Richard Stupart

Churches, rubber ducks and the wide open skies of the Karoo. It’s been a fun few days and felt like it has been a lot longer than it really has. On a journey through the Kaga mountains through to the Owl House of Nieu Bethesda and many destinations besides, I am more convinced than ever of at least one thing. It really isn’t where we travel that counts. It’s the stories we fashion as we go that truly make a journey.

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Today saw a brief trip to the diminutive Karoo town of Bathurst.  Partly because it was there, but also because it was rumoured to possess a faster 3G signal for internet access (it didn’t). Like any good, though  (in this case) short lived excursion, it was not so much Bathurst which made for an interesting afternoon, but rather the occasional oddball sights which brought the car to a halt on a number of occasions.

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In lieu of a far more interesting post on travels in the Karoo, which will shortly (but not for a few days yet) be undertaken, I thought I would share some of the background excitement of the voyage. Since last week Thursday, I have been hanging out in Grahamstown, picturesque gem of the Eastern Cape and deliciously hot and hell-freezing-overly cold in equal, if unpredictable measure. Ostensibly, this was to attend Katherine’s (my by-far-better half) graduation and subsequent socials.  I will only be back in Johannesburg from May though, with the remaining days being spent predominantly in Grahamstown and surrounds, until an ending in Stellenbosch involving competitive debating and catching up with friends not seen in a despicably long time.

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Dear President Zuma

This letter has been a long time in coming. Writing it now is one of many intellectual steps I had hoped never to see myself going through on a journey that I had hoped I would never find myself taking. And when I talk of ‘me’,  I include the uncounted numbers of thinking, reasoning, believing South Africans across this beautiful country. People who, like me, grew up in a new country born in pure principles of the rule of law, non racialism and a respect for the fundamental human dignity of our fellow citizens. We were going to show the world what a truly principled nation might look like. A miracle in the history of human rights and an enlightened democracy.

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Sometimes even if you don’t. Yes, I feel more than a little guilty that I haven’t updated these pages in an age – though by all accounts, this does not seem to have stopped the internet beating down the door (albeit modestly) in the last few days to come and read the stuff here. I guess that means this site is starting to have depth. Yeah. Depth baby. I love how that rolls off the tongue.

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