Sajonisi: Defying the power of Globalism

Port St John's is an incestuous hell-hole amidst outrageous beauty - Paradise and the Venomous Beast of Failure; Sajonisi; town of myth-making and former home to an Apartheid bantustan's torturers and Rhodesian renegades.

It is a playground to people as diverse as former SABC Board chairperson Eddie Funde, musician Thandiswa Mazwai, and the tens of thousands of township and village youth that descends onto its main beach over New Year.

It is a dump of a town, with open sewerage the norm, corrupt traffic officers, grossly incompetent police, greedy and power-crazed local government representatives, severely restrained health services and saturation crime.

It is also a place of incredibly laid-back chilling, soulful forests, extraordinarily strange characters - from the Mpondo man that hauls out his penis for a public piss and tells the nearby (female) doctor that he's got to 'release his shlong' to Rasta Dave who discovered the loveliness of the township maidens as a youth (and stayed, training as a herbalist, becoming a loved legend all around the rural areas). In-between all the chronic alcoholics and permanently doped-out drop-outs (for this is South Africa's Marijuana Paradise, too) you'll find Ben fornicating on the beach (and amplifying his already rich theatre of myth-making) or the Mayor and Municipal Manager competing for balance behind their impossibly huge stomachs. Its a place with rolling hills, dead-drop cliff-faces, misty beach vistas, picturesque villages, a township on perhaps the most valuable piece of coastal real estate inhabited by the working (and not-so-working) classes and two splendid mountains servicing as the gateway to Port St John's.

It is undoubtedly one of the most scenic places in South Africa, yet so fettered with institutional, social and infrastructural failure that it will continue to defy attempts to turn it into yet another over-priced soulless tourist destination.

It is a gateway to mad, mad beauty - for those who seek jazz in the bowels of a rat. It is Sajonisi, village town outside the globe.

Sangomas, blue sirens and castles on the beach

Last night I dreamt that I was being visited by a
whole bunch of white sangomas (traditional healers in the Mpondo culture of the South African Wild Coast). Now this was odd, as white sangomas represent a controversial rarity; most sangomas are black; and I know quite a few.

This visit was at my old family home, where I grew-up, in a Southern Cape coastal town, where Sangomas were unknown during my childhood.

The one Sangoma that stood out in my dream was grey, older, very dignified. The other was very smooth, handsome, younger - named Kay, which struck me as a woman's name. Both looked very natural, very normal (as far as Sangomas may look normal). Chris - the one white sangoma that I do know - was present - talking too much shit as usual, and wasted my only bag of skunk.

Now my closest friend is a twasa (an initiate into the ancestral world). He was present in the dream, but gave me no information or advance warning about this visit. At some point we went off to Knutzi for an ancestral ceremony, a strange little coastal hamlet where several houses were built as castles. I was keen to dispose of my notebook, as the house was being left open.
Chris wanted to organise screaming blue police sirens to light the beach. I was quite irritated by this. The whole scene looked very clean, almost roman. I was aware, vaguely, of the presence of another twasa friend, MamThembu, and a few Sangoma friends, notably Thobela iTongo.

On waking, I felt very relaxed. I rarely remember dreams, so I wrote this dream down immediately.

Image of Bhele by Philasande Mahlakatha

Into another world

The Rock that lures you into Deep Pools of Ancestral transition. The top picture shows a rock on the Mbanyana estuary, Cwebe, where people are believed to be lured to a transition from the present to the next world. The second picture was taken on the coastal route from Mbanyana to Nkanya, Wild Coast, South Africa.

Impatiens flanaganiae

I found these growing on boulder screes amidst (or often dominating) clivias, scadoxis and cycads, in my all-time favourite ravine; a place of rare beauty where I've returned up to 6 times a year for the past 20 years. Dangerous, inaccessible and unknown - its had a persistent pull on me unmatched by any other place of great natural beauty that I've enjoyed. This Impatiens is considered rare; it grows in shade typically on sandstone; has large tubers (used in traditional medicine); and it flowers endlessly through late Spring and Summer.

Mayhem is in the Eye of the tripped-out beholder: New Year's eve, Port St John's

Image credit: Psytrip by psion005
Created 2006 using Apophysis and posted to the Artist's DeviantArt page - click on Psytrip for link

Surrounded by tens of thousands of increasingly drunk revellers on the main beach, Port St Johns, Wild Coast. 2am, 1 January 2009. Thousands in the water; floodlights creating a surreal mass crowd scene, silhouetted further out, invisible against the embankments. Tripped out of my skull, it's a very Hunter S Thompson spectacle.

The road is dense with people. The beach is dense. Vuyani's is packed - and the source of the house music flooding over the beach. I snatch a close-up look at the DJ - shirtless, perspiring, pulsating in rhythm to the music and the crowd; its happening. I've missed - very deliberately - this party for the preceding years that I've lived in Transkei. I had a brief look at it, a few years ago, on the 2nd of January; saw nothing but mayhem, broken glass, bloody bodies, extraordinarily drunk people, and soldiers with automated guns and unfriendly faces. Not very trip friendly. Add into the equation the notorious inability to move vehicles in-and-out of Second Beach around this time. Seemed like a party to miss by all means. I knew all the kids went there, from Mthatha and countless rural villages. The same scene replicates itself at Mtentu, Cwebe and numerous other coastal hamlets. East London has a version of it, apparently 100 000 strong; but the mayhem is a fraction as rich.

Now I find myself in the eye of the mayhem, and I do not have the luxury to figure it all out. Its incredibly beautiful, and I'm drawn to the interplay between endless and endlessly hyped-up human bodies, the sea, the beach, the floodlights, the music, the underlying tension.

I had planned, first, my first New Year Vortex party in ages; then looked inwards at a resumption of the dre anthrax ghoul Ncise parties. Everybody I mix with seemed to pull in different, indeterminate directions. Finally, I thought, a small intimate party with 3 or 4 very close friends. But by the morning of the 31st I had bought into the promised land at Port St John's: there was to be a serious commercial house party at the soccer stadium in PSJ, with a tantalizing trance party as back-up at Amapondo Backpackers. Now Dave mentioned the House party. Rasta Dave is not to be trusted. First, he's called 'Rasta', yet has had a cheesekop for at least a decade. Second, the last New Year party he organised left Fiks and myself negotiating payment terms with the owners while still tripping off our brackets. Third, he tried hard to burn my house down during a party. Fourth, he's an artist, a herbalist, a real lunatic, and above all he's Dave. Which means real trouble. But then Phila confirmed the party and mentioned the trance back-up. (Some 24 hours later I told Phila to get the hell out of my car so that I can regain my sanity. Enough said.)

So here I am, having finally accepted that my car was going to be parked on the road (with very drunk, speeding lunatics part of the equation); that there IS no house party in town; that Amapondo has some weird rock DJ playing music that has more-or-less decayed in the deeper reaches of my mind. I finally popped some candy, with two of my weirder friends, at around midnight. Earlier I'd taken a walk onto Second beach, and was astonished at the peacefulness and chilled-out serenity of the massive crowd. So by now I knew this was where I wanted to spend my time.

The drive down was interesting. We went through a roadblock that did a double-check (different officers, about a 100m apart) on the licence disk, lights, tyres, drivers' licence, driver sobriety and general road worthiness. Thizo was the driver, handled it all very well, and joked non-stop with the cops about their newly established taxi rank (hundreds of taxis had been pulled off and grounded). It was raining at this point (on the coastal escarpment), and large numbers of dejected hikers were walking towards PSJ (still about 60km away).

Once at the beach, Thizo and Mavus - who stayed sober and straight throughout the festivities - promptly pitched tent in the busiest spot close to the water. This was to be a reference point for us. The night unfolded as an endless wandering between the beach and the backpackers; between different crowd scenes and different music. The (mostly foreign) patrons of the backpackers had generally made-up their minds that they were not to venture into the chaos unfolding below them. Not all was good. I remember, at one point, seeing bodies flying, blood, violence; but sidestepped it all gingerly. You don't pay too much attention to such incidents in a crowded space like that. Despite the fact that there must have been many tens of thousands of people, not a cop nor a soldier nor an ambulance was in sight, except at the checkpoints on the road. The faces, bodies were extraordinary. The energy, the eyes, the silhouettes. There were many small dramas, but came dawn the scene unfolding was one of exceptional beauty and detail. The night was bizarre - strangely relaxed, yet on full alert amidst massive drunkenness.

Getting out was trying. We made an initial attempt at around 6am; but turned back. At 9am we tried again, and had a 2 hour crawl up the supposedly one-way mountain route (cars coming in came on the normal coastal road). Five trucks blocked us for some time, and then painstakingly reversed up the hill. As I stopped next to the last police checkpoint, I asked if my clutch plate was smelling exceptionally burnt, but was re-assured that every clutch plate had the same noxious smell about it.

We tried to get back in later, but it was impossible. It started raining, but the crowds kept pouring in. Sleep wasn't a possibility. We had no contact with Thizo and Mavus - the cellular network was ridicolously overloaded. I'll spare you the details of further proceedings.

Yesterday Phila questioned our sanity for walking around with bulging daypacks - which included money and cell phones - amidst all the mayhem. She related how as she tried to meet up with the others, she met an acquantaince from the clinic, who told her the dead body count at the clinic was 37. Thirty seven. 3pm, 1 January 2009. It didn't warrant a reference in the regional newspaper - which only mocked the fact that East London's zero tolerance policy to public drinking was contradicted by the endless broken glass bottles on the beach.

Phila isn't interested in a repeat celebration next year. Nor is Thizo - he enjoyed the night, and wanted to stay the following night, despite the rain, but bemoaned the fact that, in general, women were dirty and ugly. What did he expect of open-air mayhem? Its the same at a Cape Town trance party. If you want sensuous style, hit the urban clubs.

I do, though, remember one couple, very stylish and beautiful, dancing to enigmatic house pumping out of a car system. As I alluded earlier, there were many fascinating, contradictory, stimulating side-shows. I want to go back - despite the 37 bodies (which must have increased substantially). Back to Mthatha, the cops were hard at work. Not a single intoxicated motorist was going to proceed - after all, accidents get media exposure.

Footnote: I carried my camera on me all night, but failed to take a single pic. Which is one of the reasons I must go back!

Breasts of the White Woman

Zanthoxylum capense, or umLungumabele - breast of a white woman - in isiXhosa; viewed on the Nqabara estuary, Eastern Cape. Known as amaBelentombi in Zulu (breasts of a girl). One wonders what it was called in isiXhosa prior to the appearance of the first ship-wrecked whites; and you're left intrigued by the rather disproportionate structure of the breast!

Shading the precipise

This magnificent shade tree, with its bright-green foliage, is rooted just below the lip of a 100m cliff-face.

Lost yet again

Three of us departed for Gwaxentaba on Christmas Day, passing hundreds of mostly very drunk people, including young kids sipping merrily from Quart bottles. We stopped briefly at Bra Moves' (briskly trading) tavern to stock-up on milk stout. It came as a relief that the drunken mayhem along the road was absent at the much more traditional rural village of Gwaxentaba.

We proceeded down the cliff-face into Magwa, pitched tent and got the fire going. I went up the ravine before sunset and discovered a perfect camp site, allowing for emergency evacuation in the eventuality of sudden flooding. This came as a surprise after 23 years of simply noticing (and using) one realistic camping option. Our intent was to hike 5 hours to Hili village, on the coast, the next day and return before sunset.

We did so, bare feet, shorts and t-shirt; at a very brisk pace, through forest and up-and-down the intermediate valleys. We hugged the escarpment, which is really just a geological fault that threw-up the sandstone features so well known to Wild Coast lovers (Waterfall Bluff, Cathedral Rock, Frazer and Magwa Falls). Its an exceptionally beautiful walk - one of the most beautiful that I've known in my life. Much of this area is depopulating, as is evident on the accompanying picture. The result is that many paths are being reclaimed by the forest. Along the way I learned that a direct route (that I really loved in the past) between Hili and Magwa had become usable again - this was to turn out to be bitter misinformation.

At Mbotyi, where we first hit the sea, we had a quick shebeen stop. On to Hili, and a swim (despite the now tentative drizzle). Ample time to get back. We took the direct route, and spent nearly 4 hours (midway to Magwa) battling the forest, searching for the path. Eventually we accepted that it had truly been reclaimed by the forest (a point confirmed by Hili residents), and were swiftly overcome by darkness and strong driving rain, as we turned back to Hili in search of an overnight stop.

I knew people in Hili, but it was pitch dark, and we had to look for help at a homestead, where the elders ordered their very recalcitrant son to show us the way. His reluctance quickly made sense: he was dead drunk and it was all a matter of time before he had a spectacular somersault off the path.

Closer to the sea the wind became a freezing cold factor (we had no back-up clothing); and once at the house that we were looking for we desperately embraced offered blankets. Sleep was good, and food and hot milky tea gave us respite. The next morning it was back into our wet, cold shorts and t-shirts, and the (now dreaded) 5 hour wet walk to Magwa. To add insult to injury we took a wrong turn and over-shot up the cliff-face (and then back down, into Magwa - food, dry clothes, pack camp - and back up the cliff-face). We learned here that it had only started raining around Magwa an hour earlier.

Mandozi - one of my 2 fellow hikers - had a lovely orientation outing two weeks before starting life as a soldier in the South African National Defence Force. Yet again, I've been sorely tested in the wondrous inhabited wilderness that forms the deep rural forests of Mpondoland.

The Hard Rock of Times

This rock formation is on the Nqabara river, inland from Dwesa Nature Reserve on the South African Wild Coast, in the vicinity of Mpume.

Metallic in appearance, Nqabara River, approximately 10km inland from the coast. What's happening? Everybody's hard at work cracking Macadamia nuts after a horse ride!

Small beauty

Lichens, fungi and insects thrive with wild abandon (and all the rapid predation of a humid sub-tropical climate) in the forests where I play, study, draw my inspiration and ultimately seek new plant elements of aesthetic abandon to introduce into landscaping.

Let me holler, majita, so politely, Voetsek...

Obviously - and oblivious to mundane mediocrity - this is a wicked blog. The writer was given the name Dre Anthrax Ghoul by a respectable acid head called Grumblings that went to work for the Beast in Seattle. Yes, he sold his soul for family, money and fear. Call it the Selfish Gene ad nausea.

It was further popularised by an archaeologist called Mad Van that works for a most obscure bunch of people whose once illustrious history inspired the hip-hop icon called Zulu Nation.
Joining them as Chief Psycho warrior and Propagandist was the Steege, who has become a modern Strandloper. That all happened countless decades ago.

This globblog will grow from within a very trippy garden, inspired by some very trippy friends, all more-or-less midway between (and an hour's drive from) that astonishingly beautiful, very contradictory natural space called the Wild Coast, and the escarpment that gives rise to Lesotho. Its a place where I'll dump many a party tale (hazy and wired), some imagery of the beautiful environment that captivated me long ago, and the occasional angry tweet about some power-crazed ape that thinks politics is the modern breeding ground for reproduction.

You'd be foolish to ever take anything too seriously. Its all a bit tongue in cheek, really. Besides, I'm still growing up. Hola majita.

And its an Up Yours to Fakebook.

Image taken from eviltongue2.blogspot.com

Metal - structure in beauty

Taken at Mtentu, Wild Coast, South Africa. An Australian company won the right to extract heavy minerals (for example titanium) from this area, but strong community opposition is ensuring that the only extracted minerals remain the rusty artwork which was long ago shipwrecked here. Mtentu is located within the Mpondoland Centre of Endemism, a botanical wonderland.

Where ships die horses wander

The community-owned and managed Amadiba Horse & Hiking trail traverses the coast from Mzamba to Mtentu.

Plants for spiritual and physical well-being

Dlamini (see accompanying picture, at his home in Mtambalala) is a traditional Healer specialising in plant medicine. Not all traditional Healers focus intently on the medicinal qualities of plants (although all are trained in the medicinal use of plants). Some concentrate more on the spiritual, psychological, ancestral or magical realms. Dlamini vociferously identifies and cultivates plants in which he sees potential. Any plant grower drawing from the rich indigenous stock of the Wild Coast (or South Africa in general) cannot help but notice the intense variation of plants, from trees to ground covers and bulbs, with a medicinal (or sometimes spiritual) application in rural society. Urban specialists have increasingly turned to these plants for mainstream researching of potential modern applications in curative and preventative medicine.