It’s not often you can say there’s an elephant in the room…and there really is! In one of the sweetest stories on Facebook today, Thula Thula MD Françoise Malby-Anthony, related how she and her safari lodge staff rescued a baby elephant that wandered away from its herd and into her garden last night. Thula Thula […]

Durban’s beach art has survived last year’s permit system hiccup and is thriving, as evidenced by these fantastic photographs taken during the Durban Sky Grand Prix at the weekend. In May 2013 Durban Metro Police removed several unlicensed beach artists in an effort to control the burgeoning trade of sand sculpting which  can earn its […]

As the prosecution winds down its case, we can expect some bombshell revelations, and today – Monday March 24, 2014 – was just the beginning. Hawks’ cellphone expert Captain Francois Moller read out transcripts of WhatsApp messages between Oscar and Reeva, which have been downloaded from Reeva’s cellphone. Below is a sample. Oscar has denied witness testimony […]

I’m back on the beat of the Oscar trial after time away from the action. Like a voyeur, I’ve been playing catch-up, tracking the replays of the Oscar Pistorius trial on Channel 199 as his uncertain fate nears. I’ve missed writing about Oscar. Like anyone with a habit, I had withdrawal symptoms and couldn’t wean […]

It was an awesome day out in Nelson Mandela Bay in Port Elizabeth yesterday for both the competitors who took part in the City Lodge Hotel Group “3 Beaches Challenge”…and for the dolphins who joined them! Photographer Dirk Erasmus was out in a rubber dingy to capture the day’s activities in this fairly new event […]

“It’s not easy to talk about Madiba,” Ahmed Kathrada said at the third Mandela Colloquium in Johannesburg this week. And then proceeded to spend almost an hour talking about his affectionate memories of Nelson Mandela, mostly in the present tense – perhaps giving a sense how present Mandela still is in his life, even after […]

Durban hosted one of South Africa’s hottest aviation events on Friday and Saturday – the Durban Sky Grand Prix of aerobatics, and as can be seen by the photos, their promise to “take you to the sky and back” was delivered. The Land Sea Air event was held at North Beach and featured a special […]

We-love-Thuli-Madonsela fever is spreading through South Africa. For those who don’t yet know her, Advocate Thulisile Madonsela is the Public Protector (Ombudsman) who recently completed the investigation and report on the over R200-million upgrade to President Jacob Zuma’s residential complex in Nkandla. Facebook fan pages have risen rapidly to support and commend Ms Madonsela for […]

A fabulously evocative and vibrant South African painting sold for over a million pounds in London this week! ‘Zanzibar Woman’ by Irma Stern (1894-1966) was auctioned at the prestigious Bonhams sale of South African art for a total of £1,082,500 (R19,289,760). Irma painted this portrait, an oil on canvas, during her 1939 trip to the […]

The United Nation’s International Day of Happiness has had an extra happy vibe to it this year with Pharrell Williams’ latest hit song “HAPPY” playing all the way from Tokyo to Toronto, Cairo to Cape Town. It seems every country around the world has uploaded their own version – Bosnia, Tunisia, Australia, Madagascar, Japan…in fact […]

Visiting Cape Town was always on my to-do list, however I never thought that the rest of the country would be as interesting as it turned out to be. I briefly visited Johannesburg in 2010, but didn’t enjoy it that much at the time. When I finally managed to land in Cape Town in 2012 […]

Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom will be screened at the United Nations in Geneva today, 20 March 2014, ahead of the commemoration of the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination tomorrow. The screening of the film, based on the late South African President’s autobiography, will be followed, by a panel discussion during the […]

As the Oscar Pistorius trial continues, with some describing it as oscillating between ‘gore’ and ‘bore’, so too does the trial of South Africa, with Brand SA Manager Simon Barber being the latest to step up and defend the country from being branded a “failed state”. American lawyer and outspoken political commentator, Alan Dershowitz, marched […]

Ever wondered just how many flights take off from Heathrow each day and how frequently; or how many passengers are bustling through that busy airport daily? Well, South African author Robert Wicks has recently put the finishing touches to a book which answers these questions and more; revealing the inner workings of the world’s busiest […]

A South African soldier stationed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has produced a creative and unique comic strip (see below)…about a day in the life of the South African contingent of the MONUSCO Force Intervention Brigade (FIB). The comic strip – which is presented in the form of photos with voice bubbles […]

Highveld Stereo 94.7 Producer Brad has created one of the first Oscar Trial parodies to go viral. The Barry Roux Parody Song started as an audio file on SoundCloud but has now been published on YouTube. The video visuals include a collage of photos from the trial showing defence advocate Barry Roux in his most […]

There was a phenomenal turn out in Cape Town today for the Global March for Lions. The Mother City was one of 60 cities around the world that participated in this March against the shameful South African industry that keeps over 8,000 lions in captivity for breeding and hunting. Animal activists united together and marched […]

Being a Top Gear photographer you get to meet and photograph some really interesting celebrities, in this case Jack Parow was the man I needed to put next to the Stig! This was the launch for the BBC’s Top Gear Festival which is coming to Durban in June. It will be the third year Durban […]

Spectacular, sensational…Durban. Here is another awesome timelapse video from South Africa’s ‘surf city’. This time the video presents the activities going on in Durban, and the people and culture of this wonderful and often overlooked part of South Africa. The stunning showreel has been compiled by Media Linc’s Mattew Wilkes, who grew up in Ballito […]

I must confess that I’d never read much of Mark Gevisser before someone at work in New York brought me this book because it had Johannesburg in the title and I was a South African. They thought I’d relate. Which I did, except it was more to the title than to the author. At last, […]

Two major wheelchair tennis tournaments are set to be staged in South Africa next month: the Airports Company South Africa (Acsa) Gauteng Open and the Acsa SA Open. Many of the world’s leading players will be in action. The Acsa Gauteng Open will be played at the Gauteng East Tennis Centre at Benoni Lake from […]

Johannesburg is the top tweeting city in Africa, with two other South African cities among the continent’s top five Twitter centres, according to the second How Africa Tweets study from communications company Portland.  The study, released by London-, New York- and Nairobi-based Portand on Tuesday, analysed geo-located tweets originating from Africa during the last three months of […]

Princess Charlene has given a candid interview to a French newspaper in which she attempts to quash yet more rumours about her love life, and pays homage to both South Africa and her new home of Monaco, while also highlighting the work of her Foundation. A German magazine, followed by others, recently published photos allegedly […]

Renowned South African photographer Grant Leversha’s exquisite book ‘Within an African Eden: Golf Courses of South Africa’ has scooped eight prestigious international awards and medals, and as evidenced by these images it’s not difficult to understand why. Most recently ‘Within an African Eden’ won Gold at the  Benjamin Franklin Awards (New York). The selection committee […]

My dear Oscar, Your freedom of access to newspaper articles and the internet doubtless leaves you somewhat bemused by your precipitous fall from grace in the eyes of an erstwhile adoring public. The reasons for this may at first blush appear obvious, but I would venture to suggest that these are as multi-faceted and as […]