Luyando Mpahlwa — Architect, Author, Entrepreneur, Change Agent Family Man

And once again, it is what's involved special guest today and I love the title of the book when I saw it. And I thought, got to speak to this guy. He is the co author of a book called Get out of your mind lessons on embracing difference from South Africa and beyond a book by Lou yonder and pulse. You see, I told you I would do this. There we go. I got it. And Klaus Doppler. So, hello. How are you? Hi, David. I'm very well in this cold and kind of rainy cloudy morning in Cape Town, but I'm good. Thanks. Wonderful stuff. Now, Leander, before we get into the book and why the book, et cetera, et cetera, let's talk a little bit about yourself. Give me a bit of your background because, you know, and I'm going to put it out there and an architect telling you to get out of your mind sounds a bit strange because architects are generally seen as being incredibly in their minds and very detail oriented. So talk to me about the background. OK, thanks, David, for that intro. Look, Leander is my name, obviously. I was born and bred in Antata. I'm a boy from the former Transcai, former homeland at a time when South Africa was, you know, facing the issue of how to demarcate, you know, different areas with different people.

So I was born in Antata and went to school there, went to a high school that we were all very proud of, of course, in Johns College in Antata. Yeah. And, you know, grew up in a family of six. My parents, very ordinary, you know, black family. My father was a teacher originally and my mother was a nurse and I've got four siblings. One is Lina Laid, unfortunately Laid. You know, so we are three now. And we, you know, grew up in a normal kind of set up town, which is quite well known because I mean, you know, quite a number of high profile people come from that from the town. And not to mention Madiba, Nelson Mandela, who is 30 kilometers from Antata. And it's a town that has over the years been always in the kind of limelight because the people there love education. And in fact, the Eastern Cape in general, I mean, we grew up with parents that were very passionate about education. So my parents were not any different. So that's my background after qualifying in St. John's College in 1976, the turbulent year of the Soweto uprising. I saw the first kind of real political, you know, engagement of a nature that brought my own consciousness. I saw some of my colleagues and schoolmates living the country and they'd been arrested in 1976.

So, I mean, you know, I grew up in that kind of context where my own consciousness started changing because of the realities of the country. And we had, in fact, even the fact that we knew about Soweto was because there were learners and pupils from Soweto who obviously had kind of first hand contact with what was happening there. I mean, we all became conscientious during that process. And, you know, doing my metric in that year was quite tricky because I also recall that, you know, we started a kind of a small demonstration in our school, because two of our colleagues had been arrested by Transcai police at a time when the Transcai had just become an independent homeland and where the brutality was starting to manifest itself there as well. So that's my background. And then I obviously, after finishing same story, like every matriculist didn't know what I wanted to do. And my parents, my mother in particular, I thought that I could study architecture because I used to like drawing houses. But it started with my dad convincing us he wanted his children to go to engineering roots because he felt that's the future for the country. And that's how I ended up where I am, if that kind of answers your question.

It does indeed, Liana. But I mean, when you talk about that, and let's just go back to those years, because I know in certain respects, it's not easy. But in others, I mean, you were a young man wanting to study architecture. Now, in those days, this was almost unheard of. Where did you get to study architecture? That was a big question. Because I'm from Antarctica, Devon was the closest at the time. But there was a kind of a catch. You know, you couldn't just be accepted to study architecture because it was preserved for white students, white people. And so I had to apply to the Minister of Education. I kind of remember who it was at the time. And I think I mentioned it in the book. And I had to give a reason why I wanted to study architecture. And the only plausible reason was that it's not allowed in black universities. So now the black universities at the time were the University of Forte, University of Zululand, University of the North, the University of the Western Cape for Kala people. And there was Westville for the University of Devon Westville, I think, for the Indian people. So I mean, we were a very fragmented country. So I could only do it in Natal, which was closer to Tintata. And as part of the reasoning, it was obviously the fact that I live in a homeland.

And therefore, the expectation was that when I finish architecture, I go back to my homeland and won't bother South Africa with trying to look for work. So I assume that was a rationale. You know, we can laugh about it now, but you know, thinking back to those days, it's actually quite tragic. But now let's move along and we will go into now you've finished your varsity, you qualified. What next? Because you're involved with quite a few things now. So I'm just trying to set the stage for what led you to writing this book. So after varsity, what did you do? Well, look, I mean, it's also not as straightforward, David, because let us let's put it out there and be honest, because I'm pretty sure you'll have young designers or young students who are listening as well. I failed my first year at the University of Natal because the university, I think, was just not ready. We were very few, a handful of black students. I mean, I count myself as among the first generation of architecture students who are black. And the circumstances to study even were just unbearable. I mean, we were not allowed to stay on campus for starters. So we stayed, the University of Natal had something called the University of Natal Black Section, which was basically the medical school. And they had a residence in Ostaville, that is, in Jacobs, in Durban.

It's a township. And it was called the Alan Taylor residence, which was a former army barracks, and still had the army present at the gate. So when you went through to our residence, you actually went through the gate of the army barracks. So I mean, we were in that environment, and I mean, one had to travel two hours to get to university. And you had to leave university by a certain time in order to catch the cooperation buses at King Edward Hospital, which was five kilometers away. So I mean, you were just not able to actually study. So I failed at Natal, or let me put it this way, I was failed because I was not assisted to be able to make it. And then I went back to Natal, worked for a year in 1979. So I mean, my first year was '78, because the first year was wasted with the application. So I had to work in '77. And then I was encouraged to change to a Technicon, which was Natal Technicon, which I then had to apply again to the minister, I was enrolled in 1980. And then this was a four year kind of diploma. And after two years, I got arrested, being caught up in the politics of the '80s. Devon was having quite some upheavals at the time. So I basically ended up on Robin Island as part of that journey.

So going to qualify actually happened in Germany, because after my release, I had to flee via Botswana, which is obviously going to probably be the actual story of my second book, which I'm hoping to write someday. And I ended up in Germany with the help of Amnesty International as a politically persecuted person. They got me out of the country. And I ended up in Germany, and that's where I got my degree. So basically, my story in the book has got a bit of a biographical touch to it, but it then goes obviously beyond and talks about my experiences as an actor. Wonderful stuff. And I wanted you to get into that part. And again, you know, because time has passed, it's so easy to kind of, I don't know, brush under the carpet what happened in those those days gone by. And, you know, you mentioned in the book and now about being incarcerated on Robin Island. That is another story in its entirety. And, you know, I want to I want to talk to you about that at some stage when that next book comes out, you're right there on the list. But you came back to South Africa in around 2000, I believe. Where did you first meet your co-author Klaus? Yeah, that's really at the crux of it. I came back in 2000 years and started working as an architect. And I'm looking at the landscape of South Africa and in Cape Town where I settled.

It was quite obvious that the space of architecture where I would find my no work would be in the public sector. So I do a lot of government work. I've built a lot of schools in the townships of Cape Town, but Klaus, it was a different story in that I was working for an NGO, which is based in the township of Philippi. And they got to hear about me, I think, just through the grapevine and perhaps the person who heads the NGO, which is a community organization that really supports young people and the vulnerable in Philippi. Reverend Otto Korstock is German. So I think he probably found out that there's a South African architect who speaks German, who studied in Berlin and who's back in Cape Town and maybe he can help you. So his projects were funded by Klaus Doppler and his wife, Margaretta Doppler. They were basically the donors who would mobilize funds from other investors and potential kind of supporters of South Africa. In Germany, they are based in Munich. So Reverend Otto Korstock said he wants to build an AIDS hospice because there are a lot of patients around Philippi that have got nowhere to go. There's no, you know, government hospital that can look after these people. So he started by establishing TB wards, which he was running as part of the NGO. But then because of the prevalence of HIV at the time, he felt that he needs to support those who are suffering from AIDS.

So he asked me whether I can convert the wards that they had into proper kind of hospital wards with the normal requirements, a sink inside. And he asked me what he could do because he was having buildings that were really not suitable for that. So I gave him advice and then we started doing the AIDS hospice. So I met Klaus then. This was now 2006 and got to know him. And then there are other projects that followed. But our journey started then and Klaus and Margaretta came to Cape Town every November to come and kind of see what is happening with their projects. And that's how our relationship started. There we go. We're going to get more into that side of it and how we move from architect to author when we come back. This is what's involved. My special guest is Lujanda Mpachwa, who is the co-author of Get Out of Your Mind, Lessons on Embracing Difference from South Africa and Beyond. Back in just a bit. And we're back with my special guest, Lujanda Mpachwa, author of Get Out of Your Mind. So Lujanda, to fit everything that you've done and where you belong and how and all of those things into one interview is almost impossible. So the book, you need to read the book. Let's just put that out there. But how did we move from being an architect and very involved in the field of architecture, wedding awards, et cetera, et cetera?

How did we get there from there to writing a book? Yeah, I mean, I'm asking myself, too, because I don't think a book was the first thing in my mind as I was working and even as I was studying for that matter. I think, to be honest, the book took seven years to write. Let me put that out there. Because when Klaus and I were working in these projects in the townships, now you must kind of picture this. Klaus is a German professional, a retired person. He is in his 80s right now. And when we met, he was probably in his 70s already. And he had written this book, Change Management, which is kind of regarded as a classic in Germany. I have a copy here. And when Klaus was observing how I was working, now being a German and you work in the German context, when you go to the authorities and you say you're applying for a building application, there's a very clear process and there's a very clear timeline by when you should expect this. So he comes to Cape Town and I say, Reverend Otto and Klaus, we need to do a building application in order for us to get this building through. The process that it took and the patience that it took and the complexity of the process was just mind-boggling to him.

And the thing is with donor funds, they have to be spent within a certain time. So we had to find ways to make this work in the corners of Cape Town and South African townships where the processes of building approvals were not as simple and straightforward. So Klaus said to me after a number of years, I'm jumping a few steps. I actually think the way you are able to take off your German hat as a German trained person, but then translate it to a South African context where in his eyes things don't seem to be working. But I was able to get all this stuff through and also work with very agitated community members who always wanted to be involved in every decision, in every project, because this is their area. Who is this architect who's coming and coming to design stuff here? We want our own people kind of thing. So I had to manage and navigate through all those processes, but actually still get the work done. So he is the one who said, look, I think we need to write about this because there's something interesting for me knowing how German education is and how the German system works, and how you've been able to adjust to the South African situation, even though you're South African, but you are able to do this in a manner that I believe has to deal with the issue of how you are adjusting to a different culture from how you've been educated.

And I, as Klaus, am adjusting to the South African way of doing things. It's a fascinating thing. So we should write a book together. So I said, Klaus, okay, fine. But to be honest, it frustrated him as well because I was not ready mentally to convey those complex issues in a book. So it took us seven years and I was writing chapter by chapter. To be honest with you, I was helped by the lockdown because during the lockdown, I was able to really just button down and put all these thoughts together, you know, being stuck here at home and not having anything else to do, and was able to finish the book, which could be published in Germany last year. He gave me like deadlines. So even between us, there was also that feeling of like, you know, the tension, a productive tension of like, you know, I want this book finished because I'm going to be turning 80. My life is coming to an end and I don't want to live and finish stories, so to speak. So there was an element of pressure on me as well. But it took me quite some time to develop the ideas that would kind of be kind of structured to convey the message that we both felt needs to be shared. Which is so fascinating because, you know, and I read right from the beginning there, this lessons on embracing difference from South Africa and beyond. This is something I think that we suffer from massively in South Africa is the differences in terms of culture, language, all sorts of things.

And I can only imagine from a German perspective coming into this cultural melting pot where you are used to things going from A to B to C and so on in an orderly manner. And then you get to South Africa, which must have looked like the Wild West to this to this poor man. So when we come back, if we can just go into a little bit about some more of the meats and potatoes of the book in terms of, you know, what some of those lessons are. Because on the surface, you go, well, surely we should spend more time talking to each other, but we don't know about this. So when we come back, we'll discuss that. This is what's involved. My special guest, Lianda Mpachwa, who is the co-author of Get Out of Your Mind, Lessons on Embracing Difference from South Africa and Beyond. Back in a bit. And we're back with my special guest, Lianda Mpachwa. So, Lianda, just before the break, I said to you, I'd love to get into more of the meats and potatoes of the book. So surely, you know, it's a simple solution for us in South Africa. I mean, you know, there's a lot of differences. Maybe we should just talk about it. Why a book? Is it that simple? I think it is when I actually got into writing, I actually found that it's actually not that difficult. It is about putting ideas out there, sharing experiences.

So while that could sound easy, but the actual process of putting thoughts together proved to be quite complex. So what Klaus then did, and I really must acknowledge him for his mentorship from an author perspective. He said we should treat this almost like as a conversation between the two of us. And I'm going to ask you questions which are kind of deep down in me as a German and as an author, but which I don't have answers for. And I think observing South Africa, which is also quite diverse, even from his perspective. I mean, we worked in the townships and we knew both. We lived in the kind of more affluent kind of area. I live in round abortion. Klaus would live in some very beautiful kind of guest house thing. So he knew also that South Africa has got conflicting realities. So the basic idea was to kind of come up with examples, case studies. So Klaus has worked all over the world as well. So he had his own case studies where he worked with communities and he's able to share. And that's all in the book. And then in my case, then it was ideal. Let's package these ideas with examples. And I chose about five or six examples from the projects that I've done where I started understanding myself how I had to change my own approaches because of the conditions I found.

So the case studies that we use are really the vehicle through which I tell the story of how to embrace difference and how to deal with otherness. As a matter of interest, the German title for the book is called the Logique de Andere, which basically means that the logic of the others. So when we came to South Africa, our publisher that we found, Tafelpeck, said that title won't work here. So let's find a title that really goes into the gist of your thinking. And if it's about changing your mindset, changing your thinking, and that's how through the editing publisher that I worked with, an amazing lady called Nvalis Karkan, you know, the title just came by itself. And she just felt that, you know, get out of your mind is really what it's all about because you get to an environment, you've got certain preconceived ideas, you're an architect, you know how to solve design problems, but you get there. You actually have to, in my experience, I had to realize that in some cases, architecture has to take a step back and I have to put forward the kind of more working together with the community that I'm designing for and designing with. To get to their mindset, to understand how they think, why do they say the things they do. And this is how I was able then through these projects that I did to actually express this.

So if I take the first project, which is profiled in the book, a building I did with sandbags, without any bricks, no conventional building material. And this was in Freedom Park, in the township of Mitchell's Plain. This is 2008 now. And the idea there, which, you know, started from just a design conference here in Cape Town called Design in Lava, was to invite architects to design a low cost house. And my idea was that, you know, we keep using the same building materials, we'll keep building, building the same old way. And I mean, as an architect, I observe, we see the government subsidy housing called the RTP house being, you know, spread all over the country, whether it's in Joburg, or Cape Town, or Nalini, or the border in the Eastern Cape, we're building the same thing. And I was like, how can this be? Because even the people we're building for are very different. They have got very different reasons why they need a house. So have we actually understood and researched that people who come into Cape Town are actually coming for work in transit. And actually never really settle in Cape Town. If you look at the Cape Town people in the most townships, they're in their homes in the Eastern Cape.

But we're building them fully fledged houses here because we believe that this is the social responsibility of the government, which I think is actually quite noble and important. But actually, these people are also used to building their own houses. So when I approached the building off of these designs that I thought through, I actually thought we should get the people involved in the design process. And the building material that I chose through research, which is building with sandbags, enabled that process to happen, where people got involved, kids were packing sandbags and helping to kind of pack them up and stack them. We obviously had a design solution, which was a timber frame structure, which provided the actual structural grid for the building, and the sandbags were in field basically. And also, you know, just the realization that, you know, using locally available materials that are not produced in a factory is actually more environmentally friendly. We use sand, which is an abundance in Cape Town. So I mean, all these things were about how do you respond to a particular situation and understand the community working with and try and build a new reality for these people.

So when they actually built their own houses, their sense of ownership was at another level, you know, in terms of them feeling a sense of pride for having contributed their own set in creating their own housing. And I think this is something that South Africa has not even thought about. I mean, I went to present this to the Department of Human Settlements and created a brochure of the sandbag housing process and what we went through. And I thought that, you know, if we could adopt this for the subsidy program, we would actually be achieving more than actually just building millions and millions of houses for people who sit and wait for them to be built. And then they move in and then they realize that, oh, it's actually costing us to live here. Let's rent this RDP house and go back to the shack. And this is the cycle that we're experiencing in the townships. So even the dream that one day we will eradicate the shacks and the informal settlements is a pipe dream. It's not going to happen because the realities out there are different from the noble decisions we are taking as government to actually provide those who are vulnerable with housing. We need to understand why and how we should do it. Should it be permanent housing? Should it be a house for rental? Because the people in the informal settlements are renting right now.

They are renting from slum loans, obviously. And then the rent is being collected. But we are not using those community networks as we configure how to reimagine these environments and create better housing. So we are using a very one dimensional approach. Government is money. Government has developers and consultants. We demarcate land for building social housing or subsidized housing. And the people must enter their names into the list. We determine who qualifies and then we build for them. The person is not involved in the process. You don't know their conditions, except the fact that they earn paid time looking for work and they don't have accommodation. But it's deeper than that. So the idea of getting out of your mind for me has to do with have we actually considered all the variables as we do things and we're not just using the simple stuff that we think is easy to do. You decide on a budget and you say you execute. You know, Leander, as I'm talking to you now, I'm going two things. Number one, I never thought about the problem like that. And number two, now that you're bringing this to the fore, I'm like, but this is common sense. You know, yes, you're right. We have these noble ideas of building houses for the masses.

Nobody has gone to the masses and said, what would you like? And just your example of the sandbag development, I think, is absolutely brilliant. And as I'm sitting here, I'm thinking, instead of all of the clouds that hang over this building of these RDP houses, we could be doing something that people could be invested in. And they could then, as you say, it would then feel like their own, because the other bit of logic for me is if you're going to build me a house number one, it's probably not going to be built to terribly high standards. But number two, if I can make money out of that and I'm happy living in my little shack, why the heck not? So this, again, illustrates the differences in our country. And that's just one side of it. If you think now in terms of people and people working in teams, working together, I'm amazed we get anything done. Yeah, I mean, David, you've hit the nail on the head there. I think in my observation as I'm a South African, I'm a South African architect who really is passionate about the country and has opted to take the route I took because I believed in democracy. I believed in the culture of accountability. And I believe I chose accountability when I opted, where I had a choice whether to go to prison or not, because I was one of those who were prisoners of conscience.

And I took that decision, obviously knowing that if I refuse to give evidence in a higher prison trial, I'm likely to go to jail. And I took that because I felt that it is my belief that standing for justice and democracy is more important than my own personal freedom at the time. I was 22. I still don't know how I had that courage and strength. But I guess there's another dynamic there as well. But I think that if we don't understand the importance of sacrifices and standing to higher principles, we are actually missing the point. And unfortunately, our society is so paralyzed that when I observe, I actually realize that there are so many steps we're missing. And we're actually not engaging with the people enough to kind of gather their own views and opinions about how to develop their own situation. We want to do it for them because we've got the means to do so. And these have become very politicized decisions, in my opinion. And I think that if government were to maybe not take a step back, but to look at things from a broader kind of perspective, you would find that the answers are not too difficult. And if you understand the situations of people and their needs and you engage with them in an honest way, I can assure you, you'll come to different results of what we're actually experiencing right now.

And this is my personal experience working in the townships and working with the people. I mean, the other project I profiled was a school's project that we did in the Eastern Cape. Can we get on to that when we come back and as we wrap up? Because, like I said initially, you know, for us, an hour is just not going to be enough. But I wanted to just touch on a couple more things. It is what's involved. My special guest is Lujanda Mpachwa and the author, co-author, get out of your mind, lessons on embracing difference from South Africa and beyond, back in a bit. And we're back with my guest, Lujanda Mpachwa. So, Lujanda, one of the things, just before we wrap it up with the second project of yours, though, is, you know, I would have imagined that, and you say this in the book, you've also got this sense in yourself of your otherness. Because you've had various experiences. You've been to Robben Island, but then you also spend time in Germany and you got sort of, you know, you picked up some of the culture from there. You're an architect, you know, and I can imagine going into a place like Mitchell's Plain, you're going to be asked certain questions and that must bring out that otherness.

And this is the part I want to touch on is, where do we start? I mean, you guys have given us a brilliant framework, okay? It's not a blueprint. It's a framework of what to do. But some advice on where to start for us, others that are other. Where do we start? Living in Cape Town, David, I think, and listening to people, friends, colleagues, professionals, people I engage with, there is such a sense of different realities, obviously, depending on who you speak to. You will find the spectrum starting from, look, we believe in democracy, we really believe in equality, and we really would like to see the lot of the poor people in the towns being improved. And we're doing something about it. We're supporting this charity, that NGO, and so on and so forth. To another kind of that says, look, the government is messing it up. There's no way that we can continue supporting a government that is doing the things that it's doing and, you know, whether you mentioned the current issues around corruption, or the fact that, you know, the black economic empowerment is now underprivileged in the white people and it's discriminatory. And therefore, you know, this government is just doesn't know what it's doing. To another spectrum that says, you know what, we always knew that African black people cannot govern, and here we are.

So you find that whole broad spectrum and then you find people in the township and saying that we actually expect the government to do things for us because we've been so marginalized before, during apartheid, at the end of apartheid, and now we are still marginalized. So I mean, you have this broad spectrum. And the question is, besides cheering for spring balls, what other thing unites us in South Africa? What are the things that we think are positive to build this country to be where it should be? What discussions are we having around the dinner tables, around the schools? I mean, I was part of an SGB of my school, where my kids are going, which is a former Model C school, and where the profile of the pupils and obviously of the parents is still predominantly white. And the discussions that we're having in the SGB about having to embrace difference have been so central and key, and they've showed me another side of South Africa, where people are willing to change but kind of like not in my backyard kind of thing. So I mean, we have to break those barriers. We have to really not just be happy with the comforts that we have. We've also got to accept the fact that there's going to be discomfort somewhere. And we have to do that, however, with the view that we want to, we want our country to succeed, we want our country to be a winner.

And we cannot do that sitting in our enclaves. We've got to start preaching integration and inclusivity as just an ordinary day to day discussions and not go back to the old polarization discussions that are actually not helping us. And when the students say frieze must fall, we say here we are, you know, this bunch is destroying everything that has been built for them. But we don't understand the issues around residences and universities still being divided according to color lines. It's just a fact. It's a reality. Go to residences at universities and you ask this question, you're going to find it. So we need to break those barriers, in my opinion, and really start engaging in a meaningful, positive oriented dialogue about what are the positive things that we think are going to unite this country and bring us as people together and get out of our comfort zones and maybe allow ourselves to think differently because there are different kind of realities out there. And instead of just, you know, from a very monocultural, single minded, narrow minded approach, say my belief is what counts, but there are other realities out there. And we've got to embrace those differences and try and find a formula that will make us to be the kind of people that our fathers and mothers of our democracies wanted us to be.

And we are not there yet. There's a long way to go. There are many positives, but I think we're still falling short of really embracing one another. And the other area which I mean I'm quite conscious about that we are not embracing is the issue of spatial justice, which I mean has allowed us to live in the comfort of the suburbs we're living in. I live in round the bush, as I said. But we're not looking beyond as to the other areas that have been marginalized for years and saying, as a government also, what kind of dialogue can we have as a country to deal with these issues? We are dealing with them from a political level, and even the political parties in our parliament, all of them, are actually not agreeing on basic issues. So having lived in Germany, where I know that the German society also has a multi-democratic system where there are a number of parties involved. In fact, there's no outright majority in Germany anymore. And the country, the parties contest the elections quite aggressively. But if there's one thing German people unite on is the fact that they are all part of the German flag and they are, you know, united in many things that kind of keep their kind of national pride, which also was ravaged after the Second World War.

It took them 50 years to get to that point. We're only at 25. So it's not easy, these things, and they need time, they need engagement, but they need the commitment by those who are in government and in power to make sure that you don't leave people behind in what you do. You don't just decide on behalf of people, you have to take them, you know, with you. And I feel that we're taking a lot of great decisions. And I mean, even the mobility of our political settlement, which was, you know, acknowledged the world over. We've kind of like, you know, stuck behind that achievement of 1994 with Matiba, but we are not willing to take the next step to say how do we take society forward? How do we build on that foundation that, you know, the fathers and mothers of what democracy established for us to take the time to forward. And these are the things that I've just been observing and have led to this book. Well, it is a brilliant book, I've got to say. Yeah, it's still, it's still, you know, the fact that you started out laugh as an architect, and now are a co author and an author. I think it's absolutely fantastic because you certainly do have a wealth of knowledge to share. Leander, before I let you go, one more question, and then we're going to have to wrap it up.

What's next for Leander and Parthwa? Yeah, well, to be honest, David, I'm also searching. I mean, I'm hoping that someday I will actually write a more kind of personal book, which I'm hoping that, obviously, depending on the success of this one, whether I will have the energy to write another book. But I think as as COVID has affected all of us, I'm also even from the perspective of being an architect, I'm actually realizing that, you know, my world really stretches beyond architecture, and I'm looking at other ways of, you know, sharing my experiences. And, you know, finding or aligning myself with people that think like me, and hoping to find, you know, some kind of resonance of these observations that have culminated in this book and say, how do I help to contribute to a better society, a better environment? So, I think, you know, COVID has allowed me to rethink myself and realize that even the architecture of, you know, the bricks and mortar, I have more I wish to accomplish at an urban scale, at an urbanism scale, at the scale of, you know, how do we contribute towards better environments? Not just about buildings, but about, you know, spatial conditions and improving the spatial realities of our country, which we have not even started talking about.

So, I mean, that's the area I'm contemplating to kind of contribute towards and it obviously is a world of research, a world of reading and writing and contributing, you know, from a consulting point of view about, you know, these ideas and hoping that someone will listen. I think that we need to do more about the teaching of architecture and our professions. We need to encourage more cross-disciplinary learning and not just kind of straightjacket everything. So, architecture even as a profession, I think, has lost its glamour because it is either seen as an object, buildings are objects, or it's just too elitist, we don't understand architecture. And the social dimension of architecture, which is what I promote, has been kind of pushed to the background. And this is the area I want to focus on, to make people understand that architecture is not just a professional design engineering kind of discipline. There's other social components, which along the way have been lost. But if you look at the origins of architecture, you know, architects were master builders that were dealing with solving problems of building, but it has evolved beyond that. And this is where I'd like to kind of play a bigger role.

Wonderful stuff. Well, first of, Leander, you need to write that next book because these are the stories that need to be told in this country, and that's going to go a long way. I chatted to another author just the other day, La Tunde Jassop. He's just written a book called Out of Quattro, which was all about the prison camp. And I said to him as well, these stories we need to know, not because we can look at them with shock and horror, but it's time to, you know, pick off the scabs, clean out the wounds and start talking to each other. So thank you, Leander, for taking the time out and having a chat to us today. I really do appreciate it. The book is called Get Out of Your Mind, Lessons on Embracing Difference from South Africa and Beyond. And it's by Lujander Mpachwa and Klaus Doppler. Leander, once again, thank you so much. Have a good run, mate. Thank you so much, David. Thank you as well for the interview. And yeah, let's keep talking. Wonderful stuff. There we go. My special guest there, Lujander Mpachwa. Go out, get the book, get out of your mind. Well worth a read. And again, we need to start talking some more. To each and every one of you, look after yourselves, take care, and thank you for listening.