South Africa Blog

Organised. Fair. 4th South African Blog Awards. Cool.

Quite a few people have been working pretty hard to get the 4th Annual South African Blog Awards off to a good start. Start supporting their effort by thinking about your nominations which open on the 11th February 2008. Some cool new categories have been included (best Green Blog, best African Language Blog, best Travel blog), there’s a cool new logo, new rules, new judging formula – This is a Blog Award Process well worth supporting, in particular to recognise those individuals who provide us daily with interesting tit-bits to read about over our morning coffee.

Whether we read their blogs to learn something new, get info about events, get design tips, advice, for a good giggle or just to waste some time – here is the opportunity to reward the writers behind the blogs. (okay, the prize is only 2008 cents, but lets at least give them the recognition they deserve!!).

Visit the Official Website at: South African Blog Awards 2008

Free Range Films have previously been commissioned by SABC 2 to produce a documentary series called “Mantswe a Bonono” which was aired in 2005. This year we have been commissioned for the second series of “Mantswe” and currently in our research phase of the production.

“Mantswe a Bonono” focuses on show casing South African writers of various backgrounds, works, genres and languages. The language criteria which we are exploring are works written in Sotho / Setswana / Sepede / Xivenda / Xitsonga / Afrikaans. We are especially also researching individuals who are located in provinces such as Limpopo, Mpumalanga, North West Province, Free State, etc. If they’ve relocated to main cities we’d also be keen to meet with them

We’ve been receiving lots of feedback on poets, novel, writers and screen- writers. It would be great to hear from people who write for radio, people who write letter, unpublished writers, tv commercial writers, journal writers, etc. If there is a team who works together on their various projects we’d also love to hear from them.

When did you start writing
What do you write about
Why do you write, ie what inspires you
What languages do you write in
What are the titles of your works
Are you published or unpublished
Where were you born
Where do you live
How old are you
Will you be in the country between July and August

Write to Elise Fernandez at Free Range films at elise@freerangefilms.co.za

“May South Africans continue to amaze the world by assisting one another across boundaries of language, race, age or religion! Then we can indeed be proudly South African, fulfill our potential and live a life of meaning by not just living for ourselves.”

Found on the www.ArriveAlive.co.za Blog, another great post by Jonckie on how companies and individuals are assisting other South Africans to better their lives. Inspirational reading. Read it now at: South Africans helping South Africans out and start making a difference!

South African Property – Home Loans for Africa! – That’s the Blog’s tagline and it is most appropriate.
“A blog aimed at helping the youth in South Africa find good financial advice with regards to bonds, home loans and mortgages. This is also aimed at building awareness to those in South Africa especially with our current escalation in property prices“. (Sponsored by Wizard Midrand).

Peppered with really good advice (especially for the first-time home-owner/those applying for their first bond), the site takes a down to earth approach at informing the public about everything to do with bonds. Practical tips on saving thousands of Rands … Quote:  “Did you Know? A R 500,000.00 bond at -1% costs you R 5332.15 per month BUT if you add an additional R 100.00 per month to your payment – Check this out - YOU WILL SAVE: R 258.76 per month on interest, AND, R 62,103.39 over 20 years. THINK about it. Also you will have access to the extra funds and be in a position to get a better rate from your branch. Thats where you win!” Useful advice for those those who did not know …

Apart from advice and guidance on applying for a home loan, the site publishes information about applying for a home loans from the various financial institutions, what interest rates you can expect to pay based on the amount of the loan, deposit paid etc. etc, some cautionary advice about different bond brokers … all makes for excellent reading if you are about to apply for a home loan! Spend some time on this site, familiarise yourself with the different options, take note of what to watch out for and do the math using their affordability calculator!

Visit the site at South African Property – http://sa-property.blogspot.com/ 

The organisation began by returned South African, Angel Jones, because she believes that we may have lost sight of what our country has to offer us and what we have to offer our country. There is so much good stuff going on here, alongside the numerous challenges and we give you the information to enable you to consider all the angles.

The Homecoming Revolution is a non-profit, non-governmental organisation that is independent and in no way affiliated to any political party. Contrary to popular belief, we are NOT influenced by any hidden societies, political organisations or propagandist movements. Nor do we bow to pressure from any groups that think we should be touting any particular agenda. We are sponsored by First National Bank because they are a Proudly South African bank that believes in our country. Our aim is to bring the skills back home and to highlight the opportunities in South Africa. We offer advice, information and services to aid people with their homecoming decision and, ultimately the journey.…This is not at any cost…the decision must be right for the individual concerned.

The Homecoming Revolution blog was created to provide a platform for open, honest and most importantly, constructive debate… an opportunity to be heard.
Visit the Blog at: http://www.homecomingrevolution.co.za/hcrblog/

The Mother City Living Blog is all about “living the good life in Cape Town, the Mother City”. The blog is about living the “good” life in Cape Town – not jet-set type good life but wholesome living, enjoying the great outdoors, the many bounties our lovely “Mother City” offers us in the form of beautiful places, spectacular scenery and so much to do.

the author of Mother City Living is a fan of natural things so you will read a lot about organic foods, original crafts, restaurants that are not chains, small shops and cafes. Pia writes about new places she has visited (and obviously these are places that take great care in the preparation of food, of the service they provide). She visits organic markets and finds websites that offer organic goods and tells you about her finds.

There is a lot of newsy info about upcoming events in the Mother city, restaurant reviews, good places to go and some unusual finds … So if you are into exploring the Cape and finding out about places worth visiting, this blog is a very worthwhile read.
Find it at: http://www.mothercityliving.co.za/

Happy exploring!

Good Morning South African Bloggers! Me Sue - a some-time contributing editor to the SouthAfricaBlog.co.za, I have not posted much in the past… that’s about to change. With the new site design completed (almost!) I’ve been tasked with starting the new section devoted to South African site reviews with a strong emphasis on Blog sites. (we’ll do the odd web site review but the flavour-of-the-month is blogging so lets look at all the new blog sites coming up). That’s what I love to do on the ‘net – surf around, read and tell people about new or interesting sites I’ve found.

So I’ll kick off with reviewing some of the best and newest South African blogs. And what a choice… there are plenty to choose from. Seems to me South African’s have been watching the blogosphere with interest and are coming out strongly with their own slant on blogging. The result is some unique topics and quite different blogs. Great South African stuff! I’ll be doing individual write-ups (or “reviews”) of all the sites I’ve recently discovered but ’want to point out a few notable new blogs that were mentioned to me today.

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