Nuff is nuff.

Nuff is nuff.

For a long time now I have disagreed with blacks who argue that reconciliation a la Archbishop Tutu's Rainbow Nation is a one-sided obsession.

The argument has been that so far it is only blacks who seem to be cosying up to our mlungu compatriots, while they are not taking any steps to meet us halfway.

Now I've changed my mind.

Sociologists will agree with me that embracing cultures other than one's own is an integral part of reconciliation.

As I write this, I am watching a New Year's Eve bash on TV and all I see are blacks in blond wigs, sounding whiter than the Windsors and trying to look damn rich when they will probably go back home to sleep on sponge mattresses in their RDP houses.

Back to reconciliation. I will never be convinced it is happening until I see most white boyz wearing dreadlocks, driving Golfs with their seats reclined almost all the way back horizontally and blasting kwaito from their 10million watt subwoofers.

It is wrong and sick, all right. And I can never understand why our boys subject themselves to so much torture when they can and should just sit up straight in their driver's seats, set the volume at enjoyably lower levels and have fun. But hell, whatever my opinion, the sickness is a South African fad and why does it afflict only blacks?

Can someone tell me why whites folks here will never say "heita . hoezit . sharp" when they greet one another, when this is South Africanese and spoken by millions here.

I would like to open the door to a white tannie asking for a job.

I see quite a few white beggars on street corners lately but I do not see them marching for RDP houses. Perhaps it is too black a thing to demand an RDP house.

I want to see white mamas walking the streets on Thursdays wearing their manyano garb headed for their various churches. I want to see them helping out at a funeral wearing their society uniforms.

Why is it that our so-called coconuts - and we have them by the millions - will scream, "Oh, my gosh! Good gracious me!" but whites will not even say "eish" unless they are in front of TV cameras and being paid to say it.

I have worked with white folks all my working life but I am still to hear one explain his or her absenteeism to the boss: "I was doing my father's job . "

It might not happen in our lifetime but it should happen sometime if we are to bridge the divide that Thabo Mbeki aptly described as two nations in one.

A simple way for them to start would be to say, every now and then: "eish . naw . ja neh . tjo-tjo, ahnever ."

Our great-grandchildren might inherit one nation - even if it is sick.