Seven-ping Sunday (11)

Pings, love and astral rights

Ctrl Alt Refresh. If there was a ping template, I would have no fun. This week, twixt new astral knowledge and an annual osteoporosis infusion (if you’re in that bracket, it’s called Zoclasta, and your doctor can prescribe it), the pings came in wearing suitably eccentric garb. Mix it up, and travel from your armchair if you can’t make the walk.

Star ping. When the deputy head of the primary school opposite our house knocked on the door saying his Grade 4 daughter needed to interview old Observatory residents for a school project, I knew not that I would also have something to learn. Die-hard Obsites as we are (I wrote a doodle a couple of years back when Ganesh changed hands – click here), we were embarrassed to admit we had never visited the astronomical observatory after which the suburb is named. Perfectly rectifiable, though: I discovered there are two-hour tours every Tuesday and Thursday night for R50 a head. (There are also open nights on the second and fourth Saturday of every month.) Sadly, twas a dark and unexpectedly stormy night when we chose to go, but the tour introductions, and poster explanations in four national languages and Braille, were off the wall and mindblowing in the huge contribution South Africa made to world astronomy. Weather precluded star viewing, but the equipment – the finest in the southern hemisphere – and history lessons, which included the !Xam praying mantis god, Kaggen, almost made up for it. I now know what spectrometry is, that the observatory was founded for maritime reasons and that astronomers have a sense of humour. (I also later learnt that the observatory was situated on the site of the farm of one of my 17^th century Dutch ancestors, Jan Visser.)

Art of the week. He’s been off the wall ever since I met him 40-odd years ago. Besides diving, surfing, cycling and holding down a full-time freelance designer job, Obsite Ian Mackie also creates his own art, the latest of which appeared at the Obs Streetopia Fest last year. Check it out here, here and here.

Walk of the week. When my bestie told me 30 years ago that her eldest daughter was born with Down Syndrome, I had no idea just how little that label would come to mean. Today Jo is living in a commune with like souls in Constantia, holding down a job beading necklaces, labelling bottles and doing other creative tasks at the Joyce Chevalier Centre in Fish Hoek. She also does physical jerks like we did yesterday, as we walked 5km through the picturesque Klein Constantia vineyards in an effort to raise funds for the Vine Community. Oozing love and happiness as she crossed the finish line, she embodied my nickname for her -- MoJo.

Fever dream of the week. I’m back on the Marita van der Vyver trail after her post on literary Easter eggs. (Click here). Current choice is ‘Just Dessert, Dear’, a compilation of imaginative e.mails and letters over ten years by a woman shattered by divorce. Comes with useful lists like ‘5 films featuring married untrustworthy men’ and ‘5 interesting jams that sorrowful women can make’. Not all is at it seems! Book no 5, one Easter egg found, many more to go!

Meal of the week. Borscht or Russian beet soup (“mixed with fresh cream it has an alluring pink colour, and pink food is always sexy, don’t ask why, just do it”) – from Van der Vyver’s ‘5 Kinds of soup to feed a hungry lover’. Don’t ask why. It works (if you don’t overdo cabbage and especially if you’re celebrating the Hungarian election)! 😊 PS I also made her ‘banana jam for sorrowful women’ burning the midnight oil one night. 😊

Green ping. With a decline in population from 20 000 to 340, the Botha’s lark is on the brink of extinction. But moves are being made to save the bird, whose habitat has been overtaken by urban development and agriculture. Click here.

Soundbyte of the week. Like the title of the song, it doesn’t leave your consciousness easily once it’s entered. ‘Haunted’ by rebellious Irish singers Shane McGowan and Sinead O’ Connor, who died within a few months of each other in 2023. Click here.

Till next week,

Ping bravely,

Sharonski