Sometimes when I’m stressed out about life, I allow my mind to wonder and roam far and wide - I think of Thailand, where, I have been told, people are so beautiful that even the boys can be mistaken for girls, the girls being so beautiful that no special lighting is needed when they film tv adverts, movies etc, they just glow (but fortunately, not with the Angelic kind of glow).
Those who have travelled far and wide return with plenty mouth-watering stories of cafes’ in Holland, Amsterdam where a number of products and services (offered nowhere else in the world) are offered to all and sundry and are guaranteed to de-stress even the most stressed out minds., guaranteed to pull you back off the edge, all of it, legal. It is worth noting, and without promoting unhealthy lifestyles I must hasten to add, that the crime rate in these countries is almost non-existent, making certain things illegal just does not make sense anymore, especially if the illegal items have extensive health benefits, and especially with the number of lonely and single people increasing each year.
Anyway in Brazil I am told, you can find much the same as in Thailand, however there’s the small matter of Adams’ Apples’ to be overlooked, easier said than done is my guess. And that’s when I remembered the dreaded Polo Neck/Turtle Neck Jerseys worn by crooked government officials who have watched too much Peter Stuyvesant and Mainstay Cane Spirit advertisements, and by the old men who have named their Townhouses after their suburbs back in Europe and strive daily to keep everything else around them very much the same.
Like Trevor Noah said “We thank all those who have died in order for us to know which mushrooms are safe to eat”. Let’s gather up all these polo neck jerseys and let us donate them all to the Eskimo’s is my humble suggestion. So what exactly was causing my stress you might well be thinking, it was not spotting a cockroach at my favourite kota place (kota = quarter loaf of bread with slap chips, a Vienna, a slice of cheese, atcha – fillings vary, not the quarter loaf, hence the name).
It was the look the Proprietor gave me when I pointed that out, his nostrils flaring and with one smooth movement he’d reached under the counter and pulled out a crinkled up, filthy piece of paper which he showed me which I presume was his buildings inspection certificate by the Health Department or such equally lofty organization.
Surely enough the dirty piece of paper seemed to have a faded stamp on it somewhere on the top of the paper confirming to me both it’s importance and it’s official nature, the rest I could not quite make out but I knew better than to question anything further, I told myself that my mind was probably playing tricks on me and tucked in.
Backing off was in no way cowardly on my part, truth be told, I was too hungry, which made me too weak to remonstrate over anything - otherwise I’d have immediately put into practice what I had learnt growing up, in an informal fight, throwing the first decisive punch makes all the difference( with regards to its outcome).
This dear reader you must not take as the Gospel Truth because there are exceptions as there often are with everything else in life, because once had the misfortune of throwing the first punch and still being the first one to land on the ground. So I went back to thinking of Thailand….
Disclaimer: All articles and letters published on MyNews24 have been independently written by members of News24's community. The views of users published on News24 are therefore their own and do not necessarily represent the views of News24. News24 editors also reserve the right to edit or delete any and all comments received.
