Happy Robbie Burns' Day

To a Mouse, on Turning Her Up in Her Nest with the Plough, November, 1785
This is one of the English language's best poems, by one of the world's greatest poets, Robert Burns. He was a 26-year-old farmer when he wrote it.

Die Antwoord, language, and rats

So my head exploded rather late in the game - not being a kid anymore means you don't find things out unless you have a reason to hang out with the cool ones - when I saw a few Die Antwoord videos over the Christmas holidays. I don't know whether I have kids to blame for seeing it or whether it was my South African connection: the first friend I had in this-city-before-it-became-mine is a guy who has now been living in South Africa for probably 15 years. His brother has been my friend since I moved here, so he's now the officially longest friend I've got here. He's a college professor, so if Paul didn't tell him about Die Antwoord, then the kids did. We stayed up late one night and watched movies and stuff on YouTube. Eggnog was involved. Good times.

Die Antwoord means "The Answer." The reason I knew that was because before I lived in Denmark, I took a German course to break down my linguistic patterns and help me learn Danish as fast as I could take it in once I got there. I also had an ex-boyfriend who was German, who was always always bickering with me (jane: i am asking some kind of a question exBF: No. What/who do you think you're asking? Are you insane or just merely annoying? jane: !!!) and so when I learned "Ich habe eine frage" (I have a question) I made sure to also learn "Das ist nicht die gute antwort!" (That is not the good answer!) 

Afrikaans is a language derived from Dutch, which I learned is a Plattdeutsch - Low German - derivation. Danish was said to also be Plattdeutsch in the course I took, but I knew it was not, although the verbs in German and Danish are often similar because, with such proximity, they have had significant influence on each other. (When in Denmark, there are special Danish classes for German speakers because they advance through the material much faster than English and ESL students.) So every once in a while, a Die Antwoord lyric in Afrikaans makes some sense. And I'm a happy person listening to music that has non-English-non-Romanic stuff smattered throughout. It extends our culture in a way that I like and which others may not expect. 

So, obviously, Yolandi Visser keeps pet rats, and you can see them in lots of photos with her and a few with Ninja too in the music videos. In one interview, Yolandi said she had 30 rats. At one point I had 27. It was temporary. (I also went above 30 for short duration rescues.) Do you have any idea how much work it is to keep that many pet rats? Imagine…you have four apartment buildings in your basement, and some of those apartments have 6 people in them, and some are split into levels and you have 4 or 5 in each. 24 little people in your home! 30 little people in your home! That sounds like a party! And then you have to clean up afterwards.

I do wish that in one photo and one interview, she hadn't held the rats by the tail. It's true that depending on how you do it AND how much that rat trusts you, you can do it without hurting them, too many people are dwankie and will just grab a rat by the tail and that's very, very bad! Once the rat is squeaking at you, you've already hurt it - and the risk with the tail is great. 

Speaking of tails… check out the fantastic rat suit she wore in the video for "Evil boy:" 

A female Hotot.

 Bonus: at least two of the videos have rabbits, so somebody in their group likely has a pet rabbit.

Even the bling and sparkly lights can't stop that glare of disapproval.

Note: If this is how you've come to hear of Die Antwoord, I recommend going through their videography in order of the singles, but definitely check out Zef Side. (It reminds me and an Ontarian friend of Keswick.) That way you get more context about the stories they're telling in video, lyrics, and interviews. And yes, they're a bit shocking, so if you don't get it in context, you might be turned off ("ugh, he's so fugly!" I said to my friend watching the first videos. And ewww has come up a few times too). But something about them is captivating and serious enough to think about. I've even got an article idea to pitch - but hey, if the comments here spark up like they usually…don't… let's go!