A recent unexpected film about a South African’s bond with an Octopus has inspired a spoof called My Sinkhole Teacher!
Johanneburg, South Africa (04 November 2020) – It looks like the next instalment of “My Octopus Teacher” will be filmed in Fourways… and will have a Joburg resident searching for meaning in his life at the bottom of sinkholes in his area.
A resident in Fourways decided to entertain his neighbours while enjoying a little swim in a sinkhole outside of his house.
The “sinkhole teacher” says that the idea was really to make light and fun of a dire situation; and that he might bring the spotlight onto Joburg’s failing infrastructure that is as old as 40 years and hasn’t been maintained properly in over 20 years old.
“A real-world “Charlotte’s Web” story that is filled with heart and drama and extraordinarily large sinkholes, My Sinkhole Teacher, reminds us that the infrastructure in Johannesburg really needs to be maintained,” – bystander who couldn’t believe what she was seeing.
The Fourways Sinkhole Teacher has pledged to take a photo by a different water burst each day to put the spotlight on Joburg’s decaying water system, decaying municipalities and infrastructure due to mismanagement over the years, greed and corruption in the city.
His view is that in 20 years, the poor remain poor and will have it harder now with all the infrastructure that has been not maintained over the years.
“We now face a water crisis and continuing Eskom electricity blackouts on top of everything and our other daily struggle to find employment,” – Sinkhole teacher explains.
His vote at the local municipal elections next year will be to vote for change and vote for action. When asked who he will be voting for he said he would be giving Herman Mashaba, and Action SA “a shot”.
The sinkhole teacher sent us this exclusive video which we posted to Twitter:
My “sinkhole" teacher… South Africans always find the funniest side of really serious situations. 😂🤣 pic.twitter.com/3r8lVcajuX
— Brent Lindeque (@BrentLindeque) November 4, 2020
But this is not the first time we have seen a crazy story about South Africans finding meaning in bodies of water. Earlier this year, another spoof called My Kreepy Teacher also went viral.
Both spoofs were inspired by an unexpected film about a man’s bond with an octopus entitled My Octopus Teacher which captivated audiences, film festivals and competition judges worldwide.
My Octopus Teacher racked up eight nominations, more than any other film in this year’s lineup, for the renowned Jackson Wild Media Award, one of the most important nature film competitions on the globe. It recently won Best Feature at Earth X and is in the running for another four conservation film awards this year, including two prestigious Panda awards at the Wildscreen Festival.
The feature documentary is a collaboration between the Sea Change Project, an NGO raising awareness of the beauty and ecological importance of South Africa’s kelp forest, Off the Fence Productions based in the Netherlands and Netflix. This is the first Netflix Original Documentary to come out of South Africa. Directed by Pippa Ehrlich and James Reed and produced by Craig Foster, My Octopus Teacher is the culmination of a decade of hard work and dedication to showcasing The Great African Seaforest and the creatures that live in it.
The story is about Craig Foster, who suffering from a loss of purpose, begins a daily diving regimen in the freezing kelp forests at the tip of Africa in order to re-energize himself. Foster is an award-winning filmmaker and co-founder of the Sea Change Project, and has dedicated the past nine years to diving every day in the Atlantic Ocean without a wetsuit, documenting the process of how the human body adapts to cold and studying the kelp forest ecosystem.
What he discovers below the water’s surface is a totally alien motivation in the form of an unusually curious octopus. This beautiful record of an animal’s entire life—something seldom achieved in the wild, let alone underwater—was shot over a full year and explores the habits and personality of a strange, undulating creature that most of us have only ever eaten.
Watch the trailer for My Octopus Teacher here:
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