A Truly great day

Last week Thursday will probably be a day I’ll remember for the rest of my life. And no it doesn’t involve beer.

When asked “who would you like to meet most in this world?” answers will range from movie stars, famous sportsmen and women, to inventors and so on. I’m sure there are many South Africans that will agree with my answer, and unfortunately some that won’t. For me, Nelson Mandela would be the person I would like to meet most in this world, February the 3rd will be the closest I’ll have ever got to meeting the man.

‘Make poverty history’ is a big campaign that’s happening over here, organised by Oxfam and various other charities, and Nelson Mandela was at Trafalgar square to promote it, along with 1000’s of supporters. Seeing Mr Mandela walking onto the stage, one couldn’t help but feel the electricity that was immediately sent through the crowd. Upon writing this I quickly checked the internet to see if I could find a figure for the amount of people in attendance, 20 000 is what English newspapers put the figure at, upon reading the article further, I noticed that they too felt the electricity passing through the crowd. Now I know this is a very cliché statement, but when he came into sight, it was like every single person in that entire crowd just lit up. As old and frail as he is, and I mean frail, he could barely walk up the 3 or 4 stairs, he still has such a presence and magical charisma that 20 000 people can take time out of their day and time off work (me) to come and see him, and him only, the African drum bands were good, Jamelia was ok, and everyone’s seen Sir Bob Geldof, they were all there to see him, the ex-president of my country.

“As you know, I recently formally announced my retirement from public life and should really not be here. However, as long as poverty, injustice and gross inequality persist in our world, none of us can truly rest”- one of the first lines from Nelson Mandela’s opening speech.

I’m not going to go on and give a full account of the day as there are enough articles on the web if you are interested. This entry is just to say that I almost met the person I most want to meet in this world, and it was almost enough.