In this comedy special, Thenjiwe shares her unique perspective peppered with political punchlines, great observations, and cutting one-liners.
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00:00Please, put your hands together for the very funny, the very talented, Ten Jiwei!
00:21Hello London!
00:23Hello!
00:25So nice to be here.
00:27One of the things that I've quickly learned is that white people are never going to pronounce my name correctly.
00:34So for the duration of my stay in London, my name is Mandela.
00:43Because that one name you never mess up.
00:47The thing is, you guys need to understand that we take pride in our names as Africans.
00:53Our names have a deep meaning.
00:57So we like it when you respect our names and at least learn to pronounce them correctly.
01:03Because you wouldn't like it if I called you Uzen.
01:10If I started calling you On.
01:16Our names, we have even English names that have a deeper African meaning than some of the African names.
01:24My father spent seven years in Robben Island.
01:31Seven years.
01:33If he had done another 20, who would have been the real Nelson Mandela?
01:39And when he came back home after seven years, my mother was eight months pregnant.
01:43She had twins, and they were named forgive and forget.
01:54And being a black South African, I come from a long line of mine workers.
02:08So naturally, I'm a gold digger.
02:13And I am trying, I am trying to understand things.
02:16I do not understand some of the things that you people here do.
02:21Especially white people.
02:23You love themed parties.
02:26I was invited to a gig, and they told me it was the Victorian themed party.
02:31As an educated black woman, I did not show up.
02:41I'm sorry.
02:42I do not trust white people.
02:45And I'm married to one.
02:50I don't trust you guys so much that I don't even tell my husband when I've had a dream.
02:55Because I know what you did to Martin Luther.
02:57And coming from a very strong political background family, it's difficult for me being married to a white person.
03:08Because after everything that we went through in South Africa, people think I'm a sell-out.
03:14But I keep telling them, it's not my fault.
03:18My mother told me not to play in the mud.
03:20And I think everyone should try to date outside their race.
03:29It's the most beautiful thing.
03:31You get away with a lot.
03:35Like if my husband wants a doggy style on a Wednesday, I just tell him it's against my culture.
03:39And I'm sure you are aware of what's going on in South Africa at the moment.
03:50As black people, we're really trying to get the land back.
03:54And I'm not a fighter.
03:56So my land is going to be sexually transmitted back to me.
03:58And the thing is, people use racism even when it's not necessary.
04:11It's always about race.
04:13It's racism. It's about race.
04:15Not all the time.
04:17Sometimes people just don't get along.
04:18I'm sure you have black people you don't like.
04:22You have white people you don't get along with.
04:25And it's fine.
04:27Like my mother-in-law and I, we don't get along.
04:30And I know she is not racist.
04:33We just have different personalities.
04:36I'm a Libra, she's a bitch.
04:37But I'm trying, I'm trying to understand your culture.
04:47I'm trying to understand the different things that you do which we don't understand.
04:52What I love about London is that you guys have some nice professional black men.
04:58There's nothing more exciting than seeing a black man wearing a suit and going to work in the office.
05:05Where I come from, you can only say two things to a black man wearing a suit.
05:11Either rest in peace or may the defendant rise.
05:24So I really love being in London.
05:27But there are things I do not understand.
05:31And I think you guys are to blame for everything that went on in South Africa.
05:35Because you really sent us some fucked up white people.
05:41You sent us your factory rejects.
05:46Like they came to South Africa.
05:49And they told us we needed to change the name of the country.
05:53And after meetings and meetings they had, they decided to settle on South Africa.
06:02How lazy can you get?
06:05We don't even have a name for our country, it's just a geographical location.
06:08And I can understand you guys, your English is so confusing.
06:18Your English is confusing.
06:20We already have 11 languages in South Africa and then you bring your English to confuse us even more.
06:25There are words I am still trying to understand, like discover.
06:26You guys came to South Africa, actually Africa, a whole continent with millions of people already living in it and you said you discovered it.
06:42How exactly do you discover a whole continent with people who have been living in it for millions and millions of years?
06:53But when my brother comes to your house and discovers a television, you put him in jail.
06:58And how you guys teach your young children to be confident and to believe in themselves from a young age.
07:12Oh little Johnny, you can become anybody.
07:16When you grow up, you can be anybody you want to be.
07:20Our Nigerian brothers come here, do exactly the same thing you call his identity fraud.
07:28I'm still trying to understand, there are things I respect about you guys.
07:37White people, you know how to save your money.
07:40You know how to invest.
07:42You have beautiful homes.
07:44You have beautiful jobs, you save your money.
07:48But when you get those two weeks off in the year, you go camping.
07:52Like if I really miss sleeping on the floor, I visit my cousins in Soweto.
08:03But I have done well for myself.
08:09I have a son, 12 year old.
08:12He lives here in Guildford, thank you very much, in Surrey.
08:15But it's so difficult for me because London is expensive.
08:21The pound is so strong against the rent.
08:25And I've been trying to promise him I'm going to take you home, I'm going to take you to Africa, I'm going to take you to the Motherland.
08:31And last year he kept asking me, but mom, but mom, I want to go to Africa.
08:38So I took him to Peckham.
08:40So now he thinks Africa is just a small town full of hair shops.
08:47And I'd like to thank you guys on behalf of Africa.
08:56Anyone who donates to Comic Relief here?
09:02We really appreciate it.
09:04But we don't need the blankets.
09:07Africa is hot.
09:08And please stop sending us your celebrities.
09:18And stop sending the crew with the cameras.
09:21I mean, you're wasting so much money.
09:24The money you spend sending someone like Davina McCall to Africa could build a school in a small country.
09:30I understand what you want.
09:32You want to have the pictures to make people pity us and see all the hungry people.
09:38I have a solution.
09:39You can use your own hungry people like Victoria Beckham.
09:46Just put a couple of flies on her face and put her in Woolwich.
09:49It's not easy.
10:03It's not easy being black.
10:04It's not easy being a woman.
10:06So for me, it's double difficult.
10:11I grew up in the township called Guamashu.
10:14It's Ngaungawini.
10:15But I've recently moved to Johannesburg.
10:21And Johannesburg is not easy.
10:25Those of you who've been to South Africa, you know Johannesburg is not easy.
10:31When you get there, they tell you things like,
10:35You're now in Johannesburg.
10:37You're now on television.
10:39You can't be seen with that hair of yours.
10:41You need to have better hair.
10:45You need 100% Indian hair.
10:48Guys, when you look at the 100% Indian hair and 100% Brazilian hair,
10:55it's all made in China.
11:00And I come from Durban, capital city of India.
11:03I have never ever seen a bold Indian woman.
11:08So my black sisters, you know where the hair comes from.
11:12And can I just say that just because I'm black, it does not mean I know every other black person in the world.
11:29Stop telling me about your friend in Ghana. I don't know them. I haven't been to Ghana.
11:39And please stop asking me what I think about Bill Cosby.
11:45I was not there. I also know him from television.
11:49Stop asking me, do you think he did it? Do you think it was fair? Do you think it was good that they arrested him?
11:58I don't know.
12:00All I know about Bill Cosby is I would love to have a taste of that vintage dick.
12:04Because if over 40 women can remember exactly what happened over 40 years ago, that's got to be some good dick.
12:16I had sex with my husband just this morning and I don't remember a thing.
12:23And I was sober.
12:31So let's learn to give credit to a Jew.
12:36And I love traveling, but please, please, England is better.
12:42America is the worst.
12:44First time out of South Africa, I went to America to be an au pair, which sounded so nice and so sexy.
12:54I didn't know it was just another name for a nanny.
12:59And when I got there, they are so ignorant.
13:02They were telling me things like, Tengiwe, you're in America now.
13:08You no longer have to sleep on the floor.
13:11This is a bed.
13:13Tengiwe, we use money in America.
13:17We get it from a hole in the wall.
13:20Guys, we come from South Africa or from any part of any third world country.
13:28We fly in, which means at least we have an airport.
13:37And to apply for your jobs, you send us forms through the internet and they are written in English.
13:45And then we come here and you ask us, when did you learn English?
13:50I learned it on the plane.
13:52I learned it on the plane.
13:56How long was the flight?
13:5811 hours and I slept for 10.
14:03Like seriously, please encourage everyone you know to travel and to see Africa.
14:11We no longer live in trees.
14:13You've taken them all and you sell them at Oak Fennish Island.
14:23But it is nice to be a comedian.
14:29I used to be a lawyer.
14:32I used to be an immigration lawyer.
14:35And what's funny is, when you guys come to our countries, you are expats.
14:45When we come here, we are automatically illegal aliens or illegal immigrants.
14:54Why can't you call us expats?
14:58And we are not here to steal your jobs.
15:04We are just here to clean your houses.
15:11What encouraged me to first come to England was I had friends who were working here.
15:17And all my life I wanted to be an actress.
15:19I wanted to be on TV.
15:20And when they told me they were working for the BBC, I thought, perfect.
15:26I'm going to England.
15:28Only to come here and find out that BBC stands for British Balm Cleaners.
15:40And then when you come to Africa, the beautiful Africa,
15:45you refuse to learn our languages.
15:47You say our languages are difficult.
15:52They are not.
15:55If you can learn French, you can learn Zulu.
16:01Because when it comes to doing business and money, you suddenly learn the languages.
16:08To my African people, I say to you, anyone who refuses to pronounce your name,
16:14stop pronouncing theirs.
16:23Catherine must be Catherine.
16:27If you start calling John on.
16:34But there are beautiful things about here.
16:36When I first worked here, I realized you guys have something so beautiful called bereavement leave.
16:44You really get time off just because somebody in your family has died.
16:50Nobody would go to work in Africa.
16:53We have diseases that kill people every day.
16:57So when I found out that where I was working, they had bereavement leave.
17:04The first thing I did was, okay, I must tell them I have a twin.
17:10I must tell them my parents are still alive.
17:12So I used to just take two weeks leave every so often.
17:17And I love that they were so ignorant.
17:20Sometimes I would take time off because my lion ate my elephant.
17:24You guys need time off when your goldfish dies.
17:30And then one time they found out that my mother had died seven years ago.
17:39And I had just gone on my two weeks bereavement leave.
17:42But it wasn't my fault that my mother couldn't hold down and she died before I got that job.
17:52So I hadn't lied. I don't know why I got fired.
17:54Racism is everywhere.
18:04And being a woman is difficult, guys.
18:07It is so difficult.
18:09We put so much pressure on each other.
18:11We are always putting a lot of pressure on each other about how we look.
18:16You go to any hairdresser, women with long hair are cutting it off.
18:20Women with short hair are putting on weave.
18:21It is so much pressure at the gym.
18:24People are trying to lose weight.
18:25Some are trying to gain weight.
18:27I think in 2018, we should stop doing that.
18:32We should just appreciate ourselves the way God created us.
18:36We should love ourselves in our different shapes and different colors.
18:41Like if you guys look at me properly, my breasts are not the same size.
18:46But I love that.
18:50And I use it to my advantage.
18:53Because it means I can fuck men who love big breasts and I can fuck men who love small breasts.
18:58You love big breasts, you play on the right.
19:03You love small breasts, we play on the left.
19:09And I'm very lucky because I was raised by a Christian woman.
19:13From a young age, my mother taught me to let go of things I no longer need in life.
19:21She taught me not to hold on to things, not to be a holder.
19:25If you're not going to need it in the future, get rid of it.
19:29Get rid of friends that no longer fit the profile.
19:32Which is why on my second day at university, I got rid of my virginity.
19:35And my mother told me to make sure that I never ever marry a man without a professional job.
19:47Because the best time to have sex is when your husband is away on a business leave.
19:51And it's not easy being a mother.
20:00I find it difficult being a mother. I am too honest.
20:04Sometimes I find myself calling my son, son of a bitch.
20:08And then I realize I am the bitch here.
20:11Which is very difficult.
20:15And being married to a white man.
20:19And people thinking that I'm a sell out.
20:22I'd like to make it clear to everyone that just because I'm married to a white man doesn't mean I no longer sleep with black men.
20:30And what I love about here, two weekends ago, I went to a place called Blackpool.
20:51Wow.
20:53Now I know where Jeremy Kyle gets people for his shows.
21:05Wow.
21:07And I have a message from home.
21:11They asked me to bring back all the jewels from the Queen.
21:16I don't know if you guys can help discover them with me.
21:21And the thing is, being black is so difficult that we go under a lot of pressure.
21:36You guys don't understand how easy it is to be you.
21:40From a young age we are told that our hair is not professional.
21:45Our hair is not good enough.
21:47We need to relax our hair.
21:48We need to straighten our hair.
21:52Like, were we born not relaxed?
21:57Do we need our hair to look like yours for us to be relaxed?
22:03Which doesn't make sense.
22:05But what I love is now we have really come to terms with who we are.
22:09We have fallen in love with who we are.
22:13And we are so happy being African.
22:16I love it when I see African people wearing their African hair.
22:20I love it when I see African people not bleaching their skin.
22:24We have such a big problem with Africans bleaching their skin.
22:35A lot of our celebrities back home think in order to make it in life you need your skin to be bleached.
22:42You need to look whiter.
22:43So much so that a lot of them started looking like chickens.
22:50And I'd like to say to all my black sisters that nothing will ever make you prouder and look better more than being yourself.
23:05Sometimes even with the makeup we go too much.
23:10Sometimes you can't even tell who the person is if they don't have the makeup.
23:16Sometimes we put it on like it's peanut butter.
23:22And most of all it's because of you black brothers.
23:25We always have to be walking around in high heels while you are in your comfortable shoes.
23:41Sometimes we can't even take a proper shower because we have to protect the fake hair.
23:45Which is why for me my beautiful black sisters even white sisters if you are going through the same problem.
23:58The next time a guy tells you you look better with 100% Indian hair or you look better with 100% Brazilian hair.
24:11You tell him brother you will also look a lot better with 100% Nigerian dick.
24:26Because I'm so tired of people thinking that every black man has a big dick.
24:34It's a myth.
24:35There are some black brothers sitting right here right now with toothpicks.
24:52And we are always busy working and comfortable for them.
24:56And I really believe that we should encourage people to date outside their race.
25:06Because if we all did that, number one, we will all have beautiful children.
25:13Number two, nobody will be racist to anyone.
25:18We will have different isms, but racism will not form part of them.
25:22We will still have ageism.
25:25Some of the people will still not get girlfriends because of dickism.
25:33And I believe as women, if we really got together and decided to say no more to abuse and to...
25:44Because no relationship is worth a black eye.
25:49No relationship is worth any kind of abuse.
25:53If in 2018 we got together and said I am not going to stay in an abusive relationship and we bought vibrators.
26:03Because the good thing with vibrators is you choose your own size.
26:12You choose your own color.
26:15And no vibrator ever wakes you up in the morning and asks you to make it breakfast.
26:20No vibrator will ever tell you that it's going out on a night out with other vibrators.
26:26It always stays exactly where you put it.
26:33No vibrator will ever put any pressure on you.
26:39If you want to take it to work with you, you take it to work with you.
26:43And in South Africa the main problem we have is our politicians.
26:50When I came here I actually wanted to say a few things about our politicians.
26:56But then I realized it would be so unfair to make jokes about my fellow comedians.
27:05With all the problems we have, they recently made an announcement that they are now going to give free condoms with flavors.
27:13Because they think Africans are not using condoms because of the flavors.
27:21And the flavors they came up with were strawberry and blueberry.
27:28And I'll tell you now, no black person likes strawberries or blueberries.
27:35Those who can afford blueberries and strawberries can afford to buy their own condoms.
27:43So I think if they are really trying to help us, they should have flavors that we as Africans can enjoy.
27:49Like tinned fish, peanut butter, fried chicken, then maybe we will start using condoms.
28:06And please, when it comes to racism, it is so difficult to understand who is racist and who is not.
28:18Like my father-in-law, I cannot tell whether he is racist or he is not.
28:25Because he is such a good man.
28:28Last month for my birthday, we were in Spain.
28:32And he said, well, Mandela.
28:35I understand that you are missing your family and you haven't been home.
28:44So on your birthday, I'm going to take you to a place that's going to remind you of where you come from.
28:50I'm going to take you back to your roots.
28:52So he took me to a strip club.
28:57Because according to him, we are still naked in Africa.
29:02And when we got there, I was so shocked that people came to Africa and told us it was barbaric to walk around naked.
29:16And then you go to other countries and people are paying to see naked people.
29:20For how long are we going to allow you guys to take business away from us?
29:27You guys even have newspapers that have a special page dedicated to naked women.
29:35But when we do it in Africa, it's barbaric.
29:42We should go to school.
29:44And then you come and you tell us, oh, you drink too much.
29:48These Africans are always drinking.
29:51I drink. I love my drink.
29:54And I blame my white English teacher and my chemistry teacher.
30:00Because according to my chemistry teacher, alcohol is a solution.
30:03So my beautiful people, my beautiful London people, my beautiful black people, it is time that we take pride in who we are.
30:23And we stop faking it.
30:27And we try to get along, regardless of our differences, regardless of our different colors.
30:34Which is why today I say, no more to this rubbish.
30:39Thank you very much.
30:41My name is Keju.