Where were you born?
Durban, South Africa, Mothers’ Hospital, third floor – overlooking the South Africa’s premier Grayville Horse Racing Course where the famed Durban July occurs (think Kentucky Derby).
Tell us about your life in home country.
Idyllic – and I am talking about in the 60’s, 70’s. 80’s, when I lived there – if you were white and had a seared or no conscience.
It was horrific if you were any other race and were unlucky enough to have still have feelings.
Thankfully these things have had radically shifted in the wake of the election of Nelson Mandela and all that has since transpired.
Durban is a seaport city on the Indian Ocean. It was bordered by sugar-cane fields and rolling hills on three sides. While the sugar industry is still very active and lucrative, many cane fields have been lost to urban sprawl. Nonetheless, it remains a very beautiful city.
Climate? I’d never seen a furnace until a bought a house near Butler University. My home in South Africa had neither heating nor cooling, which will tell you how wonderful is the climate.
Durban is a very modern city, a tourist destination for many, and a city with a reputation for some of the finest surfing conditions and for producing some of the finest surfers in the world. It is also home to the largest population of Asian Indians outside of India and thus the plethora of Indian restaurants. It’s the reason for my frequent visits to every Indian restaurant in this city. Sorry, they are good, but they don’t begin to match what my pummeled pallet would prefer.
What brought you to the United States? Indianapolis? Historic Meridian Park (HMP)?
Tabernacle Presbyterian Church (at 34th and Central) recruited me to TAB in 1990. This was initially to work with youth. I served on the pastoral staff of TAB from 1990 to the last day of 1997. The boys and I still attend TAB and regard it as our home church.
I moved to HMP at the suggestion of Ann and Steve Reynolds (who live diagonally across the street from me) so we could be intentional neighbors and continue our work with Open Hand, Inc. and Youth With A Mission (YWAM) around the world.
Tell us about your occupation(s), children, and hobbies.
I have always done a lot of things concurrently – and it is no different now:
1. My current and primary employment is at St. Richard’s Episcopal School (33rd and Meridian) where I teach middle school English – and I love it. St Richard’s has afforded me the privilege of meeting some of the brightest, nicest, most creative children I have ever met anywhere in the world.
After a 19-year break from teaching high school in South Africa I went back to the classroom. In a nutshell, I wanted my children (Thulani and Nathanael) to attend the best school in the city and I was fortunate enough to land a position at the same school. As a single dad this radically reduces the variables in our busy lives since we each go to the same building every day.
2. Open Hand, Inc. – Steve and Ann and MANY others in the neighborhood (and some from outside the neighborhood) and I run Open Hand, Inc. Open Hand, Inc. is a not-for-profit geared to the empowering of people who desire to do humanitarian work anywhere in the world. We are represented in Romania (adolescent rehabilitation center), Kenya (home for abandoned children), Australia (counseling center), and in Indianapolis (providing internship opportunities for persons from the University of the Nations who are completing their counseling degrees with that University). Open Hand, Inc. in Indianapolis held a contract to provide home-based counseling services for the Juvenile Court and for Child Protection Services.
3. The Mercury – my daily newspaper column has appeared in one of South Africa’s longest running newspapers (The Mercury). My column holds the newspaper’s record for being the longest running editorial under one name in their history. I began a website to serve newspaper readers who’d contact me for past issues of the column. The website now has far more than a million hits and might even be more widely read that the hard-copy column it was designed to support. (www.DifficultRelationhips.com)
4. Clients for Counseling / Private corporate, family, and individual clients – I see clients at my office which is housed in 124 East 32nd Street (the newly painted bright yellow house). I am a Butler graduate with a Master’s Degree in Family Therapy.
I have two sons: Thulani and Nathanael. Thulani and Nathanael attend St. Richard’s Episcopal School. Both of my children were adopted at birth.
Share with us something fascinating about yourself that few people know.
I lived in Hawaii for almost two years (before I immigrated to the USA) where, to earn my keep, I played keyboards in a luau band.
You travel quite a bit. Where are some of the places that you’ve travelled? Which one was your favorite? Why?
Along with my colleagues, Steve and Ann Reynolds, I teach for the University of the Nations and Youth With a Mission (YWAM). I’ve done this since 1986 and it continues to take me to several nations each year. St. Richard’s Episcopal School has been very generous in allowing me to continue with this “calling” but I limit my “school time” travelling to once a year. Since teaching at SRES I travel and speak mostly in the summer. In the past few years I have been to Korea (three times), Australia (twice), to Singapore, Taiwan, and Hawaii on several occasions. When speaking abroad I teach family therapy and related subject areas.
While I love Europe and Southern Africa, my favorite destination is Australia. I have family there, the weather is much like it is in South Africa, and the cherry on top is that you can get a really good curry.
How long have lived in HMP?
14 years.
What do you like best about HMP?
My friends live here. This is our community. People know and love my children – very little else is important to me.