Tania.co.za

The coming year

The past year represents one of the three or four big turning points in my life. I was in Dar es Salaam recently, and I'm returning there next year for a few days; I have also paid several more visits to Maputo since the last time I wrote about that. There have been many new friendships formed, and a lot of damage done to old ones, with slow healing and re-injury, as during a war. Very little of what I have experienced during this year has been documented here.

This blog will be replaced by four Web sites next year, each with a distinct domain.

One will be a blog devoted to Project Management, representing my professional interest.

Another will be devoted primarily to my passion for dancing, which more than any other single activity has kept me sane since 2006 -- and this in spite of the fact that at times other clubbers have mistaken me for someone on crack cocaine! I have often been asked, right there in a night club, by some stranger, "Teach me to dance like you dance!" because, unlike professional dancers who must push their bodies to painful extremes, forcing their last joy into a smile for a critical and demanding audience, my pleasure is real, others want it, and I want to give it. Last night a stranger came up to me and shouted above the music,"You rock!" I've had compliments before, but his particular choice of words warmed my soul because it represents a wordplay which he never intended, but which explains it all. 2009 was the year in which I at last understood the foundation on which I have been built, and to which I can now respond with exuberance: Of course I rock! I am autistic.

The third site will be ecclectic and personal, not distinctly themed, an agglomeration of shorter whim-based entries, and a mixture of seriousness and frivolity as befits any well-balanced human being. This site will not bear my real name.

The fourth, represented by the present domain, will be the place where I share family photographs and news for relatives and friends. There will be a link from this site to two of the others.

I am also hoping to finally get the Web zine at Magazine.co.za up and running, but that has been an "I'll do it in the new year!" goal for several years, so I am not sure whether I should trust this statement of intent until I have presented myself with a proper Project Initiation Document!

I also have the goals to take formal steps to support many of those marginalised or rejected in our society where my abilities could not easily have been substituted. I have found a niche where God can use me, and specifically me.

As 2009 draws to a close, see, I have begun formulating some New Year's Resolutions. I used to scoff the idea of having such a list, because I reasoned that if you want to do something -- lose weight or be a nicer person or whatever it is that people usually resolve to do -- why can't you just do it, and do it this year? The thing is, integrity -- following through on a promise to oneself or to others -- requires integration -- that is, providing oneself with a realistic plan and an environment wherein it is possible to implement the resolution, and then taking steps required for fulfilment. Developing a picture of the ideal future, the strategy for attaining it, and the project plan including a plan to deal with risk and change, requires considerable reflection and time. If you don't  have (or take) the time to think, you may not get much done, or you may get a lot done which does not contribute to your goals, and thus your labour diligent willl have been ineffective. Thus, I have New Year's Resolutions, and I hope that I shall be able to spend some time away from work at the end of December to reflect, plan and get going with these things which in theory could have started any time, but which in practice will have to kick off in 2010. (The pertinence of the football metaphor to the date was noted only upon completing the sentence!)

By the time that I return to this and other spaces, my position in society may have changed forever. I have committed a Great Taboo. Some people may forgive and accept me once they know; some may not forgive, because I shall not be able to apologise or to repent. I do not expect that I will ever be able to lead others from a sanctified moral high ground. If after December you choose to dislike me, if you choose to judge me for my choice, if you withhold your love, it is not with condescending magnanimity that I will accept and forgive you, but rather with cognisance of and respect for your paradigm, which forms the foundation of nearly every culture on earth. It is not that I am unafraid of your rejection: I do indeed fear it, and I fear particularly being rejected by those to whom I am close who see things in black and white and who must by force of neurological predisposition decide whether I am good or bad, a sinner or saint. I beg of you, though: Do not prevent me from serving, even if you believe that as a sinner I cannot be saved. I want to do good. I want to help. I want to save the world. Whoever is not against you, is for you. If the gifts are good in your eyes, permit the giver her giving, even if she is bad.

Tania buys a mini-skirt

In a rush on my way to have my laptop repaired by the congenial troglodyte in the basement of the physics building, I had to pass through the student shopping centre, and saw a skirt I liked.
"You can try it in the bathroom."
Two minutes later: "Thank-you, it fits. Now, can I have a pair of legs to go with this?"
"You mean leggings?"
"Never mind, I'll just take the skirt."

Gesprek in 'n nagklub

"Is dit melk wat jy daar drink?"
"Ja."
"Net melk?"
"Ja."
"Ek hoop dis ten minste 'n double."
"Dis neat, on the rocks."
Hy lag. "Hoekom drink jy melk?"
"Want ek is dors." (My ma sou dit 'n tipiese Aspergers-antwoord noem. Ek weet wat die doel van sy vraag is, maar ek aanvaar nie die onderliggende aanname nie, dus wil ek nie die vraag na sy verwagting beantwoord nie.)
"Nee, ek bedoel..." begin hy, maar hy laat dit vaar.
"Dis een van die dinge waarvan ek hou van hierdie plek," voeg ek by, sodat hy nie moet dink dat ek probeer lelik wees deur nie saam te speel nie. "Ek bedoel, hoeveel dansplekke is daar wat vir jou melk sal verkoop?"

'n Halfuur later sien ek 'n ou op die dansvloer wat 'n t-hemp aan het waarop daar staan, Celebrating Milk, en ek wys dit uit vir die outjie wat my uitgevra het oor my drinkgewoontes. Ek twyfel of die ou binne-in die t-hemp ook wel graag melk drink in 'n nagklub, maar ek behoort dit eintlik nie te betwyfel nie.

Irony

I had this conversation with the passenger next to me on the plane during my last trip to Mozambique. He was a French-speaking man of Arabic origin, and was on his way to Maputo from the DRC via Johannesburg. He had lived in Kinshasa for many years, and was going to Maputo to visit relatives.

My fellow traveler told me that he made a living by importing used clothes from Canada, and that there was a very good market for these goods in the DRC.

"Is it difficult to get new clothes in the DRC?" I asked, having learned three years ago from my landlord, a telecommunications contractor, that new clothes are hard to come by in the part of West Africa where he works. I thought it may be the same in the DRC.
"No," said my fellow passenger, "it's just that all the new clothes come from China."
"Ah," I said, "So is it difficult to import clothes into the DRC from China?"
"No, you can get them," he said, "but people prefer old clothes because they last longer."