I had expected to feel excitement and even elation. But by the time King Zuma finally announced the end of his reign, I felt no excitement, only sadness and relief. It reminded me of Richard Nixon's resignation many decades ago. Sadness at the decade that Zuma had stolen from South Africa and her people. Sadness …
Black mischief
It is July 1961, I am one the delegates from the University of Natal (Durban) travelling by train to my first NUSAS Congress, at Rhodes University in the Eastern Cape. Apartheid is in its heyday. Efforts to keep black and white apart seemed to have intensified The train stops at a station, many people get …
Another R20 Billion to Eskom? The answer should be hell no!
The new Eskom team is reported to be begging local banks to lend it another R20 billion to help it keep going. If I was a bank I would say “hell no, not until you publish your interim financial results, show me a believable survival plan, and get the new board members to personally underwrite the …
Continue reading Another R20 Billion to Eskom? The answer should be hell no!
Ixopo: more brief memories
Rock and Roll Sherry After I turned 18, a couple of friends and I used to play snooker at the Plough Hotel (it and the Offsaddle Inn were the two hotels in town). We also had a drink or three. The cheapest drink available was a sweet Rock and Roll Sherry. It cost one shilling a …
Ixopo: some brief memories
The rolling hills Alan Paton put it better than I can. At the start of his book Cry the Beloved Country: "There is a lovely road that runs from Ixopo into the hills. These hills are grass-covered and rolling, and they are lovely beyond any singing of it." Mushrooming in spring Especially during the first …
Exploding granite boulders
The granite boulders in the pine plantation must have lain on this hill above Ixopo for tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of years. Yet there they are, shattered. The granite boulders have simply exploded. Why? A fire starts One spring, before the first rains, it is hot, and everything is tinder dry. A …
Melrose Days!
After rural Rivonia, we moved to more urban Melrose - Victoria Avenue, to be exact. I think we rented there for a couple of years before moving to Natal and dairy farming with his brother W.E.S Mansfield (Tony) outside Ixopo (Lufafa Road). We lived in Melrose from approximately 1952 to the end of 1955. I was about 11/12 …
