District 6, afternoon tea and the bothersome zebra

I promised to blog more of South Africa and time has gone by.  One of the odd things about coming home, is my soul immediately seems to go off on another safari of its own taking all my better selves with it I am left with bratty spirits tearing down the wallpaper in my skull and crying over spilt milk and all sorts of sins and treasons, known and unknown.  The skull smiles as skulls do and the body gets on with business.  It even cleaned the windows this time, so that was something.  Gin shuts the trouble up at night like bonjela on a teething baby.  In the fullness of time, however, there’s a tiny doorbell in the head and back comes the soul with all her sweet children and she tactfully ignores all traces of the mayhem that has been.

 All this militates against giving a coherent account of  what I saw all those weeks ago.  It also makes me wonder what witnessing actually is when it can be bifurcated in this way. And never mind the vagaries of the brain, travel is such a mixed bag.  Some things are annoyingly disappointing.  Take the zebra.  It is so unsurprising.  We’ve all known it from alphabet books and the real thing is just as neat and smug and nicely designed as its picture.  Not a hair out of place, not a tasteless or misjudged stripe.  On the other hand – the Victoria Falls overwhelm and humble expectations.  But more of that later.  To get back to Capetown and my days with Jun and Caiden.

After the hop on hop off bus day we’d earmarked the District 6 museum as a place to visit and we were glad we did despite Caiden deciding to go ballistic and bring reproachful looks from all the Spanish tourists who were there listening to an account of the outrageous decision to bulldoze the suburb and implement the odious principles of apartheid.  “Shush” said a senora.

 And the museum was like a church in a way. The floor was a map of the place as it once was and the walls featured simple old photos – no clever technology or enlargements.  A little bedroom had two single beds with old candlewick bedspreads and around the hall were suitcases containing random personal items.  A long hanging made of simple cotton was suspended from the upper gallery and on it were embroidered names  and messages from the old residents. Rusting street signs were places here and there and on the risers of the stairs that led to the gallery. One part of the wall of the museum had been plastered white with bits of towel and clothing poking out.  Pressed into the surface as though it were a biscuit were the legal definitions of the four categories that made up the population in the 1960s – black, coloured, Asian and white.  Understated and difficult to make out but devastating all the same.

We left the museum with our wild child feeling there was probably more to see, and adjourned to a coffee bar which featured Black Insomnia, the strongest coffee ever.

On advice we had booked ourselves an afternoon tea at the lovely Lord Nelson Hotel built in 1899.  Six fluted columns marked the beginning of the drive through rolling lawns with sculptures here and there.  Understanding that ”neat casual” was prescribed for this function I put on a dress for the first time in months and felt curiously vulnerable with naked legs.  Jun looked lovely as usual in a dress that went up to the neck in a formal manner. 

We entered the tea room and in its centre was a vast table with a glass ball of roses in the middle and beneath this every cakey delight under the sun including meringues, éclairs and little chocolate balls on sticks (which immediately caught Caiden’s beady eye).

 A chandelier hung from the splendid ceiling and discreet wall fittings supplemented its light. Peculiar, slightly ugly convex mirrors were set high up on the walls and there was a muted floral carpet under our  feet . Nonchalant cadences wafted from a grand piano and people were sunk  into lime green damask chairs and sofas holding their teacups  with triple decker plates of savoury morsels in front of them.  It was all very elegant.  One thing we hadn’t reckoned with.  We hadn’t brought Business Class, the stroller to strap in Caiden and Jun’s unusually formal dress made the secret narcotic of breastfeeding impossible.  What’s more he could reach the little chocolate balls on sticks and kept  running up and taking more and more.  But the tea itself was exquisite and served in little glass pots with pretty cups.

It was only afterwards as we sat on the lawn and Caiden rolled down the little slope with squeals of glee that I thought how ridiculous and tasteless it was of us to  ape the colonial enterprise in this way.  Was there in fact a glimmer of contempt in the service we received from the staff – all black of course.  Were the silly little morsels of sandwiches a little skew whiff on our triple decker plate?  What a nonsense to eat this way, especially in a country where poverty was an issue for many.

 Caiden came rushing up the grassy slope thirsty from his gambols. “Opa Opa” he said. There was nobody around on our huge green lawn so Jun lifted up her dress and let Caiden crawl inside.  He said something in Japanese from deep within and Jun laughed.  “He says he’s found me”

I envied his oblivion and his certainty about existence. 

There in Capetown nothing seemed simple at all. Perhaps that’s why the zebras annoyed me so. They seemed to be demonstrating how easy and graceful it was to be the way they were.  It just doesn’t seem possible for us humans.

Capetown peaks and troughs

I had been warned by an ex South African to be wary in Capetown.  Although sleek and tourist oriented there is huge poverty under the surface and on no account must we take taxis. Hire a car.  I bought us all light down jackets with Caiden’s being fluoro orange to give us a sporting chance in case of a kidnap.  Actually we did take taxis and they were very good, thanks to an app not unlike Uber.  You could watch them come on the phone and check the number plate when they did. 

Although my initial fears seemed groundless in the part of Capetown we were staying, I felt an unease. Actually the area wasn’t sleek but quite old, with a lot of the buildings just slightly shabby and repurposed for restaurants and tourist souvenir shops There were some people begging who really looked sick and needing money.  I took to tucking a hundred rand note into my bra so as to be able to discreetly quiet my conscience without attracting attention.  But it didn’t help much. I felt guilty for being what I was, white and looking for nice food and novelty in this place where so much wrong had been done in the not so distant past by people like me.

The trip to Table Mountain was a delicious reprieve from all that anxst.  Caiden was strapped into what we all called “business class”, in his very comfortable stroller and then we got a taxi and made our way to the cable car at the foot of the mountain.  It was a cable car like no other I’d seen – a big glassy chamber that actually rotated as it rose up the rocky mountainside.  We were a mixed but merry group inside.  Residents of Capetown have a special cheap fare and there were locals as well as Americans, Swedes and all sorts.  As we rose the city diminished below and ascent became a light hearted tourist thing to experience. One moment we faced the rock and the next a magnificent vista taking in the town and lands beyond.  I have to say it took me a minute to realize we were rotating and I wasn’t losing my balance in some strange way.  Just before we stopped at the top we were addressed by our cable car captain in a languid voice and told the rules. “You must not feed the animals or they will eat you. You must not smoke crack cocaine and do not make any babies on the mountain”  This laconic humour was lost on a couple of Americans one of whom I heard saying to the other “So it’s OK to have fun as long as you are careful.”

The flattish top of the mountain had the special beauty that places which have been visited over generations often have. The paths were established and the terrain had graciously soaked up the wonder of the thousands who have visited it.  It reminded me a little of the Blue Mountains or the Jenolan Caves for that reason.  Caiden learnt a new word which he pronounced with profundity from business class “Beautiful”  And the views were just that – craggy and vast and eternal with air that was fresh and easy to breathe.  Yet close up the land up there had great interest too.  There were funny little creatures not unlike guinea pigs (but apparently related to elephants) called dassies that nibbled the tough looking vegetation known as fynbos – a Dutch word for fine leaved plants.  There were shiny black birds with delicate beaks.  I was surprised to see wildlife in this rocky and dry terrain.  The human life was surprising too, some people striking attitudes on the strangely shaped rocks so that phone photos could be taken, others just gazing and feeding off the peace.

Coming down was very much coming down to earth with bus fumes and getting back to the town to find some food. 

Mention must be made about Capetown food.  Almost without exception it was very good and not at all expensive.  That day we went to a tapas bar named Fork where I had the very best smoked salmon I have ever eaten.  Everywhere was cheaper than one would expect and South African wine is lovely.  Nevertheless I was aware that the eaters were almost always white and those who served us were not and this awareness would trigger a little cascade of unease which no amount of brisk self talk about the benefits of tourism could quite allay.  I began to long to be ordinary and not privileged and I became hugely grateful for small encounters that indicated friendly acceptance.  One of these sticks in my mind.  We were in a shopping precinct that was once dockland but is now full of upmarket shops and has a ferris wheel and an aquarium.  Ed and Jun were after stuff to replenish their household in Gabon and I drifted along with them.  I always wear an olive coloured akubra hat these days to keep the sun off my face.  My longish silver hair alleviates its rather masculine look and I feel happy in it.  A young black shop assistant with very short hair came up to me laughing “I like your hat. It looks so soft. Can I feel it?”. “Here – try it on” I said and we both went over to the mirror as she did so.  She chortled as we could both see how it didn’t suit her at all.  Without long hair it looked almost military “It’s so big!” she said.  We went our ways but I was uplifted by the little female collaboration.  In Sydney this kind of trivial empathy is the backdrop of daily life but not in Capetown.

Another happy time was when Jun and I took the excellent hop on hop off bus that runs around Capetown every fifteen minutes.  It has a commentary in multiple languages. “Look, I’m listening in Japanese” said Jun with a grin.  Caiden went straight to sleep so he didn’t get the benefit of all we saw which included stately colonial edifices as well as the desolate inner city wasteland which was once the exuberant multicultural District 6. It was evacuated and bulldozed during the apartheid era and its residents relocated on the Cape Flats, 25 kilometres away. Despite its prime position the land remains unused “just grass and weeds” as the commentary put it. “And perhaps that’s how it should be”.

Jun, Caiden and I got off at Clifton because we wanted some beach action for Caiden.  There are lots of beaches in the area, all a bit different and we found one with lots of shady rocks and pools and an exciting tide that swept in and out of gullies.  There were plenty of children there constructing dams and darting about on the edge of the sea.  It was too cold for swimming as the water temperature is affected by the melting ice of the not that distant South Pole.  A group of black kids of about eleven or twelve were larking about and I noticed the girls were quite uninhibited about their developing breasts and played like proper children.   How unlike the little bikinied creatures that we see on our beaches.  How free they were.

We caught a glimpse of the lovely Botanical Gardens donated to the country by Cecil Rhodes who had hoped to turn all Africa into a British colony.  We resolved to go back another day as well as go to the aquarium and visit the District 6 Museum.  We’d also been told not to miss having high tea in the splendid Lord Nelson Hotel.  All these things we did and I’ll blog them next time.  Bye for now. I need to buy some skim milk.

OOA Capetown oak trees and Caiden

There is a little while, after a long flight when your destination seems meaningless. It must be like that for astronauts.  How can you take Earth seriously after seeing it as a little ball from hostile cold space? So it was with me as we barrelled along the motorway of where? Yes Capetown.  It was solid ground and that was the main thing.  But gradually, as we drove along, a more lively interest was sparked by the beauty of the craggy pale purple mountains, the brilliant light and the blatant shame of a sprawling close-knit shantytown with its web of electric cables looping over the higgledy piggledy shelters.  Later, to my surprise, I found one of the standard postcards of Capetown was a picture of such an “informal settlement”.  I wondered who would send one of these, and why.

We were staying in an apartment opposite the “Company Gardens” a beautiful park full of grassy lawns with oak trees and squirrels (and also a solid Natural History Museum). Throughout our time in South Africa I was struck by the number of oak trees, all old and quintessentially English.  They probably came with Cecil Rhodes  and there must have been a time when they comforted the colonial overclass exiled from the woodlands and bluebells of home. Now in autumn in modern Capetown still clad in their crispy dead leaves they seem a little sad and out of place.

Our apartment complex had been pronounced safe enough by Jun’s protective employers. It had a guard and both getting in and getting out required an electronic device. Even so some of the apartment doors inside had metal grids and padlocks.  Our place was at the end of a long corridor on the third floor and a lasting and lovely memory I have is little grandson Caiden shrieking with laughter as he raced his mum down it every time we went in or out.

It was fascinating to see little two and a half year old Caiden, slender and beautiful as an elf – a perfect fusion of his Aussie father and Japanese mum. He has dark brown eyes full of toddler feelings and pale olive skin.  He loves olives and breast milk (“Opa! Opa!) and vacuums up new words in both English and Japanese.  There are rules about addressing him, apparently gleaned from experts in bilingualism. Native speakers must talk to him in their first language and none other.  Jun, who speaks English as well as I do lives a Japanese life with him whilst Eddy calls him Buddy and has taught him amongst other things to count from one to twelve in English which he often does when especially content with the world.  Sometimes, playfully, I’d toss in a Japanese word that I knew (neko – cat, ringo-apple) only to be reproved by Ed.  “It’s not as if your accent is right”

 One bewitching aspect of this little boy is his love of music.  He sings both the Oompa Loompa song from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and the theme song of a lovely Japanese cartoon from the Gibli studio called Totoro. He sometimes uses a stick as a microphone. Strapped in his pushchair at breakfast on our last day he jiggled and nodded to the musak that drifted over our croissants and coffee.  “He likes that cheesy kind of music” said Jun apologetically.  He dances with passion in any kind of band context, which reminds me to correct my last blog.  I actually did see Caiden after his birth during Ed and Jun’s last posting in Cambodia when he was one year old. A memorable image of this time is a rather awful singer croaking away in the seedy market about the catastrophic influence of his friends Johnny (Walker) Jim (Beam) and Jack (Daniel) upon him.  Tiny Caiden was in a dance floor trance going with the beat all by himself in front of the stage.

On my arrival there was some alarm. Caiden had a high temperature although he seemed happy enough.  In the past he’d had seizures when febrile so we were all very anxious and I was glad Jun was still breastfeeding as he eschewed any other form of nourishment.  The thing passed overnight whatever it was and in the morning I got to hold him, sleepy and cool, slumped on my shoulder.

Caiden went on being lovely with me for quite a long time.  We played for hours with playdough, packing it in little pots and the pots into the cylinder they came in.  He filled the handle of an airline toothbrush carefully with olives.  He gave me little pursed mouth kisses and his special high five which starts with the normal open hand clap on the greetees upheld palm then goes on with a bumping of fists and a touching of the pointer fingers followed finally by an interlocking of thumbs and wiggle of all other fingers.  I suspect Eddy made it up but it’s fun and lovely communication.

Then something, I know not what, went wrong between us.  He got cross with me and lashed out with little slaps when I approached him. “Caiden! Say sorry to Grandma” his parents would insist, but none of us knew why he did it.  “He said sorry in Japanese” said Jun but whether he did or not I know he didn’t mean it. In Coleridge’s poem The Ancient Mariner there’s a verse

“An orphan’s curse would drag to hell

A spirit from on high

But oh more horrible than that

Is the curse in a dead man’s eye”

Well all I can say is the curse in a toddler’s eye is just as potent and it was so unfair.  I never shot an albatross or did anything else I knew of to incur his wrath.  I really look forward to sorting it all out with him when he’s a bit older.

We decided next morning to go to what the tourist people call “iconic Table Mountain” because it looks flat on top – but maybe I’ll save that story for next time.  Bye for now!

Out of Africa Part One Getting There

I’m not sure I would ever have travelled to South Africa if there hadn’t been a good reason. I remember boycotting South Africa oranges as a child and even though things have moved on a bit since then a wisp of outrage still hung about in my head.  But my three sons all wanted to go to a desert festival called Africa Burn (mockingly referred to as Africa Wank by their father). 

The Burn is hard to describe, but it is a festival remote from any settlements where anything goes and people give things to each other.  My boys and their friend Julian were to be part of an outfit running Camp Deliciosa – offering free pancakes to all and sundry.  Another camp ran a human car wash where you could be bathed by loving hands – very liberating according to Julian.  Artworks of all sorts are created and burnt at the end of the camp.  Fortunately this did not apply to my daughter in law to be, Fredi, whose project was to wander naked with paints through the festival inviting anyone who wished to, to paint her.

 Eddy’s wife Jun, however was forbidden to go to the Burn by her Japanese employer even if she fancied the idea so our idea was that she and I and little grandchild Caiden were to bask in the fleshpots of Capetown while the boys and friends all did their idealistic and creative thing under the desert sun.  I hoped they’d all come back alive and not changed for the worse and I was excited to see little Caiden, now two and a half and speaking a bit in both English and Japanese. I hadn’t seen him since he was a newborn baby.

There were little anxieties.  Would I pass muster as a grandma?  Would Jun and I get on or would I become the stuff of a mother in law joke.  I intended to do my very best to fit in and be nice.

The beginning of the trip was not auspicious.  Grant had a terrible cold.  This is what I wrote in my diary

“He  took me to the airport sneezing and swearing and braking abruptly when he sneezed saying cunt to the people who honked at him for doing it.  We managed to park at the international terminal only to find the first leg of my journey was on Virgin and in fact went from the Domestic terminal. By the time I registered at Virgin’s international desk I was so longing for Grant to go home and look after himself that I instantly lost  the three boarding passes I had been given.  Boarding passes have always seemed to me only secondary to passports in sacredness and I went up to an official in a panic.  Just as he was soothing me and saying things like “not a problem” I was taken aback, along with those around me by the apparent clattering of gunfire. It quickly became apparent that it was just my necklace breaking and the beads banging on the tiled floor.  Feeling foolish beyond belief I scrabbled them up and a kind banking man gave me one of his plastic envelopes to put them in.  

New boarding passes obtained I got on to the plane and began to think all might yet be well when a uniformed woman approached me in my aisle seat.  “Are you Julia McCall?” she said.  “It’s all up” I thought.  “They’ve found all the little vials of vaping mix that Eddy  asked for and swore were totally innocuous.”  But she was smiling nicely.  “It’s just that we think an electric toothbrush is vibrating in your suitcase and would you mind giving us your lock number so we can open the case and turn it off.” Indeed Grant had thrust upon me a state of the art rechargeable electric toothbrush just as I was leaving.  I gave permission but it was disconcerting.  Somehow I always feel my luggage has evaporated once it has gone through the rubber curtain.  No more questions or weight issues. Out of sight and out of mind.  Not so this time.

The Virgin flight to Perth was cheerful but a bit trying – squashy because I was next to a very overweight gentleman and dinner was a slop of some kind of curry in a cardboard box.  But the little bottles of red wine helped.

At Perth I was picked for special treatment at security and had to go into a scary experimental cylinder with my arms up as though in surrender.  When they looked at the Xray it took there were mysterious yellow patches on it so I was patted down too.  All the while two young men had their eyes fixed on me.  Then one said “You have been selected to come with me. Are you prepared to do so?”  I was merrily hysterical by this time and said  “By all means”  He passed a sort of phallic wand over my hand luggage and said “OK”. “Just one moment” said the other man. “Which one do you like best?” He showed me two wands both long and black.  In retrospect I can only think he was making some lewd joke but he seemed serious enough. “That one” I said “Because of the nice carving” and I went on my innocent way, pure in mind, body and luggage.

The travel gods seemed to have run out of pranks to play on me by then and I arrived in Capetown and was met by Eddy who’d got a beard and I thought it might all be going to be fun after all.