A day in the salt mines here in Kleinzee is literally going off to pick up your own salt directly from mother earth. How freaking awesome is that!
Today we jumped on the XT for a ride down to the deserted yacht club, accompanied for a kilometre or two by a panic stricken steenbokkie who finally dashed off while 7 ostriches ran alongside us, not even 100m away, in their prehistoric-like gait before disappearing over the dunes. The yacht club dam is no longer in use but instead it’s become a salt bay. We were amazed at the fantastic crystals which had naturally built up over time, caking the whole perimeter. We chopped off a whole bunch of salt rocks to take back and now I’m a regte soutie.
It seems people have been using salt since the late stone age. That’s like a moer of a long time ago that people have been using the stuff to preserve food. Fred Flintsone and his tjomma, Barney, probably stood around the braai as they did most nights and as it should be, cooking their Gemsbok steaks, the home brew or magic mushrooms just kicking in and discussing their kill and how it put hairs on a mans chest, back, face and knuckles. Perhaps Wilma was in the cooking area sharing ideas with her sisters about what to do with the left over pieces of hide after making a karos bedspread. By then they would have already been using salt to season their bulbs or other ratatouli veggie dishes since there would have been natural salt pans to be found and being exploratory entrepreneurs, they would have stock piled the stuff for bartering. Maybe that night things got excited as the men chased the women around the braai, dragged them by the hair, you know, the usual foreplay stuff, and maybe that’s when the salt jug fell over onto the wild boar hindleg which Fred was saving for midnight munchies. No-one would have noticed till the next week, what with the rain and the females excited about the new hide mini skirts they were making and the men off hunting and looking for sharp stones to trim their hairy knuckles and to make goatees. And that leg my friend, lying in a salt puddle, could have been the first Parmaham eaten by Neolithic man.
These days salt has got many more functions that just preserving fish, meat and vegetables. For instance it’s used in many descriptive phrases in the Oxford dictionary and the Bible. “The salt of the earth” is a term used to describe these West Coast people. Taken with “a pinch of salt” is probably how you could interpret the story of Little Lotta when she turned back to look at her sinful orgy city and next moment she turned into a pillar of salt.
More salt is used to make pulp, paper, soap, fabric dyes and detergents that actual condiments which only uses 17% of the whole world’s salt. And then its soooo refined and chemically enhanced that it’s hardly of value. Eish now that’s almost like rubbing salt in the wound.
The Chinese were the first recorded people to actually mine the stuff out of the bowels of the Earth. That’s where the really good stuff comes from, deep down, because its been compressed over millions and millions of years and the minerals which salt is made of, being sodium, potassium, magnesium and calcium have had enough time to form magical crystals which are full of transmittable energy. So, if you wear a salt crystal around your neck, not only will you never have to eat bland food again cos you could just use your stone necklace like a salt lick, but you could attract all the dust bunnies in your house like a static feather duster and best of all, if there’s a power failure you might still be able to use your washing machine cos salt is charged with electrolytes. I find these electrolytes quite intriguing although I must say it’s all a bit too scientific for me. I never partook in those school experiments using salt and a battery is probably why I don’t get it. Under normal circumstances I’m quite electrically charged. I use to hate opening my car door because I knew a shock was waiting to jar me into reality and then when I got to work another one would be lined up when I closed my car door. Sometimes I tried to avoid the electric surge by shutting the door with my elbow pressed against the window but the charge would remain in my body and catch me out when I opened the toilet door. These days I don’t drive much but I wonder what would happen if put a few of these salt rocks in my pocket and went to work in the bar with the metal fridge door.
Mmm that could give new meaning to a depth charger. OOhhh the thrills of working a day in the salt mines here in Kleinzee are never ending.
Regte soutie – real English through and through
Moer – heck
Tjomma - friends
Braai - barbeque
Karos – leather patch work throw
Eish – Golly gee whizz
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