Zakes Mda - The Madonna of Excelsior

Profound nostalgia was not the preserve of the Pule Siblings. Tjaart Cronje wallowed in it. So did Johannes Smit. They sat in the bar of Excelsior Hotel, drowning their troubles in Castle Lager, and looking back with sad fondness to the glorious days when the Afrikaner had ruled supreme, and the “kaffir” had known his place. They felt that their people were alienated from what was fashionably called “the Rainbow Nation”. The Afrikaner was an Afrikaner, and could never be part of a rainbow anything. Deep feelings of resentment and anger swelled in them with each gulp of the beer. They blamed the generation of Adam de Vries for deceiving the Afrikaner.

“Adam de Vries and his wife have melted quite comfortably into the new dispensation,” Johannes Smit lamented.

“We fought wars on their behalf,” agreed Tjaart Cronje. “After they had taught us that the very people they are now fraternising with were the enemy. Today we are suffering the consequences of the past that their generation shaped. My career in the army was destroyed by affirmative action. I would have been a major-general by now.”

“Now de Vries even has the gall to say that apartheid laws should never have been the laws of this country,” said Johannes Smit.

“Hypocrite!”

“Traitor!”

“Soon they will mess this country up,” Tjaart Cronje consoled his mate. “The country will be in a shambles and the Afrikaner will be called back to rescue it. The Afrikaner will regain his power.”

Johannes Smit nodded his agreement. Although he was self-employed as a farmer, affirmative action had taken its toll on him as well. He was no longer getting easy loans from the Land Bank, for which he had previously qualified solely by virtue of being an Afrikaner farmer. Land Bank loans were now open to everyone, even to peasants in the villages, and like everyone else, he had to wait his turn for his applications to be approved. He now had to motivate before he could get a loan, and account for it after getting it. And the people he was motivating and accounting to were the very affirmative action people who had taken over everything. Even such sacred institutions as the Land Bank.

These were tough times for the Afrikaner. Especially for the boer — the farmer. Johannes Smit had had to change to a tougher breed of cattle that could withstand the rigours and hardships to which the Afrikaner was being subjected. He had sold all his Brahmins and had bought Gelbviehs, a breed of cattle that could thrive under tough conditions with minimum attention and expenditure.

Tough times called for tough measures.

IN THE STARK CLARITY of the Free State, a sleepy-eyed woman follows a sleepy-eyed man. Their purple faces are delicate, shaped by the music that is ringing in their heads. Their yellow ochre hats cover their ears so that the song of the wind cannot interfere with the song in their heads. He is in a purple jump suit and purple boots. She is in a purple coat, black shirt and red shoes. Over their shoulders they each carry a heavy bag. They choose their path carefully among giant yellow sunflowers. The wide-open skies are bright with purpleness.

Viliki took to the world with the Seller of Songs. They traversed the Free State, from one farm village to another, selling their songs at people’s feasts and parties. Word had spread that these two itinerant musicians, a delicately carved man and his delicately carved woman, were endowed with the power to turn the dullest of parties into torrid revelries of dance and laughter. Without the backing of the usual drums, his accordion breathed notes that set the carousers ablaze. Her flute wailed wantonly, weaving its way among the notes of the accordion. It was a combination we had never heard before, which meant that Viliki and the Seller of Songs were in greater demand than any other itinerant musicians. We invited them to play at our weddings and at the feasts honouring the ancestors. They travelled through all the districts of the eastern Free State. They spent their days walking in the fields among sunflowers, trekking to the next village, and their nights in sweaty hovels making people dance. They even crossed the Mo-hokare River into Lesotho, where they played at the all-night famo dance parties.

The best moments for Viliki were among the sunflower fields, where he and the Seller of Songs had the freedom to immerse themselves in each other to their hearts’ content. The two of them alone under the big sky. Away from the petty world of Excelsior, and particularly of Mahlatswetsa Location. Away from the politics and the power struggles. He was free at last and didn’t have any obligations to anyone. He had never thought it would be possible to enjoy so much freedom, without any cares in the world.

The local elections had come and gone. Against Popi’s advice, Viliki had stood as an independent candidate. He had lost. The Movement had regained its majority in the council in a landslide victory. Sekatle, as the branch chairperson, had become the new mayor of Excelsior. Viliki had taken to the road with the Seller of Songs. Losing the election was a blessing for which he thanked his ancestors.

While Viliki and the Seller of Songs sold songs, Popi sold her sweat. She had not stood for election, and was therefore no longer the councillor in charge of libraries. She no longer had any income from the council, and had to go out and look for something to do. Not only to put food on the table, but to resume the building of her house.

Whenever we passed Niki’s shack and saw the concrete-block house that had stopped at waist height, we remarked that Popi had been foolish. She should have taken the opportunity to allocate herself an RDP house while she was a councillor. As all the other councillors had done. Viliki had allocated himself two houses, one of which he was renting out. Other councillors had allocated houses to their mistresses, girlfriends and grandmothers. But she had become a goody-goody and had decided to build her own house from her earnings. Look where that had taken her. She and her mother were shack-dwellers when everyone else in Mahlatswetsa Location lived in a proper house.

Popi had to earn a living somehow. She could not rely on the bees, as Niki gave away most of the honey without expecting any payment for it.

When the cherry harvest season came in October and November, she went to Clocolan to join the thousands of workers who scurried around the orchards picking cherries. The air was filled with their fruity aroma. She embraced the trees, some of which she was told were more than a hundred years old. She immersed herself deeply in them, as if they were her lovers. Thanks to ample rains, the crop was large and bountiful. The winter had also been a very cold one, which was good for the cherries. Warm winters resulted in late budding, which presented a problem for farmers.

Popi took to harvesting with a passion. She hoped that hard labour would fill the hole in her heart. Since her anger had dissipated, she had been left with an emptiness that she needed to fill.

She did not like to harvest yellow cherries because picking them was easier, as they were picked without stems. She preferred red cherries, as they were picked with stems, and harvesting them was therefore more time-consuming. After each day’s harvest, the workers spread plastic covers over the hail netting in the orchards to protect the crop in case it rained. Rain at harvest time caused the cherries to burst open, reducing their shelf life.

At dawn, the workers woke up and removed the plastic covers. Once more the harvest resumed in earnest. Popi buried herself in the work and forgot about the world of Excelsior. Until one afternoon, the world of Excelsior came to her in the form of Johannes Smit. He was visiting the farmer who owned the orchard. Popi was picking her way between yellow cherries that were planted together with red cherries. She was wondering why they were always mixed like that.