Sunday Morning Short Story - Bimbi and the Mortar

You may have read the short story, Bimbi’s Letters, well here is another short story involving my friend Bimbi.

We did 82 mm mortar drills and generally this was a fun time for most of us, learning and firing new weapons from different countries, and then putting our knowledge to the test by teaching others. We were learning from all the different branches of the army. If I taught someone to fire mortars, they would teach me the ins and outs of a 12.7 mm and so on. We were getting fit by running to and from the training ground twice a day, and the hot sun was burning us white boys as brown as our troops.

One morning we decided to hold a refresher course on stripping and assembling the AKs, as we had not practiced that for quite some time. Shit, we may as well have never done it at all, for most of the troops had forgotten the first move: how to get the hoofdeksel off! No fun for anyone the next few weeks. They had to get this right or they would literally die the first week in combat. We hadn’t even begun practicing with live ammo yet, that promised to be fun.

Finally some stock that arrived was some 82 mm mortar ammo. We were sick of dry runs so we should have been happy. The problem was that the wooden crates fell apart when we touched them. The actual bombs were also covered in rust. I have a piece of paper at home with Russian writing on it from those boxes; the date is 1952 and the last time they were inspected was in the early 70s. (We opened that lot in the 1990s!) Well, we cleaned that lot up and practiced for quite some time with them. Very few miss-fires, till one day one of my mates, Bimbi and myself were letting Sergeant Ze get on with it while we chatted on the back line. We all heard this half fart, half-spitting sound come out the one tube. From then on, everything seemed to move in slow motion. The bomb had left the tube and was already coming down; it landed as we all were diving to the ground, bounced exactly three times and lay still, 20-odd metres from us.

Obviously it never went off, or I could not be writing this. The killing range of a bomb that size on open ground is huge. The weight of the HE bomb is 3.05 kg and HE stands for “high explosive”. When we had recovered from the shock we called in a couple of sappers to blow the bitch. Every time we had live practice after that, it was a nerve-racking experience.


You can find a full account of this adventure in The Chronicles of The Mexican Horse Thief I- Angola
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Photographic Club 101

Pictures of the Moon

Why join Photography 101?

There are most likely 1000’s of photographic clubs and photography courses available, so indeed, why, Photography 101? As I am only one of the managers of the site, I can only tell you from my point of view, if you will excuse the pun. And that statement actually sums it up quite nicely.

A person can have the best equipment money can buy, and get a high quality, mega pixel, in focus shot every time, no problem.  But then the composition can be lousy, no matter how interesting the subject is, and if the shot is not pleasing to the eye, is a snapshot, nothing more, nothing less.
So you go learn all about composition, the “rule of thirds”, and even take it further and go for the rule of 5ths. Your photographs are now 100% better, but still not THE best.

At Photography 101 we will not only teach you the above, but will show you how to LOOK, first with your own eyes and only then through the view finder. Some people have a gift, they not only think, but also see, From a Different Angle.  I believe the two are inter-related and that in order to SEE, one first has to THINK…..from a different angle. And that is what we shall teach you way beyond just the basic skills.

Come take a ride with me.

Photography 101 ; which is an educational club where amateurs and professionals can join and share Techniques and Photo’s join our competitions and market your product to Magazines and Websites Developers, Locally and International. It is an educational based club hosted run and managed by:

The Mexican and Bierpens.


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Evening Sky by Estelle Haward

Choosing The Right Equipment

Photography 101

Choosing The Right Equipment

| Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV | Part V |

Photo by: Wayne Bisset

Choosing the right equipment is always a very hot topic and difficult decision. There is a fine balance between professionalism and getting the job done. Unfortunately there is never a happy medium between the two and the two is merely two points on a linear line in maintaining points of reference.  a Professional Photographer will need versatile equipment that not only looks professional, but can meet all the requirements that they might encounter on a photo shoot.

Before we attempt to categorize equipment we will firstly dissect the need. Why are you going to take pictures. Personal Use, Scrapbook, Blogging, Amateur, Journalism, Professional and then comes the subcategories in each one. Money is not the only criteria. When you blog you need smaller files sizes and new cellphones does not give you a large scope of files sizes to start off with. So you end up with a mid range phone with extremely good quality photos that is to large for your application and kills both your bandwidth and uploading time as well as the bandwidth of your target market.

Sorry Guys all links externally is a subscription Blog. The reason is we not sharing common sales pitches here. We are sharing a lifetime of trade secrets. Every trade has a few shortcuts to success, but in this case we are sharing all our trade secrets from shortcuts to making money. Photography 101 is a step by step guide into the world of photography. With it's legal pitfalls counting the cost and making the sales. They say the steepest curve in any profession is the learning curve. We have paid the school fees so you can jump in and get swimming with out drowning.  

Like in our personal photo section we will teach you the value off a selfie stick and how to use it as well as the technique of birds eye view. Yes all these techniques are available on the Internet for free, but they don't come with a personal trainer available to explain them to you and evaluate your shots and give positive criticism/feedback. Photography 101 will teach you about taking pictures that no other syllabus will teach you.

Join us Now. First Three Months is not FREE

Social Media

7 years ago I found Social Media Marketing pretty fascinating, and wrote a few articles on my brand new blog about  the subject. Since then SMM has become HUGE!

This is how I saw it then. (Funny how I tend to run in 7's)

I am brand new to the Social Media business. About 7 months ago I signed onto Facebook after being told about it by a friend. I spent less than 30 minutes on line the day I opened up a profile.  I then did not go onto the internet for days. I reopened the page and found I still had none of these cyber-friends I believed would appear. That day quite by chance I stumbled upon a business site . Similar to Facebook but for business. I was curious so joined and then saw it was a paying site. I still filled in a few details, absolute bare contact details in fact. I went back on Facebook and saw the find “friends” stuff.
I typed in some names from years gone by and was surprised to find some old school and army friends. I then filled in the details of which school I went to and which units I had worked with. I left it for days. I had a bigger surprise when I opened it again, the friends request was rather full. I made contact with people I had last seen in the 1980’s. I went back on MyGenius and thought as soon as my finances permit it I will upgrade and try this site out.  I went on Facebook about once a week, again finances and circumstances permitting, I was just drifting around and using the internet cafes on occasion. Then through Facebook contact was made with an old army mate, he asked what I was upto and I said, “Nothing much.” He suggested I come stay in his backpackers and help him with his Tour company. Not doing much I agreed.
At the backpackers I had access to Internet all day, and not much to do. I opened up to find the business site had become a free site too. I messed about for a while and then got the Section Eight Group idea. My Facebook experience was incredible, people I should have kept contact with but did not all found me. I am or was a very hard person to find, notorius for disappearing for years on end. due to my moving around and strange jobs I take on: and the fact that I never phone anyone. Well maybe 2 people that I kept upto date, on occasion.
The point is the social side it is great to speak to old friends, and through the Mexican becoming a popular post on my thing that is meant to be a status report, (hell why be normal?) I now have “friends” all over the world. I have “spoken” more in the last few months than I have in the last 10 years. In my travels I can go to most places in South Africa and will find a friend or two in that area, this took 5 years of wondering around. So that side of the Social media has proved to be amazing.
On the business side. Before I began to wander around I had a proper job at a profession sound company. I got paid to travel this country and set up agents for the equipment being imported. I did this well apparently, as Music Maker Magazine kept printing article about what I was doing. My foreign boss said I had accomplished his 5 year plan in the agent set up division, in 2 years flat. I was never a t home, had one then, I drove 260 000km in one car, no idea how many air miles I accumulated. I basically lived in hotels and Guest Houses around Southern Africa. I ate in restaurants all the time. All this cost my boss a small fortune.
I had set up 30 odd agents in this time and not all were profitable. Still the boss was happy and made a lot of money. This brings me to Social Media. In 3 months I have made hundreds of contacts, learned about things that will be helpful for my Section Eight mission daily, and made friends with a lot of interesting people. That from daily logging in and trying to contribute if I can, and not moving more that 12m from my bed.
Does it make me money? I am not selling anything so cannot say. Will it make me money? Of course it will. I think if and when I find something or somebody/business that really interests me I shall make a bloody fortune.
Since the above was posted first in MyGenius and then SocialPress it has escalated at cyberspeed!

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On SMM/SMN Personalities

7 years ago I found Social Media Marketing pretty fascinating, and wrote a few articles on my brand new blog about  the subject. Since then SMM has become HUGE! 

This is how I saw it then. 

Post on Wordpress dated /2010/01/26/

As this is a very fast developing business, one has to evaluate ones strategy on an almost daily basis. It is good to have an opinion on things but here if one does not have the willingness to change an opinion as new information and data is gathered one shall be in trouble. That said, yesterday I commented that having company to do your SMM for you is like getting a professional to have tea with your mom, because you do not have the time. She will not be impressed.
During the day I read posts on various things about this subject. The main concern of people wanting to get involved in SMM is how to do it successfully. Hard sell has being ruled out completely. Giving information out freely is the way to go. Then profiles come up often, this needs a “nice” photo of yourself so people see who they are dealing with. Estate Agents were the first to put photos of themselves on everything, they still do. Must be merit in that.
Simple put you have to build a SMM personality.
Observations.
1.Some people are not very good at this and perhaps a coach is needed in this area. Their posts are informative, but overall they are very boring, and some one else with a more interesting cyber personality is posting the same information. Which will you end up following?
2. The people that comment on others posts get more attention and when they post something it gets more views than those that just put posts up selling all the time. So comment on other peoples posts.
3. Interact with people on your chosen SMM site. This makes you more “real” too.
I am sure that I can think of many more but most you know, and most people don’t do them. Why?



A compilation of my Strange Classrooms is soon to be released, please “Like” and  keep an eye on this page.
THE MEXICAN HORSE THIEF
Here is a story of developing and breaking an addiction, while dealing with Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome at the same time.
THE CHRONICLES OF THE MEXICAN HORSE THIEF II