by Robyn Scott
“No little girls?” asked Granny, weakly. “No one from ballet?”
“That’s who Lulu’s asked for,” said Mum.
“Oh, Lordy,” said Granny.
But whatever she thought, Granny Joan was, above all else – and was determined to always be – the perfect grandmother. Alarmed by the guest list or not, she would never spoil a birthday. On the day of Lulu’s party she drove out to Selebi bearing the biggest, most beautifully decorated cake any of us had ever seen: a perfect swimming pool, with white chocolate sticks for the fence, thick blue jelly in the middle as the water, and little jelly babies floating on top.
Lulu gaped in delight as Granny set down her masterpiece on the dining room table. “Just in case you didn’t have one,” said Granny, giving Lulu a hug and a kiss, and casting a suspicious eye over the bowls of nuts, the honeyed popcorn balls, the homemade peanut brittle, the fresh fruit kebabs, and the plates of wholewheat sandwiches. Her gaze settled on the bizarre creation that stood at the centre of the table – the cake that Lulu had made that morning under Mum’s supervision.
Mum’s supervision had, as always, been minimal – her main contribution being to encourage any creative suggestions about altering the recipe. The cake was, as a result, burnt at the top and edges, soggy in the middle, and had collapsed to less than an inch thick on one side. The icing was bright pink, made with beetroot juice instead of artificial colouring. Most of the loose toppings had rolled off the sloping surface, and by the time it had been carried through to the dining room table, only a few chocolate-coated raisins and marshmallows were left. To compensate, Lulu had inserted a bright stem of pink bougainvillea into the centre of the cake and sprinkled a few curly seedpods around the edges.
“That’s mine’,” said Lulu, smiling proudly. “But yours is better.”
“Yours is more interesting, darling,” said Granny Joan.
With Lulu cooing happily, Granny, looking suddenly worried, turned to Mum. “What time will the guests be arriving?” she asked anxiously, readjusting a displaced jelly baby.
Both grandfathers were playing golf and would come later, but Granny Betty soon hobbled across the road and settled herself beside Granny Joan on one of the bumpy-wire chairs beneath the big knob-thorn tree. Then came Matthews, wearing a freshly ironed shirt and tie. He greeted the two grandmothers with a nervous ‘Dumela’ and then perched awkwardly on a tree stump a little way back from the circle of chairs, where he silently studied and sipped his glass of Coke, which was allowed for birthdays.
“Isn’t it hot?” said Mum, hovering between the three quiet, uncomfortable-looking guests. And then, as several long strands of grass drifted down from the birdsong-filled branches, “Aren’t those buffalo weavers messy nest builders…Offer the food around again, Robbie…Damien, please get Granny Betty a cushion, and while you’re up – ”
A sharp cackle of laughter rang across the weaver cheeps and stilted conversation. Everyone turned to stare at the driveway, where Ruth, Moretsana, and Georgina, all in high heels, tottered towards us across the dusty red dirt.
“Good gracious,” said Granny Betty.
“I think I’m underdressed,” said Granny Joan. “And, Lin, is that your shirt?”
Mum grinned. “Decided it was a bit too extravagant for me.”
Mum’s gold-buttoned shiny cream shirt was the least extravagant part of Ruth’s outfit. The shirt was tucked into a pink pleated polyester skirt, and her shoes were gold, matching the shirt buttons, huge gold-plated earrings, and a chunky gold-plated necklace. Her short, thick black hair was slicked backwards and upwards with gel, and her nails and lips both painted bright red. Moretsana was a smaller, equally bright, replica of her mother. Georgina ‘was less shiny than the two younger women, but no less dressed up, with a thick multicoloured cloth wound around her head, an orange-and-white African patterned dress, and similarly chunky jewellery.
Mum leapt up to pour more drinks, and just as the three smiling ladies had sat down with full glasses of Coke and Fanta, Dad’s car clinked over the cattle grid. A minute later, doubling the bright polyester, strong floral perfume, and now animated chatter, Maria, Somebody, and Beauty clambered out and joined the party, waving and crying greetings in Setswana and English. Lulu ran from one to the other, hugging everyone excitedly and introducing them to Granny Joan and Granny Betty, who, despite looking a little overwhelmed, smiled, shook hands, and said, “Dumeta.”
‘Happy Birthday’ was disastrous. Half the party did not know the song at all. Appalled, Lulu insisted that they must learn at once, and after a number of botched renditions and much hysterical laughter and thigh slapping, everyone got the hang of the words, Lulu blew out her candles, and we all sat down with big slices of swimming pool – except for Mum and the two grandmothers, who valiantly nibbled chunks of Lulu’s burnt pink bou-gainvillea cake.
Finishing her slice as quickly as possible, Lulu jumped up and announced that now everyone must come and swim with her. Mum said, “I know it’s your birthday, but don’t you think you’re being a little demanding?”
Granny Joan said, “You’ll get cramp if you swim on a full stomach.”
But Lulu ignored both, grabbed Maria and Beauty by the hand, and led the giggling, feebly protesting pair to the back of the house. Damien and I dashed after them, stripping off to our swimming costumes and racing each other to the tall marula tree, from which Dad had suspended a cable for the zip wire that ran across the big blue plastic pool.
By the time we had each plunged in a few times, the rest of the party had assembled under the trees beside the pool and joined Beauty and Maria in cheering us on.
Shaking their heads at Lulu’s entreaties to try out the slide, Ruth, Moretsana, Maria, Somebody, and Beauty nevertheless eventually agreed to get into the water. Matthews, who’d had too many bad experiences when we’d tried to teach him to swim, lurked stubbornly just out of splashing distance. Granny Joan, Granny Betty, and Georgina installed themselves on chairs by the pool. The rest of the women traipsed after Mum into the house, emerging in a bizarre assortment of Mum’s swimming costumes, mismatching T-shirts and baggy shorts.
With Lulu, Damien, and I now cheering them on, the ladies gamely clambered one after the other into the waist-deep water. Clutching onto each other and the three of us as their feet hit the algae-slippery bottom, they waded, giggling and shrieking, into the middle, T-shirts and shorts billowing. The splashing intensified, and the laughter soon became hysterical. Egged on by us, they then tried dunking themselves. Each time they resurfaced, they laughed harder than before, shaking their heads furiously to get the water out of their ears.
Suddenly, at the centre of the tight group, Maria disappeared beneath the surface.
She did not come up again. Someone yelled. Damien and I tugged at Maria’s huge bulk. Nothing happened. We shrieked for Mum.
Mum, barefoot but still in her flowery dress, had been watching. She was already climbing up the ladder into the pool. She dived in, a submerged bullet of soaked cotton heading towards the panicking group. After a few seconds of what looked like underwater wrestling, she shot to the surface, clutching a spluttering Maria. Maria was too stunned to talk, but nodded that she was okay. Slowly, helped by Mum and watched from the side by a wide-eyed Granny Joan, Granny Betty, and Georgina, and a smugly grinning Matthews, the bedraggled guests made their way to dry land.
Mum said, “Never mind, we’ll have a nice cup of tea and everything will be fine.”
Towels were handed out, and as everyone reappeared in their own clothes, Mum poured cups of strong, milky tea, making no protests at the usual Motswana request for three spoons of sugar. Before long we were all eating more cake outside under the knob-thorn tree. And despite the fact that all the bathers admitted to being unable to swim, the four women who had not nearly drowned laughed mercilessly at Maria and called her a terrible swimmer. Which perturbed Maria not at all. She just laughed too and said Lulu must now teach her to swim properly.
&
nbsp; Later Mum said she wasn’t sure if it was Granny Joan or Maria who had had the more shocking experience that day.
Both took a while to get over it, bringing up the subjects of the birthday guests and the birthday swim, respectively, for months after-wards. The other women also enjoyed reminiscing, and the events of that day were replayed many times by all.
All, that is, except for Beauty, who, to Lulu’s dismay, Dad fired not long afterwards.
Dad had asked her to sweep outside the Phikwe clinic. Beauty refused, declaring she was an inside cleaner, that she would lose face if she cleaned outside. Dad said he wasn’t prepared to hire a different cleaner to work outdoors, and if that was how Beauty felt, she would have to leave.
Indignant, Beauty left.
Some weeks later Dad put an advert in the local paper for an administrative assistant. To Dad’s astonishment, amongst the candidates who arrived at the interview was Beauty, cheerful and smiling as if nothing had ever happened.
After exchanging a few pleasantries about family, Dad expressed amazement that she had the cheek to come again to him, of all people, hoping to get a job for which she was not even qualified.
“Ga ke itse,” said Beauty, grinning.
Dad said he was afraid he couldn’t possibly consider her for the job.
Beauty shrugged and got up to leave.
Dad said, “What are you going to do?”
Beauty said, “I think I’m going to study to become a doctor.”
When Grandpa Terry heard the story over sundowners, he chuckled knowingly. This, he said, was something he dealt with all the time. He was forever getting junior Batswana employees coming to the personnel department and demanding a promotion on the grounds that they could do the job of their boss – who, in most cases, they complained, just sat behind a desk, spoke on the phone, clicked ballpoint pens, and shuffled papers.
Dad said Beauty must have watched him using his stethoscope and giving injections and tablets and understandably thought she could do that too.
Grandpa smiled and said, in his gravest I-have-been-in-Africa-for-a-long-time-and-seen-a-lot-of-things voice, that of course, even if you weren’t properly trained, aspiration and self-confidence were always the most important starting points.
Everyone chuckled again. Then Mum grinned wickedly.
“Well, then, Dad,” she said, “if I turn out to be a hopeless teacher, rest assured you’ll at least have confident little Batswana grandchildren who think they can do anything.”
∨ Twenty Chickens for a Saddle ∧
Six
School
The reason we did, unexpectedly, go to school had much more to do with what we might do to Mum than the other way around.
Mum’s health had been a problem for almost as long as I could remember. But her ‘bad days’, the days she stayed in bed and read to us while we brought her cups of tea, had become a normal part of life. Her reassurances of ‘I’ll be fine tomorrow’ had always satisfied us. She’d always been fine, or her pain had been mild enough for her to function normally.
The news that she could not cope any more came as a shock.
Her problem, though always present, had never been our problem. I felt briefly indignant, and then guilty. Then doubly guilty when I saw how guilty Mum felt, about being the reason we went to school.
“I’ll hate school,” I announced, truthfully. Then, hoping to reassure Mum that it ‘was only because I shared her philosophy of education, I added, “My joy of learning will be extinguished.”
“For God’s sake, Robbie,” said Mum. “Don’t always take everyone so literally.”
Damien said, “Well, I’ll love school.”
Lulu said, “I want to go too.”
“You’re still too young,” said Mum. “Thank God.”
Lulu had then just turned five. Nearly four years before, a year after Lulu’s birth, Mum had had her tubes tied. “Having three kids is exhausting enough,” Mum had explained to me, as she’d packed for the hospital. I’d felt abandoned, and irritated. “If you didn’t want three kids,” I’d said crossly, “why did you mate with Dad three times then?” At which, even Mum’s resilient frankness had briefly deserted her.
The operation had left her with chronic pain, and several months later she was diagnosed with a condition that caused her to produce excessive amounts of internal scar tissue. The surgeon operated again to remove this, and to try and prevent new scar tissue developing. Instead it grew back, much worse than before.
In the years that followed, Mum tried endless alternative treatments. Amongst the most interesting was a bio magnet, the size of a pack of cards, which Dad brought home from work one evening. “Magnetic healing,” explained Mum. “To help align my poles,” she added, laughing. While Dad demonstrated how magnets worked, conventionally, and Damien and I magnetised paper clips, Mum sewed a pocket into the front of a pair of knickers. She put them on, inserted the magnet, and set off across the bedroom. After a few paces, the sagging knickers slid to her knees. Mum eventually solved the problem by stitching pockets onto the front of several pairs of Dad’s strongly elasticised underpants.
Mum thought the magnet might be helping, but she couldn’t be sure. She eventually gave the underpants back to Dad, mainly because of the practical difficulties of having a concealed heavy-duty magnet just above her crotch. She had regularly got stuck to the stove, and on one memorable supermarket trip, with a loud thud, to a shopping cart.
Other approaches had ‘sort of worked’. But nothing had really worked, and the pain continued to worsen in Botswana. Increasingly, Mum’s ability to cope with us was what worried Granny and Grandpa most about homeschooling. When Mum reluctantly decided to have a further operation, she finally agreed that Damien and I would be better off, at least for a while, at school.
♦
Kopano was the Phikwe mine primary school: free to all the mine children who could pass an English test – which meant mostly the white children – and open to fee-paying students, who, because of the cost and the English requirements, were mostly white or Indian too. Most black children went to the government schools that were found further out of town or in the villages – clusters of long brown and white buildings with colourful zigzag patterns painted on the walls, dusty football pitches, and children who walked to school carrying holey satchels and wearing outgrown, faded uniforms.
Approached through a shady, raked gravel car park, Kopa-no’s neat white and green buildings stood in the middle of residential Phikwe. The dark green of the buildings matched the itchy green-and-white-checked dress I had to wear. Damien wore khaki shorts and a white shirt. Both of us wore floppy khaki hats, which on our first day still smelled of starch from the uniform shop.
I held up my hat to make me taller as I waved good-bye to Dad. I kept waving until my arm ached, till long after Dad’s car had disappeared as he sped off round the corner to his clinic. By the time I turned around, I ‘was alone. Damien had vanished amongst the many small khaki-, white-, and green-clad figures streaming into the buildings. I envied Damien being so delighted about going to school; and I envied Lulu for being young enough to escape.
I felt numb as my polished black shoes crunched slowly and automatically across gravel. What the long white buildings and concrete corridors before me held, I had no idea. I assumed the worst. All Mum’s arguments for not sending us to school – wildly exaggerated by uncertainty – swirled perniciously around in my head.
By the time I reached the foreboding door labelled Class 4, I was certain I would, in a matter of days, lose my creativity, have my intellectual curiosity stifled, measure all achievement relative to others, and conform to the narrow expectations of the inflexible, antiquated southern African school system. I would, of course, also be landed with a teacher who would take a personal dislike to me. By the end of the year I would be crushed – a mere shadow of my former eight-year-old self, a hopeless casualty of the school system.
I loved school. A month of b
ells, assemblies, and weekly tests, and I had changed my mind altogether. I liked my teacher, I liked my classmates – some already friends from ballet and tennis lessons – and I loved the fact that I could get gold stars and colourful ‘Well Done’ stamps if I did my work better than most of the rest of the class. When I won the Class 4 student of the week award, handed out by Mr. French, the headmaster, in front of the whole school, I was delirious with pride.
A few weeks later, I was delirious with fever.
In the run-up to the yearly school spelling marathon, I had been up studying every night, coercing whoever was willing into testing me on the hundreds of words that I stared at until they blurred into black squiggles. A week before the test, I developed acute tonsillitis and lay tossing and turning in bed, furious to be missing important revision time.
Mum, who was starting to feel much better after her operation, sat beside me for hours, stroking my forehead, giving me regular doses of homeopathic belladonna, and mumuring soothing things about there being more important things in life than spelling tests.
No longer, as far as I was concerned. When I failed to receive one of the top three scores in the class, I was devastated. But most of all I was spurred on to do better next time. I would never, I resolved, put another foot wrong. I now had a lot to live up to. I was, after all, granddaughter of Terry McCourt – senior member of the Kopano School Board, friends with Mr. French, and multiple winner of the annual Brain of Phikwe Competition.
♦
“Between the two of you’,” said Mum, “I despair.”
I couldn’t be stopped from working, and caring; Damien couldn’t be started.
