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Books > Language & Literature > Biography & autobiography > General
“I saw my mommy walking to the court with a hoodie on and a scarf covering her face. She looked almost like someone that was poor. People were cursing at her… and that broke me. This is the woman who was there for me every day, making lunch for me and my friends when we came from school, and now here she is on television being called a criminal.”
The kidnapping of baby Zephany Nurse from the cot beside her mother’s hospital bed made headline news. Desperate pleas from her parents to return her safely went unanswered. There was no trace of the baby. For 17 years, on her birthday, the Nurse family lit candles and hoped and prayed.
Living not far away from the Nurses, 17-year-old Miché Solomon had just started Matric. She had a boyfriend. She had devoted parents. She was thinking about the upcoming school dance and the dress her mother was going to make for her. She had no idea that a new girl at her school, who bore an uncanny resemblance to her, and a DNA test would shake her world to its foundations.
Miché is now 22. This is her story – for the first time in her own words. Told with astonishing maturity, honesty and compassion, it is also a story of what it means to love and be loved, and of claiming your identity.
"As I sat on the side of Hamnafield on Foula in the Shetland
Islands, looking down at my 'enormous' 38-foot ferry stowed in its
cradle on the quay in Ham Voe, over 1,000 feet below me, I
reflected on a moderately successful career to date, and wondered
how on Earth I had ended up driving what was, in effect, a floating
dust cart" After 42 years at or connected with the sea, Jeremy
Walker ended up on the Shetland Island of Foula commanding and
running a small ferry to the mainland of Shetland. Throughout the
course of his career, firstly as a seagoing deck officer with a
large, but now defunct, British shipping company, then as a
Hovercraft Commander for four years, returning to sea for a brief
period as Master of two small coastal tankers and then for the
majority of his career as a Pilot on the River Humber, he
encountered many amusing situations. In this book he attempts to
relate these stories and to illustrate the lighter side of what was
a very difficult, responsible and, at times, incredibly stressful
job. And little did he know that his career was far from over and
new opportunities and challenges would take him on for a further 13
years to eventual retirement.
"As I sat on the side of Hamnafield on Foula in the Shetland
Islands, looking down at my 'enormous' 38-foot ferry stowed in its
cradle on the quay in Ham Voe, over 1,000 feet below me, I
reflected on a moderately successful career to date, and wondered
how on Earth I had ended up driving what was, in effect, a floating
dust cart" After 42 years at or connected with the sea, Jeremy
Walker ended up on the Shetland Island of Foula commanding and
running a small ferry to the mainland of Shetland. Throughout the
course of his career, firstly as a seagoing deck officer with a
large, but now defunct, British shipping company, then as a
Hovercraft Commander for four years, returning to sea for a brief
period as Master of two small coastal tankers and then for the
majority of his career as a Pilot on the River Humber, he
encountered many amusing situations. In this book he attempts to
relate these stories and to illustrate the lighter side of what was
a very difficult, responsible and, at times, incredibly stressful
job. And little did he know that his career was far from over and
new opportunities and challenges would take him on for a further 13
years to eventual retirement.
Met die deurlees van Jeanne Goosen se notaboeke, dagboeke, flardes en
uitknipsels verskyn 'n verrassing! Die skrywer het deurentyd los
gedagtes neergepen - nie net 'n paar nie, maar honderde gedagtes, te
kosbaar om verlore te gaan: sêgoed, insigte, waarnemings, aforismes,
mymerings . . . alles dáár, om oplaas in boekvorm met haar lesers
gedeel te word.
Die aantekeninge weerspieël die merkwaardige intellektuele aktiwiteit
van 'n denker-kunstenaar. Sy bemoei haar intens met letterkundige,
filosofiese, politiese, wetenskaplike, sielkundige insae en bevindings
wat sy soms ernstig, soms satiries en soms ook kru verwoord. Die
versameling is spesifiek nie volgens onderwerp geklassifiseer nie, maar
lukraak soos die losstaande aantekeninge opeenvolgend gevind is. Daar
is ook nie geredigeer om taalgebruik te verbeter nie. Jeanne Goosen
praat hier in haar eie, unieke stem.
Voorbeelde:
- Feite steur hulle nie aan sielkunde nie.
- Ek moet probeer om nuwe foute te maak.
- Date rape. Dit klink soos 'n nagereg.
- Jy kan nie 'n held wees met R100 'n maand vir groceries nie.
- 'n Jakkals is 'n wolf wat blomme stuur.
- As julle trou, word julle een. Watter een?
- Moenie steel nie, die regering hou nie van kompetisie nie.
- Moet nooit 'n geskenk aanvaar wat eet nie.
"I became a life insurance salesman in London in May 1969, for the
glamour, the fast cars, the groupies... the beautiful women who'd
stop at nothing to buy life insurance. It's a very well-kept
secret." Thus begins Peter Rosengard's extraordinary account of his
life so far, and the endless adventures in which he made, lost and
remade a fortune; founded London's famous Comedy Store, discovered
and managed some of the greats in stand-up comedy; turned an
unknown boy band into a chart-topping sensation; and sold the
world's biggest life insurance policy in history, for $100m, which
is still celebrated by the Guinness Book of Records. This is a book
about "chutzpah," testament to a simple belief that "nothing is
impossible."
The story of a fifty-year relationship between a Vietnam veteran
and a remote Aboriginal tribe: a miniature epic of human
adaptation, suffering and resilience. The Passion of Private White
describes the meeting of two worlds: the world of the fiercely
driven biologist and anthropologist Neville White, and the world of
the hunter-gatherer clans of remote northern Australia he studied
and lived with. As White tried to understand the world as it was
understood on the other side of the vast cultural divide, he was
also trying to transcend the mental scars he suffered on the
battlefields of Vietnam. The clans had their own injuries to deal
with, as they tried to adapt to modernity, live down their losses
and yet hold onto their ancient lands, customs, laws and language.
Over five decades, White mapped in astonishing detail the culture
and history of the Yolgnu clans at Donydji in north-east Arnhem
Land. But eventually presence meant involvement, and White became
advocate more than anthropologist in the clan's struggle to survive
when everything - from the ambitions of mining companies and a
zombie bureaucracy, to feuds, sorcery and magic, despair and
dysfunction - conspired to destroy them. And the fifty-year
endeavour served another purpose for White and the members of his
old platoon he took there. Working to help the community at Donydji
became a kind of antidote for the psychic wounds of Vietnam. While
for the clans, from the old warriors to the children, their
fanatical benefactor offered a few rays of meaning and hope. There
was no cure in this meeting of two worlds, both suffering their own
form of PTSD, but they helped each other survive. This is a
miniature epic of human adaptation, suffering and resilience, an
astonishing window into both our recent and our deep history, the
coloniser and colonised - indeed into the human condition itself.
J. Michael Wilson (1916-1999), Soldier, Medical Doctor, Priest and
Academic, may be best known for his often ground-breaking
professional achievement, from working with lepers in Ghana to his
seminal work in Pastoral Studies. For all his successful
accomplishments, however, he thought accolades, titles and
qualifications were no more than vain baubles for obituary columns.
Becoming a fully human being was, he believed, best manifested in
community, through art, poetry, prayer and revelling in the wonders
of Nature. Here, finally, is your chance to share a merry dance
through his creative life and works...
THE NO.1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER It has been 30 years since Noel
Fitzpatrick graduated as a veterinary surgeon, and that 22-year-old
from Ballyfin, Ireland, is now one of the leading veterinary
surgeons in the world. The journey to that point has seen Noel
treat thousands of animals - many of whom were thought to be beyond
help - animals that have changed his life, and the lives of those
around them, for the better. If the No.1 Sunday Times bestseller
Listening to the Animals was about Noel's path to becoming The
Supervet, then How Animals Saved My Life is about what it's like to
actually be The Supervet. Noel shares the moving and often funny
stories of the animals he's treated and the unique 'animal people'
he has met along the way. He reflects on the valuable lessons of
Integrity, Care, Love and Hope that they have taught him - lessons
that have sustained him through the unbelievable highs and crushing
lows of a profession where lives are quite literally at stake. As
Noel explores what makes us connect with animals so deeply, we meet
Peanut, the world's first cat with two front bionic limbs;
eight-year-old therapy dachschund Olive; Odin, a gorgeous
five-year-old Dobermann, who would prove to be one of Noel's most
challenging cases - and of course his beloved companions Ricochet,
the Maine Coon, and Keira, the scruffy Border terrier who is always
by his side.
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