Chronicles of Fly

Pomwene Shakela, Grade 12 learner: “Okay, the thing is… We’re not saying that the government should not give the teachers the 8% increment that they’re asking for, and neither are we saying that the teachers should accept the 5% increment that government is offering. But, what we’re saying is that they should fix their dispute, they should solve their problems, but they should leave us out of it.” Figure 1 : Learners at Gabriel Taapopi Senior Secondary School in Ongwediva. An impassioned and grammatically correct plea, against the backdrop of the first legal teachers strike in Namibia’s history. Thousands of Grade 10, and Grade 12 learners turned up to school, only to find out that the examinations scheduled for the 13 th and 14 th October had been postponed, because there were no teachers to invigilate the exams. Chalks had fallen, the educators were on strike. After failing to come to an agreement with the government on an appropriate percentage for a long d...

I grew up in the 90’s, a period that now feels like a bygone era. The definition of sexy was curvier, the Kwaito scene was heavier, and Benni was still skinny enough to be in the 18 area. Thought I’d start off with a catchy rhyme. I grew up during a time when the national broadcaster NBC was premium Television, because the only time you could watch M-net was during open time. When DSTV finally arrived, the game changed. We learned how to take over the world from Pinky and the brain, how to keep secrets from our parents in Dexter’s Laboratory, how to solve conflict from Tom and Jerry, and how to Mack from Johnny Bravo (turns out that Johnny wasn’t that good). To the 90’s babies, Maria de Los Angeles is not the title of a song, but one of the greatest telenovela’s ever made. 90’s babies know that Orquidia Cordoba Escalante and Radames Basanta are not the names of venereal diseases, but perhaps the greatest couple in telenovela history – forget Diego and Paloma .  In ...