🌻The Second Corner of the Earth
The life & times of BB – the travels & the stories of Ronald Bartels, born a South African
The four corners of the Earth are where we have been, where we are, where we will be going and where we end up. When I was a baby my parents told me I was attached to my bottle and would not give it up. They concocted a story that they had to give it to the elephant in the Bloemfontein zoo to feed her babies. That was the last I saw of it, but every family gathering they would have great pleasure in retelling the story. never realizing that it wasn't appropriate to retell traumatizing events.
From that baby lying on the beach in blissful happiness at Thompson’s Bay, I now work in connectivity.
These are my stories.
Breaking the Mould of Stereotypes
Apartheid to democracy
Cosmos, Blackjacks & Kharkibos
The Golden Liberals
The Queen of Sheba
Comrade Ernie
The Strong One
A dark night
In my previous life I would have been a Roman Gladiator
Maties
In the beginning
Vredefort Dome
Jeremy Clarkson and I agree that the best vehicle is a Massey-Ferguson
I was born in the sixties a couple of years before Neil Armstrong took those famous steps on the moon. We lived in a dusty farmhouse in a valley in the KwaZulu Natal Midlands, a few kilometres north of the small town of New Hanover. The farm was nestled in a beautiful valley where my father grew potatoes and cabbages and other vegetables including madum…
Herd of Zebra 🦓
I was born on the Glorious Twelfth. This is the opening of the hunting season in Scotland where grouse is a common bird that is hunted. The yearly event is immortalized by the Scotch Whisky, The Famous Grouse! Just read the label.
The Church in Sleepy Hollow
The first motorcar I can recall my dad owning was a Valiant. It was a big car and was partnered with my dad's Bedford truck at our farm located between Pietermaritzburg and Greytown. Pietermaritzburg is known as Sleepy Hollow. It is a dull place with not much happening in the town, except the yearly world famous ultra marathon known as The Comrades. Exc…
Standstill
Token-ring
Being in the sh*t and having the sh*t hit the fan
I worked at Madge Networks for over half a decade during the time where South Africa transitioned to a democracy. Madge Networks had a simple philosophy of “support without limits.” It meant that if you bought a Madge product you could be guaranteed that the company would assist you unconditionally in the use of that product and not charge you extra.
The Gypsy
One of the great trips I had, was to the Costa del Sol, or is that the Costa del Golf. It was a Madge Networks Sales Conference. We stayed in Marbella and flew into Spain landing at Malaga. We flew from South Africa via London and on the plane were a whole load of Germans. The Germans could not speak a word of English and I was trying to make conversati…
Angels
As a teenager I sat in the Reunie Hall at Grey College in Bloemfontein and listened to Sir Laurens van der Post. It was in the immediate years before Die Groot Krokodil's Rubicon speech and many of my school mates were not convinced a democratic South Africa was viable. It is probably the greatest speech that I have ever heard where I was physically pre…
I learnt to program on a ZX81
My first job was for the Railways. It was fun working there until I was told that I could not be a member of their pension fund because I was disabled. I did not stay around to argue the point and moved on to work for a little networking company known as Network Interface Consultants.
genchi genbutsu
Often, I see technicians dealing with issues and problems while sitting firmly on the seat of their pants at their desks. Call me old school, but I do not think this works! There is no substitute for the eyeball.
What really matters
Dolos My brother André immigrated to Australia in the mid-2000s. He decided to leave the country as he had been mugged and did not have suitable engineering projects in his field as they had been cancelled. He was an expert in placing dolosse on breakwaters and affluent pipelines into the sea. He loved running and cycling having completed over ten Comrad…
LAN Damager
There I was shooting the breeze with an old mate. The conversation turned to why Madge Networks went titsup. My analysis is that Madge Networks had a solution and decided to go out and find a problem. They deferred to more incorrect strategic technology choices. The truth of the matter is that when something goes titsup, its not because of one reason on…
The Irish Word for Social Media is Craic & it is a Better Alternative
In an Irish pub nestled between the tales and laughter, let me unfold the vibrant essence of Craic – a gem often overlooked in today's whirlwind of social media and technology. Picture this: amidst the hustle of Twitter, Facebook's frenzy, or even LinkedIn where you might stumble upon this very story, a transformation, a shift occurred.
Growing Up on Oakvilla Farm next to the Inyosi River
Copper Lines
In a Modern World we have transitioned to Electronic Tombstones
My wife used to say that often she would read about what I was thinking via something I had posted online instead of a personal conversation. Some things are easier to write about than to speak about. Something else my wife used to say is that I never took enough pictures of her and the children. I probably enjoy writing more than I do talking. That’s j…
The Oakvila Farm Memories & the Path I Travelled
The Girl Next Door & Horseback Dreams
P.O. Box 2, New Hanover, 3440
In the quiet rhythms of farm life, far from the clamor of cities, our connection to the wider world hinged on a simple metal rectangle: P.O. Box 2, New Hanover 3440. Our farm lay 15 kilometers outside that one-donkey town—a speck on the map so modest it couldn’t even afford a horse. New Hanover was the kind of place where time moved at the pace of a laz…
