Vrystaat Confessions

Category: 1_Harrismith

  • Sweating & Smelling

    Sweating & Smelling

    They actually called it stoei, and it was considered character-building, but all I could think of was sweaty smelly bodies, encountered way too intimately for my liking. I dunno why, but I wasn’t fond of smelling okes’ buttholes. Same when I played slot and 8th man in rugby. But this was early in my life, before under 11 rugby, and before Heilige Giel made me a man.

    Stoei oefening was in the Harrismith Masonic Hall in Bester Street, across the road west of the town hall. And when you’re secretly more interested in the petrified tree lying on the lawn outside than in a new stranglehold to grip a sweaty ou in, you should perhaps realise you’re never going to go far in this, the sport of kings (ja, ja, depends who you ask). Maybe I’d have done better wrestling in the Pharaohs’ days, when it seems they weren’t quite into ‘grappling’ as much. I’d still be the oke on the left, though.

    When you arrived at the Masonic Hall back in my heyday of wrestling, ca.1964, you’d first have to go up the beautiful wooden staircase with its carved banisters and get a grip on the thick heavy mats stored against the wall, then dump them over onto the ground floor, then roll them out. They were there to prevent you getting hurt by the hard floor, as hurting you was the job of the other ous. When the torture ended and Ma came to fetch you in the light blue Volksie you had to schlep them back up the stairs and store them away before you could escape.

    The coach was a meneer Joubert, and his sons – Anton and Leon – were kranige stoeiers. And kranig is what you needed to be if you wanted to advance in stoei. To the next level, where stronger okes could bend you into even tighter shapes and get you to smell your own butthole if they felt like it. That wasn’t really one of my sporting goals and I think it showed.

    Around about then I developed asthma and I suspect the smell caused it.

    Inside the hall – now a furniture shop – showing the ceiling I stared at while knotted; that petrified tree; the Masonic Hall foundation stone laid by an ancestor ‘Worshipful Master’ Alex Caskie, with another ancestor ‘Warden’ James Bain – Thanks for the pics are due to Horst Muller of https://www.ruralexploration.co.za – his site is very interesting, worth a visit!

    ~~oo0oo~~

    See what I mean about stoei? – “Cave paintings in the Bayankhongor Province of Mongolia dating back to Neolithic age ca.7000 BCE show grappling of two naked men surrounded by crowds.” Give me the 150 million year old tree any day, thanks, it seems more civilised.

    stoei – wrestling or grappling (wikipedia)

    slot – lock in rugby; your nose between a prop’s bum and a hooker’s bum

    8th man – also rugby, but your nose between two locks’ bums

    stoei oefening – wrestling practice; ‘character building’

    kranige stoeiers – formidable wrestlers

    Bayankhongor – place of torture, obviously

    kaalgat – dressed like these ous

    – here it’s 1649 and they’re still at it, 9000yrs later, but still kaalgat –

    Harrismith Masonic Lodge history – the lodge was ‘warranted’ in 1878

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Thirty years earlier, Mom used to go to the same hall for more genteel pursuits.

  • Past Perfect Profundity

    Past Perfect Profundity

    Do you remember Una Elphick? asks Mom. I do, and I can see their flat in Herano Hof* in my mind’s eye, I say. A baby grand piano in their small little lounge. That’s right, says Mary, impressed at my longterm memory. This would have been ca.1960. Ever complimentary, she continues, She played the piano beautifully. As well as you? I ask. A slight, telling hesitation, then, I think better. Ja? I query. Well, she could play anything reading the music, but not so much by memory. Miss Underwood would give us a star once we had learnt a piece to her satisfaction, and another, different star when we could play it by heart. I could learn to play by heart quite quickly. She stuck stars on, but later she didn’t buy stars anymore, she just drew stars with crayon on her noticeboard. I quietly think, I bet you had the most stars, but of course I’m biased.

    Molly had a birthday today and I got a cupcake which Sheila ate, she says. That triggers memories of baking. Scottie – legendary Harrismith English teacher Helen Scott – made wonderful cupcakes. With little wings – butterfly cupcakes. It was quite a performance when I picked her up (in her VW Beetle) to take her to cake sales. Trays on the back seat and she would balance a tray on her lap. Mrs Hartley, _____’s mother, made delicious coffee cakes which I would buy for you kids’ birthday parties.

    She’s on a roll. They owned Hartleys Cafe. Once at Hartleys I went in and there was a Black person ahead of me and she barked at him, Can’t you see there’s a person here who I must help? I was mortified, says Mom. I should have walked out. Yep, but that would have been regarded as very strange and wrong at that time, I reassure her. I’ve always known where I get my underdog bias from!

    As we’re saying goodbye she remembers: We got cut off the night before last, she says. ‘Yes,’ I said, impressed at her short-term memory, ‘just when we were about to say something profound!’ Mary hoses herself and says, Yes, like, ‘It was a lovely day today,’ or ‘The wind blew today.’ Yep, something like that, I agreed.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    • Herano Hof visible in the background, behind the pomptroppies. Hey! BEHIND the pomptroppies! Focus!

    Music came in handy back then too. Polly du Plessis and Verster de Wet loved listening to me play. Your popular songs? No, they loved the classics. Beethoven, Chopin, etc. OK! I think she could have played chopsticks, those teenage okes loved Mary and would have sat staring at her!

    ~~oo0oo~~

  • Methodists on the Booze

    Methodists on the Booze

    There are many “Methodist” denominations throughout the world, not only the 1960s Harrismith, Orange Free State version, although that is the most important one. About 112 are listed in wikipedia. So there must be around 112 methylated ways to get to heaven, I spose. Do you think methamphetamines . . Nah! Many – or most maybe? – Methylated dominees will deny whatever I mutter on the topic of their booze doctrine, but this is sort-of what they sort-of think, I think.

    They gloss over Jesus and His wine. Jesus was a lot more pragmatic and accommodating than His Methodists. If He tried that water into wine trick in 2023, He’d be in trouble with this modern-day kerk! They would turn that trick of His into a whine. While it seems Meths are at pains to say they don’t actually BAN grog – no fatwas – they tut tut about it, and suggest that much-ignored Evangelical and Catholic tactic called ‘abstinence.’ The one that doesn’t work. That tactic. This is surely an opportunity for someone to start a 113th Meth sect: One that fearlessly BANS Booze! Methodists seem to have very few Thunderous Hellfire-and-Brimstone Sermons! There’s a gap in the market, surely?

    This from one of the many Methodist websites out there: Abstinence from alcohol “witnesses to God’s liberating and redeeming love, and is part of living into the life God has prepared for us. We start there. We start with abstinence as faithful witness, and as the norm for guiding our behavior.” The fact that ‘where they start’ is 100% non-biblical? Well, the Bible is full of suggestions . . it’s a guideline . .

    In 1960s Harrismith we didn’t get any of the above doctrine, sanks goodness. We got Mary Methodist who played the organ beautifully, coached the choir, sang in the choir, served on the Women’s Auxiliary (where women were kept away from any thoughts of usurping the patriarchy), kept us kids in line, or tried to, AND ran a bottle store. Which bottles contained liquor. She did all of these things well, and with love, did my Mom Mary of the Methodist Church and of the Platberg Bottle Store / Drankwinkel. Sanks goodness, Amen.

    Do Methodists call for prohibition? Almost. They want “public policy calling for the strict administration of laws regulating the sale and distribution of alcohol.” Give them half a chance and they’ll prohibit, bottle stores will close, and the mafia will have a new income stream.

    Well, despite the best efforts and misinformed intentions of the Grog Police, if there is a place as boring as heaven, if it is a good place, and if anyone is going there, Mary Methodist is most definitely at the front of that queue. St Peter won’t even ask to see her ID or her liquor licence. He’ll just wave her right through. I have no doubt about that. Especially if I happen to be doing St Peter duty at the time.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Sundry wafflings about booze by sundry Methodist if you’re interested:

    https://www.umc.org/en/content/communion-and-welchs-grape-juice

    https://www.christiancentury.org/article/2011-03/methodists-shun-bottle-no-one-wants-talk-about

    https://christianityfaq.com/methodists-drink-alcohol/

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Important Harrismith History: Our dorp’s two bottle stores dutifully providing much-needed succour to the grateful townsfolk, including many good Methodists, were the Platberg Drankwinkel and the Horseshoe Drankwinkel. Sister Sheila tells the lovely story of the Aberfeldy farm school where the subject one day was Engels. The teacher asked, Class, who knows the Afrikaans word for Horseshoe? And quick as a flash her friend Elsa du Plessis answered “Drankwinkel.”

    Platberg bottle store, Annie’s Caltex garage, and the Flamingo Cafe. OHS 155 parked illegally in the foreground.
  • The Rajah’s Team

    The Rajah’s Team

    Mom tells of Sparrow Bester’s father coming to our place in Stuart Street – actually, he’d probably have come in the usual way in Hector street as he lived just a block away in Warden Street – to ask to borrow some sheet music. The Besters were a really musical family, says Mom. Sparrow was chosen for The Canaries, nickname of the Free State Jeug Koor.

    Sure, said Mom, What are you looking for? She had a big collection of sheet music kept in a wood and glass cabinet and under the seat of her piano chair. “Rajah’s Team,” said Mnr Bester. Or so Mom heard.

    Mom said no, sorry she didn’t have that and thought to herself, I’ve never even heard of it!

    “Oh,” he said, puzzled that she didn’t seem to know it, “From that new movie Dr Zhivago.“

    Ah, said Mary, figuring it out: Lara’s Theme. And she did have it.

    “I thought so,” said Mnr Bester.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Jeug Koor – Yech Koor we would say jokingly, but actually Youth Choir

    That was ca.1965 and now is 2024 and Mary at 95 still plays Lara’s Theme to “the oldies” at the home.

  • Matric, Interrupted

    Matric, Interrupted

    Hey, we had written four exams already and we had a five day gap before our last two exam papers. Fluffy and I were on the loose, and when Gabba said Kom Plaas Toe, we were bok for that. Gabba had a bakkie and a plaas. For us footbound townies that was Nirvana! Or heaven. Or an attractive proposition ek sê.

    Let’s go!

    First we made a brief stop for Gabba to buy beer with the pooled monies. He was legal, we were still currently unfairly disadvantaged – underage – so we subcontracted the tender.

    We waai’d via the tar N3 to near Swinburne, then level with the gravel to Kiesbeen.

    Gabba’s was an interesting farmhouse. You walked over the ruins of a fallen room or two in full sunlight till you got to what used to be an inside door, but was now Gabba’s main entrance. This section had some roof. Just inside the door was his fridge with a big glass jug on top – one of those with two ears to lift it by. That full jug would come into play later.

    First the beers – we finished them talking n laughing. Then that jar filled with umqombothi – traditional beer – and we finished that. Now we were thirsty. You know how it is: Een is genoeg; Twee is te veel; En drie is te min. Shakespeare, I think.

    Gabba was the brains of this outfit: We’ll phone Frank! he announced. Frank Aveling said Kom Plaas Toe, so we drove over there. More beer. We finished Frank’s beer. Now Frank was the brains trust: No problem, we’ll drive to town. I know a guy. We piled into his green Datsun 1800SSS. And then I thought I’m Gonna Die.

    Low-flying on the gravel road behind the mountain to the gravel Verkykerskop road, then down 42nd Hill on the tar N3 into town. Loud WHUMPS as we hit dips followed by road silence but high revs, and then louder THUMPS as we hit the ground again. Narrow bridges flash by with Frank not moving his foot from where it was planted in die hoek. He and Gabba talking away as Fluffy and I sat in the back, me (and maybe Fluff as well?) shitting myself, thinking, We Gonna Die! Buh-liksem! I was used to low flying with Steph de Witt, but this was ‘nother level! Maybe I’d had too little beer?

    In town Frank had a connection who topped us up with a small case of marginally illegal after-hours beer from behind the Royal Hotel pub. Another stop to throw stones at a first storey window for Penny to shimmy down the drainpipe and join us, and we were off like a dirty shirt. Back to Frank’s place, and now he seemed to be in even more of a hurry, very keen to get home! I’m Gonna Die!

    The next night there was a helluva thunderstorm and I remembered I should maybe tell Mother Mary where I was, I slingered the phone hanging on the wall at Gabbas. 260 asseblief.

    WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN!? Mas can be a bit dramatic, nê? I’m here at Rudolph’s with Leon, I said formally, hoping using their formal klasregister names would make Ma think I was with two august and responsible gentlemen. Well, you better stay there in this storm. Come home tomorrow, said ever-wise Ma Mary.

    This we obediently did.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Postscript: I think I got higher marks for my four pre-Kiesbeen subjects than my two post-Kiesbeen subjects. Maybe cos my head was filled with adventure! I wonder how Fluffy and Gabba’s pre- and post- marks compared?

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Kom Plaas Toe – Let’s do some hard, focused group swotting and exam preparation in quiet surroundings – Gabba’s sensible suggestion

    ek sê – verily

    waai’d – sallied forth

    Een is genoeg; Twee is te veel; En drie is te min – Ah, some Yankee oke called James Thurber, not William: One martini is all right. Two are too many, and three are not enough

    (voet) in die hoek – pedal to the metal

    Buh-liksem! – gosh

    slingered – wound the phone handle

    260 asseblief – two six oh please; To the live person at the telephone exchange; Sometimes Oom Lappies Labuschagne

    klasregister – like a police docket

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Gabba’s classmate Leon Strachan sent me a glimpse of his non-rugby talents with the comment: 😊 😊 kan jy glo dat Gabba ʼn koppie so kon vashou!

    kan jy glo dat Gabba ʼn koppie so kon vashou! – Gabba was not only a three-times Craven Week rugby player. He also was skilled in the arts.

    ~~oo0oo~~

  • On Getting Up

    On Getting Up

    Stephen Charles R, First Son of the famous Artists Village called Clarens, Vrystaat posted a story on chairs, showing this beautifully-made wooden one, on display in the Auckland Art Gallery.

    I stared at it, fascinated and was moved to comment on his blog: ‘Your first pic, the wooden chair, looks like it could stick to the rear of a person with just the wrong-sized bum, poor thing! He’d get up and walk round with people pointing at him and laughing.’

    We spoke about chairs, both confessing to using what Stefaans called, ‘a small folding campfire stool. Footstool size. Useful for lots of things. I use mine for pumping bicycle tires, weeding and any other chore for which I would otherwise have to crouch. ‘Cause I can’t get up.’

    ‘Haha!’ I replied, ‘I have one in my bakkie for changing n pumping car tyres for that same reason: Fear of being unable to rise and lying on the dirt laughing helplessly at the indignity!’

    This reminded me of two of Mom Mary’s favourite stories. At 95 and following a few TIA’s Mary’s recollection of the olden days is still strong. About yesterday she is not bad, considering, but she recalls tentatively. About some funny incidents fifty years ago, of course, she is crystal clear. These two stories both involve her good friend Hester and falls and Getting Up. Hester was a barrel of laughs, sense of humour deluxe; barrel-shaped and vertically challenged, she could tell stories and laugh like a drain; the butt of her humour often being Hester herself.

    The first story, Mary witnessed herself. They were at Hester and her husband Steve’s home. Steve was also barrel-shaped but had plenty of height as well. Visits to their home – which take note was across the road from the big Dutch Reformed Church. the NGK, the National Party at Prayer – entailed eating mountains of food to fill those barrels, and gallons of drink, followed by song, Mary on the piano. On some days if you listened carefully you could hear hymns being sung from across the road, but they’d be drowned out by the non-hymns sung by these revelers, singing lustily on that day when you’re not meant to be having fun. And now followeth a sermon: People past a certain age who imbibe and who have polished parquet floors, should not scatter rugs on those floors. Especially not rugs which are actually dried skins of dead animals, shot by your husband for biltong. Here endeth the lesson.

    Hester bustled about, slipped on a loose springbok skin and landed flat on her back under her large coffee table laden with food and drink and overflowing ashtrays, all of which were wobbling as her tummy jiggled from hosing herself at her predicament. Trapped and helpless and unable to move except for the wobbling.

    The second story Hester told. She went for a walk, slipped and landed in the gutter outside their home. Thus also opposite that church, remember. She was lying there giggling helplessly when Gerrie the town dandy, out for his constitutional, happened on her. I see him with hat, walking stick and cravat. ‘Kom Hester, laat ek jou help,‘ he offered gallantly. NEE Gerrie, LOS! she protested determinedly. Netnou beland jy ook in die sloot langs my, en wat sal die dominee dan se?

    ~~oo0oo~~

    biltong – dried meat; jerky in the ‘states

    Kom Hester, laat ek jou help – Let me help you up

    NEE Gerrie, LOS! Netnou beland jy ook in die sloot langs my, en wat sal die dominee dan se? -No! Leave me. What if you land in the gutter next to me? What will the dominee say then!?

    dominee – preacherman

    ~~oo0oo~~

    I must find a picture of dear old Hester. This one is Mary on the right with another great friend Mary Wessels.

  • I was Born to be a Kayaker . .

    I was Born to be a Kayaker . .

    . . just not a very good one. *

    Actually ‘born to be’ . . ? Yep. Check it out here.

    I love rivers and river valleys; water, especially water rushing downhill in the direction I wish to go; big water, we call it; hairy rapids; fun and scary and I enjoy the . . let’s call it excited, tense anticipation. Yeah, fear. My approach to scary rapids is logical / statistical: I know that big water is high perceived danger, but low real danger and that driving to the river is low perceived danger, but high real danger. So I’d reassure myself with that, have a pee, then fasten my splashy and push off into the current. Of course once you’re there on the riverbank, ‘scouting your line’ through the rapid, peer pressure does have a bit to do with it! You going? Yeah? So’m I.

    I love little rapids too. As long as the water is flowing I’m happy. If I can do much of the trip with my arms folded and the current schlepping me downstream, I’m in paradise. Still water may run deep, but it’s hard work – no progress unless you’re paddling. And the wind is always agin ya!

    Perspiration? Not so much. On many a trip my crazy paddle mates would paddle back upstream to where I was drifting in awesome wonder and ask, ‘What’s Wrong Swanie?’ Nothing was wrong, the day was long. My thought was, What’s the hurry?

    In big water my mate ace paddler Chris Greeff would say, ‘If you ain’t scared, you ain’t havin’ fun!’ a quote he got from Cully Erdman. ** Now Chris – he was a very good one. And also a FreeStater who was ‘born to be’ a kayaker. Like me, he grew up on the banks of a Vrystaat river – the lesser Vile (Vaal) as opposed to my mighty Vulgar (Wilge). I used to give him good advice but he’d ignore it and win races. He has no handbrake; He won just about every race you can win except the one South African laymen ask about. And he nearly won that one, despite short and sensibly reluctant legs. These things are hard to verify, but if there was a combination trophy for the highest beer consumption the night before, coupled on the tote with winning the race the next day, I reckon the only other paddler who would maybe come close was Jimmy Potgieter, a decade earlier.

    Chris should write a book.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    * I saw this lovely basketball quote –

    ‘I was born to be a point guard, but not a very good one,’ by Pat Conroy (interesting man)

    seen on Dr Mardy’s Quotes

    ** fear quotes:

    Closest I can find are –

    ‘It ain’t brave if you ain’t scared,’ by Victor J. Banis in Deadly Nightshade.

    ‘If you ain’t scared you ain’t human,’ by James Dashner in The Maze Runner.

    ~~oo0oo~~
  • Harrismith’s New Park

    Harrismith’s New Park

    (I’ve done a similar post! on the park in more recent days – ‘Our era,’ the 1960s. Enjoy both, and take both with a pincha cerebos).

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Harrismith’s young town council, established only in 1875, though the town had been going for much longer, decided in 1877 to lay out a large park for its citizens to enjoy on the banks of the Wilge River on the south-west edge of the new dorpie.

    Over the following years – and mainly thanks to the efforts of the Landdrost Warden who came to Harrismith in 1884, and Harrismith’s first Town Clerk A. Milne, the area was laid out with winding roads, walking paths, a “lovers lane of poplar trees” and up to 38 species of other foreign trees, in what was then highveld grassland. Or, as described by park praise-singers: “a bare, crude piece of ground!”

    Here we see the Wilge River banks and surrounds just upstream of the park site – near where the ysterbrug, or Hamilton Goold bridge was later built:

    – the troops stationed in the town around the time of the Anglo-Boer War erected this suspension bridge –

    Tree planting commences. Platberg the backdrop.

    The typical Free State river was narrow and shallow, so an attractive little lake with a central island was built on the right bank (town side) and used for boating. Swans were introduced from London ‘for beauty.’ As for trees, so all local life **sniff** was regarded as inferior to things imported from “home”! Home being a small island to the NW of France. The swans did quite well, settled in and bred, the cygnets being sold for £15 a pair, but not long after, they met their end at the hand of ‘some unidentified vandal with a .22 gun.’ Probably an early indigenous wildlife fan, I’d like to suggest?

    As the trees grew, so more and more birds roosted in them, large heronries eventually being established. Predictably people complained and as predictably, the council “did something about it,” shooting the local birds while pontificating against the shooting of the foreign birds! The birds’ carcasses dropped into and frotted in the lake, causing a big stink! In the 60s there were still many cattle egrets in the trees and I recall lots of white poo and some dead babies on the ground beneath their nests.

    In 1897 the lake was named Victoria Lake in honour of the silver jubilee of the Queen – that’s the queen of England, that little island to the NW of France – along with thousands of other things named “Victoria” that year around the world – much genuflection was expected of the colonies. Also they were probably trying to ease her pain over the royal pasting (or snotklap) we had given her at Majuba.

    – they named the lake “Victoria” to arse-creep the queen . . of England – didn’t amuse her, though – never once came to ghoef in it –
    – more recently – sans swans – we shot them all –

    More & more trees would be planted over the years by schoolkids and enthusiasts. Gotta get this place looking more like England, dammit!

    – lovers walk – I remember the poplar trees leaning ominously – were they trying to tell me something about my lovelife? –

    The park was officially opened in 1906 by Sir Hamilton Goold Adams, at “a colourful ceremony with troops on parade and a military band in attendance.” Now they were gloating, having given us a revenge pasting in the 1899-1902 Tweede Vryheids Oorlog (Anglo-Boer War).

    In 1907 the river was dammed by a weir just downstream of the park, thus creating a wider and deeper river for the full length of the park.

    This greatly added to the river’s charm and utility, allowing for swimming, drowning, more boating and bigger boats – even the first motorboat in 1918, owned by Mr E.H Friday. Later a boat house and a landing stage were erected by the Boating Syndicate who advertised ‘Boats for 2 and boats for 4 and boats for all’ in 1922. The Syndicate graduated to a motor launch capable of taking 14 passengers slowly along the river, including full-moon evenings where people would sing the songs of the day, accompanied by “the plaintive sounds of the ukelele”.


    On the edge of the park nearest town sportsfields were laid out, starting with a cricket oval and an athletic track, then rugby, soccer, softball and hockey fields; and jukskei lanes. No croquet?

    The park was extended across the river and a new suspension bridge about 300 yards downstream replaced the one the military had erected (the thrifty town council using some of the metal from the original in the replacement). In time a caravan park was started, but this was soon moved to the town side of the park.

    An impressive entrance – wrought iron gates between sandstone pillars – was erected and named the Warden-Milne gate in honour of those
    who had done so much to get the park established. Well done, chaps! We enjoyed the fruits of your labour in our youth in the 1960s! OK, not really labour, organisational abilities, nê?

    ~~oo0oo~~

    It’s only thanks to the preservation efforts of Biebie de Vos that we can see these old pics. Thanks, Biebie! Also thanks to SA Watt’s military history articles here and here.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Gotta love marketing! In a brochure extolling the virtues of our lovely dorp, the blurb says – where we would have said Dammit, it’s FREEZING! – “the town enjoys a bracing climate.”

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Wilge river – Willow river; Interesting name, as the willows are from the northern hemisphere, and were planted later; only after a while would they have become such a feature of this river (and many other South African rivers); Wonder if our river had another name when the town was first settled?

    dorpie – village

    ysterbrug – iron bridge; for horsedrawn carriages and those newfangled automobiles / motorcars

    snotklap – a tight slap that – if timed right – whips the snot out of the klap-ee’s nose and leaves it wrapped round his face ear-to-ear

    nê? – amiright?

  • Tragic Testicular Descent

    Tragic Testicular Descent

    If you’re writing an olden days blog you run out of material. Only so much happened from when I was born till I met Aitch, which is the timeline of this blog. My ** Born, Bachelorhood and Beer ** blog. So there’s recycling. Here’s a post I wrote in 2016, slightly updated:

    …

    I used to sing beautifully. The teacher who trained the boys choir in Harrismith Laerskool said so. Well, she might have. She was Mej Cronje, and was half the reason ous would volunteer for the choir. To look at her, gorgeous redhead she was.

    I was a sopraan ou and we looked down on the alt ous who, though necessary as backup, weren’t in the same league as us squeakers. One directly behind me used to bellow in my ear: ‘Dek jou hol met bouse off hollie! FaLaLaLa  La LaLaLaLa.’

    One day this delectable and discerning talent spotter, the red-headed Juffrou Ethel Cronje, chose me to sing a solo in the next konsert. Me, the soloist! Move over, Wessel Zietsman! You too, Mario Lanza.

    Fame loomed. It was 1965 and even then, the image of a golden buzzer appeared to me in a vision. This thought crossed my mind: Harrismith’s Got Talent!

    Then tragedy struck!

    My balls dropped.

    They handled it very diplomatically. By ignoring it and cancelling practice. The konsert didn’t materialise. Co-incidence? Surely they didn’t cancel a concert just because one boy suffered testicular descent? And by the time the next konsert came around I hadn’t been banished – just discreetly consigned to the back and asked to turn it down.

    * * *

    Just in case there are people who think Harrismith se Laerskool se Seunskoor was a Mickey Mouse outfit, lemme tellya:
    WE TOURED ZULULAND. The Vienna Boys Sausages were probably nervous.

    We got into the light blue school bus and drove for hours and hours and reached Empangeni far away, where the school hall was stampvol of people who, starved of culture in deepest Zoolooland, listened in raptures as we warbled Whistle While You Work, High on your Heels is a Lonely Goat Turd, PaRumPaPumPum, Edelweiss, Dominique, Dek jou hol, and some volksliedjies which always raised a little ripple of applause as the gehoor thought “Dankie tog, we know vis one“.

    If memory serves (and it does, it does, seldom am I the villain or the scapegoat in my recollections) there was a flood and the road to the coastal village of ReetShits Bye was cut off, sparing them the price of a ticket – though those were probably gratis?

    Can’t remember driving back, but we must have.

    After that epic and ground-breaking (sod-breaking?) tour, warbling faded in importance and rugby took over.

    Later, there was one brief but intense attempt at reviving my career as a singer.

    ~~~oo0oo~~~

    Mej ; Juffrou – Miss; not yet married to Kiewiet Uys; ladies had to be tagged as ‘available,’ guys not

    Harrismith Laerskool – the village school

    Harrismith se Laerskool se Seunskoor – very much like the famous Vienna Boys Sausages

    sopraan ous – high range warblers; not castrati, but can sound like them

    alt ous – the other ous

    ous – us men

    ‘Dek Jou Hol’ – literally, cover your ass; listen to the sopraan-ous, they’re the ones. The highballs are on them.

    highballs – slang for alcoholic drink in USA; ‘giraffe walked into a bar, said, ‘The Highballs Are On Me’

    seunskoor – boys choir

    stampvol – sold out, packed, overflowing; like – viral!

    volksliedjies – folk songs; songs of ve Chosen People

    gehoor – audience, fans, followers; (yes, it was 1965, but we could hear them clicking ‘like’ and ‘follow’)

    dankie tog – fanks heavens, sigh of relief

    ReetShits Bye – Richards Bay, then still a small fishing village on the warm Indian Ocean, the bay still a natural estuary, not yet dug out for coal ships to pollute

    Pa rum pum pum pum – listen to the sopraan-ous, they’re the ones

    ~~~oo0oo~~~

  • None Pictures

    None Pictures

    Mom tells me that after I had me tonsils out at about age three, she took me to Kindrochart for some gentle recovery for the poor little tender chap. I clung to her skirts and wouldn’t go to anyone, I wouldn’t even look at, nor speak to, our hosts Mrs Shannon and Betty Stephens. But once, when lovely, friendly Betty – a huge fan of us kids, we called her Betty Brooks – offered to carry me up a hill after I’d run out of poof, I relented / condescended to use her as a pack horse. Mom was leading us up the hill to show me their farm Nuwejaarsvlei, where she was born and lived till she was eight.

    Mom also tells that I told on Ma Shannon! I hastened into the house one day to find Mom, ‘Ma! Shannon’s got none clothes on!’ Mom hastened out to see this sight and there was Ma Shannon in full petticoat and underwear, shoes and socks, looking quite respectable, thank you. She was preparing to have the Milraes for tea, and wanted to pull on her dress at the last minute.

    Apparently Ma Shannon tried hard to get me to call her Nana, but I’d not call her anything but ‘Shannon.’

    On the way back to the big smoke, driving on the gravel road towards Platberg, Mom was telling Betty about a book she was enjoying about a Belgian nun – The Nun’s Story – I had the book in my hands on the back seat and it seems I was disappointed in it, as I piped up, ‘. . and its got none pictures.’

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Pic: Kerkenberg – the old Binghamsberg – from Kindrochart side – from mapio.net