View Topic

I don't understand why people protest by destroying their own neighborhoods, towns, and cities. I don't understand how that makes things better for the protesters.

Neither do I. This is what happened during apartheid as well, and the ANC actively encouraged it then. Now, they want to condemn it, and only because it makes them look bad. They've even banned the SABC (South African Broadcast Commission) from showing footage of violent protests.

EDIT: The thing is, though, I can somewhat understand the impulse, even if I condemn it. The ANC is terrible at delivering on basic governmental tasks, let alone the wild promises they make before each election, and when people complain about the horrendous service delivery failure, and the fact that the ANC just doesn't live up to their promises (which were wildly unrealistic to begin with), those complaints fall on deaf ears. So the people continue to suffer because the ANC doesn't do its job. Only when they resort to this type of behaviour, does the country at large finally hear about their plight. The citizens are caught between a rock and a hard place. What else can they do? So I blame the ANC as the root cause of this, even though I really don't like the way the citizens go about protesting.

Why don't they destroy government buildings instead of their own neighborhoods then?

Also Laurentus, what does your signature actually say?  This is what I get from Google Translate...   

"marching Microwave people .
Fallacy , imbalance and mismanagement .
Turned with the sun on their backs ,
I prefer the sun on face .
And I will not go back ,
I will never terugggan ,
I will send you never satisfied , happy set."

Oh noes, not the marching Microwave people. =o

Oh noes, not the marching Microwave people. =o

HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHA  I'M DYING!!! What is that even from!!??

The MMO-sim expansion to Goat Simulator...the Microwave is a class you can choose to play.

Government buildings tend to be well guarded, otherwise I'm certain they would have done it by now. Some people have attempted it. It never turns out well.

And Jesus Christ, that is one useless translation by Google Translate. This is how I would translate it, without the rhymes of course, since these are lyrics to a song from Fokofpolisiekar, an Afrikaans rock band.

"Microwave people march,
No comprehension, no balance, no control,
Turned away with the sun on their backs,
I prefer the sun on my face.
And I will never go back,
I will never go back.
I will never satisfy, satisfy them."

It doesn't make much sense like that, since translating poems and song lyrics requires a knowledge of rhythm and complex rhyme structures in both languages, which I simply do not possess. Hope that clears it up.

So there are Microwave people.

Haha, I think it's a nice way of describing people who expect things to happen too quickly. It's poetic.

EDIT: I see I previously forgot to type the word "my" as well. Oops. Fixed it now.

Oh...I guess the poetry gets lost in translation.

To a certain extent. I'm sure the more poetically inclined and skilled in both languages would do a better job of it.

But even my translated one can be understood poetically. Allow me to demonstrate:

1. Mikrogolfoond mense marsjeer / Microwave people march

People who expect things to happen too quickly/don't have enough patience are angry and marching (whether they're literally marching is up for debate. Perhaps they're simply very angry, or violent, or involved in some sort of protest.) Oh, and the imagery for microwave people being understood to be impatient ones, is because many people just buy microwave food, despite how unhealthy it may be, because they don't have the patience to prepare food properly.

2. Wanbegrip, wanbalans, wanbeheer / No comprehension, no balance, no control

The people who are up in arms from the first line don't understand the situation, they've lost control, and there is a resulting imbalance, or perhaps there was already an imbalance.

3. Weggedraai met die son op hul rûe / Turned away, with the sun on their backs

If the sun is used figuratively to mean enlightenment, or seeing, understanding and accepting reality, then these people are not enlightened, or refuse to understand (which links to the second line).

4. Ek verkies die son op my gesig / I prefer the sun on my face

The storyteller (I think it's called the speaker, if I'm remembering my high school English lessons correctly?) is not blind to reality/he is enlightened, unlike the microwave people. He accepts it and embraces it, and that has made him an outcast (which we can infer from the next lines).

5. En ek sal nooit weer terruggaan nie,
6. Ek sal nooit weer teruggaan nie / And I will never go back, oh no, I will never go back (added the "oh no" to convey the rhythm of the Afrikaans line)

The speaker refuses to go back to the dark (unenlightenment) just to fit in again. We can infer that he has already become an outcast, because he's talking about "not going back." He makes no mention of leaving.

7. Ek sal julle nooit tevrede, tevrede stel nie / I will never satisfy you, oh no, I will never satisfy you.

The speaker is just emphasising that he doesn't care about the people's opinion of him once more, and he won't betray his beliefs just so he can content them again.

This is what political dissent looks like in South Africa.

www.timeslive.co.za/sundaytimes/stnews/2016/06/21/In-Pictures-Tshwane-in-chaos

Oh, Tshwane is the new name for Pretoria, the city I live in, and the capital of SA.

That seems scary as hell. Stay safe.

I could have sworn you lived in Johannesburg, for some reason. 

Many people in other countries know only of Johannesburg.

That said, Pretoria is just north of it, and the two cities have expanded so much that no clear line can be drawn between the two. If you were to look at it from the sky, you would think we were one city if you didn't know better. We are the two largest cities in Gauteng, South Africa's smallest, yet most densely populated province. Johannesburg is South Africa's business capital, while Pretoria is the political one.

My ignorance is probably going to show now, but New York and Washington D.C. have a similar dynamic?

As heavily influenced by commerce as New York is, it is not an official capital of any sort (it used to be the capital before about 1800 or so, but not since then). For all practical purposes, Washington D.C. is the federal capital of administration, the judiciary, taxation, the military, foreign embassies, and most other purposes. (Some of these government agencies are located in the suburbs immediately surrounding D.C., but that is only because the actual district itself is too small to house everything.)