Lord dismiss us with thy blessing

The above photo is my metric dance with dear Phidelia. See, I've been wearing traditional since before it was a thing. Edward and I had a plan to design and make our own suits..WIIILLLDDD!!!

 As I started writing what I thought would be a short replay of senior school, I just kept typing and I realized ain’t no one going to read 6 pages, so I split it up into parts. So where were we? Yes, The story of Reindeer…

 

….During one science class, Mr. Coetzee wasn’t there and so the boys were huddled up in the top right hand corner of the class (our classroom for some reason had rows of desks on different elevations if you can picture it. One of the gents dared me to do something and if I failed to do it, they would all ‘plattie’ me. Plattie was when the guys surround you and then they rain slaps on you until you got out the circle. Not just potentially painful, but rather embarrassing, ESEPCIALLY as a teen. My dare was to call her and tell her I loved her. YIKES!! Idea… At the time a group called Fat Boys song called “Falling in Love”. There is a part in the song where he breath raps the words “I…. Love….you”. I will call her, tell her I have something to say and play that part of the rap for her. SWEEET!!!! Not so much. First step how do i get it right with calling at home. We had 2 phones, one in the lounge and the other with a long cord in my parents’ room. Problem 2, the phone was locked…we were a resourceful bunch in our youth. Not sure who found this out or how it spread but we found that even when a phone is locked, if you tap the part where the receiver rests that kills the call, the number gets dialed…REVOLUTIONARY. Kinda like morse code. Now when can I do this? Oh well there is a time when everyone is watching the News, sneak out and do it then. Those were the 2 easy parts. The rest was hard. My damn mind. My shyness. There was a time in my youth when I would physically sweat when I was on the phone with girls. Like real life dripping drip! What if her parents answer, worse still what if she answers, am I ready, what do I say. Tap tap tap, phone rings sister or someone answers, I ask to speak to Reindeer, she comes on. Random chit chat, then I said I have something to tell you, then I played the part of the song and then I hung up. To this day, I do not know whether she heard it or not. The next day at school I was pooing bricks in my pants from the awkwardness, but she said nothing, I told my mates the job was done, life went on. 

 

Anyway, we broke up near the end of high school. Jokes, it remained unrequited infatuation till the end of days! But we learnt right Fii?! Bwaahaa! Anyway there was another young lass a year below us who piqued my interest. She live in a suburb called Southernwood, close to my friend Philip, her and I got on pretty wellish, smart, cool, fun, bubbly lass, yep that is enough, I am in love. Our school had a tradition that the standard 9’s (grade 11’s) arranged the matric ball for the matrics. I asked her to my Standard 9 dance and she even came (it was an easy in to the big dance for her, but who cares. I was in the game. I made her a mixed tape with our song, “The End of the Road” then she started dating a gent who was in matric when I was in standard 6 and one of my mates in her class told me she was having a laugh at me. I asked for my damn tape back! As you can see I was no Casanova. Never as much as kissed a girl, no valentines day anything. Rough I tell ya. And that trend would continue. 

 

Oh in between these stated events, we used to catch a lift home at times with my father’s colleague and his wife, They, happened to have a daughter who was in my youngest brother’s class (7 years younger than I, so very inappropriate for my 15 year old self ). I kept on egging on my bro to make a move cos she was a cutie, he was having none of that. I guess that was my introduction to the concept of ‘lay away’ 

 

On the home front, life was pottering along but me being me, I picked up signs of a strain in my parents’ relationship over the years. I guess these things happen in relationships. In the early 90s the old man had the opportunity to take a sabbatical so off he went to live the student hustle (properly) at Boston university, to do a PhD. Once again moms was left behind to watch over a daughter studying accounting at Unitra, another living her best life, I mean studying pharmacy at Rhodes , an unserious son closing in on matric, another teen and pre-teen. Not to mention that ma herself was also at university getting another qualification! Pops came back before the end of the PhD, he says it’s cos I may not have made it through matric, but I think the cold and the student hustle was too much for the man, but it’s ok I’ll take the blame. It was good to have him back. They soldiered on and in July this year, God willing it will be 52 years of "till death do us part".

 

School holidays were cool, we’d either go to East London via Butterworth, Mount Alyff to hang with Auntie Barbara, Wild Coast or Durban. One of my happy places was when there was a Ghanaian party and all the kids would be there, maybe Valerie Baiden-Emissah would be there or Ingrid and Lucie (they hardly ever came but we lived in hope). The days Prof Wilson would ask me to come up to the house to wash his merc was like Christmas, I’d trot up with glee or if Edward had left his KX motorcycle at mine, I’d ride up like to the house like I was some hero . I think I had ADHD growing up so focusing on studies wasn’t my strong suit so pops used to take me to his office at the university during school holidays, I’d use the time to try and study, but a highlight was working on his monochrome computer learning to type using Word Perfect and Typing Tutor. That was when my love for computers started. We had a few games like Summer Games, Leisure Suit Larry and Carmen Sandiego. Floppys for the win big ones then the small ones. C:\ cd \games\

 

Sports was my sanctuary. We played lots and lots of touch rugby, I’d go to rugby practice almost all the time, even though I wasn’t allowed to play. No one supporter, at every game we played at home, Friday night or Saturday morning. I remember my sister and her friends coming up with a war cry whilst beating the back of the grand stands, na na na naaa na na na na….UMTATA, sang to AC/DC’s Thunder Struck. That effort paid off one day whilst watching and the wing got injured and there was no replacement. Coach Bayman came to the stands and called me to put on some gear and step onto the field, I had never tackled anyone before, but I was excited…and petrified. This was the first team. I found some boots and kit strapped up and stepped onto the field. It was all a blur other than my brother Edward making a break and setting me up for my first touch in competitive rugby which resulted in a try! I was so excited, my legs felt rather wobbly, thank goodness for no social media then cos that was no pretty sight, me tripping over my own feet in glee  Coca cola tournament was the highlight of my tennis year, never won it, came close a few times though. Athletics was the one. There was one year when we had some of the faster gents in our u17 team. We decided to make it memorable. We would wear our normal kit and when the starter shouted on your marks, we would take of the pants and have those running tights, take op our tops to show the green vests and then we would put on black swimming caps. DAMN after that showboating we had better win. Edward started, gave the baton to me on the back straight, then I passed it on to Garth who then asked Anthony Glenn to take it home… Anderson Anderson what’s your cry V-I-C-T-O-R-Y. I qualified to represent our school at the border trials. Let’s just say that if it were today I’d possibly only get a prize for attendance… yoh I was blazed…by almost everyone. In the Transkei however, I managed to do a little better, faring well in high jump, javelin and shot put. Transkei champ in high jump and javelin (zero technique in either. I used to scissor jump the high jump, high enough to gain full colours, over 1,7m if I am not mistaken…. Academic and sport full colours here we go.

 

Speaking of sport, a few of us fancied ourselves as brawlers back in the day and man so many a random fight, one not so random though. There was brewing friction between a classmate Danny, JJ and I. I think Danny had suggested that he could take us both on and beat us. One of the classmates, convinced us to have it out during one of the PT classes. That ‘fight’ may as well have been called a stand and stare competition. I cant remember a single punch or anything being thrown. Kinda like that BIG fight between Jonathan B and Timmy I. We all missioned to the golf course only to watch 2 guys talk and 2 step around each other. The saddest thing was we all just stood there and watched this randomness. On one occasion we were all on the field during break time and my bro got in an altercation with his friend. His friend’s other friend John Kanenopolis, a rather large kid, stepped in to rough up my brother. Me being an older brother, 2 years ahead of them, couldn’t just stand by so I stepped to john to get him to stand down. The situation escalated resulting in me getting a punch on the nose that had my nose bleeding. At that time I summonsed my inner Bruce Lee and ran and kicked him, he fell down and I walked away. I think the bell had thankfully gone cos I had nooooo idea how to fight (still don’t to be fair). Soon after, thanks to my good friend Ed, I discovered weights at the Fortgale gym. What a weakling I was…But we had to start somewhere I tell you I learnt so much from The Hinsons, before there was gym we used to do isometric exercises from this book, wall push ups, chair dips, towels for bicep curls…There was one fight though that I witnessed that was brutal. 2 friends from the class above us during one break gave us a display of what the UFC would be. It was brutal, fists, tackles onto the tarmac, the ground shook…

 

Writing this so many random thoughts come flooding back like the one teacher who took a liking to a smart lad in our class and kindly took him into his home with his wife. He was a fun yet odd teacher at times, he even once told a group of us that we think we are the best thing since sliced bread…and some of us were overburnt toast…hmmm, Many of us enjoyed his class. He would initiate random things like the Hawaian party, this was during the time when Kylie Minogue’s song Locomotion was popular. We would hold onto each other’s hips and prance around the classroom like a locomotion. Yes, clearly I would try and position myself to hold Reindeer’s waist. Strategy, started early Dave 

 

When we got older the guys would be talking about stealing each other’s parents cars and buying Vincoco and Coke and then head to the bypass or the water tower at the holiday in to pass time. I was so green I never went, not only that I stayed with the prison warden and his wife, those folks of mine were having none of that. On one of these occasions, legend has it that the guys were cruising in one of the mate’s parents cars and the road was uneven and they met a slight misfortune. The person whose parent’s car was stolen, hopped out and hightailed in a state of panic. Where he was running off to, who knows. Many a story of the trout fishing competition at the dam where many a young man encountered the powers of too much alcohol. I only had second hand tales of these (un)fortunately. One time when I did go out, I remember we were at one of our younger class mate’s house and people got drank and a rather unnecessary altercation broke out which I tried to mediate in. Unfortunately, things escalated to such a degree that it made it to the headmaster’s office and it may have cost one of the guys his position as head boy. 

We used to get up to no good a lot of the time, there was one instigator though, lets call him emm Lips to protect his identity, if there was any prank he was the guy, if there was anything silly people did, he started it. We used to have cadets on Friday where we marched around in formation practicing for a ritual called the Ceremony of the Bell and we used to have to go around a part of the school were there were some small pebbles, he started a thing where pebbles were picked up and hurled at people in front. We’d have to sing songs like “Oh Lord our help in ages past” and there would always be a delay or echo of in ages past, or hope for years to come… to come. Hillarious at the time boys being boys. Anyway he started this thing where people’s pencil cases would be taken and hidden for the whole class, causing much stress because the person wouldn’t be able to work during the class and then the class would end and at times the pencil case would not be returned. One day about 4 of the class mates decided to return the favour. These 4 were his compatriots in this pencil case jacking. Anyway he found out who they were and summonsed them into the quad and interrogated them. Asking them why they did such? It got to a point where he was rather irritated and started issuing slaps one after the other. The slap was accompanied by the words “BUT WHY”. It was quite perplexing to see how all 4 of them were somewhat catatonic, and stood there waiting for their warm pack of five to be delivered to their round cheeks.

I was recently telling some uni mates how they were a significant part of who I am today, but there is no doubt that Umtata High School and life in Mthatha, was a great foundation. January 1984 – December 1993. Years, friends and memories that will always be dear to me.