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By Genevieve Richards

I am in the process of planning my next holiday to South Africa and the very thought of going “home” fills me with a myriad of feelings: my face breaks into a smile, my shoulders drop as the tension of everyday life drains away, and I feel I am able to look life straight in the face, come what may.

Known as the Dark Continent, Africa really is the complete opposite: the golden sunshine splashes over everything, often scorching the earth with its intensity; the sky is blue and apparently endless; and time seems to slow down – almost to a standstill. Africa has a rhythm all of its own, and once this beat enters your blood it never leaves. 

I grew up in Durban, in the province of Natal, on the east coast of South Africa. Natal is still known as The Last Outpost (of the old British Colony) and is home to a melting post of people and culture; some of the country’s most beautiful beaches as well as lush vegetation and places of outstanding natural beauty.  As a child growing up in Durban I took it all for granted, it simply didn’t occur to me that life was any different elsewhere.  My long school holidays (the main one being the summer holidays which stretched from mid-December to the end of January) passed by in a blur of swimming, eating, sleeping and playing – and oh boy, did I play. I played so hard that at the days end I was exhausted: whether it was going to the beach, climbing trees and building “forts”, skate boarding and roller skating, or just running amok in the neighbourhood there were always scores of kids to play with.  And always present too was the heat. 

Durban is renowned for it humidity – the hot, sticky heat from which there is little relief, even with air conditioning (which even 20 years ago was considered a necessity rather than a luxury).  The only way to cope with it is to do what everyone else does: run from air conditioned house, to air conditioned car, to air conditioned office, to air conditioned shopping mall…I am sure you get the picture….and heaven help if the air con breaks down!!  Even now my mother still leaves the air con on in the house for the dogs while she is at work during the day.

Even jumping into a swimming pool doesn’t really help – with the hot sun beating down on it all day the water is often tepid and like “bath water”.  Some days are so bad that the air takes on a haze that barely lifts all day, the breeze does little but stir the hot air around, and even in the winter months the weather can play tricks on you.  Often there is a Berg wind:  a hot, dry, squally wind blowing off the interior plateau of South Africa.  A Berg wind causes your skin to feel clammy, as if feverish, while your throat burns with every breath you take in. 

It’s no wonder, really, that Africa moves so slowly – with the heat as fierce as it is it is the only way to conserve energy some days. There is an unhurried elegance to life in Africa – and foreigners especially find this amusing at first, and rather more annoying after a while. It was only when I got to the UK that I realised my concept of time was somewhat corrupt.  In answer to the question “when will this be done” my reply was always “just now”. To me “just now” means when I get around to it, while to the those of a different nationality it means “now, now”…but then again even “now, now” means “now-ish, but only when I get around to it” to me.   Like the Spanish concept of “mãnana, mãnana”, South Africa embraces the theory “just now” and “now, now”.

South Africa is also home to beasts of all description and although I have only seen some of them on the pages of a book, others I have seen rather too close for my liking.  Snakes and all manner of lizards, in particular, scare me witless.  A particular harrowing experience for me was when, as a child, I played a game of “hide and seek” with some cousins and inadvertently landed up sharing my hiding place under a sofa with a green mamba.  Fortunately, I am still alive; and even more fortunately the snake is not. My mother and grandmother had a great tag-team going: one would hold down the snake with a shovel while the other one cut off its head. 

As far as pets go though, I had the usual collection of dogs and cats along with the odd gerbil and ant colony. My sister and I even had a giant tortoise my dad brought down from Zululand for a while, but believe it or not, it ran away!  To this day the presence of pets always signifies the difference between a house and a home to me: a home is not a home unless it has pets.

Amazing as the landscape and livestock of SA may be, the most amazing aspect of the country is definitely its people.  South Africans, no matter where they are in the world, will always seek other South Africans out; and once they meet up it’s like they have access to a secret club that only they know the password to.  We just seem to “get each other”.  Completely, and without fail.  There is also a sense of expectancy and hope within the people, an inherent sense of optimism that often takes foreigners by surprise.

Some SA friends of mine who have also moved away say that they never ever feel as self assured, sexy, and alive as when they are in SA surrounded by family and friends, and I can understand exactly what they mean – I too feel more alive and vibrant.  And it is this fact that makes me look forward to going home for my holidays more than anything.

Bio:
Genevieve Richards was born and educated in South Africa and has lived in London since 1995. A graduate in public relations and journalism, she has now branched out into freelance writing.

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