My letter to Faceboek

‘Skies Ouma! Ek weet Ouma hou nie van Ingels nie, want Ouma se tande kan nie Ingels praat nie en Ouma se ore kan nie Ingels verstaan nie, maar hiedie frustrasie moet ek uit my gestel kry. Wat hierdie Faceboek-mense aan Ouma gedoen het, is onvergeeflik. Ek gaan vir hulle ‘n brief skryf om te sê hoe ek oor hierdie nonsens voel:

Dear Mr. Faceboek baas,

I am writing you this letter to let you know how upsets I am. My ouma is not a fake! She is a very nice lady, who worked hard for what she has. My ouma lives on a farm, where there’s nothing behalwe a lots of dust and thorns. Sometimes there’s electricity, but most of the times there’s not. Most of the times the telephone are working, but sometimes it does not. There’s no fast internet and connecting by data stokkie is very expensive.

There’s also no tar roads and the tar roads that does exist, is as holy as a boemelaar’s pocket! Now, for her to send you proof of who she is, she have to drive nearly a hundred kilometers to go to the nearest town and on the nearest town, there’s also nothing but a house, a post office and a plaaskakhuis! No internet keffie or someone who owns a bleddie scanner! If she wants to buy her own scanner, she firstly have to use the little savings she has and then drive hundreds of kilometers further to the nearest city. Mister, do you know where’s Putsonderwater?

For an old lady of nearly eighty, that’s a lot of driving! My oupa are also very old, he can not drive anymore, because he sat on his glasses and does not sees so lekker. He’s also half deaf and colour blind. Should he drive in the city, he do not know the difference between red and green. He drives at a red light and stops at a green! Then there’s the other problems with my oupa... He’s highly bedonderd and must never finds out that ouma spends her free time writing stories. He dislikes stories cause he says, reading are a waste of time, you only need to read the Bible.

Now I wants to ask you, who makes these stupid Faceboek rules? You know, most peoples in South Africa does not even have a computer, what to say, a scanner. Most people use Faceboek on their cellular phones and in case you close one of these accounts, they have no means to proef to you who they are. Most South Africans does not even own a legal I.D. boeks or passports, but I guess half the South African population is terrorists and bloody racist agents!

Then the other thing. In the case of a celeb using Faceboek, lets say for example: Tom Cruise, wants a Faceboek profile, but because the name in his I.D. and the name the word knows him by is not the same... does the rules apply to him too? So his Faceboek profile must be in the name of Thomas Cruise Maplotter IV! And then we would go, “who the hell is that?” Now does it mean he is a fake or an actor? The same with our own Chris Chameleon. Are you also going to close his page, because the name on his I.D. is not his stage name?

That’s why celebs is rather using Twitter, they is not so full of kak! One of these days, you is going to find yourself all alone in your Faceboek castle, while the rest of us will be tweeting our hearts out on Twitter!

Best regards

Leila Langenhoven
(Granddaughter of Dorothea Gertruida van Helsdingen)