we do see SOME funny too
By
Luc Iver de Vil
We do see some FUNNT too…
By Luc Iver de Vil
Copyright 2013 Luc Iver de Vil
Authors note: All characters in this work of fiction are 18 years of age or older
To my wife, friend, partner, lover and supporter. My thanks to her for her dedicated assistance in getting my books published.
Preface: Living in Africa has its moments, not always sour and serious. These are eight stories of some the more humorous incidents in the life of the author, Luc Iver de Vil.
GOING ON HONEYMOON
My first father-in-law was a generous man, and he showed his appreciation for me taking his daughter away, and out of his home, in a very tangible manner: he fully paid for a ten day honeymoon in Mauritius, luxury hotel, car rental, pocket money and flights included.
It was 1976, when we South Africans of a lighter skin tone were considered non-gratia on planet Earth.
This marriage thing didn’t start off well, firstly I had to replace my best friend with my strongest, to keep me upright in front of the pulpit, due to an overindulging bachelor’s party the night before, and stem my argumentative nature when canned, while "yessing" and "I doing" for the priest.
At the after-the-fact party we all got tanked up even more! Somehow my new mother-in-law got her daughter and me into the hotel near the airport, from where we would catch a taxi to the Airline terminal the next morning, for our flight to Mauritius. After battling to remove the tight wedding dress over my now wife’s compressed bulges, we decided to delay the traditional first night experimentations till we have reached Mauritius, and both passed out.
Getting to the airport, through customs and checked in wasn’t too much of trouble, maybe we just didn’t notice as both our minds were hanging over a bit.
At that stage of my life I have had no experience of aircraft and flying, but despite this virginity on flight I became apprehensive once we started walking across the tarmac to our aircraft. Firstly, we were supposed to be flying ‘Air Mauritius’, but the faded and peeling lettering on the plane unclearly read ‘Air Madagascar’. An airhostess later explained in Creole English that it was a former ‘Air Madagascar’ craft, then on lease to ‘Air Mauritius’. I was also convinced that I had noticed huge puddles of oil under the engines, from leaks I presumed, and that the patches on the tyres would have made any traffic cop look forward to a huge Xmas bonus.
We were pointed to our seats, roped in, and waited for departure.
With balls of white smoke, seven coughs and a grunt the tired motors started pushing us down the runway. I am sure if I was fit enough to run the same distance I would also have taken off at the end of the runway. We scraped the trees on the perimeter of the airport, just missed a couple of office blocks and were on our way.
The aircraft hopped, skipped and jumped from cloud to cloud, and I needed a drink. On ordering from the hostess I was firmly told that no alcohol will be served on that flight, but we could have coffee if we wished.
So we duly ordered two cups, and mine I received with ease. But as my new wife was about to take her cup, the plane jumped from a high cloud to a lower one, and the hot coffee was spilled over her chest. Except for her discomfort and pain, the resultant burns put off my exploration of that part of her body, while on honeymoon, for at least a week.
Then an announcement in an unknown version of English, but I did decipher the words "refuel" and "Maputo". Shocking, why would a plane of this size need to refuel so soon after take-off, and then tackle the long journey across the Indian Ocean to Mauritius?
Not to worry, I knew Maputo from the days it was Lorenzo Marques, not a bad place for a stopover.
I was in for a surprise, as we approached the Maputo Airport the announcement came: “All passengers with non-South African Passports may alight for the refuelling, all South African passport holders are to remain on the aircraft”.
As we hit the runway in balls of smoke from the tyres, I noticed through the porthole that the plane was being escorted on the ground by a large number of military vehicles, jeeps and armoured cars, with machine guns and cannons pointed at the aircraft. Once the aircraft had come to a halt, it was surrounded by the military, which was obviously ready for any eventuality. This made us very apprehensive: Did we land in the middle of another African coup-de-tat? Apparently not, it was normal procedure when any South Africans were aboard an aircraft, we were told. Did the Mozambicans really think that a dozen or so hungovered honeymooners and a few middle aged ‘let’s-find-our-youth-again would attempt to invade their country? Be that as it may.
When an aircraft is refuelling no engines are allowed to run, so, no lights, no air-conditioning! There we sat on knobby seats for four hours, two dozen or so South Africans in a dark, and hot, aircraft while the ground crew was siphoning fuel from 200 litre drums into the aircrafts tanks. Nor could we get anything to drink, the airhostesses did not have South African passports, and thus could spend their time sightseeing the ruins of Maputo.
The toilets were also out of bounds, the Mozambicans did not want anything originating in South Africa lying on the runways of their airports to dry.
Eventually our fellow passengers, and some of the crew, returned to the craft, and we wing flapped back into the air, heading more or less east. After a few hours another announcement, we will be landing at Tenerife, Madagascar for refuelling. All South Africans then had tears in their eyes when again told to remain behind while all others would be allowed to step off the aircraft.
It wasn’t that bad, once our fellow passengers were aground, we were allowed to follow. Only thing was that we had to report to two tables which had been set up by officials at the bottom of the gangway. Strange, all government officials across the world, regardless the country, look, sound and smell the same.
At the tables we had to hand over our passports, and "Five dollars American" each. There were two exceptions, young Indian honeymooners from Durban who were allowed to pass, without having to pay "Five dollars American".
In return for our "Five dollars American" we each received an official Madagascar dog license, to be pinned on our shirts for the duration of our visit. After purchasing our licenses, we were allowed to enter the in-transit lounge where we were not subjected to any further degrading.
Refuelling did not take too long, and after two or three whiskeys we were back flapping our way towards our honeymoon, without any further incident.
The honeymoon itself? That is another story altogether.
GHOST TOWN GHOSTS
As inspector of mines I worked for the government, and thus had plenty of time on my hands, with a state owned Land Rover thrown in. My time was occupied by fishing in the Atlantic, hunting in Koakoland, in northern parts of the then South West Africa, now Namibia, prospecting in the desert and the occasional inspection.
The instruction came from Windhoek; some important businessman was coming from a Johannesburg Mining House to look around with his eye on possible investment in mining ventures in the country.
I thought I did the job well, I showed him fishing in the sea with confiscated dynamite, poaching on the reserve and finding semiprecious stones in the desert. But ‘The Man’ was not happy; he wanted to see what could be mined in our pristine desert.
There and then I decided to show him what mining in the desert was like; I will show him Kolmanskop and pointed the Land Rover south.
Kolmanskop is an old diamond mining town, I explained, that had been reclaimed by the desert. On his question as to why the town had become ghostly, I replied: “It was the ghosts!” He laughed at me and said there is no such thing as ghosts.
That’s when the plan was hatched in my head, and I slowed down to ensure we got to our destination in the late afternoon.
After walking around the hardly damaged buildings, though the wind had half-filled all the rooms with sand, I threw out the bait: “Normally I would say we camp in one of those rooms, but the ghosts, you know, let us pitch our tent a distance away.”
He fell for it: There are no such things as ghosts, we shall sleep in one of those rooms!”
Not showing my excitement, I had the man cook us a steak on the gas stove while I prepared our bedroom, smoothing the sand a bit and putting out the stretchers.
On the Land Rover was my fishing rod. Without being observed I pulled off a length of nylon line, which I cut in two. The end of one I tied to three empty beer cans, each with a few pebbles in it, and hung them from a rafter in an adjoining room, ran the nylon over the wall and attached