Nanhlanhla had never seen her father. He walked off before she was born all of 14 years ago.
....and now she had lots of questions.", and you Mom you are dark." Is he a black person actually? Look at me! My complexion is very pale, and you.... Mom, you are dark."
" He is a black man Nana"
"So what does he look like? How does he look? Do I look like him? Mom... I don't look like you... not at all. Do I look like him?"
" I just want to meet him. See him, ... just once"
Without much help from Mom, Nana began to search for her father. She asked Mom's family and friends for information until one of the Aunts gave an address to try in Soweto. Young and alone, Nana found the house.
"He moved somewhere in Thembisa. We don't know the address" she was told.
Then, for Nana, it all happened. She and Mom were walking in Johannesburg and were being passed in the street by a Putco bus. Mom got very excited and loudly screamed at Nan. "NANA! LOOK QUICKLY !!.. SEE THE DRIVER.!... THAT'S YOUR FATHER.!!"
All she got was a glimpse of him through the window on the passenger side of the bus. Through the reflections of the city buildings in the glass, she say him. She saw his face.... pale, just as she had imagined.....and then he was gone.
It was just a moment,... but she saw him.
That moment, the passing image blurred bu the reflections in the bus window was enough to imprint sharply on her visual memory. She had seen her father! He is a Putco bus-driver.
One fairly long phone-call and a weepy story of a teenage girl wanting to meet her father and she had an otherwise confidential address in Thembisa. It took her three weeks before she could get there and find the house.
"He is not here, my dear" said the lady. "You had better come in."
Inside and seated-- "There is no other way way for me to tell you," she said, " he died eleven days ago in a motor accident. He is buried in Soweto".
The message was urgent, to the point, demanding "You had better do something for Nana. She is terrible. She is in shock and we cant comfort her.!!"
So a ritual was arranged.
The close family, mother aunt and sister were gathered for a meal. It took a day to prepare and Nana was encouraged to help with the preparations.It's called the 'Blessing Cup Ritual" This time as a memorial, a moment of intimate sharing and caring. A quiet moment in which to cry surrounded only by the embrace of loving people around the table at a ceremonial meal.A bowl like cup is passed around the table. Prayers are said, and as the bowl passes from one to other,.as each one holds the bowl that person has a chance to speak out memories or to speak directly to the person who has died.
Nana held the blessing bowl and told her story.
Then she said "I didn't even have a chance to call him 'daddy'. "
Nana, I said, "Why don't you call him 'Daddy' now.?"
Through her sobs her words were hardly audible. "I love you daddy. I love you I miss you. I am so sorry that you have gone before I met you, but I love you so much Daddy."
Then she lifted the Blessing Bowl and drank.
Wednesday, 29 February 2012
Tuesday, 28 February 2012
They said it....can you believe it..? Thoughts for talk 2
Thoughts for talk...Child and youth Care Workers said these things in training........
1. In Alexander Township...ON DEFIANCE:
We don't really know what you are talking about ------our children do as they are told.
2. The worst thing that happens to me in my work is that the children don't show respect.
ME : Tell me. What do they do when they don't show respect?
Mr B, unless you are an African, you will never know !.
3. She's afraid of cows !! Can you imagine a child care worker afraid of cows!!?
4. A learner was constantly sneezing and yawning long and loudly in class during training.
ME : Lerato! Why are you so tired?
Another Child and youth care learner * seriously and in explanation*: Mr B, she's got ancestors.
5. Almost all the female learners were dozing off in class.
ME: Come on, whats going on here today?
Response: She's pregnant. Mr B, When we are together with someone who is pregnant, then we women ..we all want to sleep.
It's true Mr B !
6. Tswana speaking learner:
We don't have a culture,......what is European.....that's our culture.
1. In Alexander Township...ON DEFIANCE:
We don't really know what you are talking about ------our children do as they are told.
2. The worst thing that happens to me in my work is that the children don't show respect.
ME : Tell me. What do they do when they don't show respect?
Mr B, unless you are an African, you will never know !.
3. She's afraid of cows !! Can you imagine a child care worker afraid of cows!!?
4. A learner was constantly sneezing and yawning long and loudly in class during training.
ME : Lerato! Why are you so tired?
Another Child and youth care learner * seriously and in explanation*: Mr B, she's got ancestors.
5. Almost all the female learners were dozing off in class.
ME: Come on, whats going on here today?
Response: She's pregnant. Mr B, When we are together with someone who is pregnant, then we women ..we all want to sleep.
It's true Mr B !
6. Tswana speaking learner:
We don't have a culture,......what is European.....that's our culture.
Thursday, 23 February 2012
Three quick thoughts for talk
1. Overheard: Cultural practices should not be made illegal. The law should be there to protect and preserve them -- they are above and beyond the law.
2 " Africans have this thing called UBUNTU: it is about the essence of being human, it is part of the gift that Africa will give the world. It embraces hospitality, caring about others, being able to go the extra mile for the sake of others. We believe that a person is a person through another person, that my humanity is caught up, bound up and inextricable in yours. When I dehumanise you, I inexorably dehumanise myself. The solitary human being is a contradiction in terms and therefor you seek to work for the common good because your humanity comes into its own in belonging " (Arch-Bishop TUTU )
BUT UBUNTU IS DEAD !!!
3.In South Africa we work from a strength-based perspective..... this must then surely mean we can no longer talk of a "disorganised family" or a "dysfunctional family".
2 " Africans have this thing called UBUNTU: it is about the essence of being human, it is part of the gift that Africa will give the world. It embraces hospitality, caring about others, being able to go the extra mile for the sake of others. We believe that a person is a person through another person, that my humanity is caught up, bound up and inextricable in yours. When I dehumanise you, I inexorably dehumanise myself. The solitary human being is a contradiction in terms and therefor you seek to work for the common good because your humanity comes into its own in belonging " (Arch-Bishop TUTU )
BUT UBUNTU IS DEAD !!!
3.In South Africa we work from a strength-based perspective..... this must then surely mean we can no longer talk of a "disorganised family" or a "dysfunctional family".
Wednesday, 22 February 2012
I'LL DECIDE if there's a vegetable garden here !
" I'm leaving....I cant take this anymore. You gonna get my resignation today !"
It was Monday morning.
" Also,my husband says I must leave."
"What happened Mpho?".. a deliberate open ended question.
Maybe if the story is told; just maybe in the telling, the hurt experienced again, will bring new insights.... maybe enough to save a valuable staff member.
"It's that family Madondo, see.".......... and out it all pours.
Madondo is a mother- headed household. Mom is ill, no real income - at least not substantial enough for survival. There are four children ranging in age from 6 - 13. An "uncle" , a sort of "boyfriend" gives some little support when he visits about once a month for a weekend. His relationship with Mom is tenuous at most, clearly largely sexually based, certainly hardly familial, He takes no real, noticeable responsibility for the children.
" See" says Mpho ," Madondo they need food." They are hungry."
So, Mpho encouraged and helped the children to make a vegetable garden. It took a week but in the end they had three long vegetable patches in the yard and seedlings all neatly standing in rows. Over three weeks the vegetable garden started to look quite promising.
Sunday, late afternoon, Mpho got a phone-call. It was the Modondo "uncle" "It was HIM" she said. "shouting and screaming into the phone"
"I didn't understand what he was trying to tell me. I only knew he was angry about something, so I went to the house."
Mpho knew that what she would walk into wasn't going to be easy, maybe not pleasant, but she got more than she expected.
All 4 children were stiffly lined up in front of the house door, arms to their sides and arranged from the tallest to the shortest ; dead quiet, looking down. Uncle stood in front of them facing her as she walked in the gate. To the left was the vegetable garden, or rather what was left of it.It was like a war zone over there. Like a bomb had struck the village and landed right on the Madondo vegetable patch. Soil was spread everywhere. It seemed to Mpho that the soil had been kicked with a booted feet from its very centre outward into the yard. Seedlings, already bedraggled, strewn over the hard swept sand of the yard.
Uncle advanced. He was shouting abusively .
"You get out!"
You don't ever come back here."
Mpho was deliberately leaving out the swear words, so it sounded softer than his threat really was at the time.
"What this?" - pointing to what was left of the vegetable garden.
" You have NO RIGHT to do this. This is my place, my girlfriend, my children. I'LL decide if there's going to be a vegetable garden here."
" Now get out!"
"Don't you ever come back"
"You leave these children alone _ I'LL sort out these children. We don't need you here."
"Now get out. GO !!"
Very quietly. " I've had enough". said Mpho " I'M leaving Mr B. .I resign"
It was Monday morning.
" Also,my husband says I must leave."
"What happened Mpho?".. a deliberate open ended question.
Maybe if the story is told; just maybe in the telling, the hurt experienced again, will bring new insights.... maybe enough to save a valuable staff member.
"It's that family Madondo, see.".......... and out it all pours.
Madondo is a mother- headed household. Mom is ill, no real income - at least not substantial enough for survival. There are four children ranging in age from 6 - 13. An "uncle" , a sort of "boyfriend" gives some little support when he visits about once a month for a weekend. His relationship with Mom is tenuous at most, clearly largely sexually based, certainly hardly familial, He takes no real, noticeable responsibility for the children.
" See" says Mpho ," Madondo they need food." They are hungry."
So, Mpho encouraged and helped the children to make a vegetable garden. It took a week but in the end they had three long vegetable patches in the yard and seedlings all neatly standing in rows. Over three weeks the vegetable garden started to look quite promising.
Sunday, late afternoon, Mpho got a phone-call. It was the Modondo "uncle" "It was HIM" she said. "shouting and screaming into the phone"
"I didn't understand what he was trying to tell me. I only knew he was angry about something, so I went to the house."
Mpho knew that what she would walk into wasn't going to be easy, maybe not pleasant, but she got more than she expected.
All 4 children were stiffly lined up in front of the house door, arms to their sides and arranged from the tallest to the shortest ; dead quiet, looking down. Uncle stood in front of them facing her as she walked in the gate. To the left was the vegetable garden, or rather what was left of it.It was like a war zone over there. Like a bomb had struck the village and landed right on the Madondo vegetable patch. Soil was spread everywhere. It seemed to Mpho that the soil had been kicked with a booted feet from its very centre outward into the yard. Seedlings, already bedraggled, strewn over the hard swept sand of the yard.
Uncle advanced. He was shouting abusively .
"You get out!"
You don't ever come back here."
Mpho was deliberately leaving out the swear words, so it sounded softer than his threat really was at the time.
"What this?" - pointing to what was left of the vegetable garden.
" You have NO RIGHT to do this. This is my place, my girlfriend, my children. I'LL decide if there's going to be a vegetable garden here."
" Now get out!"
"Don't you ever come back"
"You leave these children alone _ I'LL sort out these children. We don't need you here."
"Now get out. GO !!"
Very quietly. " I've had enough". said Mpho " I'M leaving Mr B. .I resign"
Saturday, 18 February 2012
Can we learn from Community-based care in Africa?.
The move to group homes was seen to be a better therapeutic option but largely resented by the dormitory dwellers who feared a loss of anonymity. But there you are... small is beautiful in child care.
Either way, dormitory or small group living , child and youth care workers were to be very skilled in therapeutic and developmental group care and management, whilst at the same time skilled in practicing individualised intervention and forwarding the developmental programme objectives with each child. To live, care for and work therapeutically with a group of troubling children and young people is a close, intense ... dare I say "clinical" exercise 24/7. and it needs that staff be organisationally supported with information, "treatment" guidelines and operationable development and management plans for each child. It has meant that a whole methodology built up for child and youth care practice which historically we have seen come out of residential settings. In this methodology, and in some facilities a strength-based Assessment profile based on a really sound holistic framework can take a child and youth care worker innumerable hours or more of hard work, gathering descriptive data , commenting in check-lists, and collating reports. Huge resources and large sums of money were poured into residential care services. Even in "those days" R3000 (ZAR) a month per child was not unusual. Morning after morning staff attended and contribute to case studies, family conferences, Individual and family developmental planning meetings, case reviews and assessment meetings. Then they go back into the group residential life space with the children and end the day with log-writing and reports. I have no doubt that it is still like that.
This was what I knew, and I thought always that what was learnt in the technically powered, intense "hot-house" effect and methods of practice in residential care became the model from which all other child and youth care work in all the other settings must learn. I thought of it as the Formula One Racing Circuit of child and youth care. You know, where millions is spent, High tech is used and in the end what is learnt or developed will benefit the motorist in the street... eventually... it just has to be adapted and adjusted to suit the other settings.... like community-based care.
For me, community -based care contributed little to nothing to residential care service methodology and practice. Learning in this field was a one way street. Community-based care must use residential facility thinking. .. that's it !!
But my view has changed.
NOW, with my years in community-based experience, especially in the African context, I see the short-term, intense, "hot-house" residential services CAN find much to learn from community-based child and youth care.
Community -based care has an ongoing "now" focus. It has to do with the realities if being a young person in "this" community and in this way becomes distinctly African, using African solutions, African ways of problem solving and African thinking both socially and spiritually.
Community- based care works daily at the integration and re-integration of children and young people into the essentials of community living, supports them into community schools and into the social mores, folkways and institutions of community life. It works at making good the social losses or community rejection that the child experiences in that community because of its behaviour .It focuses on restorative justice in and with the child's community.
Daily interaction with the child in the family setting means that the family and often community is super-involved in the developmental processes and ensures that the responsibility and authority of family in neither removed nor violated
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It seems to me that how we take what can be learnt from community based care and shift thinking and methodology to accommodate its lessons into Residential care will be the challenge.
Monday, 13 February 2012
Publishing comments on this blog
Comments can be made by anyone.. that is how the comments setting has been made for this blog site. Click on the word 'comments" at the very bottom of the post. A window will pop up .If comments have been made, the window will be below them. Write your comment in the box. Now select the way in which you want to be identified . There are boxes in which to click your choice.
If you have and wish to be identified through your Google account, the your pic will show.
Otherwise you can select "Name " .. only your name will be attached to your comment (URL can be ignored).
If you wish to comment anonymously, you can, just click in the Anonymous box.. the comment will be published.
Click the 'Publish the comment' box.
You may have to decipher the letter code to prove that you are not a robot. .. Its really not difficult
It takes a short while for the comment to be published.
I really do welcome comments. To enter into dialogue on this site will be an adventure into child and youth care debate... I look forward to that, and think that it will be of value to the field.
If you have and wish to be identified through your Google account, the your pic will show.
Otherwise you can select "Name " .. only your name will be attached to your comment (URL can be ignored).
If you wish to comment anonymously, you can, just click in the Anonymous box.. the comment will be published.
Click the 'Publish the comment' box.
You may have to decipher the letter code to prove that you are not a robot. .. Its really not difficult
It takes a short while for the comment to be published.
I really do welcome comments. To enter into dialogue on this site will be an adventure into child and youth care debate... I look forward to that, and think that it will be of value to the field.
Saturday, 11 February 2012
its all in the wallpaper
Maybe I'm over sensitive to what I guess could be called the "feel" of a place, - its "tone", its "atmosphere", its "ambiance"
Surely you too must have felt it!
You go into an empty church building and raised in you is a powerful sense of quiet, prayerful reverence and awe. Then into another and it feels joyful and yet another and nothing ......just a meeting place.
How is this? What makes a building communicate feeling, ... a tone?
Its the same when I go into a children"s home, or for that matter any organisation that provides services to children, or into a group home or even a dormitory. Empty.... yet it talks to me of a prevailing climate.......and when it's filled with children, young people and staff, the climate fairly screams at me.
Each of the four group homes in the organisation I ran had a different "feel". But over time the climate seemed to change. Different staff, ....different shift... different climate.
Seems that the ways in which people respond to each other and the different ways they react or respond to life-space incidents affects the tone of that place. It's almost asif the pattern of people's behaviours and feelings in a place soaks into the walls and becomes the pattern of the wallpaper , its signature. I noticed that staff coming into an organisation often , without noticing it, simply become part of that prevailing tone.. the wallpaper creeps into their being and they too become part of it.
I can understand that.our behaviour does shift to fit the tone of a place. I walk quietly in the empty convent. I speak in whispers in the holy place. I am loving in a hospice. I am tense and cautious in that Youth Centre. I'm ready to stand my ground and be defensive in this group home . I am relaxed and responsive in another.
In the Child Care settings, it seems to me that WE set the tone and others can slip into it. We are, or maybe we just become the institutionalised pattern of the wallpaper.
So there we are busy either creating the tone, or slipping into it.......making a pattern of reaction , feeling and response that the children can very easily and I think DO just adopt for themselves.
For me, the most disturbing of these climates is the pattern of staff behaviour that sends out sexual messages. It comes from a pattern of staff behaviour in the workplace, of flirtation, a somewhat seductive flirty manner in interactions, sexual innuendo in conversation and provocative in body talk. This then becomes the pattern of the organisations wallpaper. I've been there - seen it, felt it and thought of the risk that surrounds the children. If its all in the wallpaper, then that is the way in which they are most likely to build relationships and resolve relationship issues ........ because you see, it is all in the wallpaper.!!
Surely you too must have felt it!
You go into an empty church building and raised in you is a powerful sense of quiet, prayerful reverence and awe. Then into another and it feels joyful and yet another and nothing ......just a meeting place.
How is this? What makes a building communicate feeling, ... a tone?
Its the same when I go into a children"s home, or for that matter any organisation that provides services to children, or into a group home or even a dormitory. Empty.... yet it talks to me of a prevailing climate.......and when it's filled with children, young people and staff, the climate fairly screams at me.
Each of the four group homes in the organisation I ran had a different "feel". But over time the climate seemed to change. Different staff, ....different shift... different climate.
Seems that the ways in which people respond to each other and the different ways they react or respond to life-space incidents affects the tone of that place. It's almost asif the pattern of people's behaviours and feelings in a place soaks into the walls and becomes the pattern of the wallpaper , its signature. I noticed that staff coming into an organisation often , without noticing it, simply become part of that prevailing tone.. the wallpaper creeps into their being and they too become part of it.
I can understand that.our behaviour does shift to fit the tone of a place. I walk quietly in the empty convent. I speak in whispers in the holy place. I am loving in a hospice. I am tense and cautious in that Youth Centre. I'm ready to stand my ground and be defensive in this group home . I am relaxed and responsive in another.
In the Child Care settings, it seems to me that WE set the tone and others can slip into it. We are, or maybe we just become the institutionalised pattern of the wallpaper.
So there we are busy either creating the tone, or slipping into it.......making a pattern of reaction , feeling and response that the children can very easily and I think DO just adopt for themselves.
For me, the most disturbing of these climates is the pattern of staff behaviour that sends out sexual messages. It comes from a pattern of staff behaviour in the workplace, of flirtation, a somewhat seductive flirty manner in interactions, sexual innuendo in conversation and provocative in body talk. This then becomes the pattern of the organisations wallpaper. I've been there - seen it, felt it and thought of the risk that surrounds the children. If its all in the wallpaper, then that is the way in which they are most likely to build relationships and resolve relationship issues ........ because you see, it is all in the wallpaper.!!
Wednesday, 8 February 2012
Problems of threading Comments on this blog
It seems that there is a problem threading comments on this blog using Google Chrome. but not from what I can make out if using Firefox. I am looking into this. I have changed my settings to specify that anyone with a Google account can comment. Lets see if that makes any difference. I'm finding it frustrating that I cant view comments or that they don,t appear in the comments . Interesting that my comments on a trial basis do appear. I am continuing to work on this. I see other bloggers have complained of the same thing, yet others say it works.on Chrome. I'll also try some of the other search engines I have on my computer.
Sunday, 5 February 2012
How to comment on these pages
There are various page designs I chose the simplest because I was not at all sure what was capable of . Maybe one of the other designs makes it more obvious as to how you make a comment as a reader or follower. In this page set-up you will see the word "comment" right at the bottom of the post. click on the word comment and you will get a box in which to post your comment. I look forward to them. LETS TALK. I WILL look at the more complex page designs soon.
What does the Professional Board DO? INFORMATION
OK .. so we voted for them. and they get elected, so what will they actually DO?
This is what the Social Service Professions Act of 1978 Act amended in 1998 (the Third Edition) states are the objectives of a Professional Board are( Section 14b) ... so these apply then to the Professional Board for Child and Youth Care Work.
Somewhat abbreviated:
The board is to consult and to liaise with other boards and authorities on matters that affect child and youth care and to assist the promotion of Social Services nationally.
It controls and exercises authority over all training and the way in which practice is exercised in child and youth care work.
It co-operates and liaises with training institutions, decides on minimum standards of education for child and youth care workers.
It communicates to the Minister, information of public importance in child and youth care matters.
It maintains and enhances the dignity of the child and youth care profession.
It can direct the Registrar of Council to remove any name from the register, to reinstate them, to suspend from practice awaiting a disciplinary enquiry.
It approves Training Schools.
It considers any matter affecting child and youth care as a profession.
It can recognise qualifications, establish joint standing committees or committees to the board.
and finally, it performs such other prescribed functions and do things necessary or expedient to achieve the objects of the Act in relation to child and youth care.
One argument is that there is no profession until there are registered members. and for this to happen there have to be regulations for their registration as professionals approved by the Minister. These have been written, but it seems that the new board may have some responsibility to see that these are steered through the processes to them finally appearing in a Government Gazette. The Regulations set out the agreed qualifications and criteria by which a child and youth care worker will be registered at the Auxiliary or Professional level.
A registered professional must at one and the same time as being recognised for registration sign adherence to a code of ethics, or rules of ethical behaviour.These have also been written and approved but the new board may find themselves steering this process as well.
The bottom-line here is that no-one can call themselves a child and youth care worker and be employed as such unless that person is registered with the Council and satisfies the criteria set out in the regulations. The board will have a responsibility to study the applications. Further the board will have a say in recommending suspension awaiting enquiry if the rules of ethical behaviour are broken by a child care worker. in this way and in many other ways as set out in the object,the board REGULATES the profession.
In another post at some other time we will have to look at the relationship between the functions of the board and those of the Council.
This is what the Social Service Professions Act of 1978 Act amended in 1998 (the Third Edition) states are the objectives of a Professional Board are( Section 14b) ... so these apply then to the Professional Board for Child and Youth Care Work.
Somewhat abbreviated:
The board is to consult and to liaise with other boards and authorities on matters that affect child and youth care and to assist the promotion of Social Services nationally.
It controls and exercises authority over all training and the way in which practice is exercised in child and youth care work.
It co-operates and liaises with training institutions, decides on minimum standards of education for child and youth care workers.
It communicates to the Minister, information of public importance in child and youth care matters.
It maintains and enhances the dignity of the child and youth care profession.
It can direct the Registrar of Council to remove any name from the register, to reinstate them, to suspend from practice awaiting a disciplinary enquiry.
It approves Training Schools.
It considers any matter affecting child and youth care as a profession.
It can recognise qualifications, establish joint standing committees or committees to the board.
and finally, it performs such other prescribed functions and do things necessary or expedient to achieve the objects of the Act in relation to child and youth care.
One argument is that there is no profession until there are registered members. and for this to happen there have to be regulations for their registration as professionals approved by the Minister. These have been written, but it seems that the new board may have some responsibility to see that these are steered through the processes to them finally appearing in a Government Gazette. The Regulations set out the agreed qualifications and criteria by which a child and youth care worker will be registered at the Auxiliary or Professional level.
A registered professional must at one and the same time as being recognised for registration sign adherence to a code of ethics, or rules of ethical behaviour.These have also been written and approved but the new board may find themselves steering this process as well.
The bottom-line here is that no-one can call themselves a child and youth care worker and be employed as such unless that person is registered with the Council and satisfies the criteria set out in the regulations. The board will have a responsibility to study the applications. Further the board will have a say in recommending suspension awaiting enquiry if the rules of ethical behaviour are broken by a child care worker. in this way and in many other ways as set out in the object,the board REGULATES the profession.
In another post at some other time we will have to look at the relationship between the functions of the board and those of the Council.
Thursday, 2 February 2012
Dumped on a plate of food
They came as a bunch,squashed together muscle to muscle all on the narrow steps. A plate of food.. a Sunday lunchtime meal held out in front of them and under my nose.
Because of the contrast, I thought of little Oliver Twist. He walked on his own right up to the Beagle. "Please Sir, I want some more"
" you wouldn't give this to your dog!!"
" you wouldn't give this to your dog!!"
The body to body tensed, clustered tight. The plate of Sunday lunch was pushed forward closer to my face.
"Whats wrong with it?"
"It's S**t, eat it yourself and see."
Honestly, it didn't look that appetizing, but then, it didn't look that bad at all, It had been prepared in advanced and heated, but it wasn't that bad at all.
"We're not going to eat this s**t "
'This has nothing to do with food" , I thought. What the hell has gone wrong now.
"It's that kitchen supervisor. She doesn't care a f*** about us. She's just interested in herself. She's time off. She's not there. She's with her own children in her flat and they're eating nice. I hope they choke to death!!"
SO, there it was, ..... a rainbow sentence, all the colours coming out in one short, shouted cry and a system dumped on a plate of food.----"don't care about us", "self interested", "not there" "own children" "eating nice".
"You wouldn't give this to your dog" and ...I'm not exempt.. I'm different, set apart, better than the life of a domestic animal.
"Are we dogs?" It was a voice from the back of the bunch, more like a growl.
"Tomorrow there is a staff meeting, but now,what about this plate of food, what about now?"
" OK guys, here's the deal. I get the kitchen supervisor, she opens the store room, you get to choose some stuff for lunch, she goes back to her flat and you get to cook it yourselves."
and it worked!!
A grumbling kitchen supervisor, some gawky eyed guys in the holy of holies and me with a bunch of guys having baked beans on buttered bread for lunch.
.....and the original pre-prepared... well maybe we can heat it up again for the staff at Monday's staff meeting.
.
Because of the contrast, I thought of little Oliver Twist. He walked on his own right up to the Beagle. "Please Sir, I want some more"
" you wouldn't give this to your dog!!"
" you wouldn't give this to your dog!!"
The body to body tensed, clustered tight. The plate of Sunday lunch was pushed forward closer to my face.
"Whats wrong with it?"
"It's S**t, eat it yourself and see."
Honestly, it didn't look that appetizing, but then, it didn't look that bad at all, It had been prepared in advanced and heated, but it wasn't that bad at all.
"We're not going to eat this s**t "
'This has nothing to do with food" , I thought. What the hell has gone wrong now.
"It's that kitchen supervisor. She doesn't care a f*** about us. She's just interested in herself. She's time off. She's not there. She's with her own children in her flat and they're eating nice. I hope they choke to death!!"
SO, there it was, ..... a rainbow sentence, all the colours coming out in one short, shouted cry and a system dumped on a plate of food.----"don't care about us", "self interested", "not there" "own children" "eating nice".
"You wouldn't give this to your dog" and ...I'm not exempt.. I'm different, set apart, better than the life of a domestic animal.
"Are we dogs?" It was a voice from the back of the bunch, more like a growl.
"Tomorrow there is a staff meeting, but now,what about this plate of food, what about now?"
" OK guys, here's the deal. I get the kitchen supervisor, she opens the store room, you get to choose some stuff for lunch, she goes back to her flat and you get to cook it yourselves."
and it worked!!
A grumbling kitchen supervisor, some gawky eyed guys in the holy of holies and me with a bunch of guys having baked beans on buttered bread for lunch.
.....and the original pre-prepared... well maybe we can heat it up again for the staff at Monday's staff meeting.
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