5 Breakfast

There is owning a car because you love cars...and then there is owning a car because your life is currently being held hostage by the sentence: “Unfortunately, we don’t go that side.” Because in South Africa, getting somewhere is not always just about distance. It is about whether transport is available.

He turned somebody else’s mistake into an identity, Then poured a twenty-year-old memory into a frontier glass, Until the entire world counted backwards while moving forward.

What happened on this day in history.

Yesterday, on Bet You Can’t Find, we went looking for somebody living a double life or somebody who knew one. We received a lot of responses. But one message stopped us.

The woman who sent it did not say she had discovered someone’s secret life. She said she is part of it. For almost ten years, she has been in a relationship with a man whose family and household apparently know nothing about her.

This is not, according to her, a casual arrangement built around the occasional secret message. They travel together. They fly together. She joins him when his professional sporting commitments take him away. And when the phone rings from home, she goes quiet. She knows about them. They do not know about her.

We are calling her Patricia. That is not her real name, and we will protect any details that could identify her, the man involved or either family. Patricia, thank you for trusting us with this conversation.

What does it really mean to lead a double life? 

HEADLINE: Officer arrested after allegedly pointing firearm at fellow cop for [BLANK] [BLANK]

Thabo trolls the deepest darkest recesses of the internet for the most jaw dropping headlines and omits a word or two from the title which the team and listeners then have to guess.

Last Wednesday, for Drink Spiking Awareness Day, we opened this conversation through Bet You Can’t Find. And what came back from you was not just a collection of stories. It was a pattern. People who believed something had happened to them, but never reported it. Friends who watched
someone become disoriented far too quickly, but did not know what to do. And one very uncomfortable truth: drink spiking does not only happen in packed clubs or at massive festivals.

So this morning, we are following that conversation further. Not to frighten anyone. Not to deliver a lecture before your next night out. But to understand what the risk actually looks like, why so much of it goes unreported, and what friends, venues and event organisers can do before something goes wrong. 

Joining us is Peach Piche, also known as Peach Olive, the founder of
Drinkerbell. Peach, good morning and welcome to 5 Breakfast.

What happens when powerful people call unemployed young people “cockroaches”? Apparently, the cockroaches organise.