Tersinah Shieh is the go-to person for SA wineries wishing to introduce their products to greater China. So you need an extra long HB pencil with which to scratch your head for the decision by the Macau  Institute for Tourism Studies to fly an Irishman all the way from Dublin to Macau in November for a week to present SA wines at a charity dinner when Tersinah lives next door in Hong Kong. Sounds like unspent budget to me.

It’s nearly as bad as ViniPortugal sending Charles Metcalfe to Brazil to explicate Portuguese wines which nearly caused another Carnation Revolution among Luso wine writers who wondered whether Chas’ Portuguese would be up to it with native Portuguese speakers struggling in Brazil sometimes. Of course no SA scribblers will wonder why South Africans are not good enough to present wines in Macau. After all,the Irish did send the boers some handy reinforcements during the Boer War in the shape of the Irish Transvaal Brigade.

They serviced the famous Long Tom kanon at the Siege of Ladysmith and lost 18 men killed and 70 wounded during the war. Backing the underdog is one of the grandest features of the Irish which makes them most suitable to present SA wine in the most challenging wine market on the planet. That and heroic drinking. Which could be why Martin Moran (above) was hired as the face of SA wine in Macau. Or maybe Martin is a whiz at Manderin. Heck if that was the criterion, they could have sent Ed Hung from the South China Dim Sum Bar who has put together the hippest wine list on Long Street, after which the boer kanon is presumably named.

I for one am not buying the conspiracy theory that WOSA has been taken over by leprechauns. The fact that the new CEO is called Siobhan is just a coincidence and Andre Morgenthal looks nothing like Finn McCool. Besides, “Fionn” is actually a nickname meaning “bright.” Also WOSA does not stand for Wines of South Antrim.

So let’s see who will front the South African Week in India 21-27 April 2014. Someone from Outer Mongolia perhaps? Or maybe a Muslim from Pakistan?