2009 Royal Enfield Clubman EFI

I am so stuck on retro/classic bikes right now. It is, in truth, a coping strategy meant to disconnect from the usual tiresome crap.

So there I was driving to the gym on a rather cold Kimberley day when I saw a middle-aged man riding a right and proper Royal Enfield.

Yep, there is a least one Royal Enfield in our cold dust bowl. I wonder though if there is a 2009 Clubman EFI, like the one pictured below, in Kimberley, or in South Africa for that matter.

Who sells Royal Enfields in South Africa? I know I am talking to myself here ;0)

AnyHoo, my attention is starting to turn to the revitalized and back-in-Britain brand, Norton. The bike below is a 2009 Norton 961 Commando and it is probably not here in South Africa as yet.

This bike evokes the classic lines and retro bits of old skool Nortons. It is the stuff that makes me heart beat faster.

Broer if you are reading here ... I have a birthday coming up! :0)

Picture Credits

2009 Royal Enfield Bullet 500 Classic

Royal Enfield says this bike is a "modern reworking of the old legend" Bullet that has been in production since 1932.

Royal Enfields are manufactured in India and enjoy cult status there and elsewhere. I remember seeing several custom versions in India and Nepal.

These are real old skool bikes not meant for scraping or stoppies. I'd like one just to look at ... maybe drain the oil/gas and park it in my living room.

It costs about R45 000 (approximately $5500) and is artsy enough for me :)

Other Royal Enfields are sweet too. I took this picture in February 2007 of a more commonly found model in New Delhi.

Nice and new it was.

"The Flip Side Of The Race Card"

by Eusebius McKaiser
Mail & Guardian
May 25 2009

"Thabo Mbeki lived in something of a racial hell, his skin constantly rubbed raw by the devils of colonialism and apartheid. It was evident in so much that he wrote and said -- perhaps most devastatingly in his approach to HIV/Aids, where his belief that the western discourse on the disease was fundamentally racist led directly to a policy that cost hundreds of thousands of lives.

He tried to keep us all there with him, but our failure to find a way out is our own. We could have rejected his paranoia by finding other ways to engage with the race theme, but instead we escaped to the dishonest safety of multiracial coffee shops, bookstores, conference circuits, liberal media and restaurant tables filled with patrons of all skin colours talking about everything but the race question.

If nothing else, the Jacob Zuma presidency gives us the space to have the national conversation we never had. We can now lay the foundation for this overdue, but still very much needed, national debate."

Read the rest of the article here.

'Faith in Political Institutions Eroded'

by Nashira Davids
Sunday Times
May 24, 2009

South Africans’ faith in public institutions has steadily dropped in the past three years.

The results of a national survey, conducted over three years by the Institute for Democracy in South Africa, found that people have in particular lost confidence in political parties — from 48% in 2006 to 35% in 2008.

The results were presented at a symposium, Fifteen Years of Democracy in South Africa: Gains and Challenges, at the University of the Western Cape on Thursday.

Confidence was also noticeably lower in the presidency, which went from 77% in 2006 to 55% in 2008; and in local government, which fell from 50% in 2006 to 40% in 2008.

Article Credit

DA 'keep jobs for white boys club'

By Bronwyn Gerretsen
IOL
May 23 2009 (SA, 12:08pm)

"Coming hot on the heels of heavy criticism of the Democratic Alliance's all-male, majority-white Western Cape cabinet, an Umhlanga woman has now accused the party's eThekwini branch of nepotism and reserving jobs for members of their "white boys club" after she was refused an opportunity to stand for nomination as a Durban North or Umhlanga ward councillor."

Read the rest of the article here.

A Standard Ride And Getting On

I have been thinking about turning 45 next month. A lot of that thinking is about living in South Africa where 20-somethings I don't know sometimes call me "Uncle" and the men I call "Uncle" sometimes lecture me on the virtues of finding Mrs. Right and having children.

I don't feel 45. But then again, what should 45 feel and look like?

I thought that growing older would also mean growing up. But I don't think of myself as grown up, except I worry more now than I did when I was 35.

Perhaps I should stop writing here because it is kinda childish for a grown man, right? And what about my ongoing obsession with motorcycles?

Makes me worry.

I am so invested in buying a bike like the one pictured here. Same color too! It is an 08 Kawasaki Z1000 of the standard kind. I rode one this morning.

Just don't know right now if I will be hanging Northern Cape plates on it or Florida plates.

Yeah I said Florida. And no I am not thinking retirement. But I am thinking about leaving. Again.

And soon.

But not before I turn 45 here in the dust-bowl town by the hole.

Onward!

ps. I am going to hate writing this post in the morning. What will the "Uncles" say?

Makes me worry ;)

Racist Redskins Trademark To Stay

For as long as I can remember there has been a movement to stop the Washington Redskins from using their racist trademark. The trademark, as seen in the picture here, inhumanely reduces Indians to nothing more than a mere mascot.

This racist habit has a long standing in American history and it still common to find Indian mascots attached to an assortment of sport codes and teams.

Here in South Africa, Indians are similarly reduced to a racist essence by a chain of fast food restaurants called the "Spur". (See my previous post on the Spur.)

About four hours ago, as of this writing, a federal appeals court in Washington D.C. ruled that the Redskins can continue to use their trademark mascot. The ruling comes after a 17 year battle with a group of Indians who argued that the trademark is racist.

The U.S. Court of Appeals did not touch the question of racism but ruled in favour of the Washington Redskins on the basis of a "legal technicality".

I am disgusted by this decision. When I lived in the Baltimore-Washington area my blood would boil each time I saw the Redskins mascot.

The same is true now when I drive past a Spur restaurant. What the hell is the sense of reducing a people to nothing more than a mascot? And why is this piece of racist imagery even present here in South Africa?

I have been here before (see my post entitled "Racist Imaging", for example). My blood also boils when I see Jeep Grand Cherokees. Do the folks who drive these cars not see the inherent racism?

I can vouch for the fact that most folks who live in the Baltimore-Washington-Northern Virginia region are not concerned about the racism portrayed in the Redskins trademark mascot.

What a damn shame hey? Post-racial era my foot. There can be no post-race anything in settler dominated/derived societies.

Onward!

Picture and Story Credit