Happy Holidays

Santas on Patrol

Today I was driving in southeastern Pretoria, a more rural area, and a nursery was holding a giant Christmas sale. Someone thought it would be a good idea to post a Santa Claus at the driveway entrance for advertising. This Santa Claus was skinny and black and his red suit was very baggy and he was not in a promotional mood. He was sprawled in a yellow plastic chair with his legs jutting straight out while he calmly watched traffic and waved at no one. On my second pass an hour later, he hadn't changed his position but his long white beard was pulled beneath his chin so he could pop nuts into his mouth without interference. He was the most bored, skinny, African Santa I've ever seen and, while he didn't convince me to buy plants, he did make me laugh.

At the stoplights, there are always vendors. You can buy sunglasses, mesh "table tents" to keep the flies off of food, cellphone car chargers, drinks, rubber balls, brooms and clothes hangers which are very popular. There are often poor whites at the lights too but they only hold signs asking for money. Sometimes there are young black men whose faces are painted white who step in between the stopped cars, do a dance and then pass by with their can for some coins. I don't know what the history is for "white face" in South Africa but, depending on the mood and the day, it's often kind of creepy. But yesterday I saw a guy who tipped the scene into the absurdly hilarious category. He was dancing with a painted white face......and wearing a Santa hat with white dreadlocks hanging from the cap. The dreadlocks were whipping around his head while he danced and he clutched his can in one hand and hats for sale in the other. I fumbled to get out my cellphone camera but didn't make it in time for the green light so I watched the white-faced, dreadlocked black Santa prancing away in the rearview mirror.

Photos

The registration process for seeing our photos hasn't worked very well for some people so we're making the new photos visible to everyone.

Gecko

St. Lucia

Staying Put

It's finally, really, truly official: We're staying here for two years. The document has every signature needed from D.C. to Pretoria and it's a done deal. We've even seen it. This is a big relief after quite a year.

Happy Thanksgiving

Natural Stimulants

We awoke this morning to a hand-sized spider on the ceiling above the kitchen. Now that will get you going in the morning. Forget coffee - just order up a hand-sized spider and watch it frolic while you try to sweep it out the door. Even the dog wanted no part of it. Thankfully, it was the size of M's hand. If it had been the size of my hand, I would've run screaming like a girl. It was also polite, eventually hopping onto the broom and waiting there while I walked to the fence and hurled the little bastard across the street into my neighbors' yard. I looked it up and found that this species eats bugs which is good but is referred to as a Wall Crab which doesn't help take the edge off the sprawling, eight-legged hairy menace looking down at you.

"Oh look. There's Frank, our pet Wall Crab. He's a sweetheart."

Bougainvillea Is Also A Fence

Writing about South Africa is difficult; there are no easy anecdotes because of the complexity of daily relationships here. These are influenced by the many histories in this country and the multiple cultures, languages and experiences. There are, I think, distinct histories instead of a shared history. The experiences of black South Africans and white South Africans have little common ground. Hopefully there is the perception of at least 13 years of shared history now. My perspective is skewed by living in Pretoria which is still a very segregated city, particularly socially. Regardless, every relation starts with loaded assumptions based on the color of your skin. Identity is a tricky thing. Even in trying to write about this, I'm trying to figure out the terms. A "South African" isn't a particularly useful term here; it generally connotes a white person but then there are divisions between Afrikaners and English descendants. An "African" is a black South African. The prism of apartheid's divisions of black, colored and white is still attached in many minds as the default place to begin a relationship. With a category. A coherent national identity is a long way off and that's understandable. There are 11 official languages of South Africa: Afrikaans, English, Zulu, Xhosa, Ndebele, Venda, Swati, Sesotho, Sepedi, Tsonga and Tswana. I've heard Afrikaners say several times something like "if you go out into Africa" - meaning that this, here, Pretoria, is not Africa. Africa is out there where black Africans live. To them, here, this city, is something else but I think Afrikaners are very unsure of their place and scared of "here" as it exists today. For one thing, it is changing quickly, it seems daily, and the primary force of that change is the black South African cultures that are largely unknown to them - maybe even unknowable given the economic, political and historical gulfs separating them. At the grocery store, Afrikaners seem to be a mostly miserable group; it sometimes feels like the floor might cave in from a very real heaviness emanating from them. I am often addressed in Afrikaans by Afrikaners; I'm called "baas" ("boss" in Afrikaans) by black South Africans; and when I try to distinguish myself as something else, a foreigner, it seems to be received as a refutation, as a refusal by me to fit into the categories. Afrikaners generally turn away; black South Africans are bemused but unsure of what to talk about. I'm talking about Pretoria here. Johannesburg is infinitely more mixed, cosmopolitan, aware, intellectual. I go out of my way to greet people here and it seems to make a difference. Most black South Africans seem pleasantly surprised and respond kindly; a few are angry at my skin no matter who I am. Afrikaners are generally not open or friendly. I think they are understandably leery of outsiders.

In my rich neighborhood, the garbage collectors inspect the trash cans before emptying them to make sure nothing useful is tossed. I was outside one morning and one of them asked me if I had any old shoes. I told him I have really, really big feet and he laughed and said that was okay. I gave him a pair of old running shoes.

In the comment forums attached to online newspaper articles here, there is a poison. I know that the civility of online "discussions" is usually appalling so I take it with a grain of salt. When I worked at the newspaper in Denver, it was obvious that many people used the relative online anonymity as a shield for bitter attacks and false bravery. But here, I sometimes read people writing and throwing stones from across the color lines which is unfortunate but not all that surprising. The troubling angle is that some are veterans of this country's battles and they have what are obviously long-standing feuds going and they bring up vicious references to previous wars and what was inflicted and people hunting each other and how they could still do it. This is from both sides. It has only been 13 years since apartheid officially ended and that's not enough time for committed racists to, well, die off. Generally these discussions occur attached to articles about crime. It's impossible to exaggerate how omnipresent the fear of crime is here and how it undercuts the trust that this society badly needs. I despise that, while I am out for daily errands, I have to monitor everyone I see at intersections, in parking lots, in cars, in the mall. You look, you judge motives and you keep moving. It's a terrible way to interact with people and it usually evaporates the chance of a bond. And then there's race: you're not worrying much about people with white skin. This country is 80% black so it is maddening and appalling to be sizing up black South Africans like that yet you pick up a newspaper and read horror stories. There are houses in nearby neighborhoods being robbed weekly so it's not paranoia; it is happening and it is close. As an outsider, it's more difficult because you miss the subtleties of behaviour that identify friend from foe. The criminals themselves may be the only colorblind actors in this society. They rob priests, maids, black executives, white suburbanites, a famous reggae musician, whoever has what they want. And black people are suffering more from the crime than people in their fortresses with gates, walls, wires, barred windows and alarms. But the fear becomes a racial infection that is difficult to balance, enormously sad, alienating and very frustrating because it isolates people from each other. If people were just getting mugged, I would be out all of the time. In a country where there are mansions a few miles away from shantytowns, crime is to be expected. If I might occasionally get relieved of cash and a phone, that's not the end of the world. But it is the extreme violence of crime here that makes me hesitate to risk much at all because I could suddenly be risking everything. It's a tough place and highly pressurized.

All of that said, a lot of the country is much safer than the urban areas and we have not had the time yet to explore much of it. There are bright spots: artists building bridges through novels and theater; sports bringing people together in ways they never were before; interracial couples erasing the categories.

I brought the VW into a shop here that specialized in old Bugs. It needed a new carburetor which was expensive. The shop is run by two Afrikaner guys; the mechanic and other shop workers are all black. When I returned two days later, I was annoyed because there was still a problem with the fuel delivery. One of the shop managers spoke harshly in Afrikaans to the chief mechanic, who seems like a kind man, and then returned to the front of the shop. The mechanic went for a ride with me to diagnose the problem and we returned to the garage and he replaced the points and adjusted the timing belt. We went for a ride again and he said that normally the garage would charge me but that he was doing it for free. Meaning, he was installing a part and performing a service and not telling the manager who had just yelled at him. I gave him some money and he said thanks and put it in his chest pocket.

The prevalence of bougainvillea here is not only because of the insistently rich purple and red blooms but also because the plant is an impenetrable fence of thorns.

Bureaucracy 1, Tyler 0

An update for anyone interested: My reporting trip to Mozambique is delayed indefinitely while the U.N. payment system continues floundering in its attempts to actually pay me.

Food, Life

Written (as will be obvious) by a Frenchman:

"Beware of people who don't eat; in general they are envious, foolish or nasty. Abstinence is an anti-social virtue."

-- Alexandre-Balthazar-Laurent Grimrod de la Reyniere, Almanach des Gourmands (1803)

Mandatory Viewing

Rent the documentary "Sierra Leone's Refugee All Stars." It is heartbreaking and inspiring and a tribute to the importance of musicians and artists and the power of music. This group survived the worst of humanity and came back offering the best. (Be sure to watch the bonus clips, in particular the explanation of "Soda Soap" and the Featurette).

To The Mountains

From the porch, 6:30 a.m.

We finally rented a car (the ol' VW would probably triple the trip length) this weekend and got out of Pretoria to see some of the country. We drove east into the Mpumulunga province to a cottage I tracked down and rented between the towns of Dullstroom and Lydenburg. We were shocked by how beautiful it is. Rolling grasslands in the highveld with powerful spring storms passing through at great speed. The road to the cottage wound up the side of a mountain and then along a lower ridge. On the way we saw a secretary bird stalking in the high grass. The last time we saw one was in the pans in Botswana so it was surprising to find one in such a different climate. Japhta met us there and is the caretaker of the farm and lives nearby with his wife Lena. He is chocolate brown with smiling eyes and spoke little English (but does speak Afrikaans and probably several African languages like Zulu and Sotho) so we largely mimed our way through his explanations. He is a sweet man who showed us where everything was: "Yes, knives and forks. She is there. Firewood - she's here." We only saw him once again that weekend - a distant figure in blue coveralls waving an arm at us and then at the cattle he herded through the field. The cottage had no electricity but a gas oven, refrigerator and hot water. Kerosene lanterns with the roll-up wicks were mounted on the walls and scattered on the tables and there was a great fireplace. The tin roof signified rain both nights and, once, an alarming hail storm that jerked us from sleep with the sound of rocks clattering in a giant can. We arrived on Saturday and walked for hours and caught enormous rainbow trout from the stocked dam on the property. On Sunday, we walked much further, scurrying under fences, throwing the dog into creeks and M saw the tail of a bright green snake slide away into the thick grass on the edge of a pasture. Not good. One possibility is that it was a green mamba. So we beat feet through the marshy area we tried to avoid and breathed easier from a good distance away. M found a cow skull; a duiker sprung out of the grass near a creek and bounced away over the hill like a rubber ball. We decided to catch a trout for dinner but a huge storm intruded first and dropped the temperature and golf-ball hail until dusk. So there was a desperation to catching a fish. It got darker. No fish. Darker. Nothing. A fish struck and took my fly. They weren't hitting anything we tied on. Then I hooked one and it was off to the races. Wine flowed. Anticipation grew. Lemon juice, garlic, cracked pepper and diced onions coated the fish. The very hot oven cooked it perfectly. More wine flowed. We each took a bite and found that no amount of delicious seasoning could mask an important fact: The fish tasted like pond scum, like we had just hobbled in beside the cattle for a long drink from the algae-ridden water. A crushing culinary defeat but important lesson. Avoid trout that mingle socially with cattle. An hour later, M erupted in such a wailing scream from the kitchen that I was sure we were on the verge of some type of death. "THERE'S A SNAKE IN HERE!" she hyperventilated. I saw the brown end of something heading underneath a cabinet. I grabbed a box of candles and whacked it and then it emerged heading toward my bare feet. Then I noticed it was sort of blindly thrashing and that it didn't have a very discernable head, nor did it seem to have any idea where it was going. I haven't found the name for it yet but there are these giant centipede thingys that look and move like foot-long snakes but are not. Thankfully that's what we had but it took awhile for our heart rates to drop and suddenly the lack of bright electric light wasn't as great. We drove back roads on Sunday for a bit more exploring before speeding back to Pretoria where it rained so much that the pool nearly drowned.

Book Review

Here's a book review o' mine about a very good collection of travel stories.

The Name Game

I was gratified to get a little more perspective from this NYT article about the unusual names coming out of Zimbabwe. I knew a Zimbabwean man named Gift in Botswana and he knew another Zimbabwean named Spoon. One night I went to a party where Gift's cousin was hired to watch over the parked cars. He was a slim man in a windbreaker and he carried a long silver flashlight that he never turned on. I had to ask him to repeat his response to my introduction. His name was Hard Life.

Here's more.

Conservation Agriculture

Another article. While global warming is going to have some terrible impacts in southern Africa, there is some hope in conservation agriculture.

Finally

I'm finally back at journalism again with the first of what will hopefully be many articles for IRIN, an independent news service under the UN's financial umbrella that focuses on humanitarian issues. There's no glorious byline because it's a wire service designed for redistribution anywhere (Reuters, among others, distributes stories). The article is here.

Mike and Morris

On Wednesday night, we were walking on a trail off Johan Rissik Drive which runs along a high ridge above Pretoria and has great views of the city and is relatively empty and peaceful. It's a good place for walking the pooch because we can let him off the leash and he can harass the guinea fowl that live on the grassy hillsides. When we were almost back to the car, we walked across a small pullout - think "Scenic View" stop in U.S. - and there sat a South African police car with two white officers looking over the city. One of them greeted us in Afrikaans and I replied hello in English and then officer Mike started talking. He is a voluble man who was excited to see the city, his favorite, from this perspective again since he and his partner Morris were transferred to a different district. He said he and Morris were on special assignment, "We're not your regular policemen", but that the day's work was done and they wanted to revisit this view. He compared it to the other city people mention incessantly here for its beauty, Cape Town, and how he was assigned to working the "Flats Wars" in the northern townships there during the late '90s but that his favorite place was still Pretoria. One of his first assignments was in Pretoria during the '80s and he clearly relished those days as did Morris whose rounded ears and tired eyes gave him a generally circular appearance. Morris was very tan. Mike was tall and mustachioed with hound-dog eyes and a certain vigor. They both wore navy blue cargo pants tucked into combat boots and bullet-proof vests with 9mm pistols holstered on the front. He said he left his Pretoria duty for an assignment in Soweto during the wars there in the early '90s when he said it really seemed like the country would fall apart. I've read a book about that time in Soweto and it seems like it nothing short of a brutal hell. He said, despite it all, he still loves the country and won't leave. "Someone has to stay," he said in reference to the two million Afrikaaners who left, many for Australia, when Mandela was elected in 1994. Morris smiled and nodded along. I offered to take their picture because they were holding a camera and they said a friend of theirs was making a scrapbook for them so they wanted a picture from one of their favorite views and cities. They welcomed us effusively to the country and hoped we enjoyed it. M said that it was the best interaction she's ever had with a policeman and I agreed. Earlier in the day they had blown a tire at high speed so Morris decided to turn the car around to the side that still had two hubcaps and then I took their picture with Pretoria's lights behind them and dusk falling.

Jet Lag Notes

We just returned from a great visit to the States. Some notes from the transit back to Pretoria:

At 33,000 feet above the Kalahari Desert, you can see the curvature of the earth. The desert runs forever beneath cotton clouds before blurring into the cloudy horizon and blue sky with the slight arc.

The blond, pudgy boy on the plane was built like a tank and waited until his mother went to the bathroom and then wrapped his red inflatable neck pillow over the top of his head so that it framed his pudgy, freckled face and then he abruptly appeared above the back of his seat and started swaying back and forth to his own song and dance. He looked like a fat, happy, red sunflower swaying in the breeze and every person who was awake behind him started laughing which delighted him into more dramatic dance moves until he saw ma returning and then he quickly disappeared behind the seat.

The westernmost tip of the African continent is Dakar, Senegal which at 4 a.m. is gently, sparsely lit and the peninsula stretches into the dark, featureless Atlantic Ocean like a constellation in the sky. I momentarily felt like I was on the ground looking up instead of watching the land grow more distinct. The pale line of beaches emerged in the cloudy night. The plane dropped low over dark adobe houses before touching down and the plane doors opened to admit careful security guards and the loose, humid, coastal air that smelled of diesel and the ocean.

Stunningly sharp-dressed African men boarded the plane late in Atlanta and remained in their grey suits, peach shirts and metallic ties for the entire 24-hour trip. Somehow they still looked good in Johannesburg. We resembled albino racoons.

On the way to the house in Pretoria, the setting sun seemed massive, bigger than I remembered and the almost-full moon faced the sun, both sitting low on their horizons. Geese flew out of cornfields toward the moon.

We got the dog out of hock at the kennel. He remembered us.

New Pictures

I posted pictures from our trip to Chobe National Park in Botswana in May here.