Archive for February, 2010

Now I don't really like posting email joke forwards up on PharSide since most people have already seen them and its not fresh, but I got this one today that honestly made me chuckle at my desk for quite a long time… its the best I've seen in a while

So here goes….

You know you're flying S.A.A. when you ask the air hostess for the black pepper and she brings you… 

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Wait for it…..

The Sowetan

[Thanks Lorna]

- Marky Mark

If you've been to the South African restaurant called Chakalaka in Putney, you'll know how frickin awesome their chow is, and now finally for us Saffa's in Wimbledon, we no longer have to bust it on the dreaded District Line to get a good taste of South Africa, we've got it nicely tucked away right here in Wimbledon as part of the Horse and Groom Pub.

You may remember the previous raving review I did for Chakalaka in Putney some time ago, where I took on the 25oz Steak Challenge, so when I heard that another Chakalaka had opened up right here in Wimbles, I wasted no time in going to check it out. Once again my fussy little taste buds were mesmerized by the quality of the food. Now let me tell you, this time they were gonna have it a bit harder because to be quite honest, it was Sunday, so naturally I was hanging like a bitch after yet another weekend of insane debauchery in the life of Marky Mark. My taste buds were wrecked and even if I drank a whole bottle of thick bleach, it would still taste like Jack and Coke due to the inner layers of my mouth being well marinated all weekend, so all in all, it was gonna be tough for Mr. Chef Dude in the back. I decided to go for something a little lighter on my already tender tummy, so I had a look at the menu and went for the KingKlip with sweet potato and green beans… when I saw those veggies on the menu I could just hear my ma's voice in my head telling me to be sensible and healthy also I couldn't resist the sudden thought of quality nutrients to bring homeostasis back to my badly self abused body. 

When the food arrived I had a little skrik! The presentation was immaculate and that is one big point I'd like to note, it seriously looked like someone had sculptured every millimeter of surface area on that plate to be perfect… only for me to tuck right in and screw the whole lot up. The fish tasted like fish, but I don't mean the crap you get at your local fish and chip shop, this tasted like real fish, like fish should always taste, it was divine and took me on a little subconscious journey right back to SA and what our fish tastes like back there. Now comes the fun part, it was totally unexpected, I've never been a hectic fan of sweet potato or vegetables for that matter, as my ma will confirm, but call me deprived when I tell you I have never had sweet potato with a bit of cinnamon mixed into it, I am now a ridiculously huge fan, I couldn't believe how frickin awesome it tastes, I actually wanna have it made with something at home when I lock Chef Louise in the kitchen, and not let her out until she has made Darryn and I a good wholesome meal after a long hard days work The beans, oh the beans… lets just say if you told me that there was a vegitable patch outside in the back, I wouldn't be the slightest bit surprised, because those beans that I had there right on my very plate seemed to have come straight from that very patch, and to add to there awesomeness(my ma will go into absolute shock if she hears me saying this about green beans), they were marinating nicely in a delicious white sauce.

Chef Louise and Darryn came down with me this last Sunday evening. Chef Louise had the stuffed chicken breast which aparently tasted as divine as it looked and Darryn had the "all you can eat rib special" which I believe runs on Sundays and Wednesdays, so if you schmaak a ribs, £12.95 all you can eat… not bad hey.

Chakalaka is situated as part of the Horse and Groom Pub at 143-145 Haydons Road in Wimbledon [map], which mind you is also a nice little Saffa watering hole itself. Its owned and run by main man Miguel, who seems to be more than happy to provide awesome hospitality for Saffa's who stroll through his doors. I've heard alot of good things being spoken about the Horse and Groom recently since its had a change of management, and I'm quite looking forward to returning for a few pre-party drinks before hitting the late jols. If you looking to catch a couple of the Super 14 games when they are on Sky (else watch them online here at PharSide) then they are being shown at The Horse and Groom and at least with the main man being a Saffa himself, you know the rugby is going to get preference over some poncy soccer game.

All in all, I was definately impressed and recommend that you guy get your hungry little butts down there for an afternoon of good chow, good dops and good Rugby (that's if the Sharks can eventually pull their fingers out)

- Marky Mark

Theres a bit of a rattle on the net at the mo with news that the Dalai Lama himself is sticking with the times and got himself his very own Twitter account… and before you label it as a hoax… see for yourself… it's Twitter Verified.

With hours now the main man has been racking in followers… welcome to new wave religious recruitment
Next we'll see the Pope taking a cue if he check that his competitor is getting the upper edge.

Don't take this the wrong way but, if Jesus was batting his 2nd innings, do you reckon he'd get himself a Twitter account too to stick with the times?

I've started following his holiness aswell since I quite enjoy his words of wisdom that you hear from time to time. Quite looking quite forward to it as he usually has something that is quite broad minded and gives you something to think about, which in all honesty and personal opinion, is a bit more than what I can say for the Pope who is supposed to be bigger in the sense of global religious domination, not to mention being the top man of the extremely well financed institution which we all very well know.

Follow PharSide  Follow Dalai Lama

- Marky Mark

Durban and most of KZN experienced a massive violent electrical storm last week turning many urban areas into something short of the Camel Trophy…

If you were in Durban last Tuesday you may have noticed a little storm that was occuring outside, well if you didn't then I'm sure your little mutts must have due to all the thunder and lightning. Check out the pics sent to East Coast Radio by the general public. 

Essenwood Road

Florida Road

Umbilo Road

View over Moses Mabhida Stadium

View over Moses Mabhida Stadium – I wouldn't wanna be stuck at the viewing point on the stadium arch with that bolt of lightning hovering around.

Hopefully Robert Mugabe was in town enjoying the view from from the stadium arch at this moment

All I can say is that the weather in Durbs has just short of 5 weeks to sort its shit out before I get there, because I seriously need to get some colour on my pasty little white ass

[Thanks Little Day]

- Marky Mark

Check out the new paint job on South Africa's low-cost airline Kulula.com

You've gotta love this South African touch, which as you know is a break from formality with two tablespoons of humorous touch.

Apparently it was quite a bright spark idea to do this and it looks like whoever came up with this bright spark idea at Kulula is in for a big bonus this year. Pictures of the plane are circulating wildly over the net and even in The Sun newspaper here in the UK, which as you can imagine is doing wonders for Kulula's advertising campaign since the World Cup is just around the corner and thousands of soccer fans are gonna be looking for cheap flights to get around the country… which airline is going to be at the forefront of their little hooligan minds?

I'd say thats a WIN for Kulula

Check it out!

[Thanks Ballie]

- Marky Mark

For every Saffa in London, the one thing you miss from back home is biltong… Now if you live in Wimbledon you can just about get it on every street corner, but for a price that is… but did you know, you can build a decent quality wooden biltong making machine for less than twenty bucks? not to mention actually making the biltong itself is alot easier than you think, trust me, I know…

Building a biltong box is actually quite simple, there are websites selling small professionally made plastic boxes, but to be quite honest, it only looks nice but still does the same job, but worst of all, they are charging people £150 for them which is a bit ridiculous. All you basically need is a box with two sections, one section at the bottom to house the light and the main section on top where the meat will dry to make biltong. 

The diagram below will give you the basic idea…

Now you can use cardboard however I wouldn't recommend it if you want to keep making biltong, and trust me, after your first batch, you're more than hooked, so rather take the time to build a sturdy wooden box that you can clean and it will last a long time.

The most important thing about this whole venture is to have a place to hang your biltong and then move dry air through it. The moving air dries the biltong!

The diagram shows a box with a divider that divides the box into two sections, A & B. Section A is high enough for a 100 Watt (or 60W) bulb to fit into. Section B is where you will hang the meat. Near the top of section B are wooden or steel rods (marked C) from where you will hang your meat.

There are holes (½-1 inch diameter) drilled along the sides of section A, in the divider, and in the roof of the box.

How It Works

The bulb heats the air in section A. As we all know from school, warm air rises. The air rises through the holes in the divider, through section B, and out the top. The air in section A that has risen out the top, is replaced by air being sucked in through the holes in the sides of section A. The blue arrows show the air flow.

How To Make It

Now you can build the whole damn thing from scratch like a lot of people have done, or you can get a bit clever and make life a lot easier for yourself. I went over to B&Q and found a bedside cupboard that was on special for £11. It was a decent standard size and the nice thing about it was that it had a smooth beech effect, which at the end of the day is going to be alot easier to clean after each batch, than trying to clean bare wood that has soaked up alot of the juices that drip off the meat, so already its a good idea. The "cupboard" came flatpacked but only took about 10mins to assemble as you get all the screws etc to put it together, and just for the dolls, there's a nice little instruction sheet. Obviously I didn't build it with the draw at the top because that wouldn't be needed. The cupboard had an open front so all I did was cut a piece of wood (MDF) to size and fixed it to the front with a couple hinges to make the door. Next I drilled holes between the two compartments to let the airflow through and then holes at the top for the warm air to escape. I made some smaller holes near the top and slid some rods through to be used as hanging racks to hang the biltong from. In the bottom compartment I fitted two light fittings and kitted them with two 40W globes. Many people say you should use one 60W globe and many others so you should use one 100W globes, so I went in between with 2 x 40W. I used the bottom open back as the intake but closed this about half way with a small piece of plank so that the warm air would flow into the main compartment and not escape out the back…. and Voila! the whole thing took about an hour and a half to build and works like a bomb. There's a few little additions you can make such as sealing the holes off with some fine mesh to stop any bugs crawling in and chowing your biltong etc. I've done a few batches now and its taking me around 2-3 days per batch which is wicked.

Check out huge PharSide Fan, Ronan, he used this same technique to build his biltong box and he's "loving" it

He made a video for it

See guys, you don't need to be a farm boy to make it, people from the village can make it too haha

This is the party thats going on in my biltong box at this very moment…

Thats 2.4kgs raw, will be about 1.5kgs dry, perfect for a personal stash … oh yeah baby!

Check back next week and I may have a special guest showing you exactly how to make the biltong itself… so get cracking on your boxes my chinas

- Marky Mark

Well okes, I hope you have got your act together because Sunday is Valentines Day… and lord help you if you forget to get your doll something for Valentines Day… you will without a doubt experience the result of two words that NO-ONE wants to hear… not "break up"… even worse…… NO ACTION!

So in like of this, I've come to the rescue… as I do…. why not treat your doll to a dashing Valentines Card with a Saffa touch…

Remember guys, its not about the price tag, honestly… its the thought that counts…. BWAHAHAHA!

[Show as slideshow]

- Marky Mark

Yesterday marked 20 years since our main man Nelson Mandela was released from Victor Verster Prison on 11th February 1990 after spending 27 years in prison… yip, 20 years ago already… its been that long… suddenly I feel rather old…

I remember that day in 1990 so vividly its frightening, I remember we were still living in the berg in our little village called Jagersrust which is about 25km's into the berg from Bergville. I was 10 years old and parking on the couch watching TV when both my Ballie and my ma came running into the lounge and changed the channel to TV1 without consulting me first… well as you guessed, I threw my toys, to which my ballie replied, "no we must put the news on because Nelson Mandela was being released". As you can imagine my response as would have been any white 10 year old leitjie's response "Well who the hell is Nelson Mandela?". I remember having to wait watching the TV for ages waiting for him to make his appearance until finally we watched Madiba make is walk to freedom. Little did I know that that man that I was watching there on our old 51cm National Panasonic TV without remote control capabilities, that I knew absolutely nothing about at the time, would later on in life become such a great influence and mentor in the way that I view the world and people in general.

Throughout the years Nelson Mandela has been such an interest to me, I have seen every movie ever made about him, the struggle and his time in prison. I have read countless articles about him spent endless hours watching anything I could find about him on the net and YouTube. A little while back I finally took the time to endure reading "Long Walk to Freedom" which believe me is a ridiculously long read, however I was glued to every page never wanting it to end, I was actually quite pissed off when the book came to an end, because I just wanted to know more. I think through all of this I have such a deep respect for him to the extent that I try to live my life and treat people in a manner that he did. I would seriously recommend that you take the time to read the book because once you are done you feel a sense of connection with him and experience the true sense of what he devoted his life to achieving. It will change your mindset on so many aspects about what you previously thought were wrong, and through common sense you will realise just how much of our upbringing was a mass of apartheid propaganda.

One of my greatest wishes would be to meet the man that I admire so much, unfortunately the closest I've ever been in his presence, was listening to him make his speech at his 90th Birthday Concert in Hyde Park almost two years ago. Sadly I think my dream will never come true due to him becoming quite frail and retreating from the public eye, but I still hope that by some stroke of luck I may still get to meet him somehow. I feel bad whenever I meet someone who has met him because I seem to instantly have 50 questions about what it was like to meet him, wanting to know each and every fine detail.

People have their opinions and they are quite entitled to there opinions, such as, he was labelled as a terrorist or its been 20 years and look at South Africa now, from an economic and political stand point, its an absolute mess, to which, you're probably quite right, I do believe that if Madiba's successors had even a fraction of his qualities, SA would be in quite a different situation now, but hopefully one day someone will come along searching for the same ideals as Madiba, I guess we'll just have to hope and wait. However you may want to think of what sort of state SA would have been in now if Mandela was never released, if apartheid was still in full force… well lets just say that you think its tough getting around the world on an SA passport now? Sanctions on SA would have sealed us off completely from the world, or we would be or already have been at war with the world, or civil war would have surely broken out be now with dire consequences.

However all in all, I would personally just like to wish Nelson Mandela a very happy getting released day!

All the best Madiba! You are the best!

Check the video below of his first press conference the day after he was released.

- Marky Mark

Check what's going down at Suburban in Wimbledon… Saturday's Dead Celeb Party sounds like a winner!

You've gotta hand it to the boys over at Suburban, quite possibly Wimbledon's busiest bar as far as pouring drinks in record time is concerned, its an experience just to check how these okes operate. Don't ask me where they get the energy from but these boys are on top form from the second that door opens until the last drink is served, and as many a Saffa in Wimbledon will tell you, they really do know how to throw a banging party! Check out what they've got coming up

Check out www.suburbanbar.com for more info!

SUBURBAN WIMBLEDON: 27 HARTFIELD ROAD, LONDON, SW19 3SG TEL. 0208 543 9788

- Marky Mark

Many of you would have read about this in the Metro yesterday morning which has caused quite a laugh… well possibly not for the Aussie banker involved, seen checking out racy pics of none other than Miranda Kerr live on Channel 7 News…

We've all seen, especially on Sky News for example, you'll have the presenter dude parking there nattering away while his little army of news room colleagues hack away at their computers doing whatever it is that they do. Well this wasn't exactly a news room, however the same concept was applied where an office background was used while a banker from Australian bank, Macquarie Bank, gave a financial report live on air for Channel 7 News in Australia.

Now I wouldn't expect anything less from our aussie mates when it comes to this sort of thing, but look closely at the video below, watch the dude at his computer to the left of the presenter's right ear

BUSTED! haha

To be honest, I think the dude had every right to view such an awesome pic, just because

Click here for some NSFW pics which include Miranda showing a bit more than her shoulder which you might wanna check out, if you haven't already

- Marky Mark