A weekend off

We all meet up at Mbotyi for our final weekend and to share some of our experiences. The trip seems long as I am holding a cake for Jane and Mbuso’s birthdays on my lap – a big cake to feed 24 people which was made in the kitchen at Umngazi. I feel as if every bump in the road is magnified as I try to keep the cake from bumping into the dashboard or into my chest, smearing chocolate icing everywhere.
Everyone settles into their accommodation – the girls are all thrilled to have rooms in the hotel with en-suite showers. We meet in the fire-pit for dinner – a huge circular platform with a fire in the centre and seats all around the edges. A potjie with rice thrills all the students as they have all got a little tired of samp and beans.
In the morning, Pete and Neil set off early to fish and come back with a fish each – and a tale of a huge musselcracker that got away. We get to the Lodge just in time for the seminar – although proceedings are delayed because we don’t have all the connections for the data projector.
Each school group has 10 minutes to share the context of their school, the challenges, the achievements and their feelings. Well, no one presents for 10 minutes – everyone goes on at least twice as long – there is so much to say. Each group has something special to share – but the presentation that has everyone really moved is Smangele’s. She has been at Kwa Rhole only 5 days, but she has been so moved by the poverty of the children in the school. One little girl gets a lift with them one morning. She usually walks 6 km each way to and from school. They pick her up on a bitterly cold morning and she is dressed in a short little skirt and skimpy jersey, and she is barefoot. The little girl is shaking she is so cold as they help her into the bakkie, and Sma says she turns her head away so no-one else can see that she is crying, because the plight of this child has moved her so much. When she looks at the other children in the school, she sees that the problem is multiplied by 90, and all she wants to do is raise money to buy them some shoes. We are all moved by her story, and Jane decides we need to get her to write her story and we will approach some sponsors.
It is really encouraging, when we talk about issues of ownership, and we realise how all the students have bought into this project as they talk about “our” school and “my” class and all say how they love the children.
The rest of the weekend is spent relaxing – some beach soccer and swimming for the students, some fishing for Pete and Neil, and some walking for some of us. A walk along the beach next to the amazingly blue calm sea, and then sharing the beach with herds of cows being driven home was slightly surreal and yet homely. A typical Wild Coast scene, I am told.

Dave comments on how great it is to see two brothers relaxing together, standing companionably next to each other on the rocks and fishing. I think back nearly 40 years to the time I met all of them. I first saw Pete and Neil fishing together 39 years ago when they invited me to share a few days of their family holiday at Sunwich Port. A lifetime ago in some ways, and yet the blink of an eyelid in others. How far we have all come in 40 years.
For me the weekend is tinged with a little sadness as I miss my 40 year Matric Reunion in Pietermaritzburg. I hope I make it to the 50th.
A slow drive home and we are all exhausted. Early to bed for most as we brace ourselves for the last week of the great Wild Coast Adventure.