TokisoM Writes

Decoded by Jay-Z  starts off a bit stale and for a while promises to not get better! Thank you to this site  for the image! But I’m a sucker for punishment and once  I've  started a book, I will finish it. I’m that cat curiosity killed. The book aesthetically looks amazing; it makes use of glossy paper, has beautiful art work on the cover in eye seducing black and gold (the one I bought. It's also available in a nasty white and gold).  The photographs inside are hypnotic and used well. Okay back to why we buy books; to read. To really enjoy this book, you have to like Jay-Z’s music! As in; be that fan that started with him at the beginning.  If you are a new fan, you must educate yourself on his old music. To really enjoy this book, you shouldn’t be interested in Jay-Z the business man and the details of how he went from the projects to Forbes list.  For all that information read his  unauthorized  biography by Zack O’Malley...

I believe growth is everything! Have you noticed how children aim to increase their worth? They crawl, they crawl faster, they realise that standing is possible, they discover they can use furniture to walk, then they start to risk walking without holding on. Once they walk and discover running… try catching them! So that’s how I’m feeling right now. I’m crawling… and it’s exciting! Every time someone I know tells me about any kind of growth in their life– my heart skips a beat in joy. Growing up has taught me that increasing your worth is not just about increasing the amount of money in your account or the material goodies you can afford. NO! I’m talking about knowledge, skills, starting new things, taking new directions…all of that. I’m talking about the kind of worth that no one can take away.   No one can take away your education   No one can take away the lessons you learn from starting a new project (it doesn't matter if it succeeds, it’s ...

Ventriloquist : “A performer who projects the voice into a wooden dummy”. Chester and Conrad are a bag of jokes a minute! Thanks to Market Theatre for the pic  Oh what a lovely show Conrad Koch , the man behind ChesterMissing , delivered. I was in stitches most of the night. The only other South African comedian who has a similar effect on me is Kagiso Lediga . For about an hour or so, Conrad kept us fully engaged with his three puppets and began with a bit of a stand up without a puppet. We live in a world where engaging with the audience is key and highly appreciated; Conrad did this well, without it seeming forced.  South African politics are tricky. At any given moment you can be counter-revolutionary if you are a black person or racist if you are white. Comedians are a special breed because they get away with saying the craziest, most insulting things about politicians or celebrities, and that person might end up laughing.  But I guess that’s th...

Fela This Bitch of a Life by Carlos Moore was magnetic. As I dived deeper into the Fela Kuti biography, each page and chapter revealed a figure with many layers. Fela was all human; very intelligent and spiritual, with flaws and all. I’d tread lightly in saying this book is an easy read. It’s written in Nigerian Pidgin ; that’s how Fela spoke and Carlos Moore opted to write this biography in first person.  This adds to the authentic feel of the story. It’s as though the writer, Moore, was saying; ‘here is Fela love him or hate him…this is him’! Much can be said about how Fela used music to challenge the Nigerian government. Much can also be said about why he is still relevant 16-years-after his death. And much can be said about how he lived among the poor and shared whatever wealth he had.  But I’d like to focus on Fela the hot blooded man! Firstly I’ll confess that pictures of Fela reveal a very handsome man, blessed with a beautiful body. Now that my lustful ...

Omphile Molusi in character!  Image provided by The Market Theatre  Ever sat with a struggle veteran and had a conversation about pre-democracy South Africa and the things he/she went through during the fight for equality?  I have, well she is my mother and through her I've met and sat in on many conversations about the apartheid years. Thanks to my internship year at City Press I was also privileged to interview people who were there in the heat of the Sharpeville Massacre , 21 March 1960. As much as my mother and many like her are open to sharing about the struggle, there is so much that I feel they went through that they can never put into words…whether it’s by choice or that there are a lack of words to describe what they went through, one will never know. Cadre , a play written by Omphile Molusi which is currently on at the Market Theatre speaks about stories left unsaid by struggle heroes.  Lillian Tshabalala, Omphile and Sello ...

Is that too much to ask for: to have a house with two bulls running the show. There is a thinking that women should know their place (be submissive) and men are taught to run the place (bread-winners).  But times have changed. Men and women have dreams, and everybody is fighting to make their dreams a reality. Because of my energy…I’d love a man with a similar kind of drive and most importantly respect and support for my hustle. I want a man who, when I bring work home, will make me that cup of coffee he knows I live on; a man who will read my work and give me constructive criticism, a man who will not only ask how my day was for the sake of it but genuinely care to know. I want a man who understands if I’m happy making my dreams come true, he too will be happy. He must have dreams and I want to offer him the same kind of support that I’ll be getting. The older I get I see my peers pack their dreams into a suitcase, forget about them and focus on motherhood and being wive...

Image : www.tower.com “So what’s your excuse?” – nagged my inner-voice as I read Zack O’Malley Greenburg’s Empire State of Mind: How Jay-Z Went from Street Corner to Corner Office . It’s so easy to make excuses and procrastinate about dreams that are slowly gathering dust while you live every day from hour to hour without really increasing your worth or doing what you really know you should be doing.  That’s all I could think about while reading anecdote after anecdote detailing how Jay-Z went from being a teenager selling hard drugs to a wealthy business man – love him or hate him this man is successful. Greenburg is a staff writer at Forbes Magazine . His beats include business, music and sports. Jay-Z denied Greenburg a sit down for the book and therefore the author relied on  in-depth research and  interviews with people close to the hip hop mogul. He also used a lot of quotes from Jay-Z’s music.  I was a bit worried that without the...