What influenced your choice in Username?

Poisonous  ball was a played with a tennis ball ball, 2 teams  (any number sometimes we had 20 a side)  more players the bigger the field (used to play on the school rugby field.

If you got hit by the ball you are out last man standing wins.

Not many girls played as the main objective was to hit someone as hard as you could.

Can't remember  all the rules but you couldn't chase them down, had to throw from your own half I think.

If there were just a few we just played on an open field and you could chase them as much as you wanted, no teams just a free for all and the one that got hit got the ball. with the idea of hitting them as hard as you could from as close as you could get

If there are any other kiwis on here can you fill me in on the proper rules for bullrush (it was a great game) but I believe the twats have banned that now. Fuck that was about 50 years ago.

After being hacked a number of times I eventually settled with AJH.

AJ represent my first and second names and the H I earned doing military service.

DbDraad I thought that your Username represented your career in Telecommunications. 

Db for decibels and Draad for wire/cable.

Wrong.

A bit like Dodgeball... but if you can chase the guy and then nail him as hard as you can, that's Fun 

Funnuly enough I did over 40 years in Telecommunications.

I started out installing dial phones and working on paper cables.

VOIP was my signal to fuck off and sit on a beach, haven't regretted a minute of it mind you, wouldn't recommend it as a career now, no bloody money in it for the small business. Back in the 80s and 90s made a killing installing PABXs, 

B oys are really same all over the world, the more "battle wounds" at the end of the day the more fun you had.

"DbDraad I thought that your Username represented your career in Telecommunications. "

There's some of that too...I was on the brink of accepting a bursary from ESKOM for studying "swaarsroom" distribution...wasn't a university course. but some technical training for a few years and then a varsity course in the USA to qualify...had other dreams back then, but I still wonder how things would have turned out had I accepted.

Thanks boys for bringing back some great memories,  haven't thought of those days for a long time.

We're all still boys...and a girl...till Clouds returns...

Curious to know how Trad decided on his name?

Oh thanks guys .

Draad…..I’ve not been called Wendy in a while , nor did I know I had a song written in my honour ha ha ha ! 

Poisonous ball sounds like stingers we use to play. Very similar and you can through the tennis ball as hard as you can. We would normally play it before school while we were waiting for the bell. However, you had to form a circle first and then had to use your heels like a pin ball machine to try and knock the ball through a person legs. Who ever could not knock the ball away had to star. You couldn’t run and through. You could only do it standing still, but then as more people got hit the more you gained on your side.You also had to throw the ball to each other and try and catch and out think the runners. We would always cheer if someone got a proper stinger and then Laugh about it in the classroom. Yup, girls never joined in they were doing their skip rope or those hand clapping cheers would none of us boys could do. 

Ja, all these stories really brings back memories. Almost wish I was 7 again, on the farm, reliving those days. 

I would never forget how my teachers and elders would tell me to enjoy being a kid. Only took this long to realise it. 

I miss eating 3 bowls of desert without gaining any weight, to be able to run around all day, play all sorts of sport and even some of the school work was enjoyable too. 

The only part I don’t miss is getting bliksem for forgetting a text book or my mom chasing me around the garden either with a wooden spoon or a cutoff hosepipe because I was naughty. 

I would never forgot getting punished by my best friends dad when I was 6. He threw one of his neighbours, a girl in the eye with a huge seed pod. It was one those thick leather cow boy belts. Man that was a beating. I got beaten just for being with him, he said it was me and lied but his dad decided to beat both of us. 

But he walked me home along with my friend, told my mom what we did and she said, good and wanted to give me also a beating. 

Not that I would do or accept any of my friends hitting my children. However , can’t say it was that horrible 

The problem these days is that there are no consequences to what the kids do....

Corporal punishment has been banned, and to a "certain" degree i understand why, but I mostly don't.

Certain teachers back in the day, had it out for some of the pupils, and really gave it to them when it came to getting jacks, and that is where I don't agree with corporal punishment, because it was far too easy for a teacher to take it out or target certain pupils that they didn't like.... I saw it happen often, but other than that, I believe a good and deserved hiding back in the day was a good enough deterrent to not do it again.

We walked or rode our bikes everywhere, and I mean everywhere.... we also really looked forward to the Benson and Hedges cricket games.... 

Like my fellow mates, I had so much freedom it was fantastic..... and it's only now that one really appreciate it, because these days the kids just cannot do it, nor could they ever appreciate just how great it was back then.

Your kettle was known in NZ as a shanghai. Made exactly the same way and I remember Dad cutting the tongue out of old shoes for the pouch. Said he’d learned this when he was a lad in the 1920’s.

My name is a combination of Waikato’s mascot Mooloo the cow and my desire to win money, hence Moola.

Saders  fan, did you ever indulge in “Bodgie Splits” at school?

2 participants facing each other about a metre apart. Started by throwing a pocketknife into the ground to either side of the other guys feet. He would then have to spread that leg out to where the knife landed and then the other guy had his turn. This kept going whilst legs got wider and wider apart until one fell over. You could get back to standing up straight if you could get the knife to embed in the ground between the other guy’s legs. Lots of fun until the inevitable knife through the foot!!

Draad, this is more it...

Note the use of the shitty black rubber as ties. Efficient 

haha, yes, we should have saved the red tube, but it was always hard trying to pull and wrap the wrapper around to keep it nice and tight. Nothing worse than when when of the bands would snap. But we learned very quickly how to fix it and cut it. 

Oh, Initiations, man I can tell you some stories

I spend 3 years in boarding school from age of 12 until 15. My first boarding school was a lot of fun, I was in std 4. It was in Malmesbury. We would have pillow fights with the other rooms opposite us. We were normally 6 to 8 in a room and we were at the very end of the corridor. 

There was normally only one teacher on duty at night. A young teacher who got free board. Just remembered getting caught five times sneaking across to the other room and every singly time got given a hiding with a wooden beach bat. We all laugh at it. But some of the boys would put a boot or something in their pillow cases. So it would alway be a sneak attack when they would storm the room or we would storm their room. 

I then went to another boarding school where the prefects ran the show, they were right cunts. Got all caught up with power. They would come into our room and look for reasons to cane us. If they found a scrap of paper on the floor, it would be a caning. They would even have some sort of fight club where we had to try and fight them. We were only 12 or 13 and they were 16 and older. 

But I got my revenge on one of the biggest skollies, I think he was 21 already and just got kept behind every year. But he had me in a choke hold the one day as they did their usual to try and rough of us up. I did a bit of judo back in the day and could feel his centre of gravity, so I just did a over the shoulder throw, but he got such a fright that he arch his back and bounced off his arse on the hard wooden floor. He just got up and ran out. After that I got the reputation for beating up a matric. I had one of his mates try and kick my face in the one day as he use to do karate. I could block his kicks and did the same to him. I think they realise that once I could get them very easily on the ground and grapple with them as they had no chance of getting out. It also make sense if you listen to Joe Rogan on Jijutsi and using judo as self defence. 

I then left that boarding school as I was fed up with all the bullying and were told that Jan Van Riebeeck banned initiations but it was all a lie. They would call us out every Thursday night and make us do crazy stuff. They even tried to get a guy to jump from 4 floors up off the balcony. Our only saving grace was some Christian lady that would come and ask us to join her to sing songs while she read from the bible. So I would just go hang out there. Far better than getting beaten up every Thursday night, but in the end I just told my folks I had enough of boarding school and these bunch of idiots. 

I didn't mind the initiations as it was a right of passage, but by the time I got to my 3rd boarding school I just saw it as stupid and teenagers with an ego trip. A real lord of the flies which has been passed on from generation. It was okay getting woken up early and running around in your underwear or carrying your matrics heavy book case, some would even put bricks in there for you. But the older boys coming into your room and trying beat you up ore play dumb pranks. Fortunately I was a light sleeper but my friend woke up to some guys dick in his face. They would poor warm water in your ear and pretend that they would be pissing on you. I left Jan van Riebeeck not long after. Had enough of this dumb ego trip and not to mention that I had the privilege of having John Voster jr, the grandson of one of the biggest cunts in the world in my year. 

You could see the apple didn't fall far from the tree and I hated this blind obsession of following people with so called power or influence. 

Anyway, many horror stories from the koshuis with a couple of high lights. I really enjoyed doing stuff with my room mates and getting up to mischief like pillow fights but the prefects and older kids were the worse. 

Funny you ask...

"I had the privilege of having John Voster jr, the grandson of one of the biggest cunts in the world in my year. "

I was in 1st Year English tut with either him or one of his cousin with the same name in 1990...nogal in the BJ Voster Building in Merriman Laa n in Stellenbosch...didn't get to know him really,  but he looked a bit of a d!ck.

Who is Saffex,s mummy?

Probably Mrs Searle...Rosie...

No big surprise to see Doos XL dodging this thread.

LMAO!

He'd need a lot of time to explain his influences for each of his many iterations . . . Ek, Alucard, Machiavelli, JeromeV, Requiescat, Apollo13, Desert Fox, Lestat, Username, Aristocat, Augenoffner, Gonzo the Great, Sun-Tzu, Lurker, Carpetmuncher, Mambo . . . I've probably left off half a dozen.

Safe to say he'd need a rather time-consuming response to the OP.

Wow that,s a lot....but don't think Deus XL is Rosie though.

Dodging? I was one of the earliest responders. It seems to me that someone has a bit of an obsession. Be that as it may, we all know that you, Mr Rooinek, went rogue after your embarrassing exit and orchestrated a way back without losing face. I guess it all went "tits up". 

Rooi, did people call you a soutie or are you English speaking Soth African amongst the Afrikaner. 

I was called a Rooinek to because my dad was English, even though I could barely speak English. 

Draad, we must have matriculated around the same time. 

Ja, John Voster was blonde and stocky. Teachers would just grovel at his feet. He was always captain or prefect kr head boy. Remember the cricket coach chatting to home one day as to who to select for cricket team. One of the coloured kids got left out for his mate, even the guy was way better. 

I also remember his family show up in a fancy Merc to watch us practice. They literary drove onto the centre of the cricket field and parked their car with the doors flung wide open and just sat their. Come to think about it, got a lot of Nazi vibes just thinking about it. 

Kingcorn, I started posting on internet message boards as MrBlonde (based on the character in the movie Reservoir Dogs) back in 1998 during the FIFA World Cup of that year. I enjoyed posting so when that WC finished, I looked for a rugby message board with the 1999 RWC coming up. I joined the Planet Rugby message board and remained there as a regular for about 5 years. PR was a great message board in those days but there weren't too many of us Yarpies on there and those that did post were expats living in the UK. I missed discussing local rugby so I decided to join the old Supersport board . . . I'm guessing around about 2002.

When signing up, I realized I'd be interacting with Afrikaners so I used the name Rooinek, the name that they called in the army . . . (except in the army the name was usually preceded by the word "f*kken"). That's where I first encountered posters like Saffex, Moffie, Baboon-ou and ou Maaik and we've all been posting on and off on various different message boards ever since then.

"Ek, Alucard, Machiavelli, JeromeV, Requiescat, Apollo 13, Desert Fox, Lestat, Username, Aristocat, Augenoffner, Gonzo the Great, Sun-Tzu, Lurker, Carpetmuncher, Mambo . "

The big mystery is how did Mike get clever in his name? A bit like a basketball player being called tiny

Xavi

Just what people that can't pronounce my name properly call me. 

I hate Eggzavier or Zaavia or Professor X.

I was lucky enough to have a very large farming and conservation extended family. Spent every weekend either KZN North Coast at my Grandpa's (sugarcane farm) or South Coast (Umzinto area) on his brothers farms. He farmed Dairy, Cane and Macadamia Nuts. 

My mother's cousins were also gamerangers in Morwemi reserve Botswana and there was the game ranch in Umzinto Heights.

They were the best of times. 

Now the Ranch is gone and the dairy and cane farms reclaimed. Equipment, animals and jobs sold or destoyed.

Sad that all disappeared, it sounds a bit ‘Gone With the Windish’ But it must have been a great youth Xavi. I reflect on that when I hear about the lives of my American friends….a solitary week in the Bahamas as kids is what they remember as an adventure. Our whole lives were an adventure….climbing down the rocks to fish at Rooikranz, surfing at Jeffreys, hitchhiking all over the place…..days at Clifton, followed by parties somewhere, taking the risk of dating a Stellenbosch girl. 

Hell it was all great fun….the guys up in Rhodesia had similar times before the wars started….golf, horse racing, black tie evenings.

I suppose the colonials up in Kenya had similar experiences, spiced with even more of an African edge. But I think these experiences were pretty unique to Africa….the juxtaposition of cultures added the spice. 

Fxxx the ANC SCUMMMMM!

The ANC is a symptom of bigger problems. Globalism. Mandela was a 33rd degree Knights of Malta Mason. A sellout and lowlife .

Mozart, if I look at our age difference, it appears that both of us had a very similar life even though it is decades apart. 1949 to 1999. All those things you mentioned I too enjoyed. Yet, come the millennium and it all fell apart. 

We have this LGBT bs going on that is hiding child predators and sexual deviant, conflating true values with sexual and selfish interest. This bs about live your truth. There is only the truth. I don’t trust anyone near my children. 

Way back when wasn’t perfect and it had its problems, but even Nelson in his book was going on about how great it was growing up in a small village, running around with your friends in nature and cooking miellies on the fire. Even with no money, life was still enjoyable. 

Now, we are bombarded with information and the scary people are free to do what they want. 

The ANC is a failed progressive modernest that is rooted in communism and so is may modern woke culture. 

Ja, man, so glad to hear the folks on hear got to enjoy all these freedoms 

Happiness doesn’t come with possessions. Nor does all this information make us happy. I’m also glad I had my business career while one could still act without having to consult a lawyer first. So far the 21st century is very much a mixed bag….I’m sick of going through 3 layers of the car computer just to turn on my heated seat! Life is too intrusive.

Hear, Hear.

Mozart, small part to play for a heated car seat, could you remember when seats weren't heated? 

Well, in SA you were normally stuck to the seat if it was vinyl or leather.