At the weekend my dad asked me if I had a Nelson Mandela random selection for this week, and at the time I said no, because I thought it might be too late to do a memorial, but you know what, as he’s having a week of memorials, it seems like it might fit in after all, so here’s your Mandela-centric random for the week.
1. Did you know that Nelson Mandela’s first name isn’t actually Nelson? It’s Rolihlahla, which, by the way, you really need to get your phlegm going to pronounce – relatively easy for my Scottish and Irish friends, used to all the ‘ch’ sounds, but probably more of a challenge to your average Sassanach ;o) Anywho, a teacher at his school gave him ‘Nelson’ as a name when he was 9, as the custom was for every child to have a Christian first name.
2. He loved boxing and running, although after entering politics he stopped fighting, but he did used to exercise daily during his years in prison. If you visit the Mandela Family Museum in Soweto you can see the boxing world championship belt that Sugar Ray Leonard gave him. Incidentally the museum is his first house in Soweto, and it’s tiny, but packed with really interesting things, one could get lost for hours in there if one was allowed! (I wasn’t)
3. Mandela, and his ANC brethren were actually on a terrorist watchlist in the US right up until 2008, after the South African government of the 1980s designated them a terrorist organisation. They were finally removed after a bill was introduced by Howard Berman to scrap the designation.
4. Although Mandela and Oliver Tambo opened their own law firm in 1952, thanks to a 2 year law diploma topping up his university degree, it wasn’t until 1989 that Mandela finally achieved a law degree while in prison, after 50 years of studying.
5. Upon leaving prison, a slightly surprised Mandela discovered that he’d left his glasses in prison, and had to borrow his wife Winnie’s in order to read a speech to the waiting press hoards.
RIP Mr Mandela!
What a wonderful tribute.
A beautiful tribute!
A lovely tribute!
Wonderful random facts about a great man.
Nice one Katy!!
Great post Katy
Interesting reading Katy, a great post.
So many good stories about him. In other Mandela randomness my folks are due to fly back for their Christmas visit to the UK on Saturday……but they're having real problems getting hold of a hire car to get them to Cape Town – they're all off to transport people to his funeral on Sunday. They're still trying but may have to give up and leave their car at the airport for a few weeks. Juliex
Good one my love. There are so few people like Madiba save perhaps Gandhi-ji. The world needs more like them – Northern Ireland for example.
Dad
Number 4 is fascinating.
A great man.
Wonderful randomness–thanks so much for this post. I thought #5 was really interesting.
lovely, and so very interesting.
I loved this, Katy. Thank you.
Brilliant, thanks (good suggestion dad)
love the one about the glasses!
Thanks. Very nice, Katie.