So Eskom will be raising electricity tarriffs 25%. If you're an estate agent do you tell customers this is good for house prices or great for house prices?
11 comments:
Jules
said...
Simply paint the walls with "glow in the dark paint" and you wont need to turn on the lights. Unplug the Tv - no different to watching SABC anyway. Take cold showers and have lots of braais. Zero electricity needed. LOL.
Anyone read this article about how lovely SA is for expats and how much they like to buy property here? Shopping at the Gardens Mall the overheard conversations in German or Yank outnumber the Saffer ones by quite a margin (more in the mega-Larnie Woolworths Food than the Pick and Pay)
I think we're going to have to start burning posh cars in Tamboerskloof, like they do in Berlin. (a block of blitz behind the right rear tire = 5 mins to kaboom)
@ Anon#3, there must be something in the air - I was just about to post a similar story. Just overheard a German couple (early 20s) telling their friends how they've just got a "bargain" in Vredehoek for R3-million, paid in cash. This after a Victorian up-down next door to me was snapped up, also for cash, by ANOTHER pair of German 20-somethings.
That's funny. Down here by the Woodstock Lower Main rd. area (1 block from Gympie st.) I never see any foreigners at all. I wonder when they are going to be snapping up bargains round here?
I think we should add the City Bowl to the "seperate universe catagory" like the Atlantic Seaboard. I'm thinking that as globalisation trends continue every country will have it's mega larnie zones that will draw transnational elites as they hop from country to country.
The City Bowl-Atlantic Seaboard would be ideal for these people for many reasons. just of the top of my head: 1) Most people would say they are actually the nicest parts of town (as least as nice as most of europe but with sun) 2)Geographically guaranteed never to have to live next to poor people. (as I recall someone pointed out- think it was you BC) 4) Thinking a bit further down the line - Easy to seal off like the international zones in China (before the chinese had enough of it and killed them)
Re: Anon 4's farm link.
Does anyone know what these people are using this farmland for? Are they farming, or are they like our whities and use them just for weekend getaways, braais and horsies?
Benny take a look at what the "darkies" are doing with land before you start throwing stones. The minister also mentioned the other day that 90% of the redistributed productive farms are now unproductive and lie idle. Farming is hard and most people black, white or bruin cant handle it.
I am however in agreement with you on the City States projection and reasons; all part of neo-medievalism.
There is little question that the land reform policy in SA has been a disaster thus far (see links elsewhere on this page). The conclusion that most blog posters i've read so far on the topic choose to draw from this fact is unfortuanately of the "blerrie dum bleks can't farm" variety, a conclusion I can't agree with several reasons. The new farmers are, everyone agrees, unprepared to take charge of these farms. They rarely have the management experience required and have inheritated complex systems they played little part in creating. The operation of these systems can hardly be described as intuitive. It's stupid to expect a new farmer to master such diverse tasks as crop and financial planning, machine maintenance, accounting, labour and business law etc. etc. all at once with no backup. Black Africans were farming for thousands of years before colonisation. Before meeting europeans they had already mastered hybidisation, crop rotation and rudimentary aquaculture all by themselves. Europe by contrast had the benefit of thousands of years of technological development handed to them on a plate thanks to near eastern civilisations such as Mesopotamia, Egypt etc. that they were near enough to benefit from. All this should be seen in context of the fact that farming is pretty much by definition something that the overwhelming majority of human beings and cultures should be able to master - just a little while back we were all farmers.
The observation that many whites own farmland but do not actually farm is one I made myself. Their number includes my mother (whom i love dearly but her veggie patch in the corner of her 3 hectare plot makes her barely 60% self-sufficient in terms of food by my calculations. She spends more time watering the roses than the tomatoes and doesn't have the heart to retire the old hens which provide maybe 2 eggs a week out of a brood of 6. My mom is kak farmer. My question was: are these foreigners doing any better?
Benny, I agree with your politics and many of your points, but I'm afraid you're getting onto shaky ground by using history to defend your admirable position.
Yes, Africans have been farming for thousands of years, but let's remember which Africans, and where. The ancestors of the Nguni in central Africa both planted crops and bred livestock, but their descendants who came down Africa's east coast about 1,500 years ago and settled Zimbabwe and eastern SA faced a much tougher climate and much less fertile soil, which meant the emphasis had to be on herding. Xhosa culture is based almost entirely on cattle, and many of our other cultures also feature it very strongly. It is not racist or historically insensitive to suggest that our black countrymen are historically and traditionally just not that into tilling the soil.
Your comment about Europe benefiting from proximity to the middle east is rather difficult to defend if you look at a map. The distance from Mesopotamia or Babylon to Greece is almost exactly the same as the distance from Cairo to southern Sudan. If proximity to farming expertise means anything, then central African farmers had exactly the same benefits as Bronze-Age Europeans.
Let's stay in the here and now and keep things sensible.
I recently read Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs and Steel". There he claims the bulk of domesticated plants in use in the world today originate from the near-east (Babylon, Ur etc.). Seems pretty open and shut to me, though of course it has little to do with CT property. Not sure what the Southern Sudan is like for farming. I'm under the impression it's dryer than my granny's doos but that's based on what i've seen on CNN, so I could be wrong.
The points about poor prospects for crop farming in SA is conceded (maybe a Xhosa could chip in here) but then you do get cattle farms of course and it's a staple of racists to claim that the E Cape is like some kind of fertile eden that can bloom if only "bleks" could vote DA etc. etc. These viewpoints seem to contradict each other.
@Benny Have you got any respect for your grandmother? The statement that you made in your post definitely does not reflect that you do.
As for farming:
Farming is not easy. Most people forget that it is a business like any other business. How many people own and run businesses successfully? The land does not make the farmer. Not everyone is equipped and skilful enough to own businesses or farms.
If you have lots of money you can subsidise your farm or business without really showing a profit, it is then called a hobby (like your dear mother). Even if your mother is a bad farmer it gives her pleasure, she probably deserves the little pleasures she has. Life is short and there is nothing wrong with minding your own business and enjoying the time you have on earth. G
11 comments:
Simply paint the walls with "glow in the dark paint" and you wont need to turn on the lights. Unplug the Tv - no different to watching SABC anyway. Take cold showers and have lots of braais. Zero electricity needed. LOL.
I like the idea of lots of braiis. Let me know if you need some of my ample boerewors.
Anyone read this article about how lovely SA is for expats and how much they like to buy property here? Shopping at the Gardens Mall the overheard conversations in German or Yank outnumber the Saffer ones by quite a margin (more in the mega-Larnie Woolworths Food than the Pick and Pay)
http://www.realestateweb.co.za/realestateweb/view/realestateweb/en/page228?oid=56484&sn=Detail
I think we're going to have to start burning posh cars in Tamboerskloof, like they do in Berlin. (a block of blitz behind the right rear tire = 5 mins to kaboom)
Funny how this part of the minister's statement got no press.
"Foreigners are buying up productive land three times faster than the government is able to acquire farms to meet its land reform targets."
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?from=rss_Environment&set_id=1&click_id=14&art_id=vn20100303041852588C895464
@ Anon#3, there must be something in the air - I was just about to post a similar story. Just overheard a German couple (early 20s) telling their friends how they've just got a "bargain" in Vredehoek for R3-million, paid in cash. This after a Victorian up-down next door to me was snapped up, also for cash, by ANOTHER pair of German 20-somethings.
The economic ethnic cleansing continues...
That's funny. Down here by the Woodstock Lower Main rd. area (1 block from Gympie st.) I never see any foreigners at all. I wonder when they are going to be snapping up bargains round here?
I think we should add the City Bowl to the "seperate universe catagory" like the Atlantic Seaboard. I'm thinking that as globalisation trends continue every country will have it's mega larnie zones that will draw transnational elites as they hop from country to country.
The City Bowl-Atlantic Seaboard would be ideal for these people for many reasons. just of the top of my head:
1) Most people would say they are actually the nicest parts of town (as least as nice as most of europe but with sun)
2)Geographically guaranteed never to have to live next to poor people. (as I recall someone pointed out- think it was you BC)
4) Thinking a bit further down the line - Easy to seal off like the international zones in China (before the chinese had enough of it and killed them)
Re: Anon 4's farm link.
Does anyone know what these people are using this farmland for? Are they farming, or are they like our whities and use them just for weekend getaways, braais and horsies?
Benny take a look at what the "darkies" are doing with land before you start throwing stones. The minister also mentioned the other day that 90% of the redistributed productive farms are now unproductive and lie idle. Farming is hard and most people black, white or bruin cant handle it.
I am however in agreement with you on the City States projection and reasons; all part of neo-medievalism.
@ Anon above
There is little question that the land reform policy in SA has been a disaster thus far (see links elsewhere on this page). The conclusion that most blog posters i've read so far on the topic choose to draw from this fact is unfortuanately of the "blerrie dum bleks can't farm" variety, a conclusion I can't agree with several reasons.
The new farmers are, everyone agrees, unprepared to take charge of these farms. They rarely have the management experience required and have inheritated complex systems they played little part in creating. The operation of these systems can hardly be described as intuitive. It's stupid to expect a new farmer to master such diverse tasks as crop and financial planning, machine maintenance, accounting, labour and business law etc. etc. all at once with no backup.
Black Africans were farming for thousands of years before colonisation. Before meeting europeans they had already mastered hybidisation, crop rotation and rudimentary aquaculture all by themselves. Europe by contrast had the benefit of thousands of years of technological development handed to them on a plate thanks to near eastern civilisations such as Mesopotamia, Egypt etc. that they were near enough to benefit from.
All this should be seen in context of the fact that farming is pretty much by definition something that the overwhelming majority of human beings and cultures should be able to master - just a little while back we were all farmers.
The observation that many whites own farmland but do not actually farm is one I made myself. Their number includes my mother (whom i love dearly but her veggie patch in the corner of her 3 hectare plot makes her barely 60% self-sufficient in terms of food by my calculations. She spends more time watering the roses than the tomatoes and doesn't have the heart to retire the old hens which provide maybe 2 eggs a week out of a brood of 6. My mom is kak farmer.
My question was: are these foreigners doing any better?
Benny, I agree with your politics and many of your points, but I'm afraid you're getting onto shaky ground by using history to defend your admirable position.
Yes, Africans have been farming for thousands of years, but let's remember which Africans, and where. The ancestors of the Nguni in central Africa both planted crops and bred livestock, but their descendants who came down Africa's east coast about 1,500 years ago and settled Zimbabwe and eastern SA faced a much tougher climate and much less fertile soil, which meant the emphasis had to be on herding. Xhosa culture is based almost entirely on cattle, and many of our other cultures also feature it very strongly. It is not racist or historically insensitive to suggest that our black countrymen are historically and traditionally just not that into tilling the soil.
Your comment about Europe benefiting from proximity to the middle east is rather difficult to defend if you look at a map. The distance from Mesopotamia or Babylon to Greece is almost exactly the same as the distance from Cairo to southern Sudan. If proximity to farming expertise means anything, then central African farmers had exactly the same benefits as Bronze-Age Europeans.
Let's stay in the here and now and keep things sensible.
@BC
I recently read Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs and Steel". There he claims the bulk of domesticated plants in use in the world today originate from the near-east (Babylon, Ur etc.). Seems pretty open and shut to me, though of course it has little to do with CT property. Not sure what the Southern Sudan is like for farming. I'm under the impression it's dryer than my granny's doos but that's based on what i've seen on CNN, so I could be wrong.
The points about poor prospects for crop farming in SA is conceded (maybe a Xhosa could chip in here) but then you do get cattle farms of course and it's a staple of racists to claim that the E Cape is like some kind of fertile eden that can bloom if only "bleks" could vote DA etc. etc.
These viewpoints seem to contradict each other.
@Benny
Have you got any respect for your grandmother? The statement that you made in your post definitely does not reflect that you do.
As for farming:
Farming is not easy. Most people forget that it is a business like any other business. How many people own and run businesses successfully? The land does not make the farmer. Not everyone is equipped and skilful enough to own businesses or farms.
If you have lots of money you can subsidise your farm or business without really showing a profit, it is then called a hobby (like your dear mother). Even if your mother is a bad farmer it gives her pleasure, she probably deserves the little pleasures she has. Life is short and there is nothing wrong with minding your own business and enjoying the time you have on earth.
G
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