1981 London, Kensington & Chelsea Street-Sweeper & Rhodie Bush War Soldier

At Haringay, Leah continued kindergarten teaching.

Kleintjie had Eurrailed Europe, his first holiday in ten years. Banditoon job agency provided us brainless labouring jobs, including record-packaging with West Indians (CDs weren't yet popular); furniture-removal and storage; postal-clerking in a medical -equipment warehouse; textile and confectionary loading in containers. At a north London warehouse, Kleintjie and I loaded Lucozade boxes into containers.

"Mark," Kleintjie said, "during the Bush War, as a section leader, I was often pulled outta my civvie job to fight terrs. I fought right through the seventies. None of my men were killed, but we shot many zots. Last year we gave Rhodesia to Mugabe and Nkomo." Kleintjie wore a bandage on his wrist. "I hurt it when I smashed a cheeky munt's nose after Independence celebrations. I caught him burgling my Salisbury flat. Munt was a high-up terr. I must watch my back when I slope back to Zim."

We spoke Afrikaans, mocking Poms. We felt like Zulu road-gangers, swinging pickaxes in unison, chanting insults at passersby. During breaks, we gloated over pornography in smoky offices.

"On section-patrols, we quickly interrogated captured terrs," said Kleintjie, "so we could follow- up, stopping ambushed terrs gapping into the bush."

"How'd you interrogate a nanny - female terr?"

"My mates held her, or tied her down, and I thrashed her, or threatened to thrash her cunt with a stick. Usually the threat was enough to make a nanny talk. They were brave fighters. One refused to talk, so we hung her upside down from a tree, lit a fire beneath her, kicked her, swinging her, but she never talked. Her hair burnt, her fats dripped, her skull popped open, then we dropped her, when her brains burned."

We did dirty back-breaking work when dragging demolition junk into a warehouse lift. Scottish Harry tried shoving a metal door into a lift, but no-one helped Harry, as the door was too big, and Harry couldn't see it. Harry on the dole, did casual labouring for cash-in-hand. During smoke-breaks, Harry fiddled with his tobacco tin, folding tobacco and dope into Rizla paper, licking it closed, then smoking. His long hair reeked of dope. Once Harry asked, "D'ye wan' Wed Leb laddie?"

"What?"

"Och Wed Leb. Cannabis ye ken? Joos' coom onna marke' fwom Lebanon. I'll give ye a good wee pwice."

"I don't smoke. You drug-pushers are scum."

I persuaded Skate to stop slukking Jack Daniels, and do Banditoon work. A warehouse boss worked Skate and Harry together. By smoke-break Skate was gone. "Where's Skate?" I asked.

"Fooked orf! Skate slacked a coopla hours, fwew a Lucozade box orfa twuck, yelling. 'This is kaffirs work!' and fooked orf ye ken."

Smellidick (pronounced Smellick), a north London Pom, freely accommodated Kleintjie, while Kleintjie painted Smellidick's home. Smellidick organized a furniture-removal job for us, by driving Kleintjie and me to a dirty south London house, then watched us load two Victorian sideboards into his truck. Smellidick then drove us to the Strand, and smoked while we lowered the sideboards into the pavement. "Pu' a sideboards inna basemen'!" said Smellidick. "Locka door af'er ya! Cherry-bye." We lugged the sideboards into the restaurant, and shoved them downstairs into the basement, crunching wooden legs. After leg repair, we phoned our families in Zimbabwe and SA, talking into the night. Smellidick hadn't disconnected phones. When Smellidick got his quarterly bill, we were long gone.

Next day Smellidick drove me to the dirty south London house. "Clean i'!" he said. "Cherry-bye." At dusk, Smellidick drove me along Thames Embankment back to the Strand. "Lonnen's a beau'iful ci'y ri'?" he said.

"Yep."

"Yer come from Souf Africa ri'? Yer Afrikaners give blacks a 'ard time ri'?"

"Ever travelled out of England - to Africa?"

"Nah."

"You know nothing about South Africa. How come London's had Brixton riots?"

Pause. "Yer worked for eigh' hours cleanin' a 'ouse ri'? I dunno 'ow much ta pay yer?" At a warehouse we loaded a Victorian sideboard onto his truck. At the Strand restaurant, Smellidick paid me a pittance saying, "'Elp me unload a sideboard!" While I untied ropes, Smellidick talked to painters. I hopped off his truck and vanished into the crowd. "Cherry-bye," I thought, jogging to Charing Cross tube-station.

I got a street-sweeper job for the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. I was the only SA sweeper amongst Poms, who didn't invite me to their pub-lunches. Every morning, we met at our dirty Knightsbridge mews-depot, stored gear in our dirty lockers, then shoved off with our dirt-trolleys containing dirt-equipment: black bags, two bins, poop-shovel, brooms. I wore a blue overall and blue cap. We signed-on at the beginning of each shift, and signed-off at the end.

My beat was both sides of Cromwell Road, to dirty Gloucester Road intersection, past Baden Powell Scout headquarters, past Natural History Museum, up dirty Exhibition Road, past Science Museum to Albert Hall, and back past Victoria and Albert Museum. Fat foreman Tom drove a Mini inspecting sweeper beats, and ordering us to sweep dirty alleys and mews. Tom signed our bonus forms daily, if satisfied our beats matched his dirty standards. Otherwise, we got a daily fixed wage. Poms toadied Tom. Sometimes we swept other depots' beats, covering absentees.

Besides pestering women asking me to sweep sand, and remove weeds and beer bottles from properties, which I didn't do, sullen bag-ladies' and chatty hobos' beats criss-crossed my beat. They wore layers of grimy clothes. I retched when they approached, as they stank of sweet meths, piss and dirt. I wondered if they were on the dole. Bag -ladies dossed in derelict doorways under rubbish heaps. I watched one incontinent old dame piss right through her dress. Some hobos sat warming themselves in libraries, pretending to read.

Bobbies and street-sweepers were tourist information-bureaux. A fat yank wearing checked longs asked me. "Where's the Natural History Museum?"

"Ri' in fronna yer ma'e." I pointed with my broom.

"Where's the big shop?"

"'Arrods?...Strai' uppa road." I dropped full rubbish bags on pavements for rubbish-trucks to collect, and finished my beat in 2-3 hours. I hid my trolley in a disused lift-shaft at dirty Gloucester Road tube-station, changed my clothes, then visited embassies to organize visas for our Eurail trek. Tom, too lazy to walk my beat, never caught me.

One Friday morning, a Pom workmate said, "We don' sweep much on Fridays. 'Ide yer trolley a' the nex' depot, if yer need an arf'ernoon orf,"

At signing-off, Tom asked, "Where were ya all arf'ernoon? Yer trolley was a' anuvva depot. Yer weren' onna job. Furloe Place is dir'y! No bonus tidday!"

"Buggers!" I said. "Thurloe Place is clean. I swept it."

1981 UK, Ireland and Scotland Treks

On Dun Laogahaire ferry, Irishmen sang raucously in a bar...

At Waterford, we toured the glassworks...

On Blarney Castle battlements, while an underrod-ogling guide held our legs, stopping us falling, we lay on our backs and kissed the Blarney Stone...

We trekked Dingle Peninsular, and drove northwards past derelict stone-houses with roofs caved in - relics of the potato famine and starved peasantry. Hillsides were covered in yellow gorse. Besides green roadsides, we saw iron water-pumps, with long side-handles. Irishmen rolled their heads in greeting when I drove past.

At Galway Bay, storm-clouds blew in from the north Atlantic. White-washed cottages glistened rain, dribbling down yellow thatch. I thought of The Playboy of the Western World...

Beyond, we stopped at Yeat's grave...

Peat-cutters shovelled peat in bogs. At B-and-Bs, we warmed ourselves by peat fires...

At Giants Causeway, sunset reflected off red-haired Irish girls...

We avoided Belfast and Londonderry, as Bobby Sands was hunger -striking in H-Block prison for political prisoner status. Driving through Armargh, we were unaware of combatants lurking. Scowling Royal Ulster Constabulary road-blocked us, examining my licence. Machine guns bristled at corners...

With Freedom of Scotland tickets, bought at Victoria Station, we trained to Fort William near Ben Nevis...

From Mallaig we ferried to Skye, bussed across southern Skye, and caught another ferry back to the mainland at Kyle of Lochalsh...

We looked for red deer in the Highlands but saw none...

From Scrabster, we ferried to Orkney isles, the Old Man of Hoy greeting us en route...

At Stromness, we hired a car and explored. We'd heard there were Orkney Esslemonts, some of whom had emigrated to Canada, but we met none. Shetland ponies ate apples from our palms on a high hill, overlooking Scapa Flow, where scuppered German warships spoilt our view...

At Aberdeen we visited "Esslemont and Mackintosh" shop, as the name matched our surnames...

We ignored Esslemont Castle ruin near Ellon...

At Edinburgh, we visited Leah's cousin Lillian, married to Michael, a Bank of Scotland manager. Lillian hailed from Golspie. Michael was born in dirty Edinburgh. We enjoyed Edinburgh Castle and Michael's embarrassment when he slipped in dog shit, and dragged his foot down Royal Mile. Leah liked Greyfriars Bobby, and shopping in Princes Street. We drank whiskey in pubs, and eyed kilted Scots wearing sporrans and skean dhus...

On our coach-trek south, soccer supporters trailed scarves from coach windows. At dirty Birmingham, we visited dad's sister, aunty Jean, retired kindergarten principal. She flatted near Spark Hill, and we arranged to leave our extra luggage with her when we Eurailed Europe. At the coach-station near the Bull Ring, a Pom glared at me, while stealing a newspaper from a store-counter. Brum didn't impress, as it was overcast, and dirty. I sympathized with dad's emigration from Cadburys to Calcutta. Fifty years later, Brum was Indianized.

1981 London Labourer Jobs

< 1981. Sam & friend, Sam's bedsit office, George House, Courtfield Gardens, London.

Leah taught kindergarten kids in Haringay schools.

Sam organized my first labouring job with Ooplah, Italian builder, who was renovating an Italian restaurant near dirty Victoria Station, helped by a Kiwi carpenter. My wet veldskoene were uncomfortable, while I shovel-mixed concrete, so I bought protective boots. My hands were soft, and I made mistakes while passing Ooplah tools. "Youa notta a labourer eh?" he yelled. "Whya youa bullshitta me eh?"

"I recently arrived in London and need cash." Ooplah calmed down.

When I helped Kiwi he hissed. "Why the hell did ya say ya was an experienced labourer eh?"

"Sorry. I lied. I need cash. Why're you working in London?"

"There's no work for me an' Kiwi fellahs in New Zelland."

Ooplah bullshit: "Iya Doctor university graduate." Later he sacked me.

I did kitchen-porter work at Motcombs Restaurant, off Sloane Street near Harrods. Apart from soldiering in SA, I was doing menial work for the first time in my life. My white skin, SA job-reservation, and my Natal University degrees weren't going to save me from boring, repetitive, dirty work in London.

Spaniard, work-mate, fearing the "Hygiene Lady" inspector, ordered, "Shoover da flor!" I cleaned a ladies' toilet and bar, my blue jeans spotting with bleach which I poured on linoleum.

Waiters were friendly Mediterraneans. While waiting for diners, cooks fed us restaurant food, then we played coin "bowls" along a carpet. I washed dirty dishes and glasses in a scullery, using a metal sink and dish-washing machine. Once, I cut my hand when scrabbling for broken glass. "Do you have elastoplast?" I asked Italian Maitre.

"Youa crya likea da woman." After serving difficult diners, Maitre flounced into my scullery screaming, "Aaaaargh!" I ate leftover artichoke leaves and avocado hors d'oeuvres, drank wine dregs from diners' glasses, and by shift's end I was pissed. Maitre scoffed leftovers, before splashing dirty plates into my sink. He sneaked up and tenore robusto sang, "Putta smile on your face!" I could've strangled him.

I trudged through fog past Harrods. I pissed in a hedge, while taxis rumbled by. I plodded down Cromwell Road, past South Kensington tube-station, past museums, past Gloucester Road tube-station, past Penta Hotel to Courtfield Gardens. One April night, the moon shone through clouds. I unlocked GH door, rushed upstairs and woke Leah: "I've seen the moon for the first time in three months." Leah groaned.

I attended a Pall Mall Linguarama TEFL course at Kent University, near Beckett's Canterbury Cathedral. A Finn and an Englishman lectured us direct-method English teaching. We did conversational English with foreign businessmen during teas and meals. Germans said little, and gormandized. Italians hogged conversation, one insisting, "Passa da broccoli!" when he wanted salad.

Leah and I were interviewed at Linguarama's rural mansion at Riversdown. School Director said, "The job's yours kids. I'll teach Leah TEFL method, if you live with us." We ate a silver-service supper beneath chandeliers, with French, Italian and German businessmen. A Japanese admiral sat opposite me, navigating his buck-teeth around hot maize. He pierced his cob at each end with golden skewers. I sommer ate mine with my fingers.

We declined Director's job offer. Linguarama then offered me foreign students, after Mitterand became French Premier. I listened to a student saying, "Mitterand this...and Mitterand that..." then rejected Linguarama, due to low pay. An Earls Court TEFL school offered me Gothenburg's treasurer, holidaying, practising his excellent English. I challenged him with idioms and phrasal-verbs, then rejected TEFL.

Copyright Mark JS Esslemont.

1981 George House, Courtfield Gardens, London

< 1981. Leah Esslemont & Rhodie Kleintjie, our bedsit, George House, Courtfield Gardens, London.


Leah and I would visit many parts of Britain, Europe and Israel, and my script included Labourer, Clerk, Soutie Trekker parts. In Brussels, we drank champagne while staring through our hotel window at wet cobbles and a city-square nativity-play...

In London, on New Year' s Eve we poured from dirty Charing Cross tube-station, dribbled along dirty Strand, past icy South Africa House, joining thousands of carousers in dirty Trafalgar Square. Drunks threw bottles and cavorted in fountains, while people jumped and swayed. At midnight, people hugged, kissed and danced. Afterwards, piles of broken glass littered dirty pavements.

Approaching Stockwell tube-station, whites disembarked at stations, while blacks entered our train."It's like KwaMashu," I said, while we walked along dirty Stockwell platform, only whites in the station, towards Stockwell Road multiracial YMCA, where we stayed for a month. Dirty Brixton, teeming with West Indians, had grimy buildings on the wrong side of the Thames. Searching for work near the Swan pub, I visited a dirty primary school, and asked the
headmistress, "What's the black-white ratio in your school?"

"Mister Esslemon', we 'ardly no'ice tha' sor'a fing 'ere!" It was the first hostility we got from Poms who labeled us "racist." Few bothered to ascertain our views, as media had demonized South Africans well. Months later, Brixton had race riots.

We read a job notice-board at SA House; and Earls Court job notice-boards; and London Australasian Magazine ads; and National Union of Teachers' gripes; and Times Educational Supplement, and applied for teaching posts. We signed-on at dirty Soho, Barons Court and Earls Court job agencies.

Unrest: Maputo, Mozambique. 13 ANC terrorists were killed by SADF. (Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom, Abacus, Little, Brown and Co., London 1996).

I'd been accepted to read drama MA at Leeds University. In SA, I'd applied to UK varsities, and had tried to get British Council funding, but I was the wrong colour. Some English varsities said I should write an English language test, before starting studies. Those varsities obviously hadn't read my CV, showing my English and English drama majors, and implied that because I was born in Africa, I needed bridging English. I abandoned MA studies, as we didn't have the money.

We moved to Pakistani-owned George House Hotel (GH), 51 Courtfield Gardens, a Victorian house, off Cromwell Road, where we saw London wildlife for a year. Sam, Fijian-Chinese, did reception and cleaning duties, had a black tonsure, Chinese eyes, black beard and Pacific rocker-jaw. "I recently left the British army," Sam said, "having served with the Gurkhas and Australian SAS in Borneo, and served in Northern Ireland, Germany and Canada. I'm in-between jobs. Firekin' 'ell! My ancestors were Fijian cannibals, and my grandmother had four strong men buried alive in foundation-post holes of her new house."

Sam invited us to the Fijian embassy, where I chatted to Sam's ambassador aunt on a chaise-longue, spilling champagne on her lap. We sat in an inebriated ring on her carpet. Leah and I quaffed kava, last, while Fijian guests clapped, mumbling...

Whenever we walked past Sam's office-flat, we saw chicks and blokes boozing on Sam's couches. "Firekin' 'ell mate?" Sam asked Duffy, an Irishman, "Can ya take Inyoni off me? I wanna chat up Aussie Xue. Inyoni's a nympho." Inyoni giggled.

"Och aye," said Duffy, "Yer 'ave Xue, an' oi'l chat up Inyoni."

Lingam, Fijian-Indian, chewed betel-nuts, while winking and nattering to anyone who'd listen. Duffy on the dole complained, "Jashush Sham! Moi floor'sh feckin' filthy. Oi ain't makin' moi bed no more, unlesh yoush dirty bashtard clean moi shower prop'ly!" Sam punched Duffy. "Jayshush! 'Ee 'it me!" Sam handed Duffy a tissue to wipe his nose.

While a squaddie, Sam had married his RSM's daughter, produced two daughters, then divorced. "Once," said Sam," I was pissed, and attacked a squaddie's car with an axe. MPs chucked me in chokey. I needed a piss. The warder ignored me, so I pissed on the floor. The warder gave me a towel to wipe up. Firekin' 'ell. I couldn't live in SA. I'd be a coloured."

"Yeah," hooted Xue. "I loathe Spics, Wops, Dagos, Fijians invading White Australia." (Two years later, Xue married Sam in Melbourne). When Sam and Xue pub-crawled Earls Court, Leah and I did their reception work.

Dronkgat Skate wore John Lennon glasses, guzzled Jack Daniels, and smoked marijuana. The more stoned Skate became, the more Skate sang Rolling Stones' songs. A British citizen, sprouting in Durban, Skate had shared a cell with Pinetown's scissor-murderer, before deportation. Skate had worked in a Watford Post Office, disappeared with a Friday's takings, stowed away on a Hamburg-bound ship, was deported back to England, then arrested by customs, for a stint in Her Majesty's prisons. Skate's sister-in-law Skint had run away from her SA spouse to doss with Skate on the dole.

Skate stole giro-cheques from post-boxes, and on Fridays mugged payroll couriers in cobbled alleys. Skate stole enough to support himself and Skint.

Our top floor neighbour, Kleintjie, expat Rhodie, recalled: "One moonless night, while tracking terrs during the Bush War, I hid behind a sweet-thorn tree, shitting myself, hearing branches crackling, then a bristly trunk fondled me..."

Through walls, we heard neighbour Mavis's dialogues with her mates: "Loondon's boring. North Coontry's mooch better than fookin' Loondon..." Mavis chittered with people in her own mind.

I banged on our wall, shouting: "Shoodoop!" when Mavis started, "Noorth Coontry..."

Copyright Mark JS Esslemont.

1980 Apartheid Durban, Merits, Funeral, Cantabile and Teaching Roundup

1980. Esslemonts, Umgeni Bird Sanctuary, Durban North.

NED introduced merit- assessments, but merit was a joke, as apartheid stopped fair competition between whites and non-whites, so my spoilt whitey generation would never know who were the best. State white teachers weren't employed on merit, as they hadn't competed with other national groups, but Inspector Mandrill said, "Directed and undirected questions are important for your merit-assessments and your NED files chaps..." Teachers re-learnt questioning technique. I didn't bother.

"If all Hillcrest teachers are good enough for merit-increments?" asked Skelm, "Will we all get pay increases?"

"No way chaps," said Inspector Mandrill. "That's not budgeted."

"So unfairly, not all deserving teachers will get salary merit -increments?"

"Nooit chaps!" Skelm and family soon emigrated to Australia.

Inspector Mandrill assessed us. Blikskottel got a merit. I didn't. "If you ask for a reassessment," Mr Hawkins said, "It'll reflect badly on me."

Inspector Mandrill reassessed me saying, "You're a lazy chap!" He didn't say senior-assistant teachers like me became teachers with first-merit salary-increments. It was my first and last merit -increment. During the rest of my teaching career, merit-assessments destroyed collegial teaching, as white teachers toadied principals and inspectors for merit-increments, which would never be fairly distributed, so I never applied for more merit -increments. Management never asked why I didn't apply - so much for fairness. Post apartheid, the ANC government would mock white merit appointments, by affirmative-action for blacks.

Mr. Hawkins asked me to organize a pupil dance-troupe to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Republic, for the following year - 1981. "Fuck that!" I thought.

Unrest: Slovo's Umkhonto We Sizwe ANC terrorists, directed from Maputo (LM), blew up SASOL Oil Refineries, south of Jo'burg. (Joe Slovo, Slovo, Ocean Press, Melbourne, 1997).

Mom and I visited Jimmy's sweltering Chatsworth house, where agitated Rosie lay on her death-bed. Jimmy flicked off Rosie's white sheet. Naked Rosie lay slim and wrinkled: her silvery hair, coconut oiled in a long plait; her ruby-and-gold nose-stud; her heavy, gold -and-ruby earrings; her yellow cord of gold jewellery on her sagging bosom; her bony hips; her silver-toe- rings. " I don' wanna die one time Mak..." cried Rosie.

After Rosie died, Indian women laid Rosie's corpse on a table and washed her. Women dressed Rosie in her best sari. They stuffed herbs in her mouth and nose, then lay Rosie on an outside table in the sun, for family and friends to mourn.

A hearse drove Rosie, in a red shroud, to Chatsworth cemetery. Mom and Indian women stayed at the cemetery gate, while Shorty, drunken Maharaj, Jimmy and other men bore Rosie to her grave. We were the only whites at Rosie's funeral. A Hindu priest said holy words, while men using ropes lowered Rosie into her grave. Fraser and I bowed our heads, placing our hands, palms together, pointing to Rosie, honouring her the Indian way. We shovelled earth on Rosie. Jimmy wept. Mom paid some funeral costs.

For years, Rosie had reminisced about her LM laundry-work, and King George's 1935 Silver Jubilee. Rosie remembered the Boer War and World Wars. By example, Rosie had taught me curry-munching, Hinduism, humility, dignity, tolerance, loyalty, commitment, equality, a sense of humour in outcast adversity, and barefoot trekking.

Cantabile was one of Durban's top adult choirs, which had existed for years with loyal sops and altos, who'd started with Con as school-girl singers, Like Leah. Tenors were sometimes criticized by sarcastic -sopranos and bullying-basses, during practices at St. Cyprians, Umbilo. Con became sick, so some choristers wanted Cantabile closure. One practice, Con agitatedly asked, "Mark, what do you think?"

"Con, we should close." (Soprano chirpings). "I've sung with you for seven years, and trekked overseas with you. I sang juvenile lead in The Cooper operetta. We've toured school programmes, and sung in Durban City Hall, as well as churches and hospitals. We've sung on Springbok Radio and SATV. Over the last two years, we've only sung at hospitals and weddings. Leah and I trek from Pinetown for practices. There's no future planning..." Cantabile disbanded, until Con recovered.

During the seventies, Leah and I'd encountered white immigrant teachers, mainly Poms and Rhodies, in Durbs schools. We knew white South Africans, like Charlie and Skelm, who'd emigrated. Some left for good. Others were unsuccessful migrants, and returned to Durbs. As dad was British, I procured a British passport from Durban British Consulate. It was illegal to have dual-nationality in apartheid SA, but I reckoned, "Stuff that!" My British passport would enable Leah and me to live and work in UK.

Leah and I resigned from white teaching. On my last Hillcrest day, Donna arrived, replacing me. As I hadn't seen her since my wedding, I asked, "How's your family?"

"You talk too much." Donna and husband soon emigrated to Canada.

Blikskottel began cadets at Hillcrest, Mr. Hawkins early-retired, becoming an Anglican priest, and my science HOD, a boozer, later did time in Argentinian gaols for drug trafficking.

My Durban had involved much trekking, conscription, marriage, 26 active years in schools, teacher training colleges and Natal University, during apartheid.

1979 England Wedding and Umgeni Valley Reserve, Apartheid Natal

1979. Mark Esslemont playing Best Man at Charlie's Wedding, near Salisbury, England. >

In July 1979, Leah and I flew to London for me to be best-man at Charlie's rural wedding. "Long time no see," I said.

"Cut your hair!" said Charlie. "My bride's dad is a Pom soldier." I refused. Charlie and I wore Moss Brothers morning-suits and top hats. At a marquee reception, I made a speech, while the crowd chattered. Two vicars guzzled champagne, oblivious to what I said. When Charlie spoke, people hushed. Clever Charlie worked as an accountant in Malawi, then endured the rest of his accounting career commuting from Guildford to London, then Woking to London, then Saffron Walden to The City - one hour, fifteen minutes door-to-door train commutes. Charlie produced two daughters.

On a European Cosmos coach tour, Leah and I saw art-works, and ate horse-meat in France. Our tour-guide became irritated when few tourists listened to her jabbering. She sulked when few tourists brought "extra" side-trips, as she got "extra" commissions.

SADF posted me my clearing-out papers. I was on reserve, but could still be called-up in emergencies. I declined the volunteer option: doing more camps against commie onslaughts. Girlfriends saw troopie boyfriends vanish on border-duties. Some never returned. On SATV, we saw Groot Krokodil Botha licking his lips at troopies' funerals. We didn't see coffins with corpses inside, nor weeping white parents.

In 1980, I began a wildlife-conservation course. Technikon RSA posted me lecture notes. I posted assignments, and wrote wildlife -conservation exams. During weekends and holidays, I took Blikskottel and pupils camping at Wildlife Society's Umgeni Valley Reserve, below Howick Falls, where we interpreted ecosystems.

Strangler-fig-trees gripped valley cliffs below, and Natal bottlebrush trees hung above. We showed pupils wag-'n-bietjie thorn trees and paired-spines of common-hook-thorns. We watched dassies chewing cabbage-tree leaves, and watched a puff-adder rib-crawling on a loamy path, and disappearing down a hole. We strode through cycad and dragon-plant glades, where Shaka's impis had slunk through. When south winds blew, Durban-Jo'burg highway rumble echoed in the valley. We saw trumpeter-hornbills glide-flap-glide from treetop to treetop. Black-collared-barbets sang, "Toe-Botha-Toe-Botha -Toe-Botha-Toe..." Black eagles soared above, hunting cliff dassies.

We spoored wildebeest and zebra, and observed giraffe, blesbok, eland, vervet monkeys, and saw game-bones in the veld. We checked ourselves for ticks. We named wild plants, and swam in a tributary pool below a waterfall. Semi-naked, white schoolgirls tanned on black rocks. Fearing bilharzia, I forbade sepia Umgeni swimming. On night-walks, we shone torches, observing spotted-genet-cats and aardvarks. We climbed a rock and lay on our backs. I talked of Zulu ancestral spirits, of the Zulu creator Unkulunkulu, of ubuntu - African humanism embracing all. I joked that white pupils didn't have hlonipha respect which Zulu piccanins had. During the four years I took white pupils to Umgeni Valley Reserve, I never saw other national groups visiting.

For my successful production of The Importance of Being Earnest, Blikskottel's backstage crew painted Beardsley backdrops, and my cast was standard nine white pupils. Act 1 Algenon's words mocked our whitey situation: "Really, if the lower classes don't set us a good example, what on earth is the use of them?..." Besides Blikskottel and an English teacher, I had no help from Mr. Hawkins, nor other teachers. I worked myself to a standstill, doing directing, design, props and costumes (hired from Natal Schools' Theatre Wardrobe and Edgewood), advertising, tickets, programme, and directing pupil teams doing FOH, sound and lighting. I also taught general-science and biology, and coached sport while directing. When the work was done, Mr. Hawkins offered a mother to organize interval teas. My mother-in-law did the teas. We drank champagne at a cast party in a German school-girl's home, and talked of overseas.

Wee Jean, dad's sister visited Durban, then bus-toured the Garden Route to Cape Town with mom. They squabbled over dad's stamp books and other things, and returned rigidly to Durbs. Fraser and mom then trekked Europe to see Oberammergau Passion Play, their last overseas trek.

Unrest: My old kindergarten teacher was murdered by tsotsis in Pinetown.

1980. Mark Esslemont's Cast & Backstage Crew, 'Importance of Being Earnest' Hillcrest High School >

1978 Apartheid Durban, Teaching Hassles, Robberies and Rosie.

1978. Mark Esslemont's Standard 6 Class (year 8) Hillcrest High School. (Leeney) >

Leah and I moved to Old Mutual Towers, Bamboo Lane, Pinetown. Our 22nd floor flat had views of Knowles shopping-centre, Fields Hill westwards, Cowies Hill eastwards, annual Comrades Marathons. Our flat was closer to Hillcrest, and Leah was driven to Tomlinsons by her boss. A Moslem flower-seller, trading in front of Knowles, faced Mecca while praying on his knees before customers. Below our flat was an NG kerk. Its clanking bell woke us on Sundays.

I drove pupils to their homes after play rehearsals or sports. Teachers were swindled by the transport scam in all schools I taught. Parents and principals rarely thanked or acknowledged teachers for their safe, unpaid taxi services. Mr. Hawkins emotional-blackmailed, by asking me to drive a girl head prefect to school every morning saying, "Your resistance will earn you a black mark in your NED file." Prick! My reward was Mini wear, as she was big girl.

In the afternoons I couriered another girl, distributing her home above Fields Hill. Next year, I couriered a boy to Pinetown. Mr. Hawkins censured me for detaining a naughty girl, who'd missed her bus, then walked home. "Exercise and meditation on her sins will stop her defiant behaviour," I said. Mr. Hawkins disagreed, implying kaffir-rape. When principals criticised me, it was sometimes about my strictness. I preferred to be strict, stopping pupils forming bad learning habits.

Mom and Fraser toured Europe and Middle East, enjoying Israel and Turkey. They also visited aunty Jean, about mom's age, in London. Back is Durbs, mom's GP admitted her to Addington Hospital, and excised a growth below her left ear. Fraser and I held our breaths. Mom went into-out-into remission without even knowing.

One biology prac, I cut my hand on glass, and fainted, hitting my head on the concrete floor. Herr Flocker next door heard the thud, and pumped my legs, reviving me - concussed with tunnel-vision and broken teeth. Pupils escorted me to the sick-room.

Herr Flocker was promoted to Dokkies. Blikskottel, replacing Herr Flocker, unfairly allocated ECA workload. Some teachers and management did no ECA. As I did more than my fair share, and was tired of being used, after two seasons I refused to coach rugby. Coaching boys after school was boring and stressful. Blikskottel was livid: "Yous bladdy lazy man! Know whad I mean?" Mr. Hawkins threatened a black mark in my NED file. Mr. Hawkins always started staff-meetings with a prayer, and Blikskottel always said the loudest, "AMEN."

When Blikskottel and I did team-teaching, Blikskottel slacked. Two classes in my lab was a riotous-assembly of over 60 teenagers. When I taught, Blikskottel learned. When he "taught," he lectured. Blikskottel liked making teaching-aids, photographing biology specimens and producing slide-shows.

Once Af robbers, from nearby Inanda, burgled our school, demolishing office doors, ransacking the staffroom, leaving a turd on the Prime Minister's photograph. Another time, when I walked into my lab, Zulu cleaner Nkosi was digging into my purse in my briefcase. Nkosi froze, going so pale, he could've "tried for white." I sang his praises, as Nkosi was a raw kraal-kaffir. His idea of plural-relations was stealing from whites. "Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu" ne? Nkosi returned my purse, and warily cleaned my lab. Weeks later, when I spoke to him again, he beamed, knowing his job was, "Safe mah mate."

Blikskottel lived on Inanda border. His rented house was often robbed by Zulu piccanins. "Ah'm visiding my parends in Durbs dis weekend," Blikskottel told Nkosi. "Look afder mah 'ouse?" That night, Blikskottel sneaked home, hiding in his house. Piccanins removed tiles from his roof, and dropped inside. Blikskottel bashed piccanins.

"Hau Baas Blikskottel, you geev piccanins sharp hayding!" Nkosi later said.

Unrest: Puppet Venda "Independence." (Martin Meredith, Nelson Mandela A Biography, Hamish Hamilton, London, 1997.) Blacks were stuffed into overgrazed land near Kruger Park. Venda was overcrowded, degraded, desertified, with poor farming and stock-grazing methods, ignorance, witchcraft. Venda was bordered by lowveld game-ranches, where rich, white tourists shot game amidst apartheid white magic.

Rosie still worked, while living in mom's home. Every weekend, I drove Rosie to Jimmy's Chatsworth house, after Jimmy and his extended family had been cast out of Jacobs slum. They lived in a house identical to other Chatsworth houses - double storey, concrete block monstrosities. Gum Tree Road Indian slum was the third Indian community I'd witnessed destroyed by apartheid. "A Heeeeluva t'ing!" said Rosie.

Rosie slipped on mom's front step, breaking her hip. Rosie wept, when I helped her to our toilet. "I'm paining Mak. Paining! Aai-yai-yai-yai -yaaai!"

Rosie recovered in King Edward V111 Hospital, convalesced in Chatsworth, and returned to work. "Work keeps Rosie alive," said mom. Although mom was Rosie's "Maram," they'd grown long tusks over the years, and were pals, despite apartheid.

1979. U15 Rugby Team coached by Mark Esslemont, Hillcrest High School. (Leeney) >