Mandela Dead

[GD4ELI]

Israel's Shimon Peres says #Mandela "united an entire world."

 

Unlike almost every Israeli PM...

[Donald Trumps]

& PK is calling for changes to LegCo

[Donald Trumps]

Well written

 

People are saying he behaved like a prince because he actually was a prince

[GD4ELI]

The world may only be a slightly inferior place because of his departure - but it is an incalculably better place because of the life he lived.

R.I.P.

 

Maybe, just maybe the Catholic Church could stop making saints out of their own bunch of (mostly) weasels and instead make NM an honorary saint?

 

If anyone were to deserve the title then it's NM.

[Declan]

Chinahand - it was Ruth First that Ed was referring to. The error in describing her as young was mine.

[Donald Trumps]

South African Airways has cancelled it's Mandela-themed holiday package

[Donald Trumps]

#c4news at 7 will have a special reinterpretation of "Free Nelson Mandela" by "Jerry Dammers' Spatial AKA Orchestra" in memoriam

[Declan]

Speaking of "Free Nelson Mandela", that was how I first heard of Mandela and Apartheid. The single had details of the situation in the back cover. Then after reading more of the situation elsewhere, I grew to form values around equality, democracy, freedom etc.

 

Years later I was walking through Trafalgar Square and outside the South African Embassy, Jerry Dammers was playing the song and someone said that Mandela had just been released from prison. The crowd then started dancing around the square and someone hung a banner on the other Nelson's monument calling it Nelson Mandela's Column.

 

That night it seemed amazing to see him on telly that night, because up to then he'd been a mythical indistinct figure but here he was looking like a someone's granddad and seeming free of bitterness he talked of a better future.

[j-c]

thank god they will be playing the special aka and not simple minds.

[Donald Trumps]

I thought that, but it's 'Spatial' - I looked it up

 

 

 

 

 

ps For anyone who is at all concerned, I can confirm that Bono will be attending the funeral

[mojomonkey]

ps For anyone who is at all concerned, I can confirm that Bono will be attending the funeral

 

Is that "Every time I clap my hands a child in Africa dies" Bono? He's a cruel sod, often seen clapping for no obvious reason.

[Karellen]

How I am sadder about Mandela than anyone else

(I cant take credit for this but thought it worth sharing)

I don’t know about you, but I’m sitting here with tears streaming down my face, onto the table, then falling onto the floor. I’ve been crying for the last sixteen hours without cease. Tear after tear after tear.

He’s gone.

Madiba.

He’s left us.

The world, for me, is a shadowy place now, a colder darker more hostile place with no light and total darkness everywhere. Things seem muffled, subdued. Eerily empty. It is like the tiny animals, the squirrels in our parks, are putting their little paws together and praying, in total silence. And also the pigeons.

And still we weep.

Personally, I never met Nelson Mandela, but in a very real sense I met him. He was like a father to me. He was also like a brother, an uncle, a stepfather, a halfbrother, a second cousin, a best friend, a sibling, a nephew, a great uncle, a great great great grandfather, an ancestor, a cheery taxi driver, a friendly neighbour, he was the owner of the cornershop of the world who always knew to save you the last packet of Hobnobs. The Chocolate Hobnobs of Global Reconciliation.

And now he’s gone. Madiba. And I weep my tears, and the weeping will not stop, and the stopping of the tears will not arrive, and the carpet below me is now actually wet from my tears and will need to be shampooed.

But even though he’s gone, he has not gone, because he is still here, even as I reach for more tissues, because his example will be there for all time.

Nelson Mandela was not just the greatest politician of the 20th century, I firmly believe he was the greatest human being of the 20th century. But Nelson Mandela wasn’t just the greatest human being of the the 20th century, no, I firmly believe he was the greatest vertebrate organism in the history of evolution.

And yet, Nelson “Madiba” Mandela was so much more than that. He wasn’t just the greatest vertebrate organism, he was something else too. Something that is perhaps beyond words.

But I am going to have a go anyway.

In a very real sense, Nelson Mandela was probably the greatest thing in the entire history of the observable universe, and it is for this that I believe he will be remembered – remembered with smiles and tears and laughter, long after the sun has exploded into a huge ball of burning helium consuming the earth and destroying everything thereupon.

And this is why I weep. Because today is a time for tears. My tears. My tears of sadness. Because I am so very sad. And I am sadder about this than any of you, which is why I am, perhaps, in a pure and very humble sense, slightly better than you.

So let us remember, with tears and silence and reflection. And then let us pray, before the hacking sobs really kick in.

[Mr. Sausages]

I firmly believe he was the greatest vertebrate organism in the history of evolution.

 

He was a blue whale?

[Albert Tatlock]

 

 

How I am sadder about Mandela than anyone else

(I cant take credit for this but thought it worth sharing)

Pass me the bucket, please.....

Me first please.

[Shake me up Judy]

Although there is often a disproportionate reaction and coverage to events such as this, particularly since Princess Diana's death; in the case of Mandela this was entirely justified. None of us will ever see a greater man in our lifetimes. This time it's for real.