came out to have his supper, but after two days, he called me. I burst out crying, expecting the worst. He embraced me, wiped my tears and sent me off to the shop to buy another one. I could not believe his response. I still cherish that touch of softness.
We were nonetheless deeply appreciative of my mother’s domestic competence. We enjoyed treats which many children in the village had no idea about: freshly baked bread, dumplings, soup on cold days, pancakes, canned fruit, jam, cakes and puddings. Our greatest regret was that we could never have enough of the treats, particularly pancakes, which were my father’s favourite and of which he was given the lion’s share. I learnt to cook and bake quite early, because I enjoyed being near my mother and watching what she was doing. I promised myself that when I was old enough I would make myself a plateful of pancakes and eat them to my heart’s content – a promise I kept years later, in 1974, when I was expecting my first child.
My father stayed aloof from many family concerns. He kept to his room in his favourite position – horizontal – with a book in his hand. We longed to get to know him better, but were not rewarded much. We would delight in taking tea to him, and in doing whatever would give an opportunity for direct contact. When occasionally he came into the kitchen, where most of the family spent their time, it would be like Christmas! We would giggle at each one of his jokes and hang on to whatever he had to say. But these were brief and rare occasions.
When my father became angry or grumpy, we would be quite scared. When drinking, he would fly into a rage over a mistake one of us had made some days before, which we would have forgotten about by then. Perhaps one of my brothers had been careless with tools or livestock, or had not performed his domestic chores properly. On other occasions it would be complaints about the way my mother and we girls ran the household, which did not meet his high standards. Those were painful days, and unless Koko Tsheola intervened timeously, we would end up being beaten. I can only surmise that he bore grudges, and that he was inhibited by his shyness from expressing his feelings. Alcohol released him from these inhibitions.
His role as both father and teacher to his children was also not uncomplicated. So too his relationship with his wife, who had to negotiate the tensions of collegiality at work and a marriage partnership. He was always punctual and could not tolerate anything less from others. This was infuriating for my mother, who had to attend to his domestic needs and still be on time at school. He was a wonderful teacher who enthused his pupils with the joy of learning. Although he was supposed to teach us through the medium of Northern Sotho, as was required by Bantu Education at the time, he quietly insisted on teaching us in English during the course of the year, and would only drill us in Northern Sotho for examination purposes. I still remember some of the ridiculous words such as okosijeni (oxygen) which we had to learn in science. He also departed from the official syllabus, which had a heavy ideological content, though he would caution us to produce what was required for the external examination at the end of Standard 6.
I was a naughty pupil, easily bored in class, and rarely challenged intellectually. My father tried to keep me disciplined by seating me next to boys, in the vain hope that I would be shy and quieten down. I soon found a way of amusing myself, in most cases at the expense of the boy beside me. One such boy used to be so frightened when asked questions in class that he would wet himself as soon as his name was called out. I would draw the attention of the whole class to this poor boy’s pants by turning around to gaze at the wet patch.
I had problems reconciling my father’s role as my teacher and parent. He would appear to treat me so indifferently in class that I was saddened. Although I was his best student, few if any words of praise would come my way. He expected me to do well, and would show disappointment if I got anything wrong. He also seemed to be much stricter on me than on other children. Any mistake would unleash severe punishment. I had to be perfect.
My father had a sizeable library to feed his love of books. I had access to the full range of Shakespeare’s plays, the Encyclopaedia Britannica and many English novels and books of general interest to my father’s generation, which I read through as soon as I could. I remember many conversations between adults in my presence, to which I was not supposed to be privy, but which I perfectly understood.
My childhood social world was complex in its own way. Our neighbours across the street were the family of a widowed woman who worked as a domestic in Louis Trichardt, fifty kilometres away, leaving her children in the care of her kindly mother-in-law, Koko Sanie Seko. The second-oldest girl, Rebecca, was a very aggressive person, a street fighter known for her toughness. On the few occasions we played with them, we ended up with a disagreement or even a fight. We thus tended to play on our own and avoided the street.
These neighbours resented our position of relative comfort. My mother’s generosity in sharing leftover food with those less fortunate did not placate them. Their mother also became sulky and moody towards my mother on the few occasions she was home over weekends or on leave. It became so bad that we stopped having anything to do with them. The last straw was when one of my mother’s large black pigs, fattened for the next winter slaughter, was found dead. A postmortem revealed that someone had pierced it with a piece of wire, which was left in situ – a more agonising death the poor pig could not have experienced. The carcass, which had signs of sepsis, was not fit for human consumption and was used to make soap for the household. Rumours abounded about who could have been responsible, but we never got to know the truth.
There were other neighbours who were part of my childhood world. Koko Mma-Abinere Tau (Mother of Abner) was a large woman whose property adjoined the back of ours. She liked sitting on the veranda of her house and surveying all passers-by. She got the latest news from casual conversations with those who cared to stop for a chat across the fence. Her house was dark, poorly ventilated and untidy. She also liked eating meat that was off, which she claimed was tastier than fresh meat. Her house had an unpleasant odour. She came in handy whenever my mother needed to dispose of unwanted meat which had gone off. She was a stingy woman, known as the Jew, because people in this village perceived Jews as particularly stingy. A story was often told of her putting a steaming hot teapot between her legs to conceal it from passers-by who she feared would be tempted to drop in for a cup of tea – a not unfounded fear, given the practice of the time. She demanded being greeted by children passing by and would clear her throat audibly to attract attention. If this failed, she would resort to scolding those she labelled as disrespectful.
Showing respect for adults was an important attribute sought and nurtured in children. I remember being reduced to tears by a cruel comment from a woman, known as Setlotlo, who lived in our street. I had greeted her and her guests in the customary way, Realotšha! (Greetings!), but she was engaged in a conversation with other adults on her veranda and did not hear me. Those who heard me responded in a loving way, but she turned and scolded me fiercely for being disrespectful and not greeting. I was rescued from this verbal abuse by the others, but even then she did not apologise. Children’s feelings were frequently hurt in this manner.
Koko Mma-Abinere had redeeming features too. She had a beautiful soprano voice, which she put to good use as a church choir member and Sunday school teacher. She also had a good sense of humour and an ability to laugh at herself. Her husband had deserted her and was rumoured to be having an affair with Setlotlo, who had at one stage burned her severely by pouring boiling water with caustic soda over her back. She spent many months at Elim Hospital. She often joked about the fact that her beauty transcended the scars occasioned by that traumatic experience.
Kranspoort had a friendly village atmosphere where personal safety was not at risk. We grew up with a deep sense of physical security. There were tight social networks in this closely knit community. The residents felt bound together by the common identity of being believers (Christians) in contrast to ‘the heathens’ (non-believers), also referred to as ba gaLosta (lost ones), who lived on surrounding farms and who were regarded as inferior. The term ‘heathen’ was used quite unconsciously in conversations and was also a rebuke for residents failing to behave ‘properly’. It was partly this ‘insider’ versus
