The Sweet Service Award goes to Uber, for its innovative international launch (in 130 countries) of #UberIceCream 2014 tomorrow, to ‘turn the other cheek to the winter chill’ in South Africa, and to position Uber as much more than an alternative taxi service. Packages of tubs of frozen yoghurt, toppings, Uber swag scarves, and delivery tomorrow between 11h00 – 17h00 are available to order on the Uber app at R120 in Cape Town, and R165 in Johannesburg, Pretoria, and Johannesburg. To launch the campaign in South Africa, it is linked locally to Nelson Mandela Day today. Sick children at the Johannesburg General Hospital will be spoilt with an ice cream delivery this weekend. The company will also bring children from the Alex AIDS Project in Johannesburg to a Filo Yoghurt outlet, and to Myög for children from the Uluntu Centre in Cape Town, so that they can make up their favourite frozen yoghurt treats. Continue reading →
Tag Archives: Cinema Nouveau
I ♥ my Laundry Sweet and Sunday Times Sour Service Awards!
The Sweet Service Award goes to I ♥ my Laundry, for its invitation to lady lifestyle bloggers to attend its Taittinger Heart FM After Eden function yesterday evening. I ♥ my Laundry has been open for less than three months, and has already established itself as one of the most creative function venues, coming up with unusual food and beverage pairings and themes. Taittinger brand ambassador in South Africa, Mike Cox, shared that there are 20 million bottles of the champagne under maturation in Reims at any point in time, and that they produce 6 million bottles per year, with a minimum of 4 years maturation. Their product range is a Brut Reserve Non-Vintage, a Cuvé Prestige Brut Rosé, and a 2005 Brut Reserve. The function was an opportunity for Tweeters and bloggers to connect, most not having previously met.
The Sour Service Award goes to the Sunday Times, which carried a full page advertisement last week, inviting readers to an ‘Exclusive Sunday Times movie screening’ of ‘The Romantics’, at Cinema Nouveau branches in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban, and at Cavendish Square in Cape Town. When they arrived at the cinema, a number of angry and very disappointed moviegoers were turned away, as the movie was fully booked. The invitation was not subject to a ‘first come first served’ clause, nor was a number given for one to call to book a seat. All one was asked to do was to bring a coupon contained in the newspaper ad to the cinema. The manager of the Cinema Nouveau Cavendish Square absolved his cinema of any responsibility, saying that it was the fault of the Sunday Times!
The WhaleTales Sweet & Sour Service Awards are presented every Friday on the WhaleTales blog. Nominations for the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be sent to Chris von Ulmenstein at info@whalecottage.com. Past winners of the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be read on the Friday posts of this blog, and in the WhaleTales newsletters on the www.whalecottage.com website.
Mercedes Benz Culemborg Sweet Service and Cinema Nouveau V&A Sour Service Awards
The Sweet Service Award goes to Mercedes Benz (Culemborg branch) and its Service Advisor Yazid Bohardien. The car’s water bottle had come loose and was resting near the tyre, so I popped into the workshop over a lunchtime, asking Yazid if the staff could assist me in getting it correctly fitted again. He told me that the workshop is closed over lunchtime, and that I would have to wait for half an hour. In less than this time, he came back to me, saying that he had fixed the problem himself, without requiring any parts from the Parts Division. He refused to accept payment.
The Sour Service Award goes to Cinema Nouveau V & A Waterfront, for its technical problems with the movie ‘Brighton Rock’, which meant that they could not screen the movie for a number of days, as the movie was ‘broken’, we were told by the ticket office staff. The newspaper ad did not indicate that the movie was not showing, and it meant that one went to the V&A Waterfront for nothing.
The WhaleTales Sweet & Sour Service Awards are presented every Friday on the WhaleTales blog. Nominations for the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be sent to Chris von Ulmenstein at info@whalecottage.com. Past winners of the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be read on the Friday posts of this blog, and in the WhaleTales newsletters on the www.whalecottage.com website.
‘Black Butterflies’ movie honours poet Ingrid Jonker, good for Cape Town tourism!
The just-released (in South African cinemas) internationally-produced movie ‘Black Butterflies’, about the life and death of South Africa’s Sestiger poet Ingrid Jonker, is a contrast between the most beautiful Cape Town scenery, and the dark days of our political past and the unhappy life of this talented writer. The movie location is identified as Cape Town, and should attract international movie-goers to our beautiful city.
Dutch actress Carice van Houten and actor Rutger Hauer, who both don’t get the South African English pronunciation perfectly correct, play Jonker and her father, respectively. The movie tells the unhappy story of how Jonker’s mother died when she and her sister were young children, were sent to stay with their grandmother, and sent back to their ‘Pa’ when she passed away. He was a severe and critical father, and Member of Parliament, heading up the Publications Control Board, and ironically even her book of poems had to be vetted by him and his Board. They were never close, and it was his rejection of her that probably led to the sad end to her life. Desperate to find love, she had relationships with great writers such as Jack Cope, Uys Krige, Jan Rabie, and André Brink. The movie weaves the political history of the country in the ‘Sixties into the story, and ends with the reading of her poem “Die Kind wat Doodgeskiet is deur Soldate in Nyanga” in English by the then newly inaugurated President Nelson Mandela at the opening of Parliament in 1994. He called her ‘one of the finest poets of our country’. Ex-President Thabo Mbeki awarded the Silver Order of Ikhamanga to Jonker posthumously, for her contribution to literature and human rights. 
The movie was shot in March and April last year, and contains the most beautiful beach and sea shots at Llandudno, and Cape Town generally is the location for the movie, with the exception of a few scenes shot in Amsterdam. Other Cape Town locations are the playgrounds and the Promenade in Sea Point, Clifton’s Second Beach (where Cope and Krige shared a bungalow), Bo-Kaap, Table Mountain, Chapman’s Peak, Strandfontein, and Noordhoek Beach. The movie ends with Jonker walking into the sea at Three Anchor Bay in July 1965, becoming our country’s Sylvia Plath.
The movie is a co-production between the German Comet Film GmbH and South African Spier Productions (Pty) Limited, with post-production done by Bavaria Films in Germany. The name of the movie comes from the line in one of Jonker’s poems: “For the sun that I now cover forever with black butterflies”. While Jonker wrote her precious poetry in Afrikaans, the movie has the English translations, for practical purposes. Paula van der Oest is an Oscar-nominated director from Holland, reports the Cape Argus. She loved the work of Jonker, and wanted to expose it to a larger audience. South African actor Graham Clarke, playing Krige, does not do a believable Afrikaans-speaking-English accent. Irish actor Liam Cunningham is a most sympathetic Cope, whose relationship with Jonker dominates the movie. Oddly, André Brink is not mentioned by name in the movie, even though the movie notes outside the cinema refer to his name. Brink is called ‘Eugene Maritz’ in the movie, played by local Nicholas Pauling. Brink’s book A Fork in the Road contains an overview of Jonker’s life, and her effect on his life.
‘Black Butterflies’, Cinema Nouveau, Cavendish Square. See the movie trailer here.
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage