I must say I have many academic, social and sporting certificates or medals from high school and tertiary  and it never changed my life or feel good about myself. Before I will try to display them on my room wall to feel good and be motivated every time I see them, I must say it was just external and past achievement as time goes on. I never felt any motivation to do better or be inspired.  Today, the 2nd of August 2012, I was invited for lunch by our leader Roelf Meyer and to my surprise there was the honorable, humble and incredible ambassador of Netherlands André Haspels, exiting Deputy Ambassador of Netherlands Wouter and new deputy ambassador Robert-Jan Siegert. Honestly to be in the same table with incredible down to earth leaders like Roelf, André, Wouter, Robert and Schalk van Heerden in Pretoria Country Club really motivated, humbled  and inspired me. They had time time to listen to me, to interact with me. I felt respected and valued.  I was inspired, had more sense of worthiness and gave me energy to do more of what I am doing and grow more to become better. I definitely learnt a lot from these heroes, we laughed a lot, shared jokes, spoke about history of SA, the world etc. The ambassador even know more about South african soccer and he is a big fan of SA soccer and we spoke more about soccer. I even learnt that the Dutch were anti-Apartheid (one can google NIZA for more info), they did fight apartheid and as young black male from rural areas (so is the most of us), I always thought Afrikaners and Dutch people from Netherlands are the same people. Actual only to realize that is not true. It was also something else when Schalk asked the ambassador if he trace his family generation, can he still get a Dutch passport and the ambassador said NO. I thought of guys like Schalk who when they are around Africa they are called Europeans and when they are in Europe they are not called Europeans, eeeeish! But overall it was incredible experience and felt motivated and humbled as a young black male. 

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Comment by Schalk van Heerden on August 3, 2012 at 6:34pm

What i like about it is that whites always want africans to get certificates, but the real power lies in friendships and opening one's networks. Networking i think is very underrated and not talked about much in development. Basics: make friends, eat together, listen to each other...

Comment by Ayanda Sacred on August 3, 2012 at 3:26pm

Wow It must have been an experience and to find out about their humbleness, very good news coz one would think of them as cocky  oh puffed up. I love the view you gave of them, and as for the history part. Im going to start googling

Comment by teramai makumbe on August 3, 2012 at 1:07pm

Great story bro. It's good for us to always strive to be better people everyday. 

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