An open letter to Gill Marcus,
I woke up this morning with a Chinese tourist in my face. Being a rhino in the Kruger Park, I’m used to them getting up close with cameras but this one was literally in my face, with a rolled up ten Rand note, trying to shnarf the remainder of my horn!
It gets worse. When the tranquiliser wore off I gave him such a skrik that he dropped the money and ran back to his 4x4. But the skrik was on me when I checked the cash - not only was my horn missing but so was my whole head! It had been replaced with Nelson Mandela’s portrait and mine shrunk and relegated to the back. Counterfeit, I suspected and went to show my friend, the pink lion. He pulled out a few notes from an illegal alien he’d passed earlier and it was the same: Madiba in lieu of a leeu. When we broke the news to brown elephant she absolutely flipped. A car, that is. “Can Mandela flip a car,” she trumpeted, “can he?”
Now don’t get me wrong, Madiba, with help, flipped the whole country around and if ever a politician deserved to be immortalised in “hot colours”, it’s him, but this is a very slippery slope we’re on. Other politicians will think they’re just as deserving. You see, with us animals, you know what you’re getting: we can’t lie, we’re not corrupt, we don’t exploit our own kind and if we steal we do it in broad daylight and take the repercussions. If the bucks stop at Randela I’d have no problem with that, hell, you could even introduce a Dollarver Tambo and a Steve Bingo. My concern is that you’ve started something that can’t be stopped and it’s only a matter of time until we find the likes of Jewelius Malema in our pockets. Well, officially.
Papa Madiba is known the world over, he doesn’t need any more publicity. In fact he keeps telling people to stop deifying his persona for fear of it depreciating into cheap currency. Indeed. Once you’re the face of money no one knows, better than I, what happens from thereon. They rob your most valuable parts and grind them into superstition.
I’ll tell you who does need more publicity though, me and mine. I bet my horn stump if you asked the man, he’d gladly forfeit the front page to The Big Five. I mean you owe us something in consolation. It would be seriously kief if you could organise for Madiba to run a marathon dressed as a rhino. Ag, wait, he’s retired. Fine, I formally call you out to appear in a rhino costume the next time you do some grocery shopping. You’re Governor of the Reserve Bank and I’m worth more than gold, it’s perfect. Don’t forget to hack off the horn.
Yours in green,
Ten Rand Rhino
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