I worked at a bar in Observatory, Cape Town many years ago. It was a meeting place for locals and travellers who called themselves writers, sculptors, painters and philosophers. They drank and smoked together for so many years that they became completely entangled in each others lives and I was happy to call myself one of those people. Some nights that place would go crazy, people got naked and danced on the tables and we would only switch off the lights after the sun came up. There was the resident homeless man who obsessively built sculptures out of trash. The alcoholics, the deranged. Some overdosed, some committed suicide, some have continued on their paths of life with joy and pain. We all grew up in that place.
One of our regulars was a real card. Grant was always standing up in the middle of our evening rush and reciting his poetry out of the blue. He organised slide shows in the café of his trips abroad, usually ending with a recitation or an improvised skit, or music; whenever inspiration hit him he’d indulge it. We shook our heads behind the bar counter as we poured more drinks and people got up and walked out en mass. At some point while I was still working there he disappeared and I forgot about him as I did with many of the other faces that peered at me over glasses in the dimmed smoky light of Café Ganesh.
My accommodation in Barrydale is on the property an old accomplice from there, a light-hearted Blacksmith as big as a bear that used to spend a lot of quality time sitting on the seats of that bar. He moved here a couple of years ago and offered for me to stay in the tower above his gallery for a month or two. At ten o clock last night I got home to find the Blacksmith downstairs cooking up something frightful and slugging back brandy-and-cokes with his old pal Grant who was passing through with his wife and child, and had stopped by for tea. Their tea had turned into drinks, which in turn had become dinner. The Blacksmith was The Orchestrator, throwing on old LP’s and humming to Neil Diamond, Oscar Peterson and U2. Grant’s daughter, a girl of perhaps seven or eight with short, dark hair and the same intense glare as her father walked around aimlessly. Her mother, a mathematician, wafted in and out of the room covered in a shawl, smiling blissfully as I passed her by.
“Well, hi there!” a voice boomed as I walked in. Discordant electric guitar cords had started competing with the Blacksmith’s LP’s. The place was mayhem. Grant descended on me wearing a large blue kaftan that hung loosely over his tummy and hips. His hairline had receded some since the last time I saw him, and what remained had grown down to his shoulders where it hung in oily curls. He shook my hand as if for the first time. If he smiled anymore it would drop off his face.
“Hi Grant,” I said and introduced myself.
“Ah yes, I remember you I think!” he said, as if hit in the face by an old light bulb that was flickering on and off rapidly. “How lovely to see you again. Café Ganesh…. That’s like a different life now! I left Cape Town nine years ago. I just realised that the people there would never be able to think any bigger, you know? Perhaps it’s because they’re stuck between the mountain and the sea!” he laughed and the kaftan jumped around his stomach. “I went travelling after that, nowhere and everywhere for a couple of years, until I found my enlightenment, and then I came back.” I blinked twice. Did he just say he’d found his enlightenment?? “Now I’m based in Grahamstown… Hey, have you met my daughter?” He pointed to her. “I think I lost my desire to be an artist after we had her. I mean, isn’t she perfection?? What an amazing creation! Isn’t life amazing?! We’re starting a band, the two of us. Have you heard of the White Stripes? I’m totally inspired by them! I mean there’s just the two of them and you know, if you can read you can do anything! No really, you can teach yourself anything. I got this book…” Grant was gesticulating wildly and pacing and produced a small ring bound booklet with a guitar on the front. “I mean, this is all you need to start a band, isn’t it honey?!” he shouted to his little girl who had taken over the guitar and was noisily banging away at it. She ignored him completely. His wife, tall and thin, wafted through the room again like an ethereal Christian effigy, briefly stopping to applaud her daughter’s efforts on the guitar.
From this point on the conversation gets a bit hazy. Graeme spoke about how he’s discovered that sound is the ultimate art form, that it’s basically “sound sculpture” in that every sound that you make becomes an actual form in space, and that depending on what music you listen to, the shape of the object that you have created would vary. Or something like that. He quoted the Bible. He spoke fervently, like his mouth could barely keep up with his head, and all the time he looked like he might take off at any moment, like the excitement was almost too much to bare. Nothing could put him off. He wasn’t concerned by what either myself or the fourth party, (whom I haven’t mentioned) thought about any of this, which I felt was somewhat of a mistake on his part. At some point whilst Grant was blabbering on, the fourth party sucked hard at his cigarette and surreptitiously rolled his eyes at me whilst Grant went off on another tangent. I giggled. Grant is crazy, I thought quite plainly. He’s mad. His wife is as cooky as he is, and I’m sure their daughter will grow up to be a wonderful but deeply cooky person as well.
I slipped upstairs to the tower soon after that, but the music continued for most of the night. Sometimes things quietened down, but then I would hear uproarious laughter, or something breaking. There was dancing late in the night, and at about four am I was woken by Grant shouting: “Rachmaninov! Rachmaaaninov!!” The Blacksmith turned up the sound and a piano concerto blasted itself to smithereens. I might as well have stayed for the party, because sound loves a good tower. I heard them locking up after the sun came up, and later I heard a car drive down the driveway and leave. His wife must have been the driver, I thought. He’d barely gotten into bed before getting up again.
I couldn’t get Grant out of my thoughts after that. I played our short conversation over and over in my head. Something about his confidence had made me feel insecure during our conversation. The fact that he hadn’t played by the same rules as everyone else, the fact that he DIDN’T CARE what we thought and that it obviously worked for him, made me resent him. I part of me felt like saying: “Are you deaf and blind?? You’re getting pretty old buddy, you’ve never been exceptionally beautiful, you drive an old car and your daughter looks like she might just have walked out of Children of the Corn. You have NOTHING to be happy about!”
I only laid eyes on the Blacksmith again two days later, after his recovery. “Sounded like you and Grant had a great time,” I said winking. “Oh God no, Grant went to bed soon after you did. I went to the bar and brought home the German from town. It was the two of us going crazy down there. Sorry…”
The question I’m forced to ask myself is: On what grounds do you we judge people? And what do we reward them for? Did my judgement of Grant make me a happier person or did it just reflect my own rigidity and fear of going against the grain of what is acceptable in society? Let’s face it, it’s not ok to be that happy in our world. Too much joy makes you a freak, a crazy.
If he'd been a conformist he would probably have been a bored old bastard, slightly cynical about the world with a chip on his shoulder, but he’s not. Perhaps he HAS found his enlightenment; how would you go about telling someone you're enlightened anyway? Hey, the man is happy, there’s no doubt about it. Grant has been faithful to what’s in his bones, and in my book that makes him a superhero. I'm the crazy one here. I'm the one who's crazy.
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Thursday, December 23, 2010
Love is a tower.
I gave notice on my flat a couple of months ago. After I got back from America I couldn’t settle down. At night my feet burned and my dreams felt too real. Finally I conceded.
On the first of December I moved out, packed up my life and stashed it in various places in and around the Cape peninsula. There are bits of me in ceilings, at the top of garages, in other people’s flats. My travel bug has not been satisfied. Cellini Euroline was reinstated as my official Travel Companion, so I tied her up and gagged her, threw her in the boot of my car and quietly left Cape Town. No big goodbyes, no big deal. I slipped away like a shiny eel, out through the tunnel and passed Worcester, wine farms and horses, townships and trains. Out to Barrydale, a small town in a Karoo valley that’s surrounded by big blue mountains and Pierneef clouds.
My room is perched on top of an art gallery; one room, a basin for washing up. At the back an old ball and claw bath. A winding staircase laps down to the ground like a lazy tongue, and so I am Rapunzel although I have no hair. Downstairs my landlord, a metal worker, puts the final touches on the door hinges he’s been brooding over. Blue light flashes through his studios’ windows and when it does, the lights in my apartment flicker down, then up again.
Clouds roll in late afternoon to deliver a short but violent shower of rain. A hammer maims a sheet of metal below. Dogs bark. The traffic on the R62 surges past. Out one window lies a grey cemetery; beyond that houses, dogs. Out the other, endless blue sky broken in pieces by mountains, sometimes mist. Next door a couple of men are digging a grave. They’ve been at it for three days now. When night falls their employer pulls up in his car and leaves the headlights on so they can see. He sits on the bonnet drinking a quart of beer while I watch from behind a curtain in my tower. His legs dangle in front of the headlights, throwing strange shadows on the ground.
Two nights ago I woke up to scratching and flapping, a bat in my room. I chased it, we wrestled, I lost. The next morning I woke to find Bat Baby hanging upside down next to the window like a strange doorknob or light switch, deep in beautiful sleep. We gently detached it and put it out the window. I walked outside to check on it; it just lay there, entangled in the bush like a dead thing, but when I checked again an hour later, it had disappeared.
This morning it was the banging of baboons on my roof. They come after sunrise; you hear them barking in the hills, then closer, closer. In two weeks I’ve had three encounters with them. They pull at people’s doors, break in and ransack their houses. One day I walk back home and find them in the middle of town, chasing down the main road with food in their mouths as people stare and drop their groceries.
It’s the week before Christmas. I have no TV, no radio. Consequently I have taken to reading, poetry mostly: Eugene Marais, Leonard Cohen, Pablo Neruda. At night I dream of old lovers, people I used to know, and I wake up aching. I concoct wild fantasies in which I am the heroine and I get the man. I am not unhappy. I’m just nowhere.
One of my oldest friends lives in town. We went to school together, to varsity together, but he moved here five years ago and since then our time spent have been short encounters involving sushi and wine in the Waterfront. He makes chandeliers out of recycled material, he makes things with beads, he paints. He’s a sculptor. For Christmas he helped make a huge Christmas tree in the main street of Barrydale.. There was a marching band, dancers, flashing Christmas lights. I thought about the lights in New York, the shop fronts my cousin and I had gone to see at Macy’s last year this time; the bustling crowds, the subway, the cold. A year has passed.
On the first of December I moved out, packed up my life and stashed it in various places in and around the Cape peninsula. There are bits of me in ceilings, at the top of garages, in other people’s flats. My travel bug has not been satisfied. Cellini Euroline was reinstated as my official Travel Companion, so I tied her up and gagged her, threw her in the boot of my car and quietly left Cape Town. No big goodbyes, no big deal. I slipped away like a shiny eel, out through the tunnel and passed Worcester, wine farms and horses, townships and trains. Out to Barrydale, a small town in a Karoo valley that’s surrounded by big blue mountains and Pierneef clouds.
My room is perched on top of an art gallery; one room, a basin for washing up. At the back an old ball and claw bath. A winding staircase laps down to the ground like a lazy tongue, and so I am Rapunzel although I have no hair. Downstairs my landlord, a metal worker, puts the final touches on the door hinges he’s been brooding over. Blue light flashes through his studios’ windows and when it does, the lights in my apartment flicker down, then up again.
Clouds roll in late afternoon to deliver a short but violent shower of rain. A hammer maims a sheet of metal below. Dogs bark. The traffic on the R62 surges past. Out one window lies a grey cemetery; beyond that houses, dogs. Out the other, endless blue sky broken in pieces by mountains, sometimes mist. Next door a couple of men are digging a grave. They’ve been at it for three days now. When night falls their employer pulls up in his car and leaves the headlights on so they can see. He sits on the bonnet drinking a quart of beer while I watch from behind a curtain in my tower. His legs dangle in front of the headlights, throwing strange shadows on the ground.
Two nights ago I woke up to scratching and flapping, a bat in my room. I chased it, we wrestled, I lost. The next morning I woke to find Bat Baby hanging upside down next to the window like a strange doorknob or light switch, deep in beautiful sleep. We gently detached it and put it out the window. I walked outside to check on it; it just lay there, entangled in the bush like a dead thing, but when I checked again an hour later, it had disappeared.
This morning it was the banging of baboons on my roof. They come after sunrise; you hear them barking in the hills, then closer, closer. In two weeks I’ve had three encounters with them. They pull at people’s doors, break in and ransack their houses. One day I walk back home and find them in the middle of town, chasing down the main road with food in their mouths as people stare and drop their groceries.
It’s the week before Christmas. I have no TV, no radio. Consequently I have taken to reading, poetry mostly: Eugene Marais, Leonard Cohen, Pablo Neruda. At night I dream of old lovers, people I used to know, and I wake up aching. I concoct wild fantasies in which I am the heroine and I get the man. I am not unhappy. I’m just nowhere.
One of my oldest friends lives in town. We went to school together, to varsity together, but he moved here five years ago and since then our time spent have been short encounters involving sushi and wine in the Waterfront. He makes chandeliers out of recycled material, he makes things with beads, he paints. He’s a sculptor. For Christmas he helped make a huge Christmas tree in the main street of Barrydale.. There was a marching band, dancers, flashing Christmas lights. I thought about the lights in New York, the shop fronts my cousin and I had gone to see at Macy’s last year this time; the bustling crowds, the subway, the cold. A year has passed.
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Welcome to the movie.
The life of Alice would make a good thriller at the moment.
Or perhaps a drama. Either way, it has all the elements necessary to induce total and complete madness or to make you change your religion.
The current story line looks something like this:
Woman bravely gives up everything to follow her dream of becoming a location independent, travelling pro blogger and Sangoma even though everyone thinks she’s finally lost the last of her marbles (or just the big important one in the middle). At least, that’s the sexy way of summing it up. The unsexy way is to say that she’s now homeless by choice. (Hence many references to madness.)
As Woman prepares for the final cut (moving out of her flat), she knuckles down and braces herself but all and all copes exceptionally well with the loss of her cat, the loss of her home, storing her possessions for the next five years and blindly believing that she’s going to find funding for above mentioned adventurous lifestyle when there’s absolutely no proof to support this.
But then!
Her beloved and trusty car breaks down. It’s serious the mechanic says, but don’t you worry Little Miss. R6,000 should cover it. You’ll have your car back in a week he says, when the parts have arrived. (If they arrive.) Woman has large and dramatic nervous breakdown all over the mechanic’s floor but he doesn’t look too perturbed about it. He just says: sign here. Woman signs. Then goes home to spend the rest of the week shaking, crying and staring at the wall.
She sits in her flat and feels like her guts are falling out of her bottom, but they don’t. In fact, now that she thinks about it, nothing has fallen out of her bottom in quite awhile.
The Blouberg wind comes up. It blows in that specific way that makes her feel like her head might come off. In an effort to combat cabin fever she does go for a walk but the wind blows her hair up her nose and she almost chokes to death.
A couple of hours after she arrives back home, she realises that baby birds have hatched in an unreachable location on the other side of the wall and they squawk and scrape on the side of the house all day long. Her madness deepens to a new shade of purple.
The two old yappy dogs downstairs bark at her when she comes home, when she leaves and when the wind blows, which means that they bark all the time. The birds are not disturbed by the barking. Their feet scrape against the inside walls and Alice listens to them as they settle down wake up scuttle about scuttle and crawl. They wait for their mother to come back baring gifts and when she does all hell breaks loose. The wind slams doors closed. They bang like bombs down the street, and the wind howls with joy and goes looking for another.
This time a year ago Alice was packing her bags in New York City to go home. A year later, almost to the day, she’s packing them again.
Almost to the day.
Or perhaps a drama. Either way, it has all the elements necessary to induce total and complete madness or to make you change your religion.
The current story line looks something like this:
Woman bravely gives up everything to follow her dream of becoming a location independent, travelling pro blogger and Sangoma even though everyone thinks she’s finally lost the last of her marbles (or just the big important one in the middle). At least, that’s the sexy way of summing it up. The unsexy way is to say that she’s now homeless by choice. (Hence many references to madness.)
As Woman prepares for the final cut (moving out of her flat), she knuckles down and braces herself but all and all copes exceptionally well with the loss of her cat, the loss of her home, storing her possessions for the next five years and blindly believing that she’s going to find funding for above mentioned adventurous lifestyle when there’s absolutely no proof to support this.
But then!
Her beloved and trusty car breaks down. It’s serious the mechanic says, but don’t you worry Little Miss. R6,000 should cover it. You’ll have your car back in a week he says, when the parts have arrived. (If they arrive.) Woman has large and dramatic nervous breakdown all over the mechanic’s floor but he doesn’t look too perturbed about it. He just says: sign here. Woman signs. Then goes home to spend the rest of the week shaking, crying and staring at the wall.
She sits in her flat and feels like her guts are falling out of her bottom, but they don’t. In fact, now that she thinks about it, nothing has fallen out of her bottom in quite awhile.
The Blouberg wind comes up. It blows in that specific way that makes her feel like her head might come off. In an effort to combat cabin fever she does go for a walk but the wind blows her hair up her nose and she almost chokes to death.
A couple of hours after she arrives back home, she realises that baby birds have hatched in an unreachable location on the other side of the wall and they squawk and scrape on the side of the house all day long. Her madness deepens to a new shade of purple.
The two old yappy dogs downstairs bark at her when she comes home, when she leaves and when the wind blows, which means that they bark all the time. The birds are not disturbed by the barking. Their feet scrape against the inside walls and Alice listens to them as they settle down wake up scuttle about scuttle and crawl. They wait for their mother to come back baring gifts and when she does all hell breaks loose. The wind slams doors closed. They bang like bombs down the street, and the wind howls with joy and goes looking for another.
This time a year ago Alice was packing her bags in New York City to go home. A year later, almost to the day, she’s packing them again.
Almost to the day.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
The Art of being Alice.
Purpose. It’s a recurring theme in my life, one I return to again and again hoping that time would have allowed me more clarity to understand what mine might be. The dictionary tells me that purpose is simply ‘knowing what the intention is and working towards it’. In order to be a powerful human being you need to be clear about what your Life Purpose is and follow it boldly. When you are operating from this “place of power” your intention and actions combine to open a clear path that leads to your destiny.
Knowing your own purpose is no easy feat these days. The onus lies heavily on each of us to figure it out for ourselves, if we’re lucky. In earlier times it wasn’t always such a puzzle. In Burkina Faso the name that is given to you at birth is directly related to your purpose, which is ascertained by means of ritual or divination before birth. Malidoma Some writes beautifully about his name and purpose in his novel “Of water and the Spirit”.
“During the ritual, the incoming soul takes the voice of the mother (some say the soul takes the whole body of the mother, which is why the mother falls into trance and does not remember anything afterward) and answers every question the priest asks. The living must know who is being reborn, where the soul is from, why it chose to come here, and what gender it has chosen. (…) Some souls ask that specific things be made ready before their arrival – talismanic power objects, medicine bags, metal objects in the form of rings for the ankle or the wrist. They do not want to forget who they are and what they have come here to do. It is hard not to forget, because life in this world is filled with many alluring distractions. The name of the newborn is based upon the results of these communications. A name is the life program of its bearer.” (p20)
Westerners don’t have the privilege of this kind of ritual and our spirit purpose isn’t exactly considered in the West. What is considered is how we might add value – not to the earth we live on, but to the system we operate in. The task set most clearly out before us from an early age is not to figure out who we will become, rather what we will become and then to be defined by that. We are rarely propositioned with alternatives that fall outside of this clear cut agenda and it’s only those with the means, desire, brains and bravery who can create lives outside of it. The standard has been set so clearly and completely that to oppose it is considered dangerous, even suicidal. Many people force themselves to operate in frameworks they don’t really agree with and that don’t contain their actual life purpose purely because no other options have been offered to them as actual viable options. So we stick to the program. And it continues.
‘Ruin is the road to transformation’: says a character in the new film of the book Eat, Pray, Love. It sticks with me long after I leave the theatre. Ruin allowes you to open up and excavate old parts of your being, ones that you’d forgotten about or buried, ones you’d hoped you’d never see again and yet they’re still there, intact, waiting silently to be rediscovered. Yes Liz Gilbert, I understand. It’s only when you’re down to your foundations that you can see the map of how the house is to be built.
I’m lucky. When I was twenty five I was initiated into an ancient African culture that gave me an alternative framework or container to operate from. It’s like an ancient world reached out and saved me just when I really, really needed it to. I was given a life boat in an age when everyone is drowning and without this container I would certainly have continued to be depressed, suicidal and sick.
Besides for giving me a container, being initiated also offered me clear indications of what my purpose is. Naturally, I got to a point where I believed it to be more of a curse than anything else. Being a Sangoma really didn’t fit in with my plans. I had dreams see, aspirations. I wasn’t ready yet to live my purpose and accept my power, and so I danced around it like a headless chicken saying: “this isn’t my purpose, my purpose is to be an actor! A director! No wait! I’m going to be an English teacher!”
For the longest time I believed that my purpose would fit in with what they taught at school. I didn’t want to be (what I considered to be) different, so I always played down the aspects of myself that I considered to be unacceptable. The only problem was that that was pretty much the bulk of me. The past couple of years I’ve been looking at the world and wondering why I don’t feel passionate about anything anymore, and I’ve finally realised that although I felt passionate about many things, I didn’t think they were acceptable, or that they fit into the framework, or that they were impressive enough to be passionate about.
Although most of us don’t have the blueprint of our purpose locked in our name like the folk in Burkina Faso, I think most people know innately what their purpose is. It’s in your bones, down in those foundations of yours. The only thing changes is your perception of it, and most importantly your acceptance of it. Many people are unhappy because they dance around their purpose for so long that eventually they just feel really tired and lost. I’ve forced myself into many awful situations where I didn’t really belong purely because I believed I had no choice about the matter. Boy, was I wrong. I create my own blueprint for my life. I am the Master Architect of my existence.
I still don’t know what my future holds, but I know what I enjoy, where I feel most comfortable and what my strengths are. The longer I follow that, the better I feel about myself. The further I step away from them, the more desperate I become.
I’ve given notice on my flat and for the second time in two years I’m packing up my life. The first time it was partly out of desperation. This time it’s with clarity. It’s from a place of power. I don’t know what happens next but I’ve never felt more certain that I’m doing the right thing.
I’m striking out in my power.
And that is the Art of being Alice.
Knowing your own purpose is no easy feat these days. The onus lies heavily on each of us to figure it out for ourselves, if we’re lucky. In earlier times it wasn’t always such a puzzle. In Burkina Faso the name that is given to you at birth is directly related to your purpose, which is ascertained by means of ritual or divination before birth. Malidoma Some writes beautifully about his name and purpose in his novel “Of water and the Spirit”.
“During the ritual, the incoming soul takes the voice of the mother (some say the soul takes the whole body of the mother, which is why the mother falls into trance and does not remember anything afterward) and answers every question the priest asks. The living must know who is being reborn, where the soul is from, why it chose to come here, and what gender it has chosen. (…) Some souls ask that specific things be made ready before their arrival – talismanic power objects, medicine bags, metal objects in the form of rings for the ankle or the wrist. They do not want to forget who they are and what they have come here to do. It is hard not to forget, because life in this world is filled with many alluring distractions. The name of the newborn is based upon the results of these communications. A name is the life program of its bearer.” (p20)
Westerners don’t have the privilege of this kind of ritual and our spirit purpose isn’t exactly considered in the West. What is considered is how we might add value – not to the earth we live on, but to the system we operate in. The task set most clearly out before us from an early age is not to figure out who we will become, rather what we will become and then to be defined by that. We are rarely propositioned with alternatives that fall outside of this clear cut agenda and it’s only those with the means, desire, brains and bravery who can create lives outside of it. The standard has been set so clearly and completely that to oppose it is considered dangerous, even suicidal. Many people force themselves to operate in frameworks they don’t really agree with and that don’t contain their actual life purpose purely because no other options have been offered to them as actual viable options. So we stick to the program. And it continues.
‘Ruin is the road to transformation’: says a character in the new film of the book Eat, Pray, Love. It sticks with me long after I leave the theatre. Ruin allowes you to open up and excavate old parts of your being, ones that you’d forgotten about or buried, ones you’d hoped you’d never see again and yet they’re still there, intact, waiting silently to be rediscovered. Yes Liz Gilbert, I understand. It’s only when you’re down to your foundations that you can see the map of how the house is to be built.
I’m lucky. When I was twenty five I was initiated into an ancient African culture that gave me an alternative framework or container to operate from. It’s like an ancient world reached out and saved me just when I really, really needed it to. I was given a life boat in an age when everyone is drowning and without this container I would certainly have continued to be depressed, suicidal and sick.
Besides for giving me a container, being initiated also offered me clear indications of what my purpose is. Naturally, I got to a point where I believed it to be more of a curse than anything else. Being a Sangoma really didn’t fit in with my plans. I had dreams see, aspirations. I wasn’t ready yet to live my purpose and accept my power, and so I danced around it like a headless chicken saying: “this isn’t my purpose, my purpose is to be an actor! A director! No wait! I’m going to be an English teacher!”
For the longest time I believed that my purpose would fit in with what they taught at school. I didn’t want to be (what I considered to be) different, so I always played down the aspects of myself that I considered to be unacceptable. The only problem was that that was pretty much the bulk of me. The past couple of years I’ve been looking at the world and wondering why I don’t feel passionate about anything anymore, and I’ve finally realised that although I felt passionate about many things, I didn’t think they were acceptable, or that they fit into the framework, or that they were impressive enough to be passionate about.
Although most of us don’t have the blueprint of our purpose locked in our name like the folk in Burkina Faso, I think most people know innately what their purpose is. It’s in your bones, down in those foundations of yours. The only thing changes is your perception of it, and most importantly your acceptance of it. Many people are unhappy because they dance around their purpose for so long that eventually they just feel really tired and lost. I’ve forced myself into many awful situations where I didn’t really belong purely because I believed I had no choice about the matter. Boy, was I wrong. I create my own blueprint for my life. I am the Master Architect of my existence.
I still don’t know what my future holds, but I know what I enjoy, where I feel most comfortable and what my strengths are. The longer I follow that, the better I feel about myself. The further I step away from them, the more desperate I become.
I’ve given notice on my flat and for the second time in two years I’m packing up my life. The first time it was partly out of desperation. This time it’s with clarity. It’s from a place of power. I don’t know what happens next but I’ve never felt more certain that I’m doing the right thing.
I’m striking out in my power.
And that is the Art of being Alice.
Friday, October 1, 2010
These boots were made for walkin
The story goes something like this:
Girl comes into large(ish) some of cash and can either use it as part of a down payment on a property, or she can go travelling the world. She decides to pack up Cellini Euroline and head for the hills.
The hills turn out to be America. Girl traverses said America for six months. She sleeps on couches, on bunk beds, in hostels and strangers’ homes. She just keeps moving and goes right across The States. Newness oozes out of everything around her and for the first time ever Girl thinks:
“This is what it’s like to be alive! This is what it means to be free!”
Six months later her visa expires, her money disappears and her heart aches for her Lover left back in South Africa. Girl hops a plane and arrives back to turmoil and confusion. Said Lover wants nothing to do with her and has found new love in the arms of Other Girl Living Next Door. Who could blame him, but Girl’s disappointment is staggering. She spins and spins like a top that won’t stop. At night she dreams of planes and airports, of faraway places. She dreams of falling down rabbit holes and meeting strange characters in strange lands, and on waking her heart aches. She finds the perfect place to live, but she turns it down. Can’t figure out why. She struggles to get back to work. The idea of working for somebody else makes her throw up a little in her mouth. Eventually she rents another flat at twice the price and unpacks her life piece by piece. It’s not as fun as she thought it would be. Every now and again she still tries to convince the Lover to come back, but he won’t and he doesn’t. Somehow she feels out of place, like a sore thumb sticking out.
Life returns to what it was before she went on her journey (bar the love interest, the job, the cash flow and sea view) and soon boredom returns with a vengeance. Her money dwindles. Her cat dies. She finishes her crying quota till like the age of 60. The new car and apartment suck at her wallet like a vacuum cleaner on vendetta. She struggles to pay the rent. Life turns a little grim.
The dreams of faraway places become overwhelming. When she closes her eyes she’s transported to Hawaii, Amsterdam and Panama. She starts spending large portions of her time fantasizing about these places in detail, conjuring up un-taken journeys and when she wakes she shakes uncontrollably. She buys herself a map of the world and stares at it for hours. The lottery becomes her religion and she spends the little money she has on buying up tickets and then praying loudly and continuously, but she doesn’t win. During her internet job searches she ends up on doing research about "how to find the perfect backpack", "location independent living" and "how to travel the world for free".
Ten months after her return to Africa she's flippin tired of it all. She lets go of the Lover. She lets go of the cat. She wakes up one morning with a hangover and gives notice on her flat when she's not looking. Contrary to what she expected she feels enormously relieved, perhaps even a little excited. She gives in to herself, to her desire for awe and adventure.
She lets go and goes shopping for a new pair of boots!
Girl comes into large(ish) some of cash and can either use it as part of a down payment on a property, or she can go travelling the world. She decides to pack up Cellini Euroline and head for the hills.
The hills turn out to be America. Girl traverses said America for six months. She sleeps on couches, on bunk beds, in hostels and strangers’ homes. She just keeps moving and goes right across The States. Newness oozes out of everything around her and for the first time ever Girl thinks:
“This is what it’s like to be alive! This is what it means to be free!”
Six months later her visa expires, her money disappears and her heart aches for her Lover left back in South Africa. Girl hops a plane and arrives back to turmoil and confusion. Said Lover wants nothing to do with her and has found new love in the arms of Other Girl Living Next Door. Who could blame him, but Girl’s disappointment is staggering. She spins and spins like a top that won’t stop. At night she dreams of planes and airports, of faraway places. She dreams of falling down rabbit holes and meeting strange characters in strange lands, and on waking her heart aches. She finds the perfect place to live, but she turns it down. Can’t figure out why. She struggles to get back to work. The idea of working for somebody else makes her throw up a little in her mouth. Eventually she rents another flat at twice the price and unpacks her life piece by piece. It’s not as fun as she thought it would be. Every now and again she still tries to convince the Lover to come back, but he won’t and he doesn’t. Somehow she feels out of place, like a sore thumb sticking out.
Life returns to what it was before she went on her journey (bar the love interest, the job, the cash flow and sea view) and soon boredom returns with a vengeance. Her money dwindles. Her cat dies. She finishes her crying quota till like the age of 60. The new car and apartment suck at her wallet like a vacuum cleaner on vendetta. She struggles to pay the rent. Life turns a little grim.
The dreams of faraway places become overwhelming. When she closes her eyes she’s transported to Hawaii, Amsterdam and Panama. She starts spending large portions of her time fantasizing about these places in detail, conjuring up un-taken journeys and when she wakes she shakes uncontrollably. She buys herself a map of the world and stares at it for hours. The lottery becomes her religion and she spends the little money she has on buying up tickets and then praying loudly and continuously, but she doesn’t win. During her internet job searches she ends up on doing research about "how to find the perfect backpack", "location independent living" and "how to travel the world for free".
Ten months after her return to Africa she's flippin tired of it all. She lets go of the Lover. She lets go of the cat. She wakes up one morning with a hangover and gives notice on her flat when she's not looking. Contrary to what she expected she feels enormously relieved, perhaps even a little excited. She gives in to herself, to her desire for awe and adventure.
She lets go and goes shopping for a new pair of boots!
Monday, September 13, 2010
Shifting Sands.
I am but one among a vast army of bold adventurers who have chosen between a life of certainty on firm soil, and a life of surprise on shifting sands. We are the troubadours, seafarers, merchants and explorers of our age. We are vagrants and vagabonds. We have no houses: the world is our home. And wherever we go, we envision. We instruct. We construct. We forge alliances across continents and oceans. We beat the drum to the great march of progress.
Marie-Therese le Roux
August 2009
Marie-Therese le Roux
August 2009
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Clarity.
Dear Universe,
Fine! You win! I get that it was probably not the best strategic move to come straight back home after my epic six month trip to the US. Check mate world. Message transmission completed.
It took me awhile to receive it though. And in the process The Depression has become strong with me. Nine months can really stretch when you don’t have a life. Nine months. NINE LONG MONTHS of trying to stay sane. I have failed miserably. It's significant though, my friend says over coffee. Nine is the number of completion; the time it takes a foetus to become a baby. Goody gum drops, I say to my friend. Please pass the salt.
I nurse my old travel habits like they're terminal patients. I take Cellini Euroline out from time to time, stroke her under belly, put her up on my bed so she can have a view of the neighbours garage at least. We chat, but not like we used to when we were out on the road. Things have changed between us. With the demise of my last remaining functional relationship I have turned to fantasy.
Today's fantasy menu read something like this. I fantasized about:
1. Being recruited by the CIA/FBI to work on their next major undercover project. Angelina Jolie: kiss my butt.
2. Being kidnapped by my “real parents” and taken to Italy to meet “the family”. Or to the Caribbean. Or anwhere other than where I am right now.
3. Winning the R75million lottery. (Email me if you would like the detailed breakdown of exactly what I intend to do with it.)
4. Winning a round the world plane ticket in a travel competition. First class. Hotel accommodation included.
5. Someone rich reading my blog and deciding that I’m wonderful. They give me a million dollars, on the condition that I travel the world and write about it. And sleep with them.
6. Meeting a rich, handsome secret agent and travelling the world with him.
7. Meeting a rich, handsome adventurer and travelling the world with him.
8. Meeting a rich, handsome vampire and traveling the world riding on his back.
9. Getting notified that my third uncle thrice removed has passed on. Since he adored me (even though we never met, except that one time when I was but a baby) he has left his sixteen homes across the globe to moi. I live in all of them for a year and write a novel about it. It becomes a best seller.
After the above list of fantasies were completed I spent a disproportionate amount of time planning a wedding I don't intend to have to a man I don't know, and later I even named our baby I don't want. I'm living in the Twilight Zone people.
What is happening to me???!
Dear Universe, please intervene. In whatever way you see fit, as long as it's exciting, adventurous, and maybe only slightly dangerous.
Let's get it on!
Alice
Fine! You win! I get that it was probably not the best strategic move to come straight back home after my epic six month trip to the US. Check mate world. Message transmission completed.
It took me awhile to receive it though. And in the process The Depression has become strong with me. Nine months can really stretch when you don’t have a life. Nine months. NINE LONG MONTHS of trying to stay sane. I have failed miserably. It's significant though, my friend says over coffee. Nine is the number of completion; the time it takes a foetus to become a baby. Goody gum drops, I say to my friend. Please pass the salt.
I nurse my old travel habits like they're terminal patients. I take Cellini Euroline out from time to time, stroke her under belly, put her up on my bed so she can have a view of the neighbours garage at least. We chat, but not like we used to when we were out on the road. Things have changed between us. With the demise of my last remaining functional relationship I have turned to fantasy.
Today's fantasy menu read something like this. I fantasized about:
1. Being recruited by the CIA/FBI to work on their next major undercover project. Angelina Jolie: kiss my butt.
2. Being kidnapped by my “real parents” and taken to Italy to meet “the family”. Or to the Caribbean. Or anwhere other than where I am right now.
3. Winning the R75million lottery. (Email me if you would like the detailed breakdown of exactly what I intend to do with it.)
4. Winning a round the world plane ticket in a travel competition. First class. Hotel accommodation included.
5. Someone rich reading my blog and deciding that I’m wonderful. They give me a million dollars, on the condition that I travel the world and write about it. And sleep with them.
6. Meeting a rich, handsome secret agent and travelling the world with him.
7. Meeting a rich, handsome adventurer and travelling the world with him.
8. Meeting a rich, handsome vampire and traveling the world riding on his back.
9. Getting notified that my third uncle thrice removed has passed on. Since he adored me (even though we never met, except that one time when I was but a baby) he has left his sixteen homes across the globe to moi. I live in all of them for a year and write a novel about it. It becomes a best seller.
After the above list of fantasies were completed I spent a disproportionate amount of time planning a wedding I don't intend to have to a man I don't know, and later I even named our baby I don't want. I'm living in the Twilight Zone people.
What is happening to me???!
Dear Universe, please intervene. In whatever way you see fit, as long as it's exciting, adventurous, and maybe only slightly dangerous.
Let's get it on!
Alice
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Images
He liked words and images. "Blue" was one of his favorite words. He liked the feeling it made on his lips and tongue when he said it. Words have a physical feeling, not just meaning, he remembered thinking when he was young. He liked other words, such as "distant," "woodsmoke," "highway," "ancient," "passage," "voyageur," and "India" for how they sounded, how they tasted, and what they conjured up in his mind. He kept lists of words he liked posted in his room. Then joined the words into phrases and posted those as well:
Too close to the fire.
I came from the East with a small band of travelers.
The constant chirping of those who would save me and those who would sell me.
Talisman, Talisman, show me your secrets. Helmsman, Helmsman, turn me for home.
Lying naked where blue whales swim.
She wished him steaming trains that left from winter stations.
Before I became a man, I was an arrow - long time ago.
- The Bridges of Madison County by Robert James Waller
Frequently asked Questions about Sangomas:
What is a Sangoma?
A Sangoma is an African Doctor, a ritual specialist, a healer, a mediator, a negotiater and a diviner. They serve as a link between this world and the world of the ancestors. The word "Sangoma" means “off the drum” and refers to the use of drumming as a means to enter trance. It’s a pity that this term has come to collectively refer to all traditional African Healers. I am in fact a Mungoma, a type of ritual specialist found in the Shangaan tradition in the southern parts of Africa.
Sangomas work closely with the ancestral realm, collaborating with them in order to diagnose and treat clients. (Different traditions might have slightly different ways of how they go about doing this.) To this day people in South Africa visit Sangomas more frequently than western doctors.
Is a Sangoma a fortune teller?
I would like to encourage you to think of a Sangoma as an African "Homeopath" who diagnoses you by looking at where you are at in your life, looking at your environment and the people around you.
Why are you a Sangoma?
Becoming a Sangoma is not a choice, it’s a calling. It’s not a course that you take, but a long and often painful initiation process. My calling came in my early twenties when I developed all kinds of strange symptoms and illnesses. I visited many different types of doctors, homeopaths, psychologists, psychiatrists and a range of other healers over a five year period but couldn’t find any relief. I grew up in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg and had never had any contact with Sangomas and was quite frankly frightened by them and what they represented. At a time when I really had nothing left to lose a friend told me about a man who was practicing as a Sangoma nearby and out of desperation I made my first ever visit to one. It turned out to be a life-changing event for me. He diagnosed the “calling-illness” and shortly afterwards I went to Botswana where I stayed for the length of my initiation.
What can I expect to happen when I consult with you?
The traditional method of divination and diagnosis it through a bone reading. The client is seated on the ground opposite the Mungoma. A short interview follows after which the Mungoma will literally throw a collection of objects on the ground. He/she will then proceed to "read" them and lay out the meaning to the client.
A bone reading tracks the natural cycles inherent in all people. It can be likened to a weather prediction: there are natural patterns in every living thing, and if they are tracked it is possible to diagnose and predict the most likely outcome.
After a diagnosis has been made the doctor might suggest a course of treatment. My treatments are made up of ritual and the use of local herbs and plants that are administered mostly through a course of baths or steams, but treatment varies from person to person.
Why would someone visit a Sangoma?
Sangomas have the tools to take people on very deep transpersonal journeys. They assist and support people who are in transitional states, they mark important events in people’s lives, the balance what is unbalanced and shed light on what has been hidden. They work with what is seen and unseen and liase between the two on the clients’ behalf. They are visionaries and can add a new dimension to your healing process. I work with ancestral and personal blockages, psychological and physical ailments. I also do house and property tyings and cleansings.
What is the role of the Ancestors?
Speaking about our ancestral connection in an African context is a multi-layered concept. It refers firstly to our direct lineage: our parents, our grandmothers and grandfathers. It refers to all those who came before us and those that come after us (our unborn children). If we follow our ancestral lineage back we are related to everyone who is alive today, and if we follow it even further we are related to every thing on the planet and in the universe. In this way when we work with our ancestral connection, we can say that we are working with our connection to everything around us and how we are placed in the world. You are the current incarnation of your direct ancestral lineage, and therefore when we work with the ancestors we are doing deep self-transformative personal work. You are the result of a long line of people. Your ancestors are outside of you, just like your father is separate to you, but also inside you, as his blood runs through you.
Do I have to believe in the world of the ancestors in order for the treatment to work?
No, you don’t. You don’t need to believe in medical science for a panado to take away your headache. The same goes here.
I hear alot of bad things about Sangomas.
My opinion is this: when you consult with someone you consult not only a specific methodology but also a person. If that person has hatred and fear inside of them, chances are they will have bad intentions with you. The chances of you visiting a dodgy Sangoma are about the same as your chances of visiting a dodgy medical doctor; they are often bought by pharmaceutical companies and push drugs and medicine onto people that you don’t need, give you operations you don’t require, all of that riding on the back of greed. The point? Make sure that you are visiting someone who is reputable, do your research, and if something doesn’t feel right it probably isn’t.
A Sangoma is an African Doctor, a ritual specialist, a healer, a mediator, a negotiater and a diviner. They serve as a link between this world and the world of the ancestors. The word "Sangoma" means “off the drum” and refers to the use of drumming as a means to enter trance. It’s a pity that this term has come to collectively refer to all traditional African Healers. I am in fact a Mungoma, a type of ritual specialist found in the Shangaan tradition in the southern parts of Africa.
Sangomas work closely with the ancestral realm, collaborating with them in order to diagnose and treat clients. (Different traditions might have slightly different ways of how they go about doing this.) To this day people in South Africa visit Sangomas more frequently than western doctors.
Is a Sangoma a fortune teller?
I would like to encourage you to think of a Sangoma as an African "Homeopath" who diagnoses you by looking at where you are at in your life, looking at your environment and the people around you.
Why are you a Sangoma?
Becoming a Sangoma is not a choice, it’s a calling. It’s not a course that you take, but a long and often painful initiation process. My calling came in my early twenties when I developed all kinds of strange symptoms and illnesses. I visited many different types of doctors, homeopaths, psychologists, psychiatrists and a range of other healers over a five year period but couldn’t find any relief. I grew up in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg and had never had any contact with Sangomas and was quite frankly frightened by them and what they represented. At a time when I really had nothing left to lose a friend told me about a man who was practicing as a Sangoma nearby and out of desperation I made my first ever visit to one. It turned out to be a life-changing event for me. He diagnosed the “calling-illness” and shortly afterwards I went to Botswana where I stayed for the length of my initiation.
What can I expect to happen when I consult with you?
The traditional method of divination and diagnosis it through a bone reading. The client is seated on the ground opposite the Mungoma. A short interview follows after which the Mungoma will literally throw a collection of objects on the ground. He/she will then proceed to "read" them and lay out the meaning to the client.
A bone reading tracks the natural cycles inherent in all people. It can be likened to a weather prediction: there are natural patterns in every living thing, and if they are tracked it is possible to diagnose and predict the most likely outcome.
After a diagnosis has been made the doctor might suggest a course of treatment. My treatments are made up of ritual and the use of local herbs and plants that are administered mostly through a course of baths or steams, but treatment varies from person to person.
Why would someone visit a Sangoma?
Sangomas have the tools to take people on very deep transpersonal journeys. They assist and support people who are in transitional states, they mark important events in people’s lives, the balance what is unbalanced and shed light on what has been hidden. They work with what is seen and unseen and liase between the two on the clients’ behalf. They are visionaries and can add a new dimension to your healing process. I work with ancestral and personal blockages, psychological and physical ailments. I also do house and property tyings and cleansings.
What is the role of the Ancestors?
Speaking about our ancestral connection in an African context is a multi-layered concept. It refers firstly to our direct lineage: our parents, our grandmothers and grandfathers. It refers to all those who came before us and those that come after us (our unborn children). If we follow our ancestral lineage back we are related to everyone who is alive today, and if we follow it even further we are related to every thing on the planet and in the universe. In this way when we work with our ancestral connection, we can say that we are working with our connection to everything around us and how we are placed in the world. You are the current incarnation of your direct ancestral lineage, and therefore when we work with the ancestors we are doing deep self-transformative personal work. You are the result of a long line of people. Your ancestors are outside of you, just like your father is separate to you, but also inside you, as his blood runs through you.
Do I have to believe in the world of the ancestors in order for the treatment to work?
No, you don’t. You don’t need to believe in medical science for a panado to take away your headache. The same goes here.
I hear alot of bad things about Sangomas.
My opinion is this: when you consult with someone you consult not only a specific methodology but also a person. If that person has hatred and fear inside of them, chances are they will have bad intentions with you. The chances of you visiting a dodgy Sangoma are about the same as your chances of visiting a dodgy medical doctor; they are often bought by pharmaceutical companies and push drugs and medicine onto people that you don’t need, give you operations you don’t require, all of that riding on the back of greed. The point? Make sure that you are visiting someone who is reputable, do your research, and if something doesn’t feel right it probably isn’t.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Remembrance.
Once upon a time there was a great King who ruled over a large piece of land in a far away country. All the people loved and honoured him, and he was happy. The Queen gave birth to a beautiful baby boy and the land rejoiced.
“Our country will flourish when he is King,” it was predicted, and the prince grew into a beautiful boy.
A rivalling King was jealous of their happiness and wealth, and decided to make war on their Kingdom.
“Hide the boy,” the King ordered his Magus before going into battle, and so he hid him in the bud of a rose that grew inside the walls of the castle. The war raged on for many months and eventually the King and Queen were found and killed.
“Now I will reign over this land,” the evil King thought, but the Magus went and fetched the prince from the bud of the flower.
“You are to be King now,” he said to the boy, “and all will be well when you rule.”
A great festival was organised to announce that the prince was taking the throne and becoming King. When the rivalling King found out that the prince was to take the throne, he sent a witch to the prince in the night and she bewitched him.
“Forget yourself,” she whispered into his ear whilst he was asleep, “and forget your own value. You will find satisfaction in nothing, and your hands will be closed to success and accomplishment.” In the morning when the King woke up he looked around and didn’t recognise the palace.
“Where am I?” he asked the maid who came in to bring him his breakfast.
“You are in your castle my Lord.”
“And who am I?”
“You are the King my Lord.” The King shook his head.
“I’m no King and this is not my castle. I was a servant here and now I must be on my way. There are more important things to do and I must do them all!” and with that he got up, put on the oldest clothes he could find and abandoned his Kingdom.
Once he left the castle he met a woodworker next to the road.
“Where are you going?” the woodworker asked.
“I’m looking for my destiny,” the King replied, “do you know what it is?”
“Perhaps you are a woodworker,” he replied. “Come with me and I will teach you everything I know,” and so the Prince went to live with the woodworker who was true to his word. The Prince had a remarkable talent for woodworking and his teacher was impressed. “There is something about him,” he told his wife one night, “I don’t know what it is, but he’s special.” After a couple of months the Prince started having dreams about his old Kingdom and a strange yearning opened up in him.
“I have to go,” he said one day to the woodworker. “Woodwork is not for me. I can't even remember why I started doing it in the first place. It’s not my destiny and so I must leave.”
“It’s a pity,” the woodworker said, “as you were just getting the knack of the thing. He sent the Prince on his way with a couple of coins.
Further down the road he met a shoemaker in a tavern.
“I will teach you to make the best shoes in the district,” the shoemaker promised, and led him to his small homestead not far from there. The next morning he started teaching the Prince his art, and he immediately took to it. “What a talent,” the shoemaker told his wife that night over dinner. “I’m lucky to have found him. And he works for less than the maid!” The King worked diligently for a couple of weeks, but every night he would dream of a castle and a crown and in the morning he would wake up with an ache in his heart.
One day he met a beautiful maiden in the meadow.
“Who are you?” she asked him as he sat down next to her.
“I don’t know anymore. I think I’m a shoemaker, but at night I dream of castles.”
“Then you must be the Prince!” the maiden cried. “You are the lost Prince of this land and it’s your destiny to be King,” and she rejoiced in the knowledge and hugged him and kissed him, for she was a princess and had been searching for him.
“No no,” the Prince said. “I’m but a poor shoemaker and have never lived in a castle.”
“It’s your destiny to be King,” the maiden said, “and I will be your Queen.”
“You’re wrong,” he said, but they kissed in the meadow, and the maiden took the Prince to her castle. “I don’t know why you treat me so well,” the Prince said one day. “I am not as rich as you, I don’t have a house like yours, yet you treat me like a King.”
“That’s because you are one,” the princess said and a tear slipped over her cheek. Perhaps if I love him enough, he will remember himself, she thought, and so she showered him with love, but the Prince would not remember.
One day the Prince went to work and said: “I am not a shoemaker, it’s not my destiny. It’s a silly thing to make shoes and I don’t have a knack for it,” and he thanked the shoemaker for his help and left that place. He wandered around the country side looking for something that felt right, but nothing did. “I’m not sure who I am you see,” he would say to the princess, “I’m either a beggar dreaming that I’m a King, or a King dreaming that I’m a beggar.”
“You are the King of this land,” she said to him again and again, and he would shake his head vehemently, and she would turn away and cry. “Oh where, where is my King? He is here in my house, but he has abandoned himself, and now I can never be the Queen.”
“If you love me like you say you do, you will marry me,” the King said to the maiden. “Let me make you my wife, let’s be a family,” but the maiden refused him.
“I am destined to marry a King, to have a wedding in the palace my Lord. When you remember yourself I will be your Queen.” The Prince felt angry at this and withdrew from her. Soon they started to grow apart.
One morning the King woke up to find the maiden had packed her belongings. “I am leaving,” she said to him. “You have abandoned your Kingdom and yourself, and so you have abandoned me, and even though you live here with me in this house you are only the ghost of the King that I love. Nothing ever satisfies you my Lord, because you are not yourself, and I am not satisfied my Lord, because I am a princess and it’s my destiny to be a Queen,” and she cried and cried and then left him there to wander the land alone, for she too had become lost.
She travelled to far away lands and saw many great things, but always the memory of the Prince stayed with her. “He is my King,” she said to people, “but he can’t remember himself. And now I am nothing, for I am his Queen.” She walked and walked and travelled by boat and cart, drifting from place to place, but the ache in her heart wouldn’t leave. She had seen her own reflection in his eyes and couldn’t forget about it. One morning she woke up and looked around her and said: “Where am I? And who am I? I dreamt that I was a Queen, but now I wake up in rags,” and so she got up and went back to her own Kingdom where she reigned alone, but always looking for the King, hoping that he would return onto her, and that he would remember himself.
THE END
“Our country will flourish when he is King,” it was predicted, and the prince grew into a beautiful boy.
A rivalling King was jealous of their happiness and wealth, and decided to make war on their Kingdom.
“Hide the boy,” the King ordered his Magus before going into battle, and so he hid him in the bud of a rose that grew inside the walls of the castle. The war raged on for many months and eventually the King and Queen were found and killed.
“Now I will reign over this land,” the evil King thought, but the Magus went and fetched the prince from the bud of the flower.
“You are to be King now,” he said to the boy, “and all will be well when you rule.”
A great festival was organised to announce that the prince was taking the throne and becoming King. When the rivalling King found out that the prince was to take the throne, he sent a witch to the prince in the night and she bewitched him.
“Forget yourself,” she whispered into his ear whilst he was asleep, “and forget your own value. You will find satisfaction in nothing, and your hands will be closed to success and accomplishment.” In the morning when the King woke up he looked around and didn’t recognise the palace.
“Where am I?” he asked the maid who came in to bring him his breakfast.
“You are in your castle my Lord.”
“And who am I?”
“You are the King my Lord.” The King shook his head.
“I’m no King and this is not my castle. I was a servant here and now I must be on my way. There are more important things to do and I must do them all!” and with that he got up, put on the oldest clothes he could find and abandoned his Kingdom.
Once he left the castle he met a woodworker next to the road.
“Where are you going?” the woodworker asked.
“I’m looking for my destiny,” the King replied, “do you know what it is?”
“Perhaps you are a woodworker,” he replied. “Come with me and I will teach you everything I know,” and so the Prince went to live with the woodworker who was true to his word. The Prince had a remarkable talent for woodworking and his teacher was impressed. “There is something about him,” he told his wife one night, “I don’t know what it is, but he’s special.” After a couple of months the Prince started having dreams about his old Kingdom and a strange yearning opened up in him.
“I have to go,” he said one day to the woodworker. “Woodwork is not for me. I can't even remember why I started doing it in the first place. It’s not my destiny and so I must leave.”
“It’s a pity,” the woodworker said, “as you were just getting the knack of the thing. He sent the Prince on his way with a couple of coins.
Further down the road he met a shoemaker in a tavern.
“I will teach you to make the best shoes in the district,” the shoemaker promised, and led him to his small homestead not far from there. The next morning he started teaching the Prince his art, and he immediately took to it. “What a talent,” the shoemaker told his wife that night over dinner. “I’m lucky to have found him. And he works for less than the maid!” The King worked diligently for a couple of weeks, but every night he would dream of a castle and a crown and in the morning he would wake up with an ache in his heart.
One day he met a beautiful maiden in the meadow.
“Who are you?” she asked him as he sat down next to her.
“I don’t know anymore. I think I’m a shoemaker, but at night I dream of castles.”
“Then you must be the Prince!” the maiden cried. “You are the lost Prince of this land and it’s your destiny to be King,” and she rejoiced in the knowledge and hugged him and kissed him, for she was a princess and had been searching for him.
“No no,” the Prince said. “I’m but a poor shoemaker and have never lived in a castle.”
“It’s your destiny to be King,” the maiden said, “and I will be your Queen.”
“You’re wrong,” he said, but they kissed in the meadow, and the maiden took the Prince to her castle. “I don’t know why you treat me so well,” the Prince said one day. “I am not as rich as you, I don’t have a house like yours, yet you treat me like a King.”
“That’s because you are one,” the princess said and a tear slipped over her cheek. Perhaps if I love him enough, he will remember himself, she thought, and so she showered him with love, but the Prince would not remember.
One day the Prince went to work and said: “I am not a shoemaker, it’s not my destiny. It’s a silly thing to make shoes and I don’t have a knack for it,” and he thanked the shoemaker for his help and left that place. He wandered around the country side looking for something that felt right, but nothing did. “I’m not sure who I am you see,” he would say to the princess, “I’m either a beggar dreaming that I’m a King, or a King dreaming that I’m a beggar.”
“You are the King of this land,” she said to him again and again, and he would shake his head vehemently, and she would turn away and cry. “Oh where, where is my King? He is here in my house, but he has abandoned himself, and now I can never be the Queen.”
“If you love me like you say you do, you will marry me,” the King said to the maiden. “Let me make you my wife, let’s be a family,” but the maiden refused him.
“I am destined to marry a King, to have a wedding in the palace my Lord. When you remember yourself I will be your Queen.” The Prince felt angry at this and withdrew from her. Soon they started to grow apart.
One morning the King woke up to find the maiden had packed her belongings. “I am leaving,” she said to him. “You have abandoned your Kingdom and yourself, and so you have abandoned me, and even though you live here with me in this house you are only the ghost of the King that I love. Nothing ever satisfies you my Lord, because you are not yourself, and I am not satisfied my Lord, because I am a princess and it’s my destiny to be a Queen,” and she cried and cried and then left him there to wander the land alone, for she too had become lost.
She travelled to far away lands and saw many great things, but always the memory of the Prince stayed with her. “He is my King,” she said to people, “but he can’t remember himself. And now I am nothing, for I am his Queen.” She walked and walked and travelled by boat and cart, drifting from place to place, but the ache in her heart wouldn’t leave. She had seen her own reflection in his eyes and couldn’t forget about it. One morning she woke up and looked around her and said: “Where am I? And who am I? I dreamt that I was a Queen, but now I wake up in rags,” and so she got up and went back to her own Kingdom where she reigned alone, but always looking for the King, hoping that he would return onto her, and that he would remember himself.
THE END
Sunday, April 18, 2010
A touch of fire.
I spend my life coming up with inventive ways to haul my ass out of various comfort zones. Seriously, give me a day or two and I will stay at home with a good book, the internet and this here small netbook and be 100% entertained. That is until I completely lose my marbles see.
If I'm not forced to I can get real comfortable like and it's bad. That's why I'm glad I have friends who make me walk on hot coals, just for the heck of it. Yup, that's right friends. Saturday night was spent at a birthday party that turned out to be more. A facilitator arrived who put us through our paces, and by about 21h30 there we were outside, playing drums and singing our heads off and most importantly, walking on hot coals.
Exhilirating? Yes. Inspiring? Oh yes! Depression? Gone.
Thank you Nial!
If I'm not forced to I can get real comfortable like and it's bad. That's why I'm glad I have friends who make me walk on hot coals, just for the heck of it. Yup, that's right friends. Saturday night was spent at a birthday party that turned out to be more. A facilitator arrived who put us through our paces, and by about 21h30 there we were outside, playing drums and singing our heads off and most importantly, walking on hot coals.
Exhilirating? Yes. Inspiring? Oh yes! Depression? Gone.
Thank you Nial!
Saturday, April 17, 2010
Endlessly changing horizons.
So many people live within unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more dangerous to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future. The very basic core of a man's living spirit is his passion for adventure. The joy of life comes from our encounters with new experiences, and hence there is no greater joy than to have an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and different sun."
— Chris McCandless
— Chris McCandless
A whisp of despair.
Dear Universe,
I could win a competition for feeling sorry for myself today. I’m feeling it deeply, the treachery my poor lonesome bottom has to endure.
Before I went overseas I had money, I stayed in a beautiful flat and dated my very own Mr Mcdreamy with whom I shared two cats. I was bored out of my mind though. Consequently I gave it all up and headed to America. Now that I’m back it seems very little has changed in my life. In fact, post-America might be even bleaker than pre-America. The man has gone. Oh, and I don’t have any money. Whether or not all the bills will be paid this month is debatable.
I’m back to spending all my time at home, which is where I work from. I chose to live outside of the city, so I’m at least 30minutes away from friends. I rarely see people. The cabin fever’s got me bad. My jogs are turning into walks and I have to forcefully throw myself out the door in the mornings. My cats follow my every move and although I sometimes find it endearing (they’re my only company) most of the time their neediness drives me batty.
I’ve been single for a year now. In the interim I haven’t had a single interaction with a man that even vaguely excited me, or looked excited about me. As I sink deeper and deeper into my Sangoma work the same old issues start to surface. Am I alone because I’m a Sangoma??? Sometimes I think yes. I’m a chicken killer. I’m possessed. It’s not easy for other people to accept what I do and so I fight with myself; about who I am, what I am, what I want and can have.
Over dinner the other night a friend looked at my astrological chart, just for a laugh. “You’re going to be single for at least another year,” she said. “Next March looks promising on the love front.” Then she laughed. I didn’t.
Can I do this for another year? Live like a monk, in solitude, removed, poor, bored and fantasizing about a trip I once took and the freedom I felt? The problem with such a trip is: nothing is ever the same. As when I was hijacked, I am now privy to knowledge very few people have. I have travelled. I know the freedom that comes with it, the freshness and continuous stimulation. I know what if feels like to be really alive, and so my life here is even bleaker than it was before I left.
A friend of mine is travelling Scotland. He sent me a note yesterday:
Dear Alice, we saw such an amazing theatre piece the other day. It was performed by people with a range of disabilities and was completely mind blowing. How lucky we are to have arms and legs doll! We are truly, truly blessed.
Universe, save me from myself. My head will be the end of me. Feeling sorry for yourself isn’t sexy at the best of times. Heck, I spent last night watching “Into the Wild” again and cried my eyes out into my bowl of spaghetti. Should I pull a Christopher Mccandless Universe? Should I give it all up and hit the road??? If I lived in the US that might have been an option, but in South Africa… The ending might not be quite as romantic.
I know there’s more to life than this Universe. I’ve seen it. I was there. Help!
I could win a competition for feeling sorry for myself today. I’m feeling it deeply, the treachery my poor lonesome bottom has to endure.
Before I went overseas I had money, I stayed in a beautiful flat and dated my very own Mr Mcdreamy with whom I shared two cats. I was bored out of my mind though. Consequently I gave it all up and headed to America. Now that I’m back it seems very little has changed in my life. In fact, post-America might be even bleaker than pre-America. The man has gone. Oh, and I don’t have any money. Whether or not all the bills will be paid this month is debatable.
I’m back to spending all my time at home, which is where I work from. I chose to live outside of the city, so I’m at least 30minutes away from friends. I rarely see people. The cabin fever’s got me bad. My jogs are turning into walks and I have to forcefully throw myself out the door in the mornings. My cats follow my every move and although I sometimes find it endearing (they’re my only company) most of the time their neediness drives me batty.
I’ve been single for a year now. In the interim I haven’t had a single interaction with a man that even vaguely excited me, or looked excited about me. As I sink deeper and deeper into my Sangoma work the same old issues start to surface. Am I alone because I’m a Sangoma??? Sometimes I think yes. I’m a chicken killer. I’m possessed. It’s not easy for other people to accept what I do and so I fight with myself; about who I am, what I am, what I want and can have.
Over dinner the other night a friend looked at my astrological chart, just for a laugh. “You’re going to be single for at least another year,” she said. “Next March looks promising on the love front.” Then she laughed. I didn’t.
Can I do this for another year? Live like a monk, in solitude, removed, poor, bored and fantasizing about a trip I once took and the freedom I felt? The problem with such a trip is: nothing is ever the same. As when I was hijacked, I am now privy to knowledge very few people have. I have travelled. I know the freedom that comes with it, the freshness and continuous stimulation. I know what if feels like to be really alive, and so my life here is even bleaker than it was before I left.
A friend of mine is travelling Scotland. He sent me a note yesterday:
Dear Alice, we saw such an amazing theatre piece the other day. It was performed by people with a range of disabilities and was completely mind blowing. How lucky we are to have arms and legs doll! We are truly, truly blessed.
Universe, save me from myself. My head will be the end of me. Feeling sorry for yourself isn’t sexy at the best of times. Heck, I spent last night watching “Into the Wild” again and cried my eyes out into my bowl of spaghetti. Should I pull a Christopher Mccandless Universe? Should I give it all up and hit the road??? If I lived in the US that might have been an option, but in South Africa… The ending might not be quite as romantic.
I know there’s more to life than this Universe. I’ve seen it. I was there. Help!
Sunday, April 4, 2010
A mountain called distraction.
I embroider a new tapestry for my life.
When I was overseas the pattern was big, bold: one central design with detail added into it. Now it’s a patchwork of small pieces. There is nothing central, no coherency. It's a busy piece of work that leaves you feeling dizzy if you stare at it for too long.
The thing about travelling is that it simplifies. All the things that used to fill up your time just fall away. Now it's spent visiting the grocer, servicing the car, fixing my shoes. I’m constantly distracted from life. I spin a warm and safe cocoon that consists of nothing substantial yet manages to block out the world and all it offers. I barely write. Instead I get lost in the technicalities of my life. I worry about money. I spend most of my time living in a future I’m uncertain of and where the uncertainty of travel brings you into the here and now the uncertainty of being in one place leads to sleepless nights and worry. How will I pay the bills? Will I find a partner in crime again anytime soon? I make lists of things to do and run aimlessly after them all day long. At the end of the day I have no sense of completion. When I was travelling my blog did that for me. I felt like I had a voice, like I could say something. Now my voice has gotten lost in the white noise of my everyday existence.
The only thing that means anything here is being a Sangoma. It gives me meaning, makes my life valuable in some way. I throw myself into it and learn a box full of new tricks. Slowly clients trickle back into my life. Treatments start to happen. They leave me with some sense of real satisfaction.
It's so easy to get lost in all of this, to just let go and fall into the drama of life. Get absorbed in one small world governed only by me and my rules.
I really, really don't want to do that, but I'm watching it happen a little more everyday.
When I was overseas the pattern was big, bold: one central design with detail added into it. Now it’s a patchwork of small pieces. There is nothing central, no coherency. It's a busy piece of work that leaves you feeling dizzy if you stare at it for too long.
The thing about travelling is that it simplifies. All the things that used to fill up your time just fall away. Now it's spent visiting the grocer, servicing the car, fixing my shoes. I’m constantly distracted from life. I spin a warm and safe cocoon that consists of nothing substantial yet manages to block out the world and all it offers. I barely write. Instead I get lost in the technicalities of my life. I worry about money. I spend most of my time living in a future I’m uncertain of and where the uncertainty of travel brings you into the here and now the uncertainty of being in one place leads to sleepless nights and worry. How will I pay the bills? Will I find a partner in crime again anytime soon? I make lists of things to do and run aimlessly after them all day long. At the end of the day I have no sense of completion. When I was travelling my blog did that for me. I felt like I had a voice, like I could say something. Now my voice has gotten lost in the white noise of my everyday existence.
The only thing that means anything here is being a Sangoma. It gives me meaning, makes my life valuable in some way. I throw myself into it and learn a box full of new tricks. Slowly clients trickle back into my life. Treatments start to happen. They leave me with some sense of real satisfaction.
It's so easy to get lost in all of this, to just let go and fall into the drama of life. Get absorbed in one small world governed only by me and my rules.
I really, really don't want to do that, but I'm watching it happen a little more everyday.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
The Maniac.
Dear Universe,
Forgive me for I have sinned. It’s been 34 years since my last confession (assuming that I came clean just after emerging from my mother’s womb) and I can’t keep it to myself any longer.
I have raised a blood thirsty murderer, a crazy killer who plays games with his pray and tortures them for hours. It all started so innocently: first it was a cockroach that I thought he’d caught in the house. I was proud of him for keeping the pest at bay and patted him on the head like a good boy. This spurred him on and a couple of days later it was a gecko in his mouth. As time past the frequency with which he brought similar bugs home became closer and closer together, and although these specimens satisfied him for awhile I came home one day to find a mangled chameleon lying shattered at my front door. Since his head was missing I couldn’t find out for sure if my suspicions were correct and I chose to turn a blind eye Universe. I am a mother after all. I didn’t last long though. One night I came home to find him lying in the lounge with a mouse in his mouth looking utterly pleased and somewhat hungry. Then a dove that he must have poached out of a tree.
Oh Universe, what am I to do?? How do I stop this path of destruction that has opened up under my roof? How do I convey my condolences to the small furry creatures that live in my neighbourhood? How do I warn them of his crazed obsession with anything that moves quickly or scuttles about? Besides, his disguise is top notch: a black coat that covers his whole body. An unmatched agility and a fondness for climbing trees at night. What will he bring home next Universe? A squirrel? A poodle for God's sake??
Dear Universe, have mercy on the animals in my neighbourhood. Let them sleep with one eye open and tell them that Swarties the Siamese has moved in. They need to watch their backs because if he finds them… Oh if he finds them Universe, the games will go on for hours.
Forgive me for I have sinned. It’s been 34 years since my last confession (assuming that I came clean just after emerging from my mother’s womb) and I can’t keep it to myself any longer.
I have raised a blood thirsty murderer, a crazy killer who plays games with his pray and tortures them for hours. It all started so innocently: first it was a cockroach that I thought he’d caught in the house. I was proud of him for keeping the pest at bay and patted him on the head like a good boy. This spurred him on and a couple of days later it was a gecko in his mouth. As time past the frequency with which he brought similar bugs home became closer and closer together, and although these specimens satisfied him for awhile I came home one day to find a mangled chameleon lying shattered at my front door. Since his head was missing I couldn’t find out for sure if my suspicions were correct and I chose to turn a blind eye Universe. I am a mother after all. I didn’t last long though. One night I came home to find him lying in the lounge with a mouse in his mouth looking utterly pleased and somewhat hungry. Then a dove that he must have poached out of a tree.
Oh Universe, what am I to do?? How do I stop this path of destruction that has opened up under my roof? How do I convey my condolences to the small furry creatures that live in my neighbourhood? How do I warn them of his crazed obsession with anything that moves quickly or scuttles about? Besides, his disguise is top notch: a black coat that covers his whole body. An unmatched agility and a fondness for climbing trees at night. What will he bring home next Universe? A squirrel? A poodle for God's sake??
Dear Universe, have mercy on the animals in my neighbourhood. Let them sleep with one eye open and tell them that Swarties the Siamese has moved in. They need to watch their backs because if he finds them… Oh if he finds them Universe, the games will go on for hours.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
The Tortoise and the Hare
I jog for my sanity. It makes the vacant space in my head lessen for just enough time to figure out what I’m supposed to do on said day. Soon after the jog the veil comes down again and I turn into The Vacant Lot of Nothingness, but for that one hour I have some vision. (It’s a small window, but enough for now.)
I run along the beach front, and faces become familiar after a couple of weeks: the anorexics, fatties, rugby players, professional runners, the gaggle of older woman. Mostly they're white people. There are black people who also run, but they’re usually in work clothes and trying to actually get somewhere quickly instead of just running for the sake of it, or to lose weight or the like. Some people walk their dogs, others sit on benches staring out over the sea. There’s a girl who jogs past me every single day with her dog tied around her waist and gum in her mouth. (Surely that’s a health risk?) A couple of perverts roam around, bums litter the tarmac.
Frilly Broekies (pants) is my favourite. She must be in her late forties and she runs every day. She runs far, I’ve tried to establish the length of her route but it’s much longer than I’m prepared to go and so it remains a mystery. Her outfit begets the name: a strappy little black top with matching black frilly broekies that just cover everything it’s supposed to. Her hair is a matching black bob, her eyes dark to boot. Her pants are incongruous with her age though and so she always stands out when she comes past. I never miss her.
My nemesis is a man we'll call The Destroyer. He's there at the same time as I am and so we compete. Most days he wins, but not for long my friends. I'm planning on taking him out. Just because he's eighty doesn't mean I should give him some kind of special treatment, not where I come from. I run like a maniac and then walk till I catch my breath, at which point I start running like mad again. The Destroyer keeps a steady pace but just keeps going and going and going, and so I will overtake him with speed when I’m running but sure as fuck, after a bit of walking there he will be, passing me again, driving me to drink. He's a machine I tell you. He never stops, but just you wait Mr Destroyer, just you wait...
I run along the beach front, and faces become familiar after a couple of weeks: the anorexics, fatties, rugby players, professional runners, the gaggle of older woman. Mostly they're white people. There are black people who also run, but they’re usually in work clothes and trying to actually get somewhere quickly instead of just running for the sake of it, or to lose weight or the like. Some people walk their dogs, others sit on benches staring out over the sea. There’s a girl who jogs past me every single day with her dog tied around her waist and gum in her mouth. (Surely that’s a health risk?) A couple of perverts roam around, bums litter the tarmac.
Frilly Broekies (pants) is my favourite. She must be in her late forties and she runs every day. She runs far, I’ve tried to establish the length of her route but it’s much longer than I’m prepared to go and so it remains a mystery. Her outfit begets the name: a strappy little black top with matching black frilly broekies that just cover everything it’s supposed to. Her hair is a matching black bob, her eyes dark to boot. Her pants are incongruous with her age though and so she always stands out when she comes past. I never miss her.
My nemesis is a man we'll call The Destroyer. He's there at the same time as I am and so we compete. Most days he wins, but not for long my friends. I'm planning on taking him out. Just because he's eighty doesn't mean I should give him some kind of special treatment, not where I come from. I run like a maniac and then walk till I catch my breath, at which point I start running like mad again. The Destroyer keeps a steady pace but just keeps going and going and going, and so I will overtake him with speed when I’m running but sure as fuck, after a bit of walking there he will be, passing me again, driving me to drink. He's a machine I tell you. He never stops, but just you wait Mr Destroyer, just you wait...
Back to front.
Life happens. I get distracted. I stop writing. I spend a lot of time worrying about the future. What work will I do, where will the money come from. I forget to focus on the things that feed me, I find it harder and harder to concentrate. “Ifs” and “whens” start to rule my life. I'm back in the corridor, waiting for life to happen. I yearn for the emptiness of travel, the immediacy of the moment. I'm Alice caught behind the mirror again and find myself peering through it to see the vague reflection of another world on the other side.
I have settled on this side of the mirror for now. I have a home, I’ve unpacked my life. Where I was always eager to write about my travels whilst I was away I’m now impatient to get it done so I can move on to the next thing. My life slowly becomes a trance again, one which I will continuously try to escape from, mostly without luck. My head becomes filled with empty space, cotton wool. Words escape me. My shopping lists get longer as I spend more and more time at home. I am restless, lonely. I read too much into what other people say and talk my mouth off when I see them, which is rare. I have settled.
Could there be anything less rewarding?
I have settled on this side of the mirror for now. I have a home, I’ve unpacked my life. Where I was always eager to write about my travels whilst I was away I’m now impatient to get it done so I can move on to the next thing. My life slowly becomes a trance again, one which I will continuously try to escape from, mostly without luck. My head becomes filled with empty space, cotton wool. Words escape me. My shopping lists get longer as I spend more and more time at home. I am restless, lonely. I read too much into what other people say and talk my mouth off when I see them, which is rare. I have settled.
Could there be anything less rewarding?
Monday, March 8, 2010
Vacancy
I’m having a Blank Stare day. Maybe you know this one.
Wake up and feed the cats: blank stare. Go for a run: blank stare. Sit down behind my computer: blank stare. Make some tea: blank stare. Really, really try to work: blank stare. Drive to the shops, pick up some stuff, run some errands: blank stare. I win the lottery on tv and the presenter says: “So Alice, tell our viewers how you feel!” Blank stare. Walk, sit down. Blank stare. Blank stare. Write. Blank stare.
I am one with the blank stare. I go deeper into the blank stare.
My brain is a marshmallow.
I am an empty vessel people.
Wake up and feed the cats: blank stare. Go for a run: blank stare. Sit down behind my computer: blank stare. Make some tea: blank stare. Really, really try to work: blank stare. Drive to the shops, pick up some stuff, run some errands: blank stare. I win the lottery on tv and the presenter says: “So Alice, tell our viewers how you feel!” Blank stare. Walk, sit down. Blank stare. Blank stare. Write. Blank stare.
I am one with the blank stare. I go deeper into the blank stare.
My brain is a marshmallow.
I am an empty vessel people.
Focus.
Consciously fill you life with meaning everyday.
If you don't, someone else will fill it with nonsense.
If you don't, someone else will fill it with nonsense.
Monday, March 1, 2010
Dear Lovelies,
Apologies for the silence.
Alice is writing her fingerprints off on another project and fantasizes about writing her blog at night when she gets falls into bed.
I'll be back Captain, I'll be back!
Alice is writing her fingerprints off on another project and fantasizes about writing her blog at night when she gets falls into bed.
I'll be back Captain, I'll be back!
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Divide and conquer.
Perhaps the cruellest trick the age of science and the western world has played on us was taking away community and isolating us.
It has left most people grasping for a sense of belonging and put untold pressure on the family structure.
No matter how we try to compensate for it we can’t. We have been delivered out to the world
singular.
It has left most people grasping for a sense of belonging and put untold pressure on the family structure.
No matter how we try to compensate for it we can’t. We have been delivered out to the world
singular.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Day 4 - The Cahuna.
I’m driving a beat up red truck in 40+ degree midday heat in Botswana, southern Africa. My head bobs up and down with every bump in the road like a dashboard doll. Sweat runs down my back. There’s no aircon and the warm wind has flushed my face, hands slip on the steering wheel.
Here’s to hoping everything goes well when I get to where I’m going. There is protocol to adhere to. Etiquette. I’m fetching my Great Grandmother and her entourage in South Africa where they are waiting for me at their homestead. I will fetch her; someone else will deliver her back home. We will tend to all her needs whilst she stays with us. We will make her feel like a Queen.
I’ve been to her house only once before and I wasn’t the driver. The person in question spent hours getting lost and asking locals who barely spoke English for directions whilst the rest of the people in the car systematically lost their marbles and screamed at one another. It was a nightmare that I don’t want to repeat so I asked my teacher to give me directions. They were vague: turn right at the big tree on the right hand side of the road just after the spaza shop in the third small settlement that you reach after crossing the border. Keep going till you see a church that has a big “no smoking” sign painted above it. There is a small Cell C kiosk not far from there. Drive between the two and keep going on a dirt road till you find some bushes on your left…. I smile and nod even though I have no idea what the man is on about. He draws a picture: there is the school, there is the spaza shop. It’s easy, he says. I can't help but trust him.
The car groans with every gear change and chugs along like a wounded soldier. Progress is slow and deliberate but I don’t mind. I love this landscape. It has the same spirit as the place where I was born in Johannesburg and a part of me will always prefer this to Cape Town. This is real to me: thorn trees, tall dry grass, koppies in the distance, mud huts and small settlements dotted along the road. Woman wander with umbrellas to keep the sun off. Donkeys drag about. Goats follow the white lines in the middle of the tar, hypnotised by its length. Chickens flutter and scream as I swerve and miss potholes. The sun a bonfire asking for drumming. There are no walls here. Nothing separates me from nature except the grey road I'm on. I'm connected to this place and it brings a joy into me that I can’t contain. The bush waits for me whilst I speed along to go and fetch my Great Grandmother.
At the border post the guard eyes my beads out suspiciously:
“What is this you’re wearing?” she says with a frown. “Are you a Sangoma?”
“I am,” I say and smile.
“Yoh!” she says, shaking her head. “I don’t believe you koko. Look at your hands.” I pick them up and turn them over.
“What about them?” I ask somewhat perplexed.
“Huh uh, they are too clean. You are not a Sangoma. Sangomas are dirty always!” I laugh as I turn to head back to the car.
“Just wait,” I say, “I will be back later, then you will see.” She shakes her head and chews on her pen as I head out.
Over the border and I’m back in South Africa. I turn right and follow the curving road. Forty five minutes later I’m there: a tree, a kiosk, the cell c shop. I find the house without much hassle and park at the front gate. Her homestead consists of a couple of buildings: the outhouse, main house, an ndumba (sacred space of the ancestors), a shrine by the gate. She lives with numerous family members who all stick their heads out when the car pulls up and then disappear again like dassies. I dawdle in the car as they register my arrival and hurry off to tell her. It is protocol for my spirit to greet her first as a sign of respect, and so they put down a mat for me at the place where she is seated. One of her daughters wave at me to come in; she is ready. In a second my spirit escapes my body and runs into the house where much loud greeting and acknowledging takes place. It's only when I resurface that I realise that the radio has been on and that I’ve been competing with Mariah Carey’s “Dream Lover” for my Granny’s attention. She smiles and claps her hands when I am done, exchanges words with her daughter.
Now understand: the woman speaks not a word of English. I have been taught an official greeting which I employ and which she responds to, but besides for that my Tswana is limited and her English is non-existent. A series of hand gestures follow. They’re happy to see me and ready to go – their bags are by the door. I load them onto the back of the truck as her daughters pile on as well. Small black faces appear from around the neighbourhood to come and see the white woman who is paying homage to the person at this house. Some reach out to touch me. A couple of the young ones cry because they’re not used to white people yet.
My koko is riding shotgun with me and so when everyone is ready two of her daughters appear at the side of the car ready to help her in. I don’t know how old she is but she's the shortest woman I've ever come across. She literally can't get into the truck and her daughters have to boost her from behind. Each of them grab a foot and finally she clambers onto the seat like a baby onto an enormous bed. I am a giant, she a little girl. This is "Tshwene", I remember, her official title meaning baboon in Sotho. It's a reference to the spirit that she works with and today I recognise it in her. My Granny is a cross between Yoda and a tokolosh I think and smile as I pull away and she delves into her snuffbox for a good dosage of nicotine.
We drive. The language barrier makes for silence. Twice she mentions names of people involved in our lodge, enquiring if they will be there when she arrives. No, I say to the first inquiry. Yes to the second. She smiles, looks pleased with herself. Her four daughters are now wrapped in cloths on the back of the truck talking and gesticulating amongst themselves. This heat hurts even the locals.
Back at the border post my previous assailant’s eyes almost pop out:
“You are Mrs Bones!” she shouts arms in the air when we walk through the door and we all laugh. I have to fill out 3 of my travel companions forms because only one of her daughters can write. When I’m done I hand back their pieces of paper so they can sign it. Granny just holds out her thumb which makes no sense to me until the woman behind the counter produces ink and takes their prints. We hurry back to the car. Again the sister’s boost her into her seat. She clambers in and shuffles about to get comfortable. More snuff is taken. We drive through a puddle of yellow butterflies on the dirt road back into Ramotswa. We pass Chankos, a shop we visit frequently to buy tobacco and ingredients for traditional dishes and drinks. We drive past small shops, a petrol station. Traffic increases. We hit a couple of potholes and her daughters heave about on the back of the truck.
When we get back to the lodge all hell breaks loose. Their bags disappear instantly off to their sleeping quarters; chairs are brought and put in the shade. Tea and coffee arrive. Strings of Sangomas and Malombos fall down in small heaps at her feet greeting her profusely. She smiles and laughs uproariously when we present her with gifts. Joy flows out of her.
Over the course of the weekend she does her work with dignity and integrity. She is stern but kind, powerful but small. Everything comes easily to her. From the moment she arrives we become a meaningful community, one with clarity of purpose and a drive to succeed. She unites us by merely being there.
She is Tshwene. My Great Grandmother.
Here’s to hoping everything goes well when I get to where I’m going. There is protocol to adhere to. Etiquette. I’m fetching my Great Grandmother and her entourage in South Africa where they are waiting for me at their homestead. I will fetch her; someone else will deliver her back home. We will tend to all her needs whilst she stays with us. We will make her feel like a Queen.
I’ve been to her house only once before and I wasn’t the driver. The person in question spent hours getting lost and asking locals who barely spoke English for directions whilst the rest of the people in the car systematically lost their marbles and screamed at one another. It was a nightmare that I don’t want to repeat so I asked my teacher to give me directions. They were vague: turn right at the big tree on the right hand side of the road just after the spaza shop in the third small settlement that you reach after crossing the border. Keep going till you see a church that has a big “no smoking” sign painted above it. There is a small Cell C kiosk not far from there. Drive between the two and keep going on a dirt road till you find some bushes on your left…. I smile and nod even though I have no idea what the man is on about. He draws a picture: there is the school, there is the spaza shop. It’s easy, he says. I can't help but trust him.
The car groans with every gear change and chugs along like a wounded soldier. Progress is slow and deliberate but I don’t mind. I love this landscape. It has the same spirit as the place where I was born in Johannesburg and a part of me will always prefer this to Cape Town. This is real to me: thorn trees, tall dry grass, koppies in the distance, mud huts and small settlements dotted along the road. Woman wander with umbrellas to keep the sun off. Donkeys drag about. Goats follow the white lines in the middle of the tar, hypnotised by its length. Chickens flutter and scream as I swerve and miss potholes. The sun a bonfire asking for drumming. There are no walls here. Nothing separates me from nature except the grey road I'm on. I'm connected to this place and it brings a joy into me that I can’t contain. The bush waits for me whilst I speed along to go and fetch my Great Grandmother.
At the border post the guard eyes my beads out suspiciously:
“What is this you’re wearing?” she says with a frown. “Are you a Sangoma?”
“I am,” I say and smile.
“Yoh!” she says, shaking her head. “I don’t believe you koko. Look at your hands.” I pick them up and turn them over.
“What about them?” I ask somewhat perplexed.
“Huh uh, they are too clean. You are not a Sangoma. Sangomas are dirty always!” I laugh as I turn to head back to the car.
“Just wait,” I say, “I will be back later, then you will see.” She shakes her head and chews on her pen as I head out.
Over the border and I’m back in South Africa. I turn right and follow the curving road. Forty five minutes later I’m there: a tree, a kiosk, the cell c shop. I find the house without much hassle and park at the front gate. Her homestead consists of a couple of buildings: the outhouse, main house, an ndumba (sacred space of the ancestors), a shrine by the gate. She lives with numerous family members who all stick their heads out when the car pulls up and then disappear again like dassies. I dawdle in the car as they register my arrival and hurry off to tell her. It is protocol for my spirit to greet her first as a sign of respect, and so they put down a mat for me at the place where she is seated. One of her daughters wave at me to come in; she is ready. In a second my spirit escapes my body and runs into the house where much loud greeting and acknowledging takes place. It's only when I resurface that I realise that the radio has been on and that I’ve been competing with Mariah Carey’s “Dream Lover” for my Granny’s attention. She smiles and claps her hands when I am done, exchanges words with her daughter.
Now understand: the woman speaks not a word of English. I have been taught an official greeting which I employ and which she responds to, but besides for that my Tswana is limited and her English is non-existent. A series of hand gestures follow. They’re happy to see me and ready to go – their bags are by the door. I load them onto the back of the truck as her daughters pile on as well. Small black faces appear from around the neighbourhood to come and see the white woman who is paying homage to the person at this house. Some reach out to touch me. A couple of the young ones cry because they’re not used to white people yet.
My koko is riding shotgun with me and so when everyone is ready two of her daughters appear at the side of the car ready to help her in. I don’t know how old she is but she's the shortest woman I've ever come across. She literally can't get into the truck and her daughters have to boost her from behind. Each of them grab a foot and finally she clambers onto the seat like a baby onto an enormous bed. I am a giant, she a little girl. This is "Tshwene", I remember, her official title meaning baboon in Sotho. It's a reference to the spirit that she works with and today I recognise it in her. My Granny is a cross between Yoda and a tokolosh I think and smile as I pull away and she delves into her snuffbox for a good dosage of nicotine.
We drive. The language barrier makes for silence. Twice she mentions names of people involved in our lodge, enquiring if they will be there when she arrives. No, I say to the first inquiry. Yes to the second. She smiles, looks pleased with herself. Her four daughters are now wrapped in cloths on the back of the truck talking and gesticulating amongst themselves. This heat hurts even the locals.
Back at the border post my previous assailant’s eyes almost pop out:
“You are Mrs Bones!” she shouts arms in the air when we walk through the door and we all laugh. I have to fill out 3 of my travel companions forms because only one of her daughters can write. When I’m done I hand back their pieces of paper so they can sign it. Granny just holds out her thumb which makes no sense to me until the woman behind the counter produces ink and takes their prints. We hurry back to the car. Again the sister’s boost her into her seat. She clambers in and shuffles about to get comfortable. More snuff is taken. We drive through a puddle of yellow butterflies on the dirt road back into Ramotswa. We pass Chankos, a shop we visit frequently to buy tobacco and ingredients for traditional dishes and drinks. We drive past small shops, a petrol station. Traffic increases. We hit a couple of potholes and her daughters heave about on the back of the truck.
When we get back to the lodge all hell breaks loose. Their bags disappear instantly off to their sleeping quarters; chairs are brought and put in the shade. Tea and coffee arrive. Strings of Sangomas and Malombos fall down in small heaps at her feet greeting her profusely. She smiles and laughs uproariously when we present her with gifts. Joy flows out of her.
Over the course of the weekend she does her work with dignity and integrity. She is stern but kind, powerful but small. Everything comes easily to her. From the moment she arrives we become a meaningful community, one with clarity of purpose and a drive to succeed. She unites us by merely being there.
She is Tshwene. My Great Grandmother.
Let it go.
Western culture is the only one in the world that focuses solely on gathering and hoarding.
All ancient cultures know the importance of emptying out and letting go.
All ancient cultures know the importance of emptying out and letting go.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Day 3.
Sleeping is hard when the three people with you wake up at 3am and break out dancing and singing. The mozzies don’t help. Neither does the fact that this place rarely cools down. I’m exhausted when I wake up but the altitude might partly be to blame.
More beading. A drive to Ramotswa to buy ingredients for traditional marula beer. Much organising as other doctors start to arrive and do shopping for food, goats and chickens. Everything needs to be in order by tomorrow when our Great Grandmother arrives from South Africa. She is our big Cahuna, a Sangoma of great stature and knowledge, the oldest living member of our lodge and by far the highest ranking. She is also the smallest. (When she sits on a chair her feet don’t touch the ground.)
When jobs are doled out I offer to go and fetch her from her home in a small hamlet across the border the next day. It entails an hour and a half drive there, getting cross the border and getting back, and possibly waiting around for Granny to finish packing for an hour or two. But that’s tomorrow.
Uncharacteristically we attend a cocktail party at the University of Botswana in Gabarone to witness my teacher’s father honorary doctorate ceremony. He delivers a moving presentation and lecture about his work over the past 40 years and we all marvel at the astonishing life he has lived. Everyone living at the lodge is surprisingly clean which is fun in itself.
By the time we get back it’s 22h30 which is way past the witching hour when you live in the sticks. We fall into bed immediately, knowing full well that sleep will not be indulged over the next couple of days.
This is it people. It's all going to become blurry from here.
Day 2.
Wake up in Africa. Tea. Run. Cold shower. Spend the day beading and making preparations for the coming ceremony. For the next day or two there are only four of us living here: the two initiates, our teacher and yours truly. It’s blissful and quiet. Birds call from the trees. Bees buzz around the kitchen. Mosquitoes and flies invade us from time to time. The sun calls back every inch of moisture he can find and by lunchtime the mud pools are almost completely dried out and the sky sears us with brightness.
On Friday hoards of the initiates' family members and friends will arrive and more doctors will come. Both the thwasanas have big eyes. Anticipation burns in them. They know from experience that whatever is about to happen will be big, probably extremely taxing, will involve very little sleep and change the course of their lives forever.
We chat, giggle at each other, make light of what’s about to happen. The lodge is cleaned, swept, chairs are washed, more mattresses bought for visitors. We are slowly gathering momentum. Soon things will come to a head.
In the evening the four of us huddle around a gaslamp quoting “The Walrus and the Carpenter” and “The Jabberwocky”.
If this is Wonderland, I am the Queen for today.
On Friday hoards of the initiates' family members and friends will arrive and more doctors will come. Both the thwasanas have big eyes. Anticipation burns in them. They know from experience that whatever is about to happen will be big, probably extremely taxing, will involve very little sleep and change the course of their lives forever.
We chat, giggle at each other, make light of what’s about to happen. The lodge is cleaned, swept, chairs are washed, more mattresses bought for visitors. We are slowly gathering momentum. Soon things will come to a head.
In the evening the four of us huddle around a gaslamp quoting “The Walrus and the Carpenter” and “The Jabberwocky”.
If this is Wonderland, I am the Queen for today.
Day 1.
No sleep. Sit up at 5am. Pack last things, eat, my bowels tap dance about 5 times in the next half an hour in anticipation of a flight I really don’t want to take but have to to get to where I want to go asap. The extra set of keys I made for the Ex (who is coming to feed the cats) don’t actually open the door and so I drive to Melkbos at 6am to drop my set at his house.
Back home Rox is waiting. My bowels do the jig one more time before I take a Spasmend and hop in the car. Traffic fucking traffic. Drop and go. The Spasmend hasn’t touched sides and as my spirit once tried to climb out of my body whilst in transit on a plane I’m only slightly concerned. Find airport clinic and have a Valium shot which makes everything just dandy. Lovely flight. Picked up by friend going the same way at OR Thambo Airport, Johannesburg, and hit the road to Botswana. Still calm as a cucumber even though she overtakes like a racing car driver.
Arrive at borderpost five hours later, just as the rain sets in. Huge dubble decker grey clouds that resemble the oros man merge overhead. Thunder. Lightning. Damn I missed this place! The air smells fresh, it’s still warm even though it’s pouring with rain. Instant homecoming party. By 7pm we arrive on the farm and the Valium finally wears off. Greet everyone, have some tea. Carry belongings down to the lodge in the rain. Mud splatters up my legs and within half an hour of being there I’m already filthy. This will be a consistent state of affairs for the rest of the week.
Pass out at 9pm in a mudhut at the bottom of a farm in one of the most beautiful countries I’ve ever visited, thankful for the discovery of a mosquito net. Water spiders sit flush against the wall. A small oil lamp burns deep into the night and I fall asleep to the sound of frogs gurgling their songs in a dam on the farm next door.
Back home Rox is waiting. My bowels do the jig one more time before I take a Spasmend and hop in the car. Traffic fucking traffic. Drop and go. The Spasmend hasn’t touched sides and as my spirit once tried to climb out of my body whilst in transit on a plane I’m only slightly concerned. Find airport clinic and have a Valium shot which makes everything just dandy. Lovely flight. Picked up by friend going the same way at OR Thambo Airport, Johannesburg, and hit the road to Botswana. Still calm as a cucumber even though she overtakes like a racing car driver.
Arrive at borderpost five hours later, just as the rain sets in. Huge dubble decker grey clouds that resemble the oros man merge overhead. Thunder. Lightning. Damn I missed this place! The air smells fresh, it’s still warm even though it’s pouring with rain. Instant homecoming party. By 7pm we arrive on the farm and the Valium finally wears off. Greet everyone, have some tea. Carry belongings down to the lodge in the rain. Mud splatters up my legs and within half an hour of being there I’m already filthy. This will be a consistent state of affairs for the rest of the week.
Pass out at 9pm in a mudhut at the bottom of a farm in one of the most beautiful countries I’ve ever visited, thankful for the discovery of a mosquito net. Water spiders sit flush against the wall. A small oil lamp burns deep into the night and I fall asleep to the sound of frogs gurgling their songs in a dam on the farm next door.
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