November - Department of Defence

8letters to the editorTHANKING THE GIANT IN OUR LIFEKindly allow me to convey my heartfeltthanks to one of the giants inour Army family. Our family hasexperienced every move that the SAArmy had us undergo as a blessedexperience.My husband continuously instils inour lives the fact that wherever we are,we are there to make love visible and tobelieve that success is the natural consequenceof constantly applying thefollowing basic fundamentals. Firstly,constantly work hard. Secondly,respect and treat others as you wouldwant them to treat you. Lastly, humblenessis not a sign of humiliation;rather it is a sign of maturity.SINGLE WOMAN SORROWSAs a woman I personally believe thatbeing a single woman is the greatestexperience of them all. It is the perfecttime to be a little selfish and spoil yourself,spending time doing what youenjoy, going shopping whenever andwherever, free of worries that somebodyis waiting for you.Being single allows you to discoverwho you are. You will have an opportunityto experience what your likes areas well as your dislikes. The bright sideof all this is that you get to know howto deal with life's testing situations thatare likely to arise and to know what todo when the stumbling blocks comeyour way, knowing that no man willcome to the rescue no matter how difficultthe situation might be.Sadly enough, you will be stigmatisedamong your colleagues, evenyour best girlfriends, who in generalwill not trust you with men. Anyonethey see you with will be labelled asyour boyfriend, regardless of age, race,S A S O L D I E R • NO VEMB ER 2 0 0 8In May 2008 my husband, Col J.P.M.Kobbie, was selected to attend a yearlongcourse in the USA. For this we feelvery blessed and humbled because werealise that it is an experience of a lifetime.For this experience we need to saya big thank you to General RobertMandita - the giant in our life - for thefact that he opted to let my husband furtherhis learning in another part of theworld with his family.General, you know we are gratefuland greatly appreciate your wisdom,calmness and loving support always.We thank you. Lilla Kobbie, wife ofCol J.P.M. Kobbie (Proudly SANDFfamily)rank or even if he is married. You will beregarded as someone who does not havea life, especially if you are staying in abungalow, because you said you weresingle. Everybody will start havingexpectations, such as no man must cometo your room, they must not give you alift, be friendly to you, or be your friend.If one of these things I have mentionedhappens, that will be a nice subject forgossip for a week or two, even if thatputs you or your career in danger. Theydo not care.Women, let us get our unique, speciallives embraced by others and notdestroy them by ourselves. I took note ofthe things mentioned on the basis ofday-to-day experience, and thus myconcern. Life is tough, we need to sticktogether, bad things are happening inour presence and we do not do or sayanything about them. Some men abuseus; they violate our rights, break ourhearts and destroy our lives. We see thateveryday and yet we do not supportDISCIPLINE GOES HAND IN HANDI went around asking people what disciplinemeant to them and some surprisinglytold me that I did not havediscipline myself and I told them that Idid have discipline and they said that Idid not have it according to the militarystandard. I have realised that disciplinein the military and civilianenvironment is absolutely not thesame. I think that we should all try tolive by the standard of military disci-A DISCIPLINEDSOLDIERMy question to all serving members ofthe SANDF is: What is a disciplinedsoldier? How do we see a disciplinedsoldier? Someone said: "Charity beginsat home". That means if you were nottaught how to behave, respect, shareand reason, soldiering will not changeyou. Is it discipline or the military wayof living to stand three hours onparade? The same goes for saluting andpaying compliments. Please do notconfuse military culture with personaldiscipline. To all MSDS members, youhave what it takes to be real soldiersand I salute you for that.Rfn T.L. Mashala (MSDS member),10 SAI Bn, Mafikengeach other. Instead of giving support toother women who are living the curse,we abandon them with laughter ormore curses. We are not phenomenalenough to hold everyone's pain.Being single is not a bed of roses. Itfeels terrible at times, especially if youare staying miles away from homeand you only depend on friends. They,in turn, will spend more time withtheir loved ones or just be tired of yournagging.So for those who are single, I knowits difficult sometimes, but please donot just jump into a comfort relationship.You will be hurt more than youcan imagine. Live your life at large, letthem talk, they will not stop anyway.Lastly, have faith; no person was meantto live alone. You may feel as if you arethe only single person in the world andthat you will be single forever, but thisis not true. You are not an island; all youneed is patience. L Cpl M.M. Nkitseng,Infantry Schoolplinary codes since we are uniformedmembers, whether of high rank or low.What I have noticed is that all the basesor units are complaining about theMilitary Skills Development System(MSDS) members' discipline and mostof the time they are talking about thewomen. When we see someone behavingin an inappropriate manner in thecivilian environment they say we do notblame the person or child, but the parents.I have asked why the parents andthe response was that the parents arethe backbone of every growing humanbeing.Do not expect your child or yourstudents to be disciplined while yourlife is not disciplined. When you showrespect you will earn respect. Do nottry to force a person to be disciplined,but coax him or her to be disciplined.Airman S. Mnikathi, 18 DSU