may 11 2010
our police of chief has said he hopes that the united states of america gets knocked out early on in the world cup so president barack obama will not come and visit our country...
the article is short, but the comment seems to be have been made in reference to our security being sufficient to have heads of state visit our country without their legions of bodyguards and secret service agents tagging along. it's not that they doubt it (though they should in my opinion), it's simply the way they travel. be it in their own back yard or to deepest darkest africa...
sometimes our 'leaders' need to think before they open they mouths and let words randomly fall out!
Posted by sarah | add a comment | debate, politics, sport, stoopidity
mar 07 2010
i have been pretty busy because i should've written sooner about this but that tmo in the stormers vs brumbies match should have his eyes checked or get a better screen to watch the replays on because even on youtube it looks like a try to me...
Posted by sarah | add a comment | bloopers, debate, sport
dec 12 2008
in june / july of this year, the competition commission made recommendations that the banks should reduce charges over a wide variety of services. today, 5 and half months down the line, there is another story about this. this seems to be the full technical report...
it still doesn't change the fact that the findings prove we are being ripped off and almost 6 months later nothing has changed.
while these were only recommendations, time-frames were set for their implementation, after which commissioner shan ramburuth would initiate official investigations into the practices.absa seems to have taken the first step with a r5 charge for their entry-level customers. what does that mean? who is an entry-level customer? what service is this r5 charge for?
Posted by sarah | add a comment | debate, information, ranting
nov 11 2007
i really like it when the 'big players' get blocked. the latest casualty is the dstv guys...
they claim to show 1800 movies every month. as a subscriber, i know that even through repeats there is simply no way they have 1800 movies every month. anyway, they have been blocked... yay! the story is way interesting in the sense that dstv thought they could furnish the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) with a list that included programs - repeating them nogal since the program is on 8 times a month... lol
for me personally with regards to 'movies', the most irritating thing for me on the movie channel(s) is the 'dinner for 5' program, a bunch of pompous movie types sitting around a dinner table talking kuck. i wonder if anyone really watches that? i tried it out for 5 minutes and couldn't stomach it anymore.
another gripe i have with dstv is that when i knew i was moving and that they weren't sending my bill to my postal address i called them up and changed my bill receiving address to my postal address. on thursday eve i turned on the telly and saw surprisingly that i had been disconnected... i guessed it was because i hadn't paid the bill that i hadn't received...
anyway i called their cape town number and was greeted with a recording saying that i could pay and activate my dstv immediately online at their website... that's convenient, however, the whole thing was broken and i had to call back and wait for over 15 minutes before my call was answered. i asked them why the website is broken and yet they are referring people there. it seems they were in the process of transferring their payment systems, everything should be up and running in no longer than 48 hours i am told. great, change your recording until it's working, how hard can that be really?
sunday morning and the website is still not working, i think i should contact asa and tell them about that false advertising?
apr 03 2007
this is insane, the petrol price went up again today.
when i went to the garage earlier in the day, there were queues of cars waiting to fill up. deep down i know one tank of fuel really doesn't make too much of a difference. it would be better if you could buy in 'bulk' before the increase, cause it'd really make a difference then.
sheez man, this just means everything else is going to go up now. when the petrol price comes down (hopefully), do you think the other 'knock-on' price increases will?
Posted by sarah | add a comment | debate, ranting
feb 20 2007
the first 2 news articles on the local news websites i peruse - from this morning, (i will not surmise, just go and read them):
IOL:
Mbeki to get R90m security wall
'Blood on the floor' if Zuma recharged
News24:
Mbeki's 'secret' R90m wall
French firms 'circling Eskom'
iafrica:
'R90m wall for Mbeki'
Fidentia boss defends R8m loan
nothing very positive out there to start your tuesday morning... plus i think it's ludacris that our current president and the future president's of this country should get a R90 million wall around their residence when we are having such a debate about ordinary citizens not feeling safe. we are screaming for more to be done about crime...
Posted by sarah | add a comment | debate, politics
nov 27 2006
i can't believe that this guy has actually received leave to appeal to the supreme court of appeal, because of this. ridiculous!
Posted by sarah | comments (2) | debate, ranting, stoopidity
oct 06 2006
i voted in the past municpal elections. yeah, so what? well, a couple of days ago i was searching the web for a map of duynefontein and came across this census report of ward023. this didn't make sense to me though, because on the iec website, ward023 is in drakenstein (paarl). so where are the results for my supposed ward023 in the municipal elections?
digging a little deeper, i discovered that my voting district no. is 97120302 and that has been grouped together with the city of cape town.
are the census people creating their own wards, independant of the iec? or vice-versa? and why? why does my voting district fall under the city of cape town? if you would want to project a way a ward would go according to the census you would be in for a great surprise. discovering (as i did) that your ward isn't infact the same ward that the iec refers to...
Posted by sarah | add a comment | debate, politics
sep 21 2006
i got a call from the bank this afternoon. not just any call, it's one of those marketing calls that i normally don't take... but i took this one. it turns out it was more of a 'we'd like to know what you think of this service' call. ahhh, excellent...
so i let rip. now i have mentioned the bank charges before and how much i am not impressed with the banks. to actually speak with a live person from the bank about this, wow!
i let sandra* know that i think absa thinks i'm a stoopid customer. stoooopid... if they think that i would rather use their credit card than fnb's. why she wanted to know? well, you guys charge me 19.75% debit interest if i spend less than 10,000. if i spend more than 10,000, you charge me 16.25% - effectively encouraging me to get more in debt (quite honestly who can afford to pay back more than 10,000 on a cc every month?). at fnb (and standard bank) the credit card debit interest rate is a flat 17%, no 'rewards' for spending more or less than a certain amount every month... i couldn't find the cc interest rates on nedbank, page not found error!
having said all that i needed to, sandra said she would talk to her manager about this and get back to me. i must admit, i don't know what i expected - it wasn't much though. about 30 min later sandra phones back and says her manager wants to waiver all cc charges this month in a gesture of good faith... i'm like well thanks, but you still don't get it do you? you charge me more than double the interest rate set by the reserve bank and give me less than a quarter (on average) back if i 'save' my money! it's just so mad because most of the banks services just don't warrant these ridiculous amounts of money they are taking from us.
seriously, i'd love to know when this investigation into the high bank charges is going to yield positive results for the consumers?
* not her real name
jul 20 2006
the place were kids learn for a better future (among other things, kids will be kids right?) have gone back to school this week. mostly bad news for me because the traffic has gone to the dogs as a result. not my main concern though... that goes to the stupid assholes who break into schools and steal their resources. in this day and age a computer is not for a pupil seeking to 'specialise', computers are used in most offices nowadays, useful to every single pupil in our schools. for the shuttleworth foundation to give back to the disadvantaged in a really helpful way is just awesome. for a scumbag to deliberately break into a school and steal those gifts is despicable... and it wasn't as if the community wasn't getting anything out of the deal, the schools had 'open days' for the surrounding community (it's probably when the scumbags 'cased' out the places).
more stories about schools and kids
Posted by sarah | add a comment | crime, debate
jun 12 2006
i've thought about the increasing levels of crime. please don't tell me the stats say that crime is decreasing, because it isn't... there have been a spat of robberies in duynefontein recently - residents and police are linking it to the eskom drive to get people using energy effecient light bulbs and warm blankets on their geysers. the houses are being marked according to the difficultly the robbers would experience in the robbery attempt. so violence could be possible. i'm not saying eskom is involved, there is speculation that the people employed by eskom to distribute these items are involved.
this sucks. this is a place where i have grown up and known for most of my life. it's a sleepy town, where when you drive through it there aren't many walls around the yards. garages are left open with no-one in sight and lots of 'goodies' to be seen... there's hardly been any crime in this town and in one evening last week more than 8 houses were robbed!
earlier, i was reading carte blanche's site at the recent stories section (i went there to read this - unrelated) and came across this expat story and later clicked through to see some expats posts and their stories...
i am stressed out about crime. my world revolves around ways to keep my stuff safe from criminal elements and working hard to get my stuff.
so what's the solution? these people don't have stuff and want stuff. should they get a job and buy their own stuff? are they illiterate and unemployable? do they need further education? are they hungry and needing to feed their families?
there could be a ton of reasons why my stuff and your stuff gets stolen. there has got to be a solid first step to getting our society working better than it is right now. should we emply more police and build more prisons? what about all the corruption (case dockets going missing in murder cases)? why does it seem like only carte blanche is asking these questions and all other forms of media are not? why are we so tolerant about it? should i buy a gun? and why are criminals walking around so freely (brazenly) while we increasingly become prisoners on our homes?
there's got to be a solution, i don't feel positive about south africa's future when i read about all the crime. i love this country and i always hope for the best, but lately i'm seriously worried about our future...
how do we make our country a better place for everyone?
mar 02 2006
what a load of crap! anybody with abit of common sense knows that it's just not possible (it helps if you also know some-one who works at koeberg).
i've been told that there are at least 2 security checks before you actually even enter a main building at koeberg. sure you can drive up to the parking area in koeberg without a second glance from anyone. it's a nature reserve aswell as a nuclear power plant. people actually cycle, hike and even go horse-riding there!
you might say "but greenpeace climbed the walls". i would say "whoop-dee-doo" to that. i've walked up to those fences, i've even slid down the dunes there without getting shot at (i did get asked to leave the area). those fences are about (and i might be wrong) 1-2 km away from the koeberg buildings.
to get into a restricted area is alot harder than entering the 'main' building. staff are searched thoroughly. the questioning of the security measures at koeberg are unfounded, ask anyone who works there.
our current mayor says she had her suspicions about there being sabotage on the reactor. yet koeberg was mystified by the governments claim of sabotage.
sabotage - my ass.
bolt - my ass.
setup for political gain / escape - for sure.
feb 07 2006
i read about this device that a guy is selling that can warn drivers if they are travelling in the vicinity of laser detectors. it's only for laser detectors though, it doesn't detect the old method of lines across the road connected to a camera.
at first i thought why would the state want to outlaw something that would make people slow down rather then wanting to get a fine? the other side of the coin is that there are people that would want this device in order to speed at every opportunity that they have and know that they are going to get away with it.
there's also another device, the silver bullet, that jams the laser detector signal and gives an incorrect speed reading. this device is banned. i am of the opinion that the 'warning' device should also be banned.
it's really simple actualy, if you're not speeding, you've got nothing to worry about...
Posted by sarah | add a comment | debate
Jan 17 2006
there is quite a commotion going on here in south africa with regards to donating blood and who's a risk and who isn't. before you donate blood you fill in a form stating your skin colour, sexual orientation, etc. if you're gay, you're a risk, according to the sanbs.
the gla has now claimed that 120 of it's members have donated blood without disclosing their sexual orientation. i think that's malicious. because if it's true, the sanbs is going to have to 'destroy' a whole batch of donated blood. some potentially bad and the rest absolutely fine.
what's the answer though? it's time consuming and simple but fool proof. test all blood that is donated. discrimination on skin colour, social status or sexual orientation (among other things) is unacceptable.
oct 14 2005
so in an article on tonight, they say something about jennifer aniston laughing, having fun ...
as she watched the heartthrob's performancewho would this heartthrob be? none other than vince vaughn! i wouldn't call him a heartthrob, but that's just me maybe?
apr 26 2005
i need some help, i need to know if i have bad (read: different) taste or what?
here are 5 different logos proposed for a company that has the letters 'q' and 'i' in their name, which one of the 5 do you prefer? i have my favourite and then there is the majority who have their favourite...
no 1  |
no 2  |
no 3  |
no 4  |
no 5  |
dec 02 2004
so a work collegue mailed the asa (advertising standards authority of south africa) and asked them about that ad by telkom that is misleading... asa told him that they have received a few complaints and they're looking into it. that was about 2-3 weeks ago... today, he got a pdf document report of what went down.
first i would like to highlight that once again telkom believes that everybody in sa who has seen the ad is under the impression that what the ad portrayed is something that will happen only in the future and it hasn't actually really happened yet...
excerpts from the asa directorate ruling:
1. complainants (sp?) pointed out the following:
the commercial tells the story of "juma", a tanzanian boy who has "...just turned six...". the commercial explains that this would not have been possible had it not been for the "...emergency operation, performed by cape town heart surgeon doctor anton louw". the commercial explains, "...the real miracle is that juma and anton were three thousand miles apart, thanks to isdn technology". at the end of the commercial the pay-off line "touch tomorrow" appears on screen, and the voiceover states "from telephones, to distant surgery and this is just the beginning"2. response:
the respondent submits that the aim of the commercial is a creative rendition of what technology and the advances in technology can do to enhance the lives of customers. technically speaking, it is possible to have one surgeon direct another to perform specialised procedures using video conferencing, which might be made possible by isdn technlogy in the near future.3. actual complaint:
the complainants believe that the commercial is misleading based on the fact that there is no isdn technology in tanzania, nor has remote surgery ever been performed in south africa. telkom is misleading consumers into believing that the event has actually taken place, when it has not.4. result:
respondent is required to: - withdraw the commercial in its current format - the process of withdrawing this commercial must be actioned with immediate effect - the process of withdrawing the commercial must be completed within the deadlines in clause 15.3 of the procedural guide, and - the commercial may not be used in futurethis is good news, telkom may believe it can do anything it pleases but not today. i can't wait for the monopoly to one day be over...
nov 19 2004
one night when ed and i were watching a movie at the cinema that telkom ad came on, the one where a doctor at groote schuur hospital operates on a kid in tanzania, via telkom's infrastructure. ed was blown away. "wow", he said. i wasn't fooled though and rightly so, because telkom does not currently have this infrastructure. this never happened... the doctor is an actor and the kid doesn't / didn't have a life threatening medical problem.
telkom says:
"It is a story, and I reserve the right to tell a story. If we had put something like 'Imagine in the future', it would have lost all sense of impact and authenticity for the viewer. It was a 50/50 call, and we took it."authenticity? wtf? i think they'd have more credibility if they had actually said something like 'imagine the future'... cause i certainly knew that what telkom was portraying in that ad was just not possible right now, today!