Pinot, Bretzels, and Cathedrals

Indeed, a fortnight has passed since I started regaling the niceties of South Africa on holiday, and I worry that I have mostly buried some events in the depths of my soul.

Do you really want to know about how my children adapted to life on the farm like ducks to water?

Do you really want to know about how every time I stepped out on the stoep at my Mum and Dad’s that I drank in the comforting sight of the Nhlosane?

Do you really want to know that I had almost no inclination at all to do anything except for sit and have tea with my darling Dad, and lie with my Mum and her beautiful cats Milo and Rozie and chat?

The thing is this:  I LOVE my little home…um…hamlet (for lack of a more suitable word, because ‘dorpie’ is just not it) that I am going to sit you down and you’re going to let me prattle off for a few hours.

After packing in so many social gatherings while up in the metropolis, I packed my bags and hitched a lift down the N3 with one of my besties.  After 2 full weeks of glorious sun, that Tuesday was grey and wet, and Eskom (*) was pulling off its final session of screwing the public before Christmas.  We crawled out of the city, there was bumper to bumper traffic for miles.  (Load shedding (*)- it’s funny how most people have overcome it in the homes, but commuting is the most ridiculous victim of all).  Eventually we hit the open road, cruised all the way down to Howick without stopping- not even to let us 2 ladies or 2 little boys have a bathroom break.

By midafternoon, I was sitting on the stoep at Godolphin, sipping tea from my Dad’s tea pot, while he ceremoniously brought me a slice of birthday cake.  This was special, because a.)it was fruit cake, b.)he personally had made it when Mum was recovering from surgery in October, and it’s his favourite, and c.) he had kept the last morsel just for me and him to share.  It’s our thing. So much of pure bliss.

For the next two weeks, many a tea break was shared out on the stoep.  We watched my brother’s dairy cows being led to their pastures, and how they systematically grazed their way up and down the strips of kikuya. We watched how the clouds gathered and fell away.  We watched my girls run along the lawn, on the trampoline, under the sprinklers, with the cats, swinging golf clubs.  We dug up Bumpy’s carrots and potatoes, we ate green beans straight off the plants.  We walked to fetch milk. We marveled at the grass that has grown, on a patch that was mud a short 3 months ago.

Towards Christmas, Mum strung up lights on the verhanda, and inspired by the Juniors solar-powered Christmas lights (see what I mean, Eskom), she went off to buy some.  Later that evening, after Dad returned to the house after sunset, he noticed how the lights that had been left on the lawn to soak up the sunlight had come to life, so he strung those onto his tree ferns.

Of course, we spent some lovely afternoons with my brother and his family.  My niece dragged her cousins off to her bedroom and they got to know each-other over a tea party, while I could wander around my old home, seeing all the clever changes that a new family brings, and it was lovely to see that there is still so much love and happiness within the walls of that home.

In the week before Christmas, the Farmer took us up the hill to saw down a Christmas tree, and in the way that used to happen when I was growing up, the tree was dragged onto the patio, it had it’s lower branches cut off, it was placed into a plastic drum with bricks around the base to ensure it stood straight and taken into the Family Room where the scent of the gum would linger behind a closed door.

And when family time was too much, we meandered.  The Natal Midlands is a delight for shopping, eating, chilling and seeing the beautiful countryside.  This time around we didn’t get to see the Nelson Mandela Capture site Memorial, but we hunted down the delightful coffee roastery called Terbadore, with its’ humungous Great Danes as big as ponies that terrified the pants off Beth.  We bought leather boots that have been the Best-Buy-Ever since arriving back in snowy Europe.  We lunched at the Bierfassl, an Austrian pub, where we ate Eisbein, and drank locally brewed beer.  Who needs Paulaner and Erdinger, if its what you drink  at home?

I was able to shake off my girls occasionally for coffee sessions with high school friends- it is so fabulous to be able to still have those friendships, after nearly 25 years!

Back at the farm, we would go out driving, and I would soak in the views that surrounded me all my life.  Walking around without shoes and socks, the grooves in my feet were ingrained with mud, and the skin on my arms was flaky from gentle sun tanning.

As you can imagine, all that was difficult to say goodbye to. Well, for me anyway.  On the last evening we were there, once the girls were tucked away in their beds, I went outside.  It was almost the first evening that the sky was clear in 2 weeks, and I could see the waning moon, and the night sky.  I was so full of sadness, because… well, just because.  You know how it is.

The next day we returned to the Big Smoke, capitalised on more friends who were still around, and eventually had to focus on packing those darned suitcases.  Turns out having a big suitcase is actually a pain in the ***.  You might have the space for an extra case of your favourite wines, but damn those airlines for their weight restrictions :-(.

The girls and both Anton and I slept beautifully on the flight back to Frankfurt.  I was very grateful that I had not seen the South African news broadcast the day before that spoke about the snow in Europe.  I’m not so sure I would have boarded the airplane happily.  Frankfurt was white with snow, our car was frozen.  My poor hubby had to change 2 tyres in that grizzly weather, and I have to say that he drove back carefully on icy roads.  And while I am not the biggest fan of that white fluff, Strasbourg looked almost magical under a fresh snowfall, and our street was almost free from tyre-tracks. But that is for another day- my thoughts on snow. For now, I just want to say again, to all those that made our holiday special, thank you.  We loved seeing each of you.  Mom and Dad, Ma en Pa, we love you all so much, and are grateful to have you in our lives.  The same goes for siblings, children, and dear friends. Till next time, Xxx

* Eskom is the state electricity provider, and *load shedding is when they have planned shut-downs, and during this period, you have no access to electricity, unless you have generator or solar power