Comments on: Toilet saga still smells

By: John Doe

John Doe — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 13:01:01 +0000

Your editorial sucks!

By: Jeff Jones 80

Jeff Jones 80 — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 17:50:50 +0000

The DA were not “posturing” or “point-scoring”. They merely tried to rectify the situation and explain how it arose.

By: X Cepting

X Cepting — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 08:55:28 +0000

@Owen – Indeed, it always comes back to empowering education or the lack thereof. I am also a firm believer in a minimalist government. The less they get involved in, the less they can stuff up

By: X Cepting

X Cepting — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 08:24:28 +0000

Thanks MLH, I was starting that I am the only one remembering the good old pioneer days of very little technology and lots of fun figuring out how to improve one’s lot with the little one has. On the other hand, I think that it must be very difficult for people to help themself when they and their parents were constantly told how useless they are and how little they are capable of achieving. All lies but believed by the majority nevertheless. Freedom is a state of mind…

By: owen

owen — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 12:45:09 +0000

@X Cepting very well said.

For the life of me, I cannot understand why shack dwellers cannot build and maitain their own long drops and when life improves build a septic tank. I too was raised on long drops and then septic tanks. Helped my Dad build one for the workers. I used to dig long drops on camping holidays. Filled them up afterwards as well.

Of course if one has toooo many people trying to use one long drop then health issues become a concern but again perhaps shack dwellers need use their own brains and build more long drops. Build trees and bushes around them to help dull sounds and provide shade and natural removal of the waste.

I believe in minimal enabling government so I don’t think that governments should ever build toilets. They should enable citizens to do it for themselves via training and financial / tax incentives based on the priciple of rather ‘Teach a man how to fish instead of giving him fish’.

By: MLH

MLH — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 21:41:37 +0000

Yay for X cepting!
I also spent many hours sitting over long drops as a kid and can’t remember anything about indignity. In those days, there simply was no piped water on farms. We all survived. I was terrified of things that crept and crawled, but at least I could duck out of a farmhouse window at night to cover the 5m to the kleinhuisie.
Potties were far more of a no-no.
I was also far less enchanted about being forced to service urges in an army camp during a girl guide camp; a row of a dozen long drops was not separated by so much as a piece of cloth. Privacy counts, but necessitity is the mother of invention!
And let’s face facts, public toilets seldom have floor to ceiling walls and doors. Sounds abound. I fear far more for my health nowadays, when a public toilet door handle is wet.
I was already in my late 20s when proper, modern waterborne sewerage was put into the Woodlands-Montclair suburbs in Durban and, I might add, paid for by the homeowners. The council paid the initial cost of laying pipes but homeowners paid the expense off over several months. No one got anything free then. A septic tank had served the friends I often visited there for a lifetime.
There are still places in Westville with septic tanks.
Get real! Even your average so-called ‘rich’ white has learned to make do with less than the best.

By: Wearethestreetborg

Wearethestreetborg — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 16:56:26 +0000

Politics may be complicated for everyone, but when delivery don’t happen then D.I.Y!

By: X Cepting

X Cepting — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 12:43:49 +0000

@Jackie – I can well relate to the long drop, having spent my childhood on my grandparents farm, that for many years sported one of those. The smell, despite the grand’s dilligent maintenance was undescribable, as was the fear of snakes and scorpions! Then septic tanks became the vogue and with it, the flush loo. These things were all built by my grandfather who had very little former schooling but kept abreast of developments through the “Farmers Weekly” and figured things out as they were needed. Perhaps what is needed in Evaton is a library of how-to books rather than giving the politicians opportunities to score points (with you on that one, Carl).

I am a ratepayer but for all the services I receive from my municipality might as well be living in a squatter area. It does not stop me from improving my own situation as and when I can. To soundproof those thin walls: take the 24 egg cardboard trays and nail/glue them to the wall. Two layers of those on either side will do the trick. Old phonebooks also make great insulators. I am not being facetious but if we do not help each other and wait for our government to improve our lot, we are going to wait long.

By: B Steyn

B Steyn — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 12:20:53 +0000

@Dave Martin: Yes, the outcome of the toilet saga is to cry about. But one has to carry the consequences of your deeds. So sad though that everybody in informal settlements will now carry the consequences of a few idiots.
@Mike: I am not exactly quaking in my boots by the thought of Dave Harris. I could think of a few things to say about a ‘racist ANC’ myself. I have to admit that the latter party has been a huge disappointment to me (and to many others, I’m sure). Not because they are racist–but because they don’t care about the poor (and whether they have toilets).

By: Mike

Mike — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 10:38:38 +0000

Oh o, you’re in trouble now.

Dave Harris and the rest of his mates are going to have a field day moaning about the “racist DA”, The Cape Colony and Madame Zille!

@B Steyn
Dont think that the facts are going to matter. Dave and his mates will roast you with charges of racism and neo-colonialism. In two words you are “dead meat”.

Never let the facts get in the way of a good revolution!