Our guest on this episode of The Podcast is Sameer Rawjee, author of 'Taking the Anxiety out of AI".

Sameer Rawjee is the founder of the Life Design Movement at Google, a programme for exploring purpose at work which has served over 10 000 Google employees globally, and has also been taught at INSEAD, Trinity College and the London Business School. Sameer is a serial venture builder via O School Ventures, where he partners with companies like Meta, Salesforce and TikTok to help young professionals prepare for new futures. He has been invited to speak at Standard Bank, ENS and Investec on how to be intelligent in a new world, and has shared his thoughts on the future of education and business with the Investec Private Wealth community across South Africa. Previously Sameer started an EdTech venture to bring universities online. His work has been featured on CNN, in the Sunday Times and in Real Leaders magazine. SOURCE: Penguin Random House Struik

Nongcebo McKenzie: The Podcast
Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za

The Podcast:
Camera: Mluleki Dlamini & Siyabonga Meyiwa
Sound: Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi
Editing: Mluleki Dlamini & Kwenza Trevor Masinga
Co-ordinator: Phumelele Khambule
Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za
View episodes on YouTube : Link ➡️ https://youtube.com/@nvmckenzie?si=y8ZcaOQ0yYqjGhA8

Disclaimer:
Some content may include sensitive topics and discussions, listener discretion is advised. The intention is not to offend but to provide information. Proceed only if you are comfortable with potentially sensitive topics. The content on this podcast does not constitute financial, legal, medical, or any other professional advice. Users should consult with the relevant professionals for specific advice related to their situation.

The Podcast is not responsible and cannot be held liable for any damages resulting from reliance on the content provided through the channel's content. All content is provided without warranty.

Sam Beckbessinger is the author of the bestselling Manage Your Money Like a Fucking Grownup and the novel Girls of Little Hope (co-authored with Dale Halvorsen). Her interactive story about climate change, Survive the Century, was featured in New Scientist and Gizmodo. She teaches creative writing at Bath Spa University, writes kids' TV and picture books, once wrote for Marvel, and is weirdly obsessed with spreadsheets. Her perimenopausal werewolf novel Femme Feral is coming in summer 2026. She grew up on a farm near Durban with a pet donkey named Mr Magoo, but now lives in London.

She joins us a guest on this episode of The Podcast to chat about her book, Manage Your Money Like a Fucking Grownup .

''In this clear and engaging basic guide to managing your finances, Sam Beckbessinger covers topics from compound interest and inflation to "Your brain on money", negotiating a raise, and particularly local South African phenomena like "black tax". The book includes exercises and "how-to's", doesn't shy away from the psychology of money, and is empowering, humorous and helpful. The book you wish you'd had at 25, but is never too late to read. '' SOURCE: Google Books

The Podcast:
Camera: Mluleki Dlamini & Siyabonga Meyiwa
Sound: Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi
Editing: Mluleki Dlamini & Kwenza Trevor Masinga
Co-ordinator: Phumelele Khambule
Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za
View episodes on YouTube : Link ➡️ https://youtube.com/@nvmckenzie?si=y8ZcaOQ0yYqjGhA8

Disclaimer:
Some content may include sensitive topics and discussions, listener discretion is advised. The intention is not to offend but to provide information. Proceed only if you are comfortable with potentially sensitive topics. The content on this podcast does not constitute financial, legal, medical, or any other professional advice. Users should consult with the relevant professionals for specific advice related to their situation.

The Podcast is not responsible and cannot be held liable for any damages resulting from reliance on the content provided through the channel's content. All content is provided without warranty.

Milton Schorr is on The Podcast to chat about his book 'Addict' where he chronicles his life journey and how he has come full circle through addiction and recovery.

About the book:

‘I wanted to be who I felt I was. Broken. A wreck. Unloveable.’

There’s a moment where life happens. It’s the moment just before making a good decision, or a bad one. For Milton Schorr, just such a moment took place at the age of seventeen, when he found himself squatting on his haunches in a Cape Town flat with a heroin needle in his arm.

A friend sat with him, his thumb on the plunger, and a decision was to be made. Let the heroin slip inside, and take the road the drug offered, or turn away, and find a new life not defined by the endless quest for oblivion.

For Milton, the path was already set, as it had been at his first taste of shoplifting, porn, cigarettes, alcohol, marijuana, Mandrax, LSD, Ecstasy and crack. In this memoir he details the life that led him to addiction, the wild and dark years of his drug use, his struggles to return to normality, and the reckoning with the self that ultimately led to his recovery.

Addict is a courageously honest account of Milton's life in active addiction and recovery. Today, two decades sober, he relates the pivotal points in his journey toward death, and back to life. This book is essential reading for anyone touched by addiction.

SOURCE: Penguin Random House Struik

Nongcebo McKenzie: The Podcast
Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za

The Podcast:
Camera: Mluleki Dlamini & Siyabonga Meyiwa
Sound: Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi
Editing: Mluleki Dlamini & Kwenza Trevor Masinga
Co-ordinator: Phumelele Khambule
Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za
View episodes on YouTube : Link ➡️ https://youtube.com/@nvmckenzie?si=y8ZcaOQ0yYqjGhA8

Disclaimer:
Some content may include sensitive topics and discussions, listener discretion is advised. The intention is not to offend but to provide information. Proceed only if you are comfortable with potentially sensitive topics. The content on this podcast does not constitute financial, legal, medical, or any other professional advice. Users should consult with the relevant professionals for specific advice related to their situation.

The Podcast is not responsible and cannot be held liable for any damages resulting from reliance on the content provided through the channel's content. All content is provided without warranty.

Kolosa Mbedla from the Department of Social Development in KwaZulu-Natal is our guest on this episode of The Podcast. In this conversation, she helps us to understand what child abuse is exactly, how to try our best to protect children from child abuse, and how to work together as a society to prevent and report instances where children are abused.

To contact the Department of Social Development:
https://www.dsd.gov.za/index.php/about/contact-us
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The Podcast:
Camera: Mluleki Dlamini & Siyabonga Meyiwa
Sound: Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi
Editing: Mluleki Dlamini & Kwenza Trevor Masinga
Co-ordinator: Phumelele Khambule
Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za
View episodes on YouTube : Link ➡️ https://youtube.com/@nvmckenzie?si=y8ZcaOQ0yYqjGhA8
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Disclaimer:
Some content may include sensitive topics and discussions, listener discretion is advised. The intention is not to offend but to provide information. Proceed only if you are comfortable with potentially sensitive topics. The content on this podcast does not constitute financial, legal, medical, or any other professional advice. Users should consult with the relevant professionals for specific advice related to their situation.


The Podcast is not responsible and cannot be held liable for any damages resulting from reliance on the content provided through the channel's content. All content is provided without warranty.

The Podcast:
Camera: Mluleki Dlamini & Siyabonga Meyiwa
Sound: Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi
Editing: Mluleki Dlamini & Kwenza Trevor Masinga
Co-ordinator: Phumelele Khambule
Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za
View episodes on YouTube : Link ➡️ https://youtube.com/@nvmckenzie?si=y8ZcaOQ0yYqjGhA8

Disclaimer:
Some content may include sensitive topics and discussions, listener discretion is advised. The intention is not to offend but to provide information. Proceed only if you are comfortable with potentially sensitive topics. The content on this podcast does not constitute financial, legal, medical, or any other professional advice. Users should consult with the relevant professionals for specific advice related to their situation.

The Podcast is not responsible and cannot be held liable for any damages resulting from reliance on the content provided through the channel's content. All content is provided without warranty.

Nthabiseng Malakoane of the eThekwini District AIDS Council discusses the realities of being a teen parent.
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The Podcast:
Camera: Mluleki Dlamini & Siyabonga Meyiwa
Sound: Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi
Editing: Mluleki Dlamini & Kwenza Trevor Masinga
Co-ordinator: Phumelele Khambule
Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

The Podcast:
Camera: Mluleki Dlamini & Siyabonga Meyiwa
Sound: Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi
Editing: Mluleki Dlamini & Kwenza Trevor Masinga
Co-ordinator: Phumelele Khambule
Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za
View episodes on YouTube : Link ➡️ https://youtube.com/@nvmckenzie?si=y8ZcaOQ0yYqjGhA8

Disclaimer:
Some content may include sensitive topics and discussions, listener discretion is advised. The intention is not to offend but to provide information. Proceed only if you are comfortable with potentially sensitive topics. The content on this podcast does not constitute financial, legal, medical, or any other professional advice. Users should consult with the relevant professionals for specific advice related to their situation.

The Podcast is not responsible and cannot be held liable for any damages resulting from reliance on the content provided through the channel's content. All content is provided without warranty.

District AIDS councils reach beyond just the healthcare system and bring business, labour, other government departments, and civil society into the AIDS response in their province or district.

Nthabiseng Malakoane of the eThekwini District AIDS Council shares more on the Council's interventions to get young people to make use of public health facilities to protect themselves from STIs and HIV. She also encourages families as well at the community at large to play a part in dealing with HIV/TB/STIs and Teen Pregnancy.

The Podcast:
Camera: Mluleki Dlamini & Siyabonga Meyiwa
Sound: Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi
Editing: Mluleki Dlamini & Kwenza Trevor Masinga
Co-ordinator: Phumelele Khambule
Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za
View episodes on YouTube : Link ➡️ https://youtube.com/@nvmckenzie?si=y8ZcaOQ0yYqjGhA8

Disclaimer:
Some content may include sensitive topics and discussions, listener discretion is advised. The intention is not to offend but to provide information. Proceed only if you are comfortable with potentially sensitive topics. The content on this podcast does not constitute financial, legal, medical, or any other professional advice. Users should consult with the relevant professionals for specific advice related to their situation.

The Podcast is not responsible and cannot be held liable for any damages resulting from reliance on the content provided through the channel's content. All content is provided without warranty.

A definition that is offered for psychosis is that it is a collection of symptoms that affect the mind, where there has been some loss of contact with reality. But what are the causes? Well, Dr Wambua joins us on this episode of the Podcast to discuss her research on Psychosis Among Victims of Childhood Trauma.
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About Dr Nduku Wambua

According to Dr Grace Nduku Wambua, a Kenyan Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Africa Health Research Institute who graduated with a PhD in Psychiatry from UKZN on 6 May 2024, levels of resilience might explain why although there is a high incidence of psychosis among victims of childhood trauma, not all individuals exposed to it develop mental health problems when they become adults.

Psychosis refers to a collection of symptoms that affect the mind, where there has been some loss of contact with reality. A clinical psychologist by training, Wambua felt it was important to understand how the processes involved in child development interact with individuals to develop resilience. Her doctoral research thus aimed to add knowledge to the field of mental health research by exploring the role played by resilience in individuals exposed to childhood trauma by comparing patients with first-episode psychosis with healthy controls.

Co-supervised by UKZN’s Psychiatry Chief Specialist and Head of Department, Associate Professor Bonga Chiliza and clinical psychologist, Dr Sanja Kilian, 14 participants who had experienced adversity in their childhood were recruited to Wambua’s study using a multiple-case study design. They were interviewed to understand how they conceptualised trauma and how they coped during and after the traumatic experience. The data was analysed using Braun and Clark’s reflexive thematic approach, the findings providing a local portrait of childhood adverse events and coping strategies, providing a qualitative understanding of the role of early experiences and their subsequent impact on perception and adaptation.

‘This study concurred with previous literature, suggesting that resilience processes are complex and contextual. In addition, consistent with the literature, the study supported the notion that the negative sequelae of childhood trauma may be prevented or moderated if appropriate support through necessary prevention and interventions was put in place at all ecological levels and provided at the right time for those confronted with adversity, especially those in vulnerable environments.' Wambua said.

‘With most knowledge on the topic having been generated in the Global North, this study in sub-Saharan Africa (specifically Kenya) adds a unique addition to the field of resilience in psychosis. Our findings emphasised the multi

The Podcast:
Camera: Mluleki Dlamini & Siyabonga Meyiwa
Sound: Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi
Editing: Mluleki Dlamini & Kwenza Trevor Masinga
Co-ordinator: Phumelele Khambule
Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za
View episodes on YouTube : Link ➡️ https://youtube.com/@nvmckenzie?si=y8ZcaOQ0yYqjGhA8

Disclaimer:
Some content may include sensitive topics and discussions, listener discretion is advised. The intention is not to offend but to provide information. Proceed only if you are comfortable with potentially sensitive topics. The content on this podcast does not constitute financial, legal, medical, or any other professional advice. Users should consult with the relevant professionals for specific advice related to their situation.

The Podcast is not responsible and cannot be held liable for any damages resulting from reliance on the content provided through the channel's content. All content is provided without warranty.

I first met Dr Balungile Zondi in 2018 and I was intrigued by her research that delved into the life and experiences of young women (19-35 years) living on the streets of the Pietermaritzburg CBD and surroundings. On this episode of the podcast, we look at what has changed since we last spoke and post-COVID.

Dr Balungile Zondi has a PhD in Anthropology, MA in Policy and Development Studies, Honours in Policy and Development, Honours in Sociology as well as a Degree in Development and Anthropology which she got from the University of KwaZulu-Natal (Pietermaritzburg Campus). She joined UKZN from 2017 and has graduated MA and Honours students in the School of Social Science. Before joining UKZN, she worked for the Department of Social Development for 11 years (5 years under the Zululand Cluster as a development practitioner) and other six years at the Provincial Office where she worked as Assistant Director: research specialist, Assistant Director: Advocacy and Information specialist and well as Assistant Director: Monitoring and Evaluation. She specialized in issues of development, monitoring and evaluation, HIV/AIDS and women programmes while coordinating international programmes for United Nations Population Funds (UNFPA). She has a teaching experience introduction to Anthropology, Culture and Society in Africa, Culture, Health and Illness, Applied Anthropology, Research plus special Topic, Ethnographic Research Methods as well as in Globalisation, Migration and Diaspora studies. As an emerging scholar at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, she has developed an interest in research areas such as policy development, implementation and analysis, migration, globalization and diaspora studies, women and young women issues, gender-based violence, development issues, streetism, local government and democracy, children rights and other related issues, disability. Lastly, she is a mother of twin boys and also involved in community engagement.

The Podcast:
Camera: Mluleki Dlamini & Siyabonga Meyiwa
Sound: Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi
Editing: Mluleki Dlamini & Kwenza Trevor Masinga
Co-ordinator: Phumelele Khambule
Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

Contact: info@nvmckenzie.co.za
View episodes on YouTube : Link ➡️ https://youtube.com/@nvmckenzie?si=y8ZcaOQ0yYqjGhA8

Disclaimer:
Some content may include sensitive topics and discussions, listener discretion is advised. The intention is not to offend but to provide information. Proceed only if you are comfortable with potentially sensitive topics. The content on this podcast does not constitute financial, legal, medical, or any other professional advice. Users should consult with the relevant professionals for specific advice related to their situation.

The Podcast is not responsible and cannot be held liable for any damages resulting from reliance on the content provided through the channel's content. All content is provided without warranty.