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BESTSELLING AUTHOR AND AWARD-WINNING JOURNALIST

MANDY WIENER

Featuring authors

ANELE MDODADANNY K

KHAYA DLANGANIK RABINOWITZ

SHAKA SISULU

A fresh, entertaining series of pocket books that feature prominent young South African voices worth listening to.

The Youngsters series explores topics of interest to the youth, ranging from hair weaves to discovering who you are and what you should do with your life, as well as issues of race and gender, love and sex in the time of social networks, the music and radio industries, comedy, empowering yourself and more … The series shares the naked reality of being a youngster in South Africa and helps you to make sense of it all.

SERIES IS EDITED BY

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It Feels Wrong to Laugh, But …

ANELEMDODA

EDITED BY MANDY WIENER

I’m not saying your drink is who you are, but knowing your drink is part of knowing yourself. The process of finding the tastes you like, whilst you’re there deciding what you drink – surely you should also be finding out things about yourself. For example, am I studying law because I want to be a law-yer or because I like Ally McBeal/The Practice? Or is being a doctor your calling or do you want to find McDreamy? Also knowing what you should stay away from is just as important. Does tequila on the rocks make you dance on the table? If that’s your thing, then go ahead. If not, it may be best to step away.

I personally don’t like beer and in university it was just so cool for girls to drink beer. One of the years there was a wave of pretty chicks drinking beer, so know that deciding against it was part of forming not only my independence but also for-tifying an opinion I would stand for. For one thing, I don’t like yeast unless it’s in a loaf of bread. Beer makes me burp and

Gin & Tonic with a Splash of CranberryThat’s my drink. And I think it says a lot about me.

WHO ARE YOU?

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@anele

I don’t like unnecessary burping. As unruly as I think I may be, I don’t like unladylike behaviour and as such, not only because of my knock-knees, I shy away from pants. I can just hear the feminist’s … Urgh, leave me alone and please use a coaster. It is who I am and I’m unapologetic about these things that make me me.

I don’t do cocktails – I like guarantees. Cocktails just don’t know what they want to be in life, being a jack-of-all-trades and master of none. Think about a Long Island Ice Tea: vodka, tequila, rum, gin, triple sec, sweet and sour mix, Coca-Cola. All these different tastes coming together and not going anywhere without each other. It has so much going on and no clear direction, but because there’s so much of it, it feels safe to kick your sobriety out of the way.

That was something I hated in university; the whole let’s go together somewhere even though we have our own cars. I can hear the green people moaning we should be saving the world. Building your independence is a part of university; why then would we happily not celebrate that independence.

And I have no idea what’s in a Jam Jar (who the fuck knows what’s in those, only it knows), nor do I like the way the wait-ers look at me as they serve it to me.

Anyway, just because everyone is doing it, doesn’t mean

IT FEELS WRONG TO LAUGHT, BUT ...

‘I am not my gap, but I own it. I am not my size, but I own it and you can’t use what

you see as a negative against me. I own me and proudly so.’ – Anele Mdoda

Carving her own path in radio, Anele Mdoda is known as one irreplaceable half

of The Grant & Anele Show on 5FM and, from April 2012, on the Drive Time show

on Highveld Stereo. A talker, a comic, honest and raw, Anele discusses everything

from radio to hair weaves and owning your size in It Feels Wrong to Laugh, But …

Twitter Handle: @Anele

June 2012 | Non-fiction (Youth) | Paperback (148 x 128 mm) |128 pp

978-1-77010-247-7 | Rights: World |Available as an eBook 978-1-77010-252-1

you have to. You saw the table next to you have a Jam Jar and it’s just easy to go along with hooraying to the colourful mixture, with too many straws, in front of you.

My point is, everything you’re doing should be a series of choices – leading to the next choice – you can’t just fall into things, everything is a sum of choices. Fate favours the pre-pared. Fortune favours the brave. The brave know who they are and what they stand for.

Let’s say cheers to that.

9

DANNY

EDITED BY MANDY WIENER

Take It From Me

I’m sure everyone has heard the gossip regarding my rela-tionship with Lee-Ann Liebenberg; I can honestly say I wasn’t prepared for the amount of publicity we would get. During the time we were together, we literally became public property and I was seen as being famous purely for whom I was dating. I blame myself for the media circus our relationship became. My naivety and blind faith that it would all work out had me digging my own grave. I’ve learnt the hard way to be more discreet and measured about my public life.

People saw me as a poser, and I wasn’t taken very seri-ously for being a musician even though I’d worked so hard over the years to produce albums that would prove differ-ently. After four albums I still felt myself having to prove my worth to everyone. During the rocky parts of our relationship, I was spending a lot of time in London recording my latest album, Across the Line. I had become very frustrated with so-cial commentary regarding my career and I was determined

One of the harshest realisations of fame is that the critics don’t stop at tearing into your career;

they delve into your dirty laundry too.

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@dannykmusic

to demonstrate that the criticism was unfounded.I find it strange how criticism affects people differently. I’ve

always been one to pretend it has no effect on me, when in all honesty, I never forget what’s been said. I think it subcon-sciously filters down into some of the decisions I make, some-times positively and sometimes negatively. On the one hand, I’ll work harder because of it but on the other, I’ll always try to win people over and change their minds about me, even though I know that most of the time I won’t succeed.

I’ve always felt that I’ve had to prove I’m deserving of my fame; deserving of my career. I’ve never really felt like an artist or a musician; I’m constantly proving and re-proving that I can do this. I don’t think I really give myself credit in my own mind, and with this last album I was determined to do something so different that people could see that there was enough talent in the songwriting and production ability to do anything.

To keep yourself sane in an industry that can be so ment-ally taxing, is to have the ability to divorce yourself from your public persona. When I’m at home I’m just Danny; I don’t have anything that will tell you I’m a singer. There are no pictures of me on stage, no posters, no tour memorabilia. I think it’s important to be able to let go in a place where you feel safe, where you don’t have to prove anything to anyone. We’ve all

TAKE IT FROM ME

seen what fame can do to people; it’s in the media every single day. There isn’t much that can prepare you for that, but finding a balance can really make all the difference in the world.

Take It From Me:❑ Never let praise go to your head and never let criticism

go to your heart.❑ Be honest enough with yourself to listen to criticism.❑ If you can’t let it go, you can’t move on.❑ Have a place where you can be yourself❑ Don’t let the hate consume you, keep believing in

yourself. …

‘They say there’s no business like show business. And that’s not because of the fame, or

the money. It’s because of just how hard it can be.’ – Danny K

Take It From Me records the ups and downs of the career path of South African

singer, songwriter, actor and producer, Danny K. A performer from a young age,

Danny K talks about the good, the bad and the ugly of the music business, his

influences and how rejection can sometimes pay off.

Twitter Handle: @dannykmusic

June 2012 | Non-fiction (Youth) | Paperback (148 x 128 mm) | 128 pp

978-1-77010-248-4 | Rights: World | Available as an eBook 978-1-77010-253-8

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KHAYADLANGA

EDITED BY MANDY WIENER

In My Arrogant Opinion

One of the major reasons is because their fathers have been fathers in name only, and not in actions. The only thing they seem expert in is making babies – and then abandoning them. I have heard many people simply call their fathers sperm donors. I have heard people refer to their fathers as ‘that thing’. The great bitterness towards fathers has less to do with hate than deep-seated disappointment. It is because they know what fathers are supposed to do. When they don’t do what they are meant to, bitterness sets in. But this does not mean that they hate their fathers. A myriad of contradictory feelings settle upon many children directed at their fathers.

A large number of black fathers should be ashamed of themselves. They have not taken responsibility after enjoying some hanky panky. They are like gangbangers in projects in the United States when gang violence was rife, and drive-bys. They practise what one could call bang-bys. It is no co-incidence then that one of the reasons we experience high

Many young black South Africans carry around bitterness towards their fathers

for a variety of reasons.

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@khayadlanga

levels of crime in South Africa is precisely because fathers have abdicated their duties as men. The greatest crime that has been committed against black South African children has to be that of fathers abandoning their children. In fact, I don’t know if a large section of black fathers deserves the honour of being called men at all. ‘Boys’ would be more ap-propriate considering the behaviour of many of our fathers.

This is not meant to take anything away from the many great fathers who know what it means to be a man. Those men who look after and show their children through actions as well words that they love them. Some fathers think that throwing money at their children is being a father. We all know that they do this to avoid confronting the fact that they haven’t been fathers. Money will never take the place of an absent father. Children want their fathers to be around more than they want their father’s money.

According to AMPS, 65% of women in South Africa with ba-bies under the age of two are single (never married and not living together). In 2006, this proportion was 50%. Obviously there is a serious underlying problem with society. Towning and running.

When I was in high school I noticed that a large portion of black children had absent fathers. In one of my classes over

IN MY ARROGANT OPINION

70% of the black children had fathers who were not around. They were there but they were missing. Not in a ‘Let’s file a missing person’s report’ manner, they just didn’t live at home with their children. Most of these children might as well have been raised by single parents, their mothers …

‘This book isn’t about anything in particular. I know that sounds a little disturbing,

but hear me out. I think that those people who read my work read it precisely because

there is no particular pattern; they read it to find out what I have to say. Essentially I

am like them. I am a conversationalist. I write like people talk. No fancy language; nor

do I show how smart I am.’ – Khaya Dlanga

Award-winning blogger and advertising guy who never eats black jelly babies

Khaya Dlanga discusses issues of racism, love and sex, money, gender and a range

of things in between. Khaya’s humour mixed with opinion is a recipe guaranteed

to make you think and laugh out loud.

Khaya Dlanga is a Senior Communications Manager: Content Excellence at

Coca-Cola South Africa. He writes in his personal capacity. He is a winner of the

prestigious Cannes Gold and Black Eagle advertising awards. He is also a terror of

the social networks.

Twitter Handle: @khayadlanga

June 2012 | Non-fiction (Youth) | Paperback (148 x 128 mm) | 128 pp

978-1-77010-246-0 | Rights: World | Available as an eBook 978-1-77010-251-4

17

SOUTH AFRICAA Long Walk to

a Free RideEDITED BY MANDY WIENER

& GILLIAN BRESLIN

‘Oh great,’ you’re probably thinking, ‘a history lesson. I have bigger things to worry about. Why should I care about an-cient history when the present is changing all the time?’

Our generation is all about change: regime changes, party changes, road name changes, province changes, Facebook status update changes. History books get changed accord-ing to who is in power, so we don’t know where we’re coming from. Newspapers are censored and sanitised, so we don’t know where we stand. Twitter and Facebook are no use be-cause they are full of people who lie and can’t spell. And the future is uncertain, so we don’t know where we’re going. But sometimes, knowing where you came from can help you to figure out where you are going. Or at the very least, help you to win at Trivial Pursuit.

It may come as a surprise to you that South Africa was not always the raceless, classless utopia you see in beer adverts. Once upon a time this was a dark and dangerous

The hardest thing about South African history is getting people to agree on it.

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@nikrabinowitz

place, beset by racism and violence. Like America, but with elephants.

So what happened? How did we get from primitive violent racists to sophisticated violent racists? If you were educated prior to 1990, you might remember learning that the noble Boers and long-suffering British people were beset by prob-lems caused by the bloodthirsty black tribes.

That isn’t really a big theme in post-1990 teaching. So we are here to set the record straight. This is the true, una-bridged version of South African history.

PrehistoryMillions of years ago, there were tiny, hairy hominids roam-ing the West Rand of Joburg. This is still true, but the original hairy hominids had not yet invented the wheel, let alone the tow-truck. These original hominids were the missing link – the precursors to all mankind. We don’t know much about these guys, but we do know that they were incredibly clumsy, because we keep finding their bones down holes and in old riverbeds. Since we don’t find many bones we assume they were either incredibly good at decomposing or they ate each other. We are going with cannibalism, since every good story needs a bit of cannibalism …

A LONG WALK TO A FREE RIDE

Then evolution happened. Unless you don’t believe in evolution, in which case God made some new and improved humans.

According to these two youngsters, ‘The hardest thing about South African history is

getting people to agree on it.’

A fast-paced, hilarious guide to surviving your youth in South Africa. Expect a

history lesson with a difference, what makes a comedian tick, some alternative

political insights and thoughtful crystal-ball gazing. Join Nik Rabinowitz and

Gillian Breslin on a side-splitting journey to discover the ‘real’ South Africa.

Nik Rabinowitz was raised on the mean, green streets of Constantia, Cape Town,

a world of ride-bys, piano lessons, and unrelenting love and financial support from

family members. Despite all this hardship he still managed to be moderately suc-

cessful, achieving fame as the world’s foremost Xhosa-speaking Jewish comedian.

Gillian Breslin obtained a Journalism Degree from Rhodes University, but

quickly realised that writing is much easier when you get to make stuff up. After

a brief stint as ‘The World’s Worst Producer’ she started writing for television, and

hasn’t looked back since (mostly because that’s where the creditors are). Gillian

and Nik have been working together since 2008.

Twitter Handle: @nikrabinowitz

June 2012 | Non-fiction (Youth) | Paperback (148 x 128 mm) | 128 pp

978-1-77010-249-1 | Rights: World | Available as an eBook 978-1-77010-254-5

21

SHAKASISULU

EDITED BY MANDY WIENER

Becoming

We were at a traffic light so she had my full attention. She then asked me very pointed questions about the nature of my relationship with her mother. Stunned, I waded through the inquisition as honestly as I could. When she was satisfied, she simply nodded, looked briefly into the distance and then turned on the radio again. Within moments she was happily chatting about something or the other that had captured her imagination.

Something happened in those few moments. She had held me to account in a way that I allowed very few people to do. Not only that, her questions reminded me of the role I was playing in determining what sort of romantic relation-ships she herself would be predisposed to pursuing. There remains no doubt in my mind that daughters find their fa-thers to love, or spend their lives searching for him. Whether I liked it or not, I was directly influencing the quality of her adult life through my actions, even if I felt that certain things

One day my little girl, then three, and quite keen on simply driving around with me,

reached over to the radio, turned it off and looked me squarely in the eye.

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@shakasisulu

had nothing to do with her or were none of her business. You know, parenting begins when each decision we make for ourselves considers the souls in our care for safekeeping. I have said that my daughter has raised me. Partially because of her, Bond had to go.

* * *

‘By three methods we may learn wisdom:First, by reflection, which is the noblest;Second, by imitation, which is the easiest;and Third by experience, which is the bitterest.’

Confucius (551–479 BC)

In the years since, I’ve more often than not opted for bitter experience to spur me into turning my back on my Bond. My break-up with alcohol after a 19 year (yeah, really) relation-ship followed my imitation of Judge Motala. In my moment of clarity I finally understood what ‘the good life, an enemy of a great life’ meant. I decided there and then to conquer my vices one by one. I was not just leaving Bond, now I was out to kill him.

There is a poetic justice to life because we are the sum of our experiences. I am sure that had it not been for this pro-cess of transition, even unwitting, I wouldn’t have found myself

BECOMING

‘There is a poetic justice to life because we are the sum of our experiences.’

– Shaka Sisulu

Grandson of anti-apartheid stalwart Walter Sisulu, CEO of non-profit organisation

Cheesekids, creator, dreamer, father and devoted Afrikan, Shaka Sisulu discusses

heritage, BEE, inspiration, leadership, legacy and how you can carve your own

destiny in the Afrikan soil in Becoming.

Twitter Handle: @shakasisulu

June 2012 | Non-fiction (Youth) | Paperback (148 x 128 mm) | 128 pp

978-1-77010-250-7 | Rights: World | Available as an eBook 978-1-77010-255-2

pouring myself into the sort of activities (with Cheesekids, for example) that would later lead to people pointing me out as having leadership qualities. I suppose flawed characters with Damascene experiences present the most appealing candidates for leadership; we want to follow folks who have escaped their circumstances.

Back in Oxford, having reflected on all that I have shared with you, I then asked myself who it was that had replaced Bond? Who was my new idol? I remember smiling, it was an easy answer ... one that I will share with you in the next chapter …