‘We always recognize our homeland when we are about to lose it.’ — Albert Camus
I set out to see the Xhosa, in their natural habitat. Or at least the first of the Bantustans established as a titular homeland by the Verwoerd government in 1959. I wanted to see them leaning on their walking sticks and smoking their lead-lined wooden n(click)gawe pipes, outside their rondavels. I was going to what used to be Pondoland, then the Transkei, now completely gone.
My thumb carved an arc. It felt good. After quite a few rides, I slept in the Gold Kazoo, on a highway overhang just outside East London that night, covered with stars and contemplation.
The first real challenge came at the Bantustan border next morning. I had slipped through the barely open crack of dawn, in and out of several vehicles, on my way to the gates of Mordor. In the frontier post on this side of the canyon sat a huge Dutchman, studying my passport. He was dressed in shorts, long socks, and a white shirt with epaulets. He had a brush cut and osso buco-sized knuckles. His chest began where his chin ended.
“You know you have a single-entrry visa into South Afrrika, don’t you,” he said. And he was clearly unimpressed that it was a loose-leaf visa, rather than one stamped directly into my passport.
“Really?” I replied.
“Yes, Rrreally,” he rolled. “You werre awarre that the Trranskei is an independent countrry?”
“No, I wasn’t,” I said.
He scoffed. “Why do you want to go to the Trranskei?” He asked.
I told him I thought the people were quaintly interesting. He scoffed again. Then he asked a dozen more questions and ended the interrogation by speaking on the phone in agitated Afrikaans with my baas, Koosie, at Woodstock, back in Cape Town. He seemed a little more settled, when he finally put the receiver back into its cradle.
“You must be back herre by this time five days from now.” He tapped his osso buco index finger on his desk. “Or else you’ll be living in the Trranskei for the rrest of your life. Do you understand?”
I told him I understood and got up to leave. He called after me.
“Doktorr?” He said.
“Yes.”
“You must rrememberr one more thing.”
“What’s that?” I asked.
“They won’t trreat you like we trreat you.”
I walked across the swing bridge over the canyon, and into the immigration control shack on the other side.
An old black man, wearing an older brown South African army uniform several sizes too big for him, stood alone behind the counter.
“Is this where I get my entry visa to the Transkei?” I asked.
“Yes, Master,” he said.
* * *
It was, as it turned out, a relatively stable time to be in the Transkei. Less than two years before I crossed the chasm, President Matanzima, because of a territorial dispute, broke all diplomatic ties with South Africa, and refused to deal with the only internationally recognized nation he was recognized by. When he woke up to the fact that South Africa was also the only place that economic aid came from, he fixed this quickly. When he realized that his only political opposition, King Dalindyebo of the Thembu, was a vocal opponent of Apartheid and could be forced into exile to Zambia, he fixed this as well. Just before I arrived, an election was called, and he fixed the voting to win 100 per cent of the open seats for his now unopposed Transkei National Independence Party. He was a fix-it kind of guy.
In 1893, Cecil Rhodes had described Pondoland as ‘a barbarian power between two civilized powers’ ruled by ‘a drunken savage,’ that needed to be annexed. It seemed like they were still trying to decide.
I stepped out of the immigration shack, into some of the best hitchhiking in Africa. I got one ride and a cold beer in a truck full of happy chappies, playing township jazz all the way to the capital, Umtata. I loved the way it sat on my tongue. Oom-ta-ta. ‘Goodbye Uncle,’ in kitchen Dutch. Not that there wasn’t evidence of Afrikaner control. A black limousine pulled up alongside me. A rugby team of Boer suits with briefcases scrummed into the bank with a long Afrikaans name. I checked into the Hotel Clarendon for ten Rand, and asked directions to mail the post card they gave me. My parents would have to look this one up.
The Post Office was crowded. There were three long queues to as many grilled sticky wickets. I lined up in the first one. Ten minutes later, I arrived at the counter.
“Oh yes,” the young Xhosa clerk looked petrified.
“I would like to send this post card to Canada,” I said.
“Oh yes. Next line,” he said, pointing to the middle queue. I got in the next line. Ten minutes later I arrived at the counter.
“Oh yes,” the young Xhosa clerk looked even more petrified.
“I would like to send this post card to Canada,” I said.
“Oh yes. Next line,” he said, pointing to the last queue. There was nothing else I could do. I got in the final line. Ten minutes later I arrived at the counter.
“Oh yes,” the young Xhosa clerk looked crestfallen.
“I would like to send this post card to Canada,” I said.
There was no next line.
“Transvaal?” He asked.
“No, not Transvaal. Canada,” I said. There was no place for him to escape. He went to get his supervisor. We did the dance again. Near the end there were five people using fifteen different click sounds simultaneously. It sounded like an old Olivetti typewriter having a seizure. Then, the clicking stopped.
“One Rand twenty,” said the supervisor.
I gave him two Rand. He gave me four one Rand ‘Grinding Maize’ stamps, and five Rand sixty in change.
I mailed the card. It arrived in less than a week.
* * *
Early next morning, I set off for the wild coast of Pondoland. It was the shipwrecks on these treacherous shores of the Eastern Cape that fed their castaways into legend. Some were massacred and eaten, and others were absorbed by the amiXhosa, swimming in a cauldron of clashes with the Portuguese, British, Dutch, Boers, Khoikhoi, Bushmen, Malay, Indians and Zulus. I walked ten kilometers out of Umtata before a vehicle appeared, headed in my direction. A gold miner from ‘Janiceberg’ picked me up in his small pickup. He took me five kilometers before turning off. I walked under flowering mimosa trees, along a dusty road, for another two hours. Finally, three guys from the Ministry of Justice stopped to give me a lift.
In 1894, Cecil Rhodes recommended that the Pondoland Thembu be given only enough land to make it necessary for them to work for cash wages. ‘It is our duty as a Government to remove these poor children from a life of sloth and laziness, and give them some gentle stimulus to come forth and find out the dignity of labor and, in order to occupy their minds, allow them a measure of local self government.’ Well done again, Cecil. Steady on.
They dropped me quietly outside Port St. Johns.
* * *
Candy corn. Trees lining my road into Port St. Johns bloomed with bushels of yellow and cream candy corn. It was clean, and there was a public library open two hours a week. It had a Standard Bank, a Caltex station, and the Coastal Needles Hotel, so money, fuel and comfort were possible. The ‘Bing-bong-bing-bong-bing’ of Xhosa Radio spilled into my path, from a restaurant that was mostly windows. Inside were pallets, piled with whole grain bread. I gave the chubby owner fifteen cents for half a loaf. I also bought some cheese, raisins and nuts, yogurt, Liquifruit juice, and a Transkei walking stick, all for less than three Rand. I headed off to the sand dunes I could see in the distance and fell asleep inside them after lunch.
The wind blowing fine sand across my face woke me some time later and, for another moment, I thought I was back on the beach in Cabo Frio. I collected my Colombian bag and walking stick, and headed to my planned destination, the Kampeer Terreine huts, down on the Indian Ocean. The Afrikaner maasie who ran the place charged me three Rand fifty and showed me to my rondavel. It was confusing at first, because I had no corners to put my few possessions in. She told me to make sure I locked the door, or monkeys would break it and steal everything. I went down to the beach for a swim. I was alone. Ek was alleen. Or so I thought.
Two black adolescents, with horizontal lines scarred into their cheeks, cautiously approached from out of the bush. They were wearing loincloths. Welcome to Africa, Doc.
They spoke to me in broken Afrikaans. Near as I could understand, they wanted to sell me some cannabis. I gave them a twenty-cent piece, and they looked like they just won the lottery. They ran off back into the bush. My thinking was that it was a good investment, either way. I didn’t really appreciate how good, until they returned. Both were carrying a shopping bag, filled to the brim with local weed. I laughed out loud. They laughed out loud back. The monkeys behind them laughed too. I told them to keep the contraband, that I was only here for two nights, and that I didn’t have smoking papers, and hadn’t yet bought my Transkei Xhosa pipe. They seemed offended and then agitated. One of them pushed down on the air with the flat of his hand, as a gesture for me to be patient. The other started removing handfuls of cannabis from one shopping bag and pushing it down into the other with the flat of his hand. When the first bag was half empty, he rolled it tight and tore off one end with his teeth. I was concentrating hard now. From somewhere in his loincloth, he produced a Bic lighter and lit the other end of the rolled paper bag. The strings dangled down. We all laughed out loud again, monkeys included.
So much smoke was produced that it covered the mountain.
* * *
I spent the next two days collecting shells, sunbathing on the beach, and getting to know some local families. It was idyllic, and I was sad to have to leave. But I knew how important my appointment on the other side of the chasm was, and I couldn’t afford to be late.
I arrived at the border with minutes to spare. Neckless was almost glad to see me.
“Welcome back to civilization,” he said. I thanked him.
“Did you learrn anything over therre?” He asked. I told him no and turned to leave. Once again, he stopped me.
“Doktorr?” he said.
“Yes?”
“I told you they wouldn’t trreat you like we trreat you.” I told him he was right.
It had been a magical trip. I was very careful to take only one roll of 36, special photos of rondavel villages and beach scenes, Xhosa women and kids’ faces, and old men smoking their pipes. When I finally got back to Cape Town, I opened Oracle II to retrieve my film. The camera was empty. I had forgotten to load it. I still have my parent’s post card as the only physical evidence of my ever having been in the Transkei. That, and my memories, of a country that no longer exists.
Image: Dimitri Bong Unsplash cropped