It’s just the bare necessities, the simply bare necessities of life.

It’s just the bare necessities, the simply bare necessities of life.


I wonder if I’ll ever understand the ways of the Xhosa people here. I’ve only been here a month so naturally it’s way too soon to even imagine that I’m close to knowing what makes them tick.

The cultural village rondavels where we are staying has given me lots to mull over. A few years ago some or other concern, I think it was the department of water conservation, pumped a lot of money into this development centre and it seems as though this place pumped. There is a massive woodwork rondavel where they made cupboards, chairs, blinds and screens from bamboo. At the leather rondavel, it seems as though hundreds of leather shoes, key rings, book covers and bags were produced. The dusty filing cabinets filled with fishmoth riddled paperwork indicates that different skills were taught here but when the development group left, for what ever reason I don’t presume to know, things just stopped. The fence has fallen down around vegetable garden which is now a field but the nursery is still standing although the sprinkler system doesn’t work anymore and in fact none of the taps around here work since apparently the road construction diggerloader rode over and broke all the irrigation piping at the project rondavels. The handful of crafter women left over from the project just sit around waiting for a miracle or for someone to fix things. That’s the way things appear to be from an outsider point of view. When I questioned Mandisa, who is making a desperate, albeit futile, effort to get things going again in some way, about the possibility of selling the machines for scrap and using the money constructively she showed concern that the people who ran the programme before, might return and demand their equipment back. The programme ended in 2004, which was 8 years ago and the sewing machine, the pattern press and the R100 000 or R200 000 woodwork saw is now a scrap of rusty metal from rotting outside in the rain ever since that rondavel roof caved in. About 4 or 5 women, Mandisa’s team, still come down here occasionally. They have made a few crafts and planted a few seedlings in the nursery which they want to sell but don’t have an offset. We mentioned to Faneka, one of these women that there is an opportunity right here on our doorstep to cook food for the 20 or so construction workers who are building a road here and who Mandisa rents out a few rondavels to for a site office and accommodation for couple of the workers. She seems very keen and wants to learn to cook but has missed out on the past 6 months that the workers have been here. There’s no electricity in the kitchen here but there is a lovely big gas stove and an empty gas bottle. She doesn’t have the know how or the money to lay out to get started. We hope to get this project going soon and I will write about its progress.

A lawyer from Cape Town has sometime ago, kindly sponsored stacks of books and computers which are in another rondavel here. I don’t know why but no-one ever bothered unpacking the books before so this week Theo and I helped ourselves to some of the dusty bamboo shelves from the woodwork rondavel and I’ve unpacked all the boxes, sorted and alphabetized all the books. The library now has one whole rack of wonderful reference books, another with great fiction books and a third with lovely story books for the younger children. There are even another two racks of high school text books which I’ve unpacked as well as a bunch of puzzles for the kids to do. Apparently during the school term, the high school kids come down here to use the computers but there’s no-one around to teach them so I don’t know how much they get used.

So, as a 1st world city person you are probably shaking your head, tsking away about the backward way things happen here. Let me tell you about a few other things which have come to my notice recently. A few days ago I asked Mandisa where she lived, assuming her house was over the road or down past the general dealer since, when she does pitch up here, she arrives at about 9 o clock in the morning and her 3 kids go to school where we teach which is down the road next to the general dealer. She turned around and pointed to the hill in the distance and told me that her house was way over there, more than 5km’s away and that’s why sometimes her children can’t go to school because when it rains, they can’t cross the river. Wow. So they don’t just jump into their double cab and drop the kids off at school when the weather is bad like the folks do back home. A few afternoons ago, 2 matric students pitched up at the computer room to see what was happening after hearing that we were here. They stayed a while, fiddling on the computers, playing music and we chatted in English. I offered to help them with homework projects etc when school starts again in 2 weeks time. Soon thereafter they said they had to leave before it got dark since they had to walk home. They live 10 km away from here so I guess they will spend a huge chunk of their afternoons walking to and from the library in their efforts to get their homework done to pass matric. No internet access at this library or in their bedroom at home so that they can cut copy paste like the kids do back home who prepare for the same matric paper. Today being Saturday is shopping day for many people here. It was raining so I stood in my rondavel doorway watching the countryside get wet and I noticed 3 women walking in the distance. They were on their way over the hill, laden with shopping balanced on their heads and clutching bags in both arms. I wondered how far they had walked already or how far they still had to go or whether they first needed to make a fire to cook dinner since I doubted they were carrying take away Pizzas to feed their families. Every day this week I’ve seen a bunch of kids with buckets on their heads off collecting water somewhere. Half the village’s water has been off for nearly a week again and it’s the 2nd time since we moved in here but luckily there is a rain tank here at the nursery where Theo fills our 20 litre plastic containers. I’m waiting for the water to come on again before I can do my washing in my fancy Sputnik washing machine which I proudly showed to some of the women here who admired it. Many of the people here do have those big green rainwater tanks but they don’t exactly run through to a tap in their kitchen or bathroom like they do in the city so you fill a bucket manually to wash dishes or your body. We have electricity in our rondavel (well we run an extension lead from the site office 60m away) so I’m thankful that I can quickly first boil my water and not have to make a fire first every time.

Last night we visited at Tim’s house (our new friend who I’ll tell you all about later) for a braai and a welcome shower. One of his workers, Doemesan, who had lingered a little later than usual and didn’t go home when the rest did, ended up hanging around for about 3 hours waiting for the moon to come out. He had to walk home, I don’t know how far but I do know that he also lives over the hill and had to walk through the river and his only light was the full moon which only rose at about 10 o clock. There’s a bus which runs to Kentani then on to Butterworth daily but that’s at 7 in the morning so great if you work there (I doubt anyone here does) or need to go there for shopping but otherwise around here after work (the lucky handful who do while the rest live on a government grant) you walk home no matter how far it is. Doemesan said we are teaching at the wrong school and that we should rather come over the hill nearer to his house to teach at the poor school where his kids go. I didn’t even know that there was another primary school other than the high school 15 km’s from here so I wonder if it’s as modern as the one we teach at which has an actual building and even has electricity in most of the 8 classrooms.

I haven’t even scratched the surface yet of finding out what these peoples dreams or ambitions are or what makes them happy or sad so I know that I have a lot to learn. What I have figured out so far is that the Xhosa people here have basic daily needs to attend to, like being able to get to school, access to water, collecting firewood and a simple thing which I take for granted such as the time of day is pertinent to going somewhere on foot like the library to learn how to type and still make it home before dark and definitely not what time the Cape Town Museum closes or what time the next episode of National Geographics is shown on the dish. Fanciful and complicated ideas like starting ones own business or the desire to know the diet of Eskimos are not high on the list of the adults here in Transkei. I on the other hand, once again forgot to close the door down at the ablution rondavel and now the goats have left what looks like 5 kg’s of chocolate coated raisons all over the floor. Oh Dear.



So, look for the bare necessities, the simple bare necessities of life. Forget about your worries and your strife. I mean the bare necessities, old Mother Nature’s recipes that brings the bare necessities of life. Wherever I wonder, wherever I roam I couldn’t be fonder of my big home.

GOT TO HAVE KAYA NOW

GOT TO HAVE KAYA NOW


Bubbling with excitement we hit the N2 and headed up towards Butterworth where we planned to turn towards the coast through Cantani and then explore a couple of villages which were nestled in the hills close to the sea, all as per John’s helpful directions. We reached the busting town of Butterworth about 100km’s later that day, we measure our days in distance not time, since we are not directed by time but rather by how much diesel we need to pump into our fuel guzzling truck. 5km’s to the litre isn’t bad but when you’ve clocked 1300 km’s and more to go with no bank account to continually replenish the trucks addiction to fuel, then every km counts. It was Saturday and everyone from far and wide was their doing their shopping at Shoprite, Lewis or Pep Stores. 50km’s further we arrived at Cantani and everyone who wasn’t in Butterworth was doing their shopping there. The main road was lined with little shack shops where people could buy mieliepap, get a haircut, buy airtime or chickens. We made a mental note that we could definitely stock up on vitals in Cantani since it would probably be the nearest town from us and there was a grocery shop. Taxi’s weaved across the roads, loaded with people and their heavy 50kg bags of pap and sugar. We grinned. It felt good. This was rural and we loved it. Viva Africa. I was relieved to see that the younger women in the villages and towns were wearing jeans and T-shirts. I had been a bit concerned that women were expected to dress conservatively and not wear shorts or long pants but only dresses or skirts as stipulated by the elders and I didn’t own a single such feminine article of clothing. We got directions for a place called Ngobla or Ngura or Ngani or something like that. Anyway it was a name which we clearly had trouble with cos when we hung out the truck window clicking away with our tongues, asking for directions, no-one seemed to know where we were headed. Eventually after getting cheek tied, we were told to follow a gravel road which looked more like a dirt track than anything else and we hoped it led somewhere. The road was as pock marked with embedded stones as a hormonal teenagers’ pimply face. We rattled on for about 30 km’s over hills and dales, passing goats, cows, the odd person and clusters of colourful homes, some were mud rondavels, others were hexagon shaped brick houses and many were painted bright blue or green. The Xhosa women which we saw had painted white circles around there eyes and coloured in cheeks and I assumed it must mean something but I wasn’t sure quite what. It definitely did not indicate a bride to be as these big mammas did not conjure up pictures of virginal youth as they surveyed us through a cloud of billowing dust left by the truck. I waved but they didn’t seem too enthusiastic to wave back. Tatomkhulu’s neatly dressed in their Sunday best, their crinkled faces tucked under their weather beaten hats didn’t hide their questioning eyes as we rattled past them down the bumpy narrow road. Here and there we saw children playing or working in vegetable gardens in front of houses which were closer to the roadside. They stopped to stare from big blank eyes concealing their thoughts as we passed.

We arrived at the Kei river mouth and decided to stay right there for a day or two while Theo tried to catch a fish. Palm trees grew up to the beach front which was abundant with 100’s of oyster shells the size of rocks big enough to knock a tent peg into the ground. Across the water we could see a hill, sprinkled with white peoples’ holiday houses and a resort, all nestled in pockets of sub tropical forest. This side, a few Xhosa people stood around, laughing and jabbering loudly, waiting for the pontoon to carry them across the river. They were still returning from their days’ shopping it seemed and had a lot of exciting things to discuss. Some were on foot and others squeezed into their bakkies together with their groceries, babies, children and a bunch more people in the back. A couple of holiday makers from EL in their 4 x 4’s crossed the river and a few local Xhosa mammas, selling beads and beautifully woven baskets, comfortably sitting flat on their bums, legs spread out straight in front of them, feet neatly pointing upwards, in that customary way which seems to come naturally for them but which I, as a white person, just can’t do, well not without some kind of back support.

Monday morning we left the waterside and headed up the hill to explore the next village. The truck struggled up the hill, and much to my dismay, didn’t make it to the top. We panicked for a minute and thought we were gonna slide back down but luckily Theo was able to back down the truck successfully although the clutch smelt funny. We tried again in a lower gear and whew, relieved, the colour returned back to my face, fingernails digging chunks out of the seat and Theo probably needed to change his underwear but we reached the summit. Now that’s one way to get your adrenalin pumping on a Monday morning. Who needs peak hour traffic! We headed off to Qolora village, sometimes referred to as Trennery, named after the old colonial hotel established there in 1908. We arrived in the village with a good feeling about the place. There was construction road works happening on the way in, which was most unexpected and we passed a cluster of deserted, some dilapidated rondawels with Qolora B & B, KITCHEN and SHOP written in big letters across the bright orange painted walls. We stopped to find out whats what. Imagine if we could park our truck there, re-establish the veggie garden, maybe get a cultural craft thing going with the local mammas or sell local food or or or….. The potential was endless as we let our minds run away at a pace fast enough to try out for the Olympics. We needed a place to park the truck and check out this village which had definitely peeked our interest. A road took us up a hill to the coolest, deserted braai picnic area, surrounded by dense tropical forest pockets with winding pathways to follow to yet another river mouth and a strip of beach which stretched as far as we would see. We decided to park the truck right there.

Once we were settled in and after exploring our immediate surrounding area, we visited the hotel and met the friendly couple who either ran or owned the place. Its not a hotel in the true sense but much quainter, very colonial style cute little bungalows tucked under cool date trees and other thick vegetation, and I half expected to find guests playing crocket on the perfect lawns shaded by more tropical trees or drinking tea and eating cucumber sandwiches in the pretty garden. I could almost taste the history of the place.

The next day we put clean clothes on, Theo even shaved and we rode the bike down to the village school to meet the principal and find out if they needed our help. Maria, the principal was very enthusiastic and pleased and called a quick meeting with the other 6 or so teachers, and it was settled. We would start the next day. WOW! We crapped ourselves. This was really happening. Now we needed to meet the headman and ask him if we could stay somewhere for free. We did suggest the rondavels but anywhere would work so long as we had access to running water and be able to plant a veggie garden so we could grow some of our own food. The idea of eating fish wasn’t panning out quite yet since Theo hadn’t had any luck so it looked like he would become a vegetarian after all. Yeah right! Anyway, a nervous little 6 year old boy walked us towards the sub headman’s house and shyly pointed us to his door. The old man’s English and our Xhosa was not good enough to communicate so the 3 of us walked back to the school for the principal to help translate our requests. The 2nd in charge told us that he would take it to the meeting and that he was very happy to have us.

We were ecstatic and nervous about our first lesson. We realized we better start working on a lesson plan for the next day since it looked like we were jumping right in feet first and would have a roomful of Xhosa children to teach. Yeehaa!