The Witwatersrand College for Very Advanced Education chose a rugby team to play in the inter-college festival down in Durban-by-the-Sea and they didn’t choose me. I can only think the selectors hadn’t had their eyes tested.
So I had to choose myself and find my own way down to the coast on the sparkling blue Indian Ocean so as to be able to add to the fun and laughter and educational and character-building value of such gatherings. And the imbibing contest, which was actually my forté, but – for some reason – they didn’t have a drinking span. Strange.
So we had to compete in our specialist discipline informally, yet enthusiastically. I spose because there were no officials officiating our match – which we were winning – we lost sight of the time and forgot to arrange accommodation n stuff, so when it became very late we looked around and found we were in someone else’s hotel – the salubrious Killarney – and in someone else’s room, like Ray Schoombie’s the flyhalf of a less important span that was only playing rugby. We were trying to scrounge floor space to kip on.
Schoeman and the delightful Fotherby were 100% legal and official and legitimately (if you believe that Slim and Pru knew about this) had a room and so we made merry in it. Perhaps too much. Because suddenly someone marched in and very rudely demanded that we shurrup and also that we leave. I stepped forward to help this rude gentleman right, but would he listen? Blah hotel manager Blah he carried on trying to explain while I was trying to explain. He was like:
Then another man stepped forward. A man of few words – also few clothes. His opening move was a mighty klap on my left eardrum, shattering the peace. Eensklaps, I understood what he was on about and agreed to leave the premises forthwith. He was what you’d call succinct. That klap blocked my ear, but cleared my vision and I now could see he was large and dressed like Shaka Zulu and carried a shield and a knobkierie.
All the way down the stairs this burly and persuasive gent’s lips were moving, so maybe he wasn’t all that succinct? Anyway, I couldn’t hear a word he said. I was deaf as a post.
He was like:
I was like:
Don’t worry, compassionate people, I found a comfy place to sleep (someone took a photo). The next day my empathetic “friends” were singing to me.
Unsympathetic shits. Luckily I couldn’t hear them.
~~oo0oo~~
span – team
klap – flattie; flathand smack
eensklaps – Shakespearean, meaning ‘forthwith,’ or ‘like a thunderbolt’
knobkierie – fearsome weapon used for bigger challenges than simply evicting trespassers
“Kom, kom, kom! Vyf Rand elk. Brings your money! Five Rands. I’m going to town. E’ gat do’p toe”. Town being Ellisras or Thabazimbi. The civilian staff sergeant from the Cape was shouting in that well-known accent – or eccent, ek sê. He was organising a whip-around to augment the army rations he had been issued as mess sergeant on our Commando camp out in the bushveld somewhere north of Pretoria. We were playing ‘Field Hospital Field Hospital’.
He returned a few hours later with a big sack of onions, cooking oil and a vark of cheap white wine – a 25l plastic spug-spug. So instead of plain bully beef and boiled spuds we had a varkpan full of fried bully beef, spuds and onions, like bubble-n-squeak GT, and a fire-bucket filled with half a litre of semi-soetes for our supper. Much better. We considered the matter carefully and then all agreed one could actually quite easily call him a gourmet chef, and so we gave his mess a Michelin star.
His vark was unlike the one on the left. Also actually unlike the one on the right. It was a big, floppy, papsak bag – like a very large colostomy bag.
=======ooo000ooo=======
One of the civvies on camp was Rod Mackenzie, trainee-ophthalmologist and lovely mensch from Durban who I would soon meet again and work with for years, first in hospitals and then in private practice. That was after the weermag in their wisdom sent me to Durbs as adjutant to the medics in the various KwaZulu hospitals.
=======ooo000ooo=======
E’ gat do’p toe – Capetonian toothless way of saying I’m Going on a Shopping Spree
vark, spug-spug – large plastic container filled with fine, rare vintage wine, if you ask me
varkpan – metal army-issue eating and cooking pan
fire bucket – metal army-issue drinking and cooking bucket
semi-soetes – fine, rare vintage wine, if you ask me
papsak – scrotum-like but transparent, unlike the army
Very few people realise just how good the Stromberg is. One of those very few is Brauer. He knows, as he invested a large portion of his student fortune in one at The Rand Easter Show one year (or was it the Pretoria Skou?).
We watched a demonstration in fascination. I mean EVERY time the good honest salesman hooked in the Stromberg the engine ran sweetly and WHENEVER he unhooked the Stromberg it spluttered and farted. Brauer was SOLD. He just KNEW this was the answer to his faded-blue Cortina with faded-black linoleum roof’s problems. Instead of taking it for a long overdue service and changing the oil, water, filter and spark plugs, he would sommer just fit a Stromberg. What could possibly go wrong go wrong, and who could doubt this:
~~~oo0oo~~~
Here’s an email thread that sparked the discussion of the amazing Stromberg phenomenon:
2015/08/30 Steve Reed wrote:Re: Fat takkies
Further proof that nothing stays the same. From our youthful past, it was always a “given” that the back takkies would be fatter than the front …Specially if you have the windgat version. Now the Audi RS3 has em 2cm fatter in the front than the back if you have the windgat version.
Really…I am getting too old for all this. Do they have to mess with everything?
Me: Yep. Because they can . . .
I remember the mindset change I had to undergo when diesels started getting status. Ditto when auto boxes started making more sense than manual? Had to quietly swallow a few ‘definite’ and ‘absolute’ statements made in ignorance!
One of my fascinations has been looking up when the first ____ (whatever) was ever fitted or used in a car.
First electric car – 1881 in France
First patent for seat belts – 1885. But still not compulsory when we grew up and STILL not compulsory throughout the USA today. Politicians in many states wouldn’t dare vote for such a law!
First petrol-electric hybrid – 1899 Lohner-Porsche Mixte
First modern hybrid car – 1904 Auto-Mixte (Belgium)
and so on – almost always WAY before I would have guessed !
Brauer: A glaring omission has been noted from your ”when was it first fitted” list:
THE FAMOUS STROMBERG
Do you recall how I had Alan Saks (the great car fundi) going on this one . . ?
Me: I do. Didn’t we see it some show or other? A great demonstration. If it had been a religion I’d have converted. I would be a Strombergie now.
Who would think Pretoria would have a skou!? What is there to show?
So Alan was not an all-knowing deskundige after all?! Even HE could learn a thing or two?
Brauer: The one and only Pretoria Skou. ca 1976. Alan had driven my Cortina a few days prior and was subjected to the stop/start lurching. He had many remedies and suggestions. I obviously thanked him for his advice, BUT ALSO ENLIGHTENED HIM re: THE NEWLY PURCHASED SOLVER-OF-ALL-CAR-PROBLEMS . . . THE STROMBERG. Remembering the “God-ordained” visit to the Skou and that Stromberg stand where we witnessed the justifiably impressive presentation of a product that should have outstripped Microsoft in sales.
To which he chuckled and shook his head in disbelief. I hauled it off the floor behind the driver’s seat to show him. I remember a few choice expletives . . “complete f…ing piece of sh-t” etc etc.
So that weekend I started installing said Stromberg, which involved a rare opening of the bonnet (a procedure I normally advise against to any motoring enthusiast). For starters (no pun intended), after glancing at the oil coated sparks, I thought that while the bonnet was open I might just clean the sparks and set the gaps. Before removing the Stromberg off it’s familiar position of lying on the floor behind the driver’s seat I thought I’d take the Cortina for a spin to see if it still could go after my risky DIY service.
Shit a brick . . it flew! (“why the hell didn’t I do that long ago!?” rolling through my thoughts as the apparently turbocharged Cortina used our sedate suburban streets as its new-found race track).
After getting back home I parked the car and almost forget what I’d started . . THE STROMBERG.
I quickly installed it on-line on the main spark lead and couldn’t wait for Alan’s visit that arvie. Chucked him my keys and said he should take the Cortina for a spin to see if he could tell if the Stromberg had made any diffs . . . The rest is folklore history . . he was stunned into silence, well for at least 3 minutes – but a Saks record nevertheless.
Steve Reed chipped in: You will laugh out the udder side of your face when you read these glowing endorsements. I think I am going to buy one online right now.
Me: Brauer, you forgot to put in the most important feature of the Cortina: The colour. What colour was it?
(I read about a popular radio talk show in the States: Two brothers had a “Car Experts” show. People would phone in and ask about the problems they were having with their cars. Long technical details of what the clutch and carburetor and shit were doing and where the smoke was coming out of etc etc – and the one brother would ask “Tell me: This Corvette of yours: What color is it?”).
.
It was light blue.
– the Cortina after the stromberg was fitted –– before stromberg –
They wanted us to have a good time and they fed us with many many craft beers and ordinary beers. Come and enjoy the Rand Easter Show, they said in 1976. Well in those days it was that or this:
We glanced at the displays and the arena – cows were moo’ing and plopping, horses were made to jump over things – but most of the day was spent in the friendly beer halls where the only answer to “May I have another beer?” was “Of course you may!” We ended up sparkling with wit and bonhomie.
After dark it all shut down and we wandered towards the car park eating ice cream cones the TC girls from Maritzburg – up to visit the handsome Doornfontein crew – had bought us (hoping to sober us up?). We passed some horse trailers and the rear end of Gonda Betrix’s horse stared us straight in the eye. Like this:
It was too much to resist and our artistic instincts took over: Lift the tail, place ice cream dollop on the O-ring and then the horse made the mistake of clamping its tail down hard, cementing the deal. I spose a shiver ran down its spine, but it stayed pretty calm considering, just dancing a little – in pleasure maybe? Thoughts of animal cruelty DO cross my mind now but they didn’t reach my addled brain at the time.
We shuffled off. Who drove that night? Hopefully the ladies. Sheila, Noreen, who else? Anyway we safely arrived at Stephen Charles’s flat, Greenwich Village, Becker Street in Yeoville and had another beer as we were inexplicably thirsty.
Noreen said to me, “I’ve run a bath, you go ahead”. Very thoughtful of her! I shucked my kit and jumped in and immediately went right through the ceiling! Which wasn’t ceiling board as Steve’s flat was not on the top floor. It was concrete. She’d run the hot only and my (future) wedding vegetables were parboiled. Took days before they were ready to be molested again. In fact, the damage may have been permanent: I ended up waiting twelve years before risking getting married, and waited a further ten before adopting kids.
I could have done with some of that ice cream, applied judiciously and not wasted on the Beatrix nag.
Quora asked this question recently: “How do you know when you are fluent in a language?”
I answered thus: My guess is usually you won’t really know. Native speakers are usually polite and will flatter you with a better assessment than is true. Maybe a better question to ask yourself is “When am I fluent enough?”
My guess? When you’re enjoying using it and not really thinking about it. I am fluent enough in Afrikaans and can happily hold any conversation with someone who only speaks that language. But even though I have spoken it since I was little, no native speaker would mistake me for a native Afrikaans speaker.
Confession: I laboured under the mistaken impression that I was completely fluent. No-one told me otherwise. Then at age fourteen I went to Namibia (South West Africa as it was) and visited third cousins I had never met before. Within two sentences one of them blurted out “Jis! Jy kan hoor jy’s ’n rooinek!” (Boy, You can hear you’re English-speaking!) and my bubble burst. I’m now amazed I was so deluded!
Another case in point: My 94-yr old Dad speaks “fluent Italian” which he learnt in Italy in WW2. I asked an Italian-born schoolfriend a few years ago “How well does the old man actually speak Eyetie?” and he said “Really well. Really”. Somehow I think that’s politeness. I mean, two years in Italy seventy years ago when he was already 22yrs-old – ?? How likely is that? But I have no way of telling, so I’m happy to go with Claudio’s assessment! Thanks, figlio!
Another: I often get complimented for speaking good Zulu. This is definitely not true and is just polite people’s way of saying “Thank you for trying to speak isiZulu to me”.
Tshwane – An interesting place, Tshwane, famous for the protection of its inebriates.
Home of the Self-Guided Car
– Brauer crashes Audi into school, dances on roof –
Few people know that Pretoria Boys High, Audi and Elon Musk were secretly piloting a new self-driving car in Tshwane when their test pilot, one PH Brauer, Esq, pulled out of the program for reasons unknown, although rumour has it his wife gave him a thick ear one evening after golf. Details are sketchy, as is the test pilot, a Pretoria Boys High old boy. A PHB from PBH you could say. Some of the project’s left-over funds were spent re-building a school wall. You’d think they would speed up the research, cos some people really do need to have their steering wheel removed – as in the top picture.
So that didn’t really work out.
Home of the Amphibious Canoe
– roof about to be danced on –
OK, that didn’t work so well either, but at least there was no ongeluk thanks to the presence of two more responsible parties and the same long-suffering wife who took over the wheel of a high-powered vehicle at a crucial point when the inebriated one on the white Ford Cortina roofrack, one PH Brauer, Esq, thought paddling the Dusi was as easy as running Comrades.
Home of the Original Toilet Bowl Airbag
– toilet airbag –
This field project took place outside Tshwane city limits in rural Yeoville on the second floor of a two-storey building. It also didn’t really work so well, as the protective airbag failed to deploy until after the teeth of the main character in the act, one PH Brauer, Esq, had already chipped the porcelain. Work is continuing on developing a more robust alcohol fume sensor that triggers the bag. It seems the original sensor was simply overwhelmed by the overload and went phhht.t.t. and instead of inflating the bag it caused deflation in more areas than one. Some left-over shards of porcelain from the shattered toilet were used as a temporary stop-gap in the teeth gaps. Thutty years later they were still there and he was still saying he’d go for the permanent crowns ‘soon.’
Home of Gullible Stromberg Suckers
Although handicapped by the absence of any alcohol consumption, this project went surprisingly well, when the sucker in question, one PH Brauer, Esq, paid a premium price for a piece of inert plastic to attach to his car’s sparkplug cable. Or fuel pipe. Or windscreen wiper cable. It doesn’t matter where you clamp it. The resulting imaginary marginal improvement in performance from sat to so-so was enough to impress another Tshwane deskundige – a brother-in-law of the original sucker – into believing the scam. Both were so taken in they gave the old pale blue Cortina its first service and wax.
Home of a Future Dynasty
– australopithecine swanies out birding –
Interesting place, Tshwane, ancestral home of the australopithecine Tshwanepoels, where we have land claims we haven’t exercised. Yet. But we know the area well from having lived there for many generations, eating various antelope and picking berries. Also Terry’s famous roast and extra veg cos some people don’t eat their vegetables.
~~oo0oo~~
ongeluk – smash; prang; crash; motor vehicle accident
sat – farktap – sluggish+; very sluggish; unimpressive
farktap – not well
deskundige – ‘like Des’; spurt; eggspurt; would-be expert; given to calling things ‘kak’
One dark night in Deepest Darkest Doornfontein we were playing darts in the New Doornfontein Hotel pub, a salubrious emporium of renown. Probably one of the best hotels in Doornfontein. Top three anyway.
Actually to be more exact, we were engaged in a very important international darts championship tournament, and we were in the final. We had made it through to the final by skill and courage. And imbibing. See, it was The unOfficial Inebriated World Darts Championships of The World. Our opponents were the Sicilian Mafia who had materialised out of nowhere, tapped one of us on the shoulder and announced darkly in a sinister growl: “We play you next.” That’s how they got into the final. We didn’t dare to do anything but nod nervously.
It was like this in the Us vs Them stakes:
– Us – – Them –
We were not fooled when during the important ceremony of ‘diddle for middle’ they missed the bull’s eye by about three metres and we hit bull to go off first. We knew they were simply lulling us into a false sense of security and had in fact wanted us to go first as part of a dastardly plot. This plan was executed faultlessly as we continued to whip they asses and beat them by a mile in all three rounds. Something was afoot. We got even more nervous when they appeared to accept their defeat in good spirit and retired to a corner of the bar conversing – sinisterly for Sicilians – in Portuguese and Joburg English.
Our lives were saved that night in that we ordered beers when the barman called ‘Last Round!’ and the Mafia didn’t. So at closing time the Mafiosi left and we stayed behind to finish our drinks, huddled in a corner as far away as we could get from the door in case it suddenly shattered and splintered under sustained machine gun fire.
The barman then escorted us out the back. He ‘eskorted’ us note . . Behind the bar counter, through the kitchen past the chest freezers – take note, I am not mentioning the chest freezers for nothing here – past the chest freezers: these clues will feature again at the end of this story, eskort and those chest freezers – and out the back door. As I hurried through the kitchen I thought I had seen some movement of the one chest freezer lid out of the corner of my eye . .
Then we were outside – into the courtyard of the New Doornfontein which was even darker than the unlit streets. Then out that side motor gate visible on the far left into Height Street.
– recent pictures here and top showing clearly how the New Doories has been nicely renovated since our day – also doubled its number of stars – bloody looxury now – I see they are still ‘open till late’ –
We scurried home through the empty streets at night to our lavish quarters in the plush Doories residence of the Witwatersrand College for Advanced Technical Education a few blocks away, keeping to the shadows. It was all shadows.
Once safely inside we opened the large door of the old off-white Westinghouse with ‘Fridge Over Troubled Waters’ written on it in cokie pen. Finally we, The unOfficial Inebriated World Darts Champions of The World, could relax. Another beer to calm our troubled nerves . .
Suddenly the smell of frying bacon filled the room . . .
I once got mugged in Louisa Street. By Louisa Street.
Lightly inebriated, I was walking back to res from a trip to Hillbrow to spend invest some of my Barclays Bank student loan.
The normally dark and deserted Louisa Street in Doornfontein was dark and crowded. Parked cars lining both sides of the road. The Arena Theatre across the road from res had a show on.
Quite unexpectedly – maybe seismic movement from all the tunneling underfoot to reach the Doornfontein gold in days gone by? – Louisa Street suddenly leapt up and smacked me right in the face, breaking my glasses.
For some unfathomable reason it was very important that I gather all the little shards of glass from my shattered lenses, so – as luck or Murphy would have it – I was on my hands and knees when the theatre ended and happy patrons streamed out into the street, their minds filled with the moral of the story (or more likely, flashes of boobs and skin – the few shows we went to at The Arena had actresses acting daringly with sundry nipples jiggling). They were scurrying a bit, eager to find their cars and drive home to more salubrious areas of Johannesburg. The Arena was surrounded by vacant lots and abandoned houses, so they were probably in a bit of a hurry because of the shady reputation of the neighbourhood. AND HERE, in front of their eyes, on its hands and knees, was proof of that!
– The Arena Theatre of Doornfontein –
I was not to be put off my search though, so people had to walk and drive around me, grovelling searching diligently in the middle of the tarmac. Next minute someone bent over me and said “What’s your name?”. The affrontery! It was Mnr “JJ” van Rensburg of the Doornfontein koshuis who was trying to help by getting one of his charges out of harm’s way. “Shwanepoel” I slurred.
I spelt it out in case he didn’t know: “S – W – A – N – E – P – O – E – L – Shwanepoel” .
Explaining that I probably didn’t need to gather every tiny piece as the School of Optometry would likely replace my lenses for me, he coaxed me back to the safety of the res grounds. He was weird, but had a good heart, ole JJ. We gave him sleepless nights.
– “Ah! Here’s another little shard . . . ” – maybe this one’s got the PD on it –
In this aerial view of our lekker JHB pozzie, the red arrow marks the spot where the nose and the nosebridge met the tarmac.
The green arrow is where Agnes ignited. Another story . .
PONTE, the tall round famous building, was just out of picture at the top edge.
There could also be a purple arrow where my roommate Twaalf Eiers hid naked in my cupboard while the cops searched for him – wanted for questioning for streaking near the guineafowl arrow during rush hour . . .
She actually did. My sister Barbara’s granma lived at 131 Boom Street Pietermaritzburg.
Born in the bedroom on the left on 15 December 1922
Right across the road was this school. Going to the Afrikaans school would have meant a bus ride, and Oupa was frugal.
And so started the ver-engels-ing of Dad. The rooinek-erisation. Pieter Gerhardus became ‘Peter’.
~~oo0oo~~
*ver-engels – Anglicisation
*rooinek – Boer word for Poms – anyone from ‘England’ – any of those islands left of France. Literally ‘red necks’ – but not American rednecks. NB: This excluded those Irishmen who fought for the Boers against the plundering, wicked, invading, looting Poms. Even though Irishmen can have very red necks.
~~oo0oo~~
From here (the way I understand it) they all went to Havelock Road Primary; Yanie the oldest went on to matriculate at Girls High; Lizzie the second child went on to Russell High School adjacent to the little school across the road, leaving in Std 8 to go and work; Boet finished Std 6 at Havelock Road and got his first job at Edel’s Shoe Factory, his second in Howick at Dunlop. On the way back one day he crashed his motorbike and injured himself badly. Lizzie arranged a bursary for Dad the youngest to go to Maritzburg College where he left in April in his matric year to join the post office as an apprentice electrician.
– a pre-school, a primary school and three high schools – click to enlarge –
As a 17-yr-old in 1973 I flew from Jo’burg to Rio de Janeiro, then on to New York. This in an SAA Boeing 707 – a narrow-body, four-engined jet airliner built from 1958 to 1979, the first jet to be commercially successful. Dominating passenger air transport in the 1960s and remaining common through the 1970s, the 707 is generally credited with ushering in the jet age’. Wikipedia also says that 10 of them were still flying in 2013! Here’s one:
I flew on via Chicago to Oklahoma City, where I was met by Apache Rotarian Robert L Crews III.
I knew very little about flying and maybe that’s just as well. I now know this:
January 2 – Attempting to land in Edmonton, Canada in blowing snow, a Pacific Western Airlines Boeing 707 carrying 86 head of cattle and a crew of five, crashed and caught fire. The entire crew was killed. The cattle? Who knows.
January 2 – Released from a psychiatric hospital days earlier, 37yr-old Charles Wenige hid in a lavatory aboard a Piedmont Airlines plane after it arrived in Baltimore, Maryland. When all the passengers had disembarked, he emerged and pointed a .45-calibre pistol at a crew member, demanding access to the liquor cabinet and to be flown to Canada. After two hours of negotiations, he agreed to release the stewardesses in exchange for a meeting with a psychiatrist and a priest. An FBI agent advised Wenige to tuck his pistol away in the priest’s presence. When Wenige did that, the agent overpowered and arrested him.
January 4 – As a Pacific Western airliner prepared to take off from Vancouver, Canada with 18 people on board, a passenger, 26yr-old Christopher Nielson, drew a gun and demanded $2 million in cash and to be flown to North Vietnam, threatening to blow up the airliner if his demands were not met. During negotiations he allowed most people to disembark, leaving three crew members aboard the plane with him. Police then stormed the plane and arrested him, finding that he was armed only with two toy guns.
January 5 – The mandatory security screening of all airline passengers began at all airports in the USA.
January 12 – The 197th and final American air-to-air battle of the Vietnam War.
January 15 – President Richard Nixon ordered a halt to all bombing, shelling and mining of North Vietnam.
A Boeing 707 chartered by Nigeria Airways crashed after the right main landing gear collapsed while the plane was landing in high winds in Nigeria. It was the deadliest aviation accident in history at the time.
January 27 – A U.S. Navy plane was shot down over South Vietnam – the last American fixed-wing aircraft lost in the Vietnam War.
January 27 – Frontier Airlines hired the first female pilot for any modern-day U.S. airline, Emily Warner. On the same day, the airline also hired its first African-American pilot, Bob Ashby.
~~oo0oo~~
– Air India !! –
On the way back at the end of that year, I flew in an Air India 747 – my first jumbo jet! – from New York to London. On the plane I read in an abandoned newspaper that Air India had been voted World’s Worst Airline – again.
I have since learned this: ‘The years 1971-1973 were very bad for Indian Airlines. The 1971-1972 Pakistan War didn’t help. The airline reported a 45 million rupee loss in 1973, the carrier’s largest to that point. Exacerbating the aforementioned crises was the continual strike being waged by labor. Management, concerned by growing labor costs and inefficiency, eventually locked out many of its workers, operating only a skeleton schedule with a non-union workforce’.
I notice groping is a problem on Air India and they now keep plastic handcuffs to bopha the culprits. I feel I have to report with some regret that none of those sari-clad hostesses groped 18yr-old me, despite this alluring suggestion:
– my first jumbo jet flight was Dec 1973 –
Here’s Air India in 2025 after the worst crash in a decade. Same old . . .?
~~oo0oo~~
World Trade Centre
The Twin Towers of the World Trade Centre in Manhattan were opened in April 1973. I didn’t see – or consciously notice – them in December 1973. How unobservant is that!? And I must have seen them – I went up the Empire State building and looked around. Maybe I was staring at Central Park and the river?
Aerial view of Empire State building – by Sam Valadi
–oo0oo–
bopha – isiZulu for bind, tie up (pronounce “bawpah”)
Vrystaat Confessions 