Since I came to South Africa I have basically moved flats every year. This weekend I was moving for the 9^th time! I must say that I’m glad that we don’t have furniture to move too! And even with moving so often, it is amazing how many things one can accumulate.

At the end of every year I give things away in a “spring cleaning” effort to get rid of things. However, moving apartments makes things pop up from out of nowhere and one wonders where all these things came from? Things that you didn’t even remember existed!

I wonder how people that live for years in the same house do it when they move. It must be crazy! Well, hopefully next year this time we won’t have to move again.

Our greatest strengths are our greatest weaknesses

I totally agree with this statement. I can relate through personal experience and I guess that most of us can. In my case I am extremely organised and a person who strives for perfection – I have been told that this is very noticeable. I believe that being organised and paying attention to detail are great strengths. It enables one to manage their time more effectively and efficiently, thus making the most of it. However, it can also be a weakness. It can make one experience a lot of stress for very little.

The secret is to always have a logical overview of your capabilities and what is expected of you. Do your best and use your strengths and weakness to your favour.

Brazilian Food

brigadeiro

I must say that one of the things that I miss the most from home is the food. Brazilian cooking is very rich, we have influences from all over; Portuguese, Italian, French, slaves, native and one big mix. The most famous dish is called “feijoada” which is black beans cooked with pork pieces. This is served with rice and “farofa” which is a dish made of “mandioca” flour. People often have some deep-fried breadcrumbs, banana and pieces of orange with it. It might sound weird but I promise you, it is delicious!

coxinha

We also have a lot of savoury and sweet snacks that, when I was back home, I could go to any bakery or supermarket and just buy it all the time. I never had to make anything and now being so far away I had to start learning how to cook and bake Brazilian dishes.

I always try to do something every now and then. My South African friends think that every Brazilian sweet dish must have condensed milk, well, not all, but most of it ☺

quindim

One big difference between Brazil and South Africa is the use of the avocado pear. In South Africa it is used in the food while in Brazil we eat it as a fruit. We cut the avocado pear in half, sprinkle sugar over it and eat it with a spoon, as simple as that. And the avocado pear in Brazil is double the size of the ones found in South Africa. We also make “batida” which is kind of a “smoothie”; we blend avocado pear, milk and condensed milk (here it is again!) and there it is! Delicious! A must try!

Try a cliché

To write this post I actually searched on Google and ended up deciding to use a very South African cliché which Google didn’t find it for me: Just now.

I have never heard this expression anywhere else but in South Africa, it is a total cliché and the interpretation of it is very dependent on who is saying it, to who it is being said and in response to what.

Just now can mean in 5 minutes, 10 minutes, half an hour, an hour or even “I don’t want to deal with it right now, I will let you ask me again and again”. At work every now and then we have people visit from the French HQ and I remember once one of them come to me to ask for something to which I replied “just now”, meaning “I am just finishing this then I will come to you”. He just stood there with a confused expression on his face until I “translated” my just now.

We take for granted that clichés are the same everywhere and it is in this kind of situation that we realise that it is not really this way.

Free hugs

I remember once when I was a child and my aunt told me that she had read somewhere that people should hug 8 times a day. In doing so, our bodies liberate a chemical substance that will make you feel happy. From that day on I became a hugger, I’m always hugging my loved ones (well, when they are at a hugging distance).

When I was a teenager I heard about the Free Hugs Campaign. I’m not the kind of person that will go around hugging people that I don’t know but I still thought it was a nice initiative. The fact that the campaign became successful shows the lack of affection that people have nowadays.

Juan Mann, the instigator of the campaign, tells the story of his first hug on the website. He waited for 15 minutes for his first free hug and it was given to a very deserving lady whose dog had died that morning, the morning that marked the anniversary of the day on which, one year before, her daughter had died in a car accident. After the hug the lady had a smile at her face. Nothing changed, her dog or her daughter cannot be brought back to life, but a hug can help the pain go away by letting care and love in.

Feelings follow behaviour

Do feelings follow behaviour or does behaviour follow feeling? I guess it is a case of who came first, the egg or the chicken. Feelings and behaviours follow and motivate one another. For every action there is a reaction.

Therefore it is important to be aware of your own behaviour as it can trigger feelings not only in yourself but also in others. I always aim to treat the people around me as I want to be treated. Whatever feelings or behaviour you put out there comes back to you - it might take time but it will. So be aware of it.

PR not PRing itself

In class we always talk about how Public Relations (PR) is not recognised in the corporate world as a top management function as it should be. So I was asking myself, is PR in need of some PR? I would definitively say yes.

PR practitioners are not really working to promote the industry, at least not as hard as they are working on promoting their clients. Taking into consideration the gender studies that we are busy with in our Communication Science class and looking at where the profession stands at the moment we can assume that PR has a long way to go in promoting itself.

The fact that the PR industry is dominated by woman may have created a prejudice towards the industry. Even though we are now living in a modern world, where everywhere people talk about the equality of genders and anti-discrimination, we still have prejudices, not only by men but also women.

We can also look at the fact that the profession is lacking effective communication and a willingness to work together amongst both the members and between the members and the industry association. We are PR practitioners - who best to promote PR? We must take ownership and pride in the profession and do what we do best, PR.

It is better to practice a little than talk a lot

This is a very truthful statement, however in general much easier said than done. As people we like to interact and usually talking has a big part in it. But some people talk too much and do too little.

If people transfer the time and effort used to talk (and complain) about things to actually doing something to improve it they would grow from it. What I mean is that once you actually stop talking about it and start actually doing things you create knowledge and gain experience.

An example is when you go to a job interview.  You could go there and talk all about how wonderful you are but what will really count is what you have already put into practise. The interviewer could always call to check on you and confirm your experience (your practise). So whatever you do, make sure you do it to the best of your ability, you can only improve from it.