Tag: Di Fotherby

Letter from a Student – 1977

I wrote a letter – on paper with a ballpoint pen – as a final year optometry student! Astonishing. When could one find the time? To sister Sheila, newly-qualified teacher in Empangeni in Zululand. My news was:

Passed my supplementary exams.

Started organising our Annual Ball at Carlton Hotel already.

I’m SRC chairman till July.

The mighty grey and grey Opel Concorde ‘needs a tjoon up.’

I may not make Rag Ball in Pietermaritzburg this year!

Unhappy with res in Doories; expensive, badly looked after, phones don’t work; fought with matron; I am moving into a communal house, 4 Hillside Rd in Parktown, where Glen Barker and Clive Nel stay. ‘Before I go, though, I’m going to raise hell to see if things’ll improve.’ (!? )

Steve Reed, Cheryl Forsdick and I baby-sat for Bobby & Jill and Louis & Gail; Babies Craig and Twanet. ‘chaos for an hour, then not too bad. They enjoyed their evening; it had been a long while since they’d gone anywhere.’

Great parties; Braais; a Chinese Dinner-Dance; a cricket day; ‘Played our first rugby match in our new kit – pitch black from toes to necks with the only white our optom badge on the pocket and our numbers on the back; We beat the engineers 18-0.’ (I had REALLY wanted our kit to be all black – no white collars, no white rings on our socks, no white shorts – and we got that! Sponsored by Zeiss Optics).

‘Went to the Vaal river for a weekend’s skiing; two of the guys had boats; stayed in a resort – lovely; went to a 21st in Pretoria; Generally busy except for work – work is suffering muchly; latest tests got 50% and 82% – the averages , thought were something like 80% and 95%.’

And all that was in a letter written 10th March!

Later that year:

– truth-teller –

Went to Pete Brauer and Terry Saks’ wedding in Pretoria. I was best man, had to get on my hind legs. My partner was the delightful Cheryl Forsdick; Lovely evening; Driving back with Clive Nel and the delightful Sandy Norts in Clive’s gas-guzzling white Mazda RX-2 we had a midnight head-on collision; Some drunken idiot turned straight into us on the highway! I was fine but the others got a bit battered, with Clive, driving, the worst. He’s in plaster and on crutches.

~~oo0oo~~

30 May 2020
Someone Burst His Eardrum

Someone burst his eardrum

Hip Hip Hip Hooray
1932

The Witwatersrand College for Advanced Technical 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 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 informally, yet enthusiastically. I spose because there were no officials officiating our match 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 upon which he – a man of few words – explained the situation to me by unleashing a mighty klap on my left eardrum, shattering the peace. I immediately understood what he was on about and agreed to leave the premises forthwith. The klap had 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 but 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 place to sleep (as in the photo on top). The next day my empathetic “friends” were singing to me as mentioned above.

Unsympathetic shits. Luckily I couldn’t hear them.

~~oo0oo~~

18 May 2017