Thoughts on a Book – The Sabi, by Diane Brown

Over the last few weeks I've been looking for books online, books written by black African authors, particularly black South Africans. I was in deep search for an experience I can relate to. I love novels, but I'm in a stage where I've been searching for something more "real" than a novel. A true, human experience. I looked and looked, for days on end, and found nothing that I felt I could relate to.

So it was no easy feat. Looking for published work within my search criteria (black, South African, non-fiction) was, indeed, trying to find that needle in the haystack - story of my life. (I'm not complaining very much though, because one day, I'm sure I'll find that needle). I remained hopeful that I would find what I was looking for.

It so happens that I'm currently right in the heart of Africa, in a very remote area where there's absolutely no access to bookshops. So my access to literature is restricted to online searches. So even if I find what I'm looking for, it has to be available in EBook format because there are no delivery services where I am. Otherwise, I'd have to wait till I'm back home in South Africa. So my search for "the book" gets constricted even further – it must be by a South African author, black, non-fiction, a life story and in EBook. Needle!!!!

So after days of looking, I find something by an author I had, up to last week Friday, not heard of. How glad I would be.

Diane Brown, in her book "The Sabi", writes a personal life story of her upbringing, which had amazing features and contrasts - she was raised in a mixed race family, in apartheid South Africa. She had a father who was both charming and brutally harsh. She grew up in a home where there was relative abundance of everything material, but the children were never allowed sense of entitlement to these material possessions. She was adored by one grandmother, but disliked and unaccepted by the other. She does not explicitly say this in the book, in these exact words, but it’s almost safe to say that she first experienced apartheid at home - from relatives.

In the book, Brown places and explains the different stages of her life within the context of what was happening in South Africa and the world, particularly when it comes to issues of race equality and the emancipation of Africans. She takes the reader on a journey, where this emancipation of the African population somehow becomes her own emancipation from the shackles of her childhood.

There's an important issue in the book that she deals with - the violent nature of the South African society, particularly that of men across the racial spectrum. She places and explains this in context and gives her own experience of it, both from home and on the street. At certain stages of the book I had to put it down to pull myself together, to compose myself. It was a little bit difficult to handle. How much healing South Africa needs.

But if I had to give the book a theme, it would definitely come from the title itself, The Sabi. Unfortunately, it would be terribly difficult to explain the concept of the Sabi, without spoiling the book for you. It's something that you will have to discover on the journey with Diane. The journey is worth it, I promise.

But there's one thing I will mention which is personal that I discovered in the book, and that is why I say this is only "half a book review" - it's personal. Diane, reveals and explores meeting her soulmate in the most beautiful way. People often have "mismeetings" and "meetings". Mismeeting, being where two people encounter one another, but are unfortunately floating in different frequencies, such that they struggle to truly and authentically connect. They struggle to relate. And then you have a "meeting", which is where the two are able to connect; in the course of their interaction, they "find" each other, they relate. And when that happens, it is the most beautiful thing. Words cannot describe it.

So I sent Diane an email , giving her my feedback on the book. In it, I thanked her for sharing her experience, particularly on how she met her soulmate and how they finally "found" each other. It gave me hope and assurance that such experiences do exist, I said to her. To my absolute delight and pleasure, Diane graciously responded to my email and in the most humbling and charitable way. Among other things she said to me, this is what she offered as encouragement on the issue of finding my soulmate, and I hope she doesn't mind my sharing some contents of a private conversation:

"Love as I described it really does exist. It is the most beautiful thing that we can experience. It is a force of creation that cannot be mimicked, manipulated, faked or forced. It is a powerful force. There is someone out there in this world that can share this kind of love with you and by its presence make you see the beauty in you and life around you.  I pray that you find your soul mate - I believe that your soul mate will find you too.

Please do not give up or settle for less.".

Ladies and gents, I Sabi.

Name  : The Sabi

Author : Diane Brown

Price    : $9.99 (Kindle version on Amazom.com)

The Social Worker cum Builder

It was a lazy afternoon in the office in late 2009 when my colleague and I struck up a conversation about our individual career plans, as we sat lazily in what was then our open-plan office. After sharing with me his plans which I thought were great hopes and aspirations for a young quantity surveyor in the mining industry, my colleague asked me what my career plans were, what I wanted to do with my life. He also casually asked me if I would consider going into private practice with him once we were established quantity surveyors in the industry. I don’t think he was quite expecting to hear my response.

Without as much as a blink, I spoke heartily about my dreams for the future. I spoke, ever so passionately, about my long-held dream of dedicating my life for the rehabilitation of our sick society. I tried to show that the bulk of the social ills we have in our communities today were and are a result of a society that has lost strong, responsible father figures, in what has come to be commonly referred to as the “fatherless generation”. I spoke of how my burden to help men see the importance of responsible, active fatherhood and also building meaningful relationships with our children, has been nudging me for years.

After an elaborative few minutes of speaking about this, my heartfelt desire and passion, he looked at me and said very wryly (and I think with a tinge of disappointment), “so, you want to be a social worker?”. I too, must admit, that I didn’t see that one coming. I had never, up to that point, thought of it as “social work”. To me, it was not even about what it’s called, what its label is. No, to me it was what it was – a crisis that needed to be addressed and I felt very deeply about it. It didn’t have a name, not in my books.

But we live in a society of labels, and names. We want things to have names, which is not necessarily a bad thing. The only draw-back, for me, with the exercise of naming things is the part about who gets to name. Who am I to ascribe a name to this, or to ascribe a name to that? Do I have the right standing to name? Who gave me that right? Am I convinced that that is the appropriate name? A topic for another day.

Back to the story. “So, you want to be a social worker?” my colleague asked. I looked up to the ceiling, thought about it for a moment, and finally responded. Yes, I suppose you are right. Maybe I do want to be a “social worker”.

And I suppose that’s how I would like to introduce myself, and this blog. In me, lies the heart of a social worker who seeks to see social healing, especially in this nation of ours – South Africa. But there are a lot of things that I also want to share, about my journey, and how I see society. We will most probably not solve society’s problems by blogging about them. But somehow I believe, blogging, as a form of communication with each other and ourselves, may help us identify what these problems are and as a result we might perhaps find the solutions to these problems.

But, no, I’m not all about “social work”, as it were. Well in fact, I’m not even sure that “social work” will form the bedrock of my posts. And you might even be asking how “social work” jibes with “building” (my by-line, Chronicles of a Builder).

It’s simple, really. I was trained as a building scientist. I spent a few years at university, studying the intricacies and science of buildings. From the theory of the laying of foundations to the commercial side of the trade, I learned valuable lessons about what it takes to erect a high rise building. And it was only after I came into the corporate world that I got to appreciate how the science of erecting a building, bears and carries remarkable lessons about building relationships, families and (you’ve guessed it) societies. And I will try to share these lessons on these pages.

So, I invite you dear friend, to come and build with me….