Father Michael Lapsley prefers a coffee cup with a square handle or one small enough to fit in the grip of his prosthetic hands. At odd moments he feels "grief at what I lost and frustration at the things I can't do anymore."
A victim of a 1990 letter bomb from South Africa's apartheid police and the loss of both hands and an eye, he says "support, love and prayers of people around the world" have saved him from bitterness, but it is not the same for other victims.
Father Lapsely, who spoke at a meeting in Trinity College, Dublin, last night, has responded to the trauma of others, countries and individuals, by his work at the Institute for the Healing of Memories in Cape Town.
Sometimes it makes him angry that the "old order" of people like ex-President Frederick de Klerk attempt "self-absolution" and are unwilling to accept culpability by passing blame on to ordinary people, "the foot soldiers".
Past victims often victimise others: for example the Afrikaners, the Israelis and the Indonesians. In Northern Ireland too, where he has been attending an AFrI conference in Derry on employment and the arms trade, he wonders to what degree both sides think of themselves as victims and "give themselves permission to do terrible things". He ventured that "the Protestant and Catholic God is too small".
Father Lapsley - an Anglican priest born in New Zealand who has been in trouble for his membership of the ANC - is a recent visitor to East Timor. He offered the future president, Mr Xanana Gusmao, the institute's services to help overcome the people's trauma after almost 25 years of Indonesian occupation.
The Derry conference highlighted the proposed building of an arms software factory there by Raytheon, maker of the Patriot missile. As in South Africa, which inherited an important arms industry, there would be a "sad, tragic irony" if peace in Northern Ireland were to be accompanied by an employment which "caused destruction and death to other parts of the world", he says.
It seems churlish to say no to jobs but this is, he says, a question of morality and should be raised higher.
People's stories of trauma, whether from bad things they did or were done to them, has to be "acknowledged, reverenced and recognised." Creating a just and democratic society was one thing, but trauma had to be dealt with "at the level of the human heart" to stop people passing on hatred. He stresses the pain of the journey of forgiveness, and says it is a matter of personal choice that may involve reparation and restitution.
Paraphrasing a Chinese proverb, he says "the one who wants revenge should dig two graves".