jokingly wrote that Greece should outsource the economic management of the country to German financial polizei. A friend and fellow pavementista, while sipping his cappuccino and poring over the morning newspapers, remarked that if he was Greek, he’d brush up on his German. Looking at the massive debt levels of the other SWEAP’s, if I were them; I’d start learning
Cantonese.


Costas Ayiotis
Pavement Philosopher