remember my mother proudly relating to her friends how much the dominee respected my father, in spite of his racism. She said that whenever my father accompanied the dominee on district parish visits, they would be invited by his Afrikaner friends for lunch. They would set a separate table for my father in the same diningroom! That was an honour in the 1960s in rural racist South Africa.
The high-handedness of this man eventually led to a mass expulsion of two-thirds of the mission villagers between 1955 and 1956. The events were the product of local and national grievances coinciding and igniting into open rebellion. It was a significant development involving people who had been compliant and docile. Most of the men in the village were migrant workers, a significant proportion of whom were working as labourers on the Witwatersrand. The Defiance Campaign of the 1950s, the Kliptown Congress of the People of 1955, and the anti-pass campaign triggered by the extension of the pass laws to women, kindled a rebellious spirit in many of these migrants, who in turn influenced their relatives in Kranspoort. It required only a small spark to set the mission village alight. This spark was provided by the dominee when he refused to allow an old woman, the mother of a resident of the village, to be buried in the mission graveyard, because she was a ‘heathen’ (someone who had not converted to Christianity). This old woman used to live on a farm in the mountains above the mission village and had been brought to her daughter’s home for nursing in the twilight of her life.
The battle for the right to have her buried was a fierce and sad one. I have only a vague recollection of it, because I was then only seven years old. I must rely on my mother’s recollection of the events. The village was divided between those who supported the dominee’s ruling, referred to as boDaza, and those defying it, the boSofasonke (We will die together). It is noteworthy that in the 1950s there was a strong following of the Sofasonke party in the poorest parts of Soweto, and some of the migrant workers may have brought the name back with them for this local struggle. The old woman was defiantly buried in the mission graveyard with the church bells rung by the rebels, who physically took control of the church grounds, Police were called in to protect the dominee. He was beside himself with anger after being humiliated by the public defiance, which included some militant women poking their fingers at his face and calling him ‘Lukas’ (his first name) instead of the usual respectful Moruti (Preacher).
The conflict raged for months after that episode. The rebellious residents were arrested under various excuses by security policemen and beaten. But they would not give in. A massive removal was then executed with the support of the police. People known to be part of the Sofasonke were given short notice to pack and go. There was no compensation for the property they lost. Many also lost household effects and personal clothing in the rush to leave before the deadline. They left their houses standing, some with furniture, which was later stolen or destroyed by the elements. Only about a third of the village residents remained. These were largely families of civil servants or other people who kept out of the conflict for fear of repercussions. There were bitter feuds between the two groups, and physical and other forms of violence were traded between them regularly.
My father in his usual quiet way successfully walked the tightrope between remaining a loyal civil servant and not antagonising those who were up in arms against the dominee. It was not easy. He took advantage of my mother’s eighth pregnancy to send the vulnerable members of his family away at the beginning of 1956 to his natal home in Uitkyk. My mother and my younger brother, Phoshiwa, went to live at my mother’s family home in Krantzplaas, where she could receive prenatal care from a nearby clinic. There were no clinics in Uitkyk at the time.
Sethiba, my younger brother, and I were left in the care of my paternal grandparents. My elder sister, Mashadi, was placed in the care of my mother’s cousin’s family, the Mahapas, while my elder brother, Mathabatha, remained at Kranspoort with my father. It was the first family separation, and it was not easy for us at all. The only reason I can now think of why all the children did not go with my mother was that my paternal grandparents would not have approved of ‘their grandchildren’ being looked after at my mother’s natal home. We were naturally not consulted in the matter. The separation from both parents for the sake of keeping the peace between the Rampheles and the Mahlaelas was traumatic for us. We resented it and cried a lot over it.
Sethiba was then in Sub A, and attended a nearby local school which catered for only Sub A and B. I had to go to G. H. Frantz Secondary School, some three kilometres from my grandparents’ home. Fortunately an older cousin of mine, Mbatha, attended secondary school there and could give me a lift on his bicycle. But I had to walk home from school on those occasions when he had afternoon activities. I found that hard, not only because of the long distance for my eight-year-old frame, but particularly because hunger was a constant companion. There was no lunch packed for me nor was I given pocket money to buy snacks from the village shop. I was regularly rescued by my mother’s cousin, who was teaching at the same school and living near by. She would give me food during the school break.
Breakfast in my grandparents’ household was mainly tea and dry stale bread bought from the local store. There was often no food waiting for us when we got home after school. We would then have to make do with whatever leftovers were available from the previous day’s supper. Sethiba was even more miserable. He was expected to herd my grandfather’s sheep and goats after school, often without any food in his stomach. He also bore the full brunt of my grandfather’s authoritarianism and harsh approach to child-rearing. His six-year-old body was subjected to hunger and hard work for most of the nine months of our stay there. I was protected by the relative gentleness with which both my grandparents treated me. My tears, which flowed very readily each time I was hurt or miserable, were a useful lever for obtaining greater and gentler care. In contrast, Sethiba was under pressure to respond to my father’s edict that moshimane ke draad, ga a lle ge a e kwa bohloko (a boy is like a piece of wire and should not cry).
I saw my parents only once during the entire nine-month period. Given the distances involved, my father could only afford to come and see us during the June school holidays, and later took us to visit my mother. We had to be torn away from her at the end of the visit. Release came one Sunday morning in September while we were waiting with my grandmother to depart on a church trip to another parish twenty kilometres away. Someone came to tell my grandmother that my mother had just arrived with her new baby. I jumped for joy and ran all the way home. Sethiba could hardly recognise his mother. As she got off the donkey cart that brought her, he thought to himself: That woman with the baby looks like my mother. But he was not sure until my mother called out to him and hugged him. The joy of reunion was indescribable for the two of us. We giggled and danced to the music within our deprived hearts. Our family was finally reunited.
* * *
We moved back to Kranspoort where things had calmed down. The innocence of my childhood was brought to an abrupt end one Wednesday evening late in 1960 just before I went to the weekly evening prayer service. I was twelve years old. I ran to the toilet to relieve myself, only to be confronted by a bloody panty. I had no idea what was happening to me. I quickly changed and ran to church. My special prayer was for the Lord to make the blood go back to where it came from. It was one of my many unsuccessful pleas for God to intervene directly in my life. The blood continued to flow for four or five days.
Fortunately, Miriam Mokgadi Kutumela, one of the many young people who used to stay with us, noticed my bewilderment and offered advice and practical suggestions about appropriate hygienic measures. She also explained what it meant in terms of the development of my sexuality, pregnancy and matters relating to childbirth. She had got to know all these ‘facts of life’ from the initiation she underwent at puberty in her village. Ironically, the embracing of ‘Christian ways’ deprived us of such an exposure, while not creating other mechanisms to provide information about human development for young people. One had the worst of all worlds in this regard.
It never occurred to me to tell my mother even though I was close to her in many other ways. The silence which existed between children and adults around sexuality was absolute. I sensed that this was not a matter to
