Vrystaat Confessions

Tag: Natal Teachers College

21st on Kenroy
Sheila saw to it I had a party! As so often, Sheila saved the day. Back in 1976 before there were rules and the rinderpest was still contagious.

– those TC wimmin could really get things going –

Des Glutz threw open his palatial bachelor home, Kenroy, on the banks of the mighty Vulgar River to an invasion of students from Johannesburg and Pietermaritzburg. That’s because as a lonely horny bachelor Free State farmer he had his eye on some of those student teachers from Teachers Training College in PMB!

“Kindness of his heart” you thought? Ha! You know nothing about horny bachelor Free State farmers! Anyway, he owed me for managing his farm brilliantly when he went to Zimbabwe. Probly doubled his profit that year.

Sheila invited everybody – and everybody arrived!

Eskom had not yet bedeviled Kenroy, so paraffin lamps, gaslamps and candles gave light. So you didnt flick a light switch, hoping it would work, no. You lit a lamp knowing it would work cos Gilbert will have reliably topped up the paraffin. Des might have done that, you thought!? Ha! You know nothing about lonely horny freestate farmers with butlers. Music pomped out from car batteries. There was singing and much laughter. Except when Noreen, Jo and Ski danced their Broadway routine The Gaslamp Revue with Redge Jelliman holding the silver tray footlight staring in open-mouthed wonder at their skill. And of course, their legsnboobs – another lonely horny bachelor Free State farmer, y’know. Awe-struck silence reigned. For minutes.

– Noreen and Jo in the Gaslamp Revue, using available props –

– Reg dreaming bachelor harem dreams – Noreen Mandy Jill Liz –

There was also Liz and Mops and Jenny, Georgie, Mandy, Gill and Jill; Hell, we bachelors were in awe at almost being outnumbered – a rare event. We were so excited we got pissed and fell down. Timothy Paget Venning got so excited he walked all the way round the house smashing Des’ window panes to let in the night.

– someone baked a cake – lots of advice on how to cut it –

Poor ole Gilbert, Des’ personal butler, valet and chef – seen here in purple – and his men bore the brunt of the extra work!

He cooked and cooked, including a big leg of lamb which didn’t make the main table, getting scoffed on the quiet by ravenous would-be teachers under the kitchen table. Pity the poor kids who would have to grow up being taught all the wrong things by this lot in Natal in the eighties.

– Sir Reginald dreaming he has died and gone to heaven – with Noreen, Mops, Mandy, Jill and Liz –

These would-be teachers and pillars of society were wild n topless:

– if the bachelors had been there, we’d have politely averted our eyes. Right!! –

Tabbo wore his tie so he could make a speech into his beer can microphone:

Funny how Glutz doesn’t feature in any pics! Where was he? We know he wasn’t in his bedroom cos the TC girls raided it and were in awe at the impressive collection of bedroom toys and exotic rubber and latex items in his bedside drawer. No stopping those TC girls!

Ah! Here’s Glutz – Sheila and Liz presenting Des a thank-you gift for hooligan-hosting:

– Sheila & Liz thank Des for hosting – Des tries to hide the liquid gift – in vain –

The morning after dawned bright. Too bright for some . . .

– hair of the dog in the morning –

A mudfight! said some bright spark – Sheila, no doubt – so Des arranged transport to the mighty Vulgar river.

– fasten seatbelts while I check the airbags, says Farmer Glutz, Kenroy’s Safety Orifice – Occifer – Officer – Simpson scratches his head –

– the mighty Vulgar River and its mud – roomerazzit it has beauty-enhancing properties – seems to be working –

After the weekend I roared back to Jo’burg in my brand-new 1965 two-shades-of-grey-and-grey Opel Rekord Concorde deluxe sedan, four-door, grey bench-seated, 1700cc straight-four, three-on-the column, chick-magnet automobile. My first car! Watch out Doornfontein!

– 21st birthday present! A 1965 Opel Concorde DeLuxe 1700 in sophisticated tones of grey and grey. Note my reflection in the gleaming bonnet! –

Thanks Mom & Dad! And thanks for the party, Sheils and Des! Before we left, Mom tickled the ivories while the TC gang belted out some songs:
~~oo0oo~~

The old man organised the numberplate OHS 5678 for me. The man at the Harrismith licencing office said “Oom, are you sure you want an easy-to-remember number for your son? Don’t you want one that’s hard to remember?”

~~oo0oo~~
12 Dec 2017
Homeward Bound after Rag Ball
After NTC Rag Ball in 976, we left Pietermaritzburg’s notorious Hotel Insomnia and drove home in Tabs’ red Datsun fastback, famed for having being called a Ferrari by one of the automotively-challenged TC girls, and a Datsun Triple Ess Ess Ess by Geoff Leslie. We had spent a few short hours in the Hotel Insomnia after the ball was over. I seem to recall about a dozen people in a double bed.

Braithwaite was behind the wheel. He had held back slightly as he still had to drive on from Harrismith to Nelspruit where he was needed to dry-clean some Lowvelders’ underpants. Tabs was in the passenger seat, me on the back seat.
- me & Liz Howe, Sheila & Hilton – Tabs in full voice with John Venning –
Under the flat raking solar panel-like back window of that red fastback was most of a case of beer, baking in the sun. After a short hung-over silence Tabs turned to me and asked “How hot are those beers?”

I said “Shall we share one and see?”

He said “Let’s open two and share them and see.”

We happened to finish the case before we got to HY. Thank goodness for Hilton’s driving! It’s a lot easier to divide by two than by three after a few ales.
- Tabs & Jilly Shipman sing – Dave Simpson, Lettuce and me sit -all at a very clever stage of these academic proceedings –
I was probably sipping cooldrink . . .

~~oo0oo~~
26 Dec 2016
A Chrysler Maritzburger Deluxe

I wasn’t there. It really felt like I was there, and I wanted to be there so bad, but I wasn’t. I wasn’t there. All I know is the Arabs decided to reduce the availability of their oil, thus raising the price of petrol and reducing the speed limit to 80km/h. Petrol stations closed at night and we were forbidden to carry extra fuel. Also that Tabs and his cousin Des decided around then to buy a 1947 Chrysler New Yorker Deluxe. A maroon one. Like good mafiosi, they formed a syndicate to buy it.

I also found out that Tabs and Des set off for the sleepy hollow city of Pietermaritzburg with a few jerry cans full of contraband fuel in the capacious boot of their ‘new’ 1947 maroon Chrysler New Yorker Deluxe to attend the Natal Teachers College Ball. Probably at more than 80km/h.

I also know – well, I heard – that when the cops pulled them over late at night after the ball was over (sing that part), Des was driving clad only in his frayed baggy underpants – had they been for a swim in the Epworth Girls School pool? – and I know that there were lots of ladies on the capacious sofa-like back seat who suddenly found Des sitting on their laps in those same capacious underpants, saying ‘Why, I doubt I even know how to drive such a vehicle, officer.’ The cops apparently very rudely said he was anyway way too drunk to have driven and threw them all in the back of the Black Maria (that part can be sung too, they wrote a song about it).

– TC ladies inside –

When it was time to drive off they asked whose vehicle the maroon Chrysler New Yorker Deluxe was. Everyone pointed at Des; so he was hauled out of the back of the Black Maria and made to drive the big maroon beast to the cop shop.

I also heard that when in the custody of the gendarmes in the back of their police van, those same innocent young ladies let the air out of the cops’ spare wheel.

But as I say, I don’t really know WHAT happened that night . . .

~~oo0oo~~

My friend Charlie Mason remembers something his old man told him years ago:

‘He was too drunk to sing; So we made him drive.’

~~oo0oo~~

26 Jan 2014