Wandering thru Southern Africa, 1986-87

Friday morning, July 18 on the train from East London to Grahamstown The best thing about staying with Jon and Ethne was the good shower.  The rare times when I do get a shower (as opposed to a tub bath) in South Africa, the spray nozzle doesn’t work worth a damn.  Oh, and also the bagels with cream cheese for breakfast this morning.  After breakfast, Ethne drops me off at the railroad station downtown so I can make reservations for the train to Grahamstown tomorrow.  It looks like she’s wearing about five coats of make-up this morning.  I also notice that she has no sense of humor.  Gawd, what a painted princess. After making my reservations to Grahamstown, I ask the clerk about the train to Umtata.  On the drive there yesterday with Francois, I saw that the route was very interesting.  The reservations clerk gives me the information but warns me that the Umtata train has no special cars for whites.  I smile and reply, “That’s okay....

At 6:50AM, just as I’m starting to wake up and am considering strangling the python, I hear my door open.  I’m in the little daughter’s room who was moved to another room in the house for the night.  The intruder is a fucking fat maid who proceeds to go through the little girl’s dresser drawers to get clothes for her for school.  I mean, she could have knocked, fer chrissake.  I look up in amazement, then bury my face in the pillow mumbling something like, “Shit, can’t I ever have any privacy in this goddamn country?”  It’s not the first time something like this has happened to me in southern Africa.  White people here seem so oblivious to servants that they probably think nothing of a maid sweeping the bedroom floor while the master and madam are screwing. A few minutes later, I’m in the can draining the dragon when someone opens the bathroom door part way before I manage to push it shut.  By now, I’m really pissed off.  It’s no time to make a ...

  Friday, July 18, 12:30PM, on the train from East London to Grahamstown After spending the night with Rotarian John and his family, John takes me to meet Billy at one of Billy’s car lots.   Billy is a jovial white fellow in his early 40s who belongs to both Rotary and Round Table.  He seems to have a very liberal attitude for someone of Afrikaner background.  Still, he introduces me to his white employees as Will Mahoney and to a black salesman as Mr. Mahoney.  I believe Billy is trying hard to change, but old instincts run deep. The black salesman takes me for a quick photo trip to Mdantsane.  It’s the second largest township in South Africa – well, actually it’s in the Ciskei independent homeland.  It’s 15kms from East London to Mdantsane, much of it vacant land.  I ask the salesman why the township was built so far from East London.  He laughs but doesn’t respond, and I say, “Oh, I think I know the answer.”  There are numero...

  It’s nearly noon when the Amatola Express train arrives in East London.   I am met at the station by John, a tall, good-looking 40ish local Rotarian with longish curly brown hair and a moustache.   He’s the headmaster for a local teachers’ center which offers seminars and classes for school teachers.   John comes from an Afrikaner background, but he’s very fluent in English.   His family speaks English at home. John offers to start me off with a tour of the city.  First, we drive through the unimpressive downtown, then across the Buffalo Bridge through an industrial area and lower class white neighborhood.  I tell John about the incident on the train this morning when the fat Afrikaner in the canteen car wouldn’t sell me fried fish because it was “for the black people.”  He points to a group of seedy-looking whites in front of a house we are passing and tells me that these are the kinds of people who won’t change their thinking on racial issue...

  I get up at first light before the little monsters.   A black janitor is sweeping trash in the corridors.   The teen-age munchkins made quite a mess last night.   To avoid being trampled by kids, I go down to the end of the last car where I can take photos in peace.   We are stopped in Queenstown.   Mountains are all around.   Nice setting.    South to Cathcart.   Great countryside.   Two 1 km long tunnels before we get into the town.   Some good photo opportunities. Cathcart is located at the foot of the Amatola Mountains for which our train (the Amatola Express) is named.   We stop for a few minutes at Thomas River, a black township, where I witness an ugly scene.  It’s feeding time at the zoo.  Several little black kids (probably 5 to 7 years old) scamper around outside the coaches begging.  The white school kids laugh and laugh.  They throw biscuits, pennies, etc. at them and watch them grovel and...