A collection of stories from South Africa
A collection of stories from South Africa
"I can only tell you things that happened as I saw them, and what the rest was about only Africa knows." – Oom Schalk Lourens
Fireside stories. Warm, fuzzy—the kind of tale you want to use as a nice, comfy pillow when you drift into dreamland under a magical star infused sky. The reality is, though, that when talking about South Africa, about home, it’s not all warm and fuzzy—is it?
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Thirteen years ago, we arrived in London with a suitcase each and have there since morphed into a family of seven with stuff to match. It’s LOL funny, when you don’t have to pack and carry it.
There it was. Delicious, spongy, oozy, drippy, squidgy Malva Pudding. And then it was gone. Obliterated. Not by an army of South Africans “after the braai” but by one wily 20-year-old.
Once, I was shooting portraits of Stephen Fry at Abbey Road Studio. We had properly limited time because Stephen is a busy guy and the shoot was squeezed in between his recording session, but we got on well and all he wanted to do was tell me stories.
Often, I have to fight the feeling that I am passing on to my children a vague silhouette, an inkling, a ghost, of something that shaped me, that is important to me, that lives in me but is not really real, anymore. And yet I need it to be real. I need to remember…
You know when you go on holiday and there is that overwhelming desire to open every drawer and cupboard in whatever place you are staying just to see? Well, we snuck into the pantry and had a little look.
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Why couldn’t they live close by? What did you think about it?—That your maid’s family was so far away and she was taking care of you? The words that followed; I remember the look of shock on her face…
It was to the backdrop of dust and fynbos that I was served my first vetkoek for breakfast (by a regte egte tannie nogal).
Hastily, we rushed into separate rooms to swap our formal kit for more comfortable party attire. I walked downstairs after finally accomplishing my feat of finishing a magician’s change of clothes, only to realise that I was in an empty apartment…
So when the power went out in our home in Croydon-near-the-power-station that one fateful day, we just sat. Waiting. For hours. Shaking our proverbial fists and swearing (non-proverbially) at Eskom for yet another unscheduled power cut. Six hours later…