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Global
Lay-Correspondent Report on South Africa
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Jeff Spahr-Summers,
US
13: Camps Bay
We moved into a
house recently built on a small lot near the base of Devil's
Peak (below Table Mountain) in Camps Bay. The property was so
extreme that the house was built straight up. At street level
was only the two car garage (no driveway), one flight up was
only a recreation room, one more flight led to the living
room, then half a flight to the dining room and kitchen (this
was the ground level from the back), one more flight and then
another half to the bedrooms. My bedroom was four stories
directly above the street. The view of Camps Bay was
breathtaking; along the left ran a range of mountains called
The Twelve Apostles (because of their distinctive twelve
peaks), to the right and straight ahead was the spectacular
Camps Bay with it's spotless white sand beaches and the blue
water of the Atlantic Ocean. The irony of having mountains
named The Twelve Apostles towering above a community that was
predominantly Jewish wasn't lost on me. The view from my
window was so captivating, that Mom and Dad hired South
African artist Lambert Kriedman to paint it in watercolors.
This very painting has hung in every bedroom I've had since we
left Cape Town, just as it does now.
I was enrolled in Camps Bay High School, which also overlooked
the bay. There were approximately 400 students in the school
(only white students, of course), made up of 26 different
nationalities, of which I was the only American. This
incredibly beautiful place and it's people enchanted me. I
signed up for Gymnastics again (which I hadn't done since my
friend Jerald died two years before), every English class they
would let me take, History, Afrikaans (a requirement for me),
and other general studies. I made friends quickly and eased
into the life at the school. I slipped naturally back into my
class clown mode of old, particularly in the Afrikaans class
(which was no longer Immigrant Afrikaans). I was not required
to participate in the Afrikaans class, I pretended to know
absolutely nothing about the language so the teacher just left
me to myself. It wasn't long before our favorite entertainment
was ... for me to blurt out some odd or suggestive Afrikaans
phrase, then claim I didn't know what it meant ... "They told
me to say that!" Of course 'they' (my friends) knew I was
fluent in Afrikaans, it was great fun, and no one ever really
got into trouble. I was hopeful in Cape Town. I stopped
drinking so much, although I certainly continued to go on
benders now and then. I started writing poetry regularly, and
I even joined the Drama department (but not to act, mind you,
I just wanted to get my hands on the lighting panels).
Read the entire
South Africa Series by Jeff Spahr-Summers
1:
On the Move—December
2007
2:
Rain—January
31, 2008
3:
Culture Shock—February
29, 2008
4:
Lord of the Ridge and Fort Scorpion—March
31, 2008
5:
Nightmares and Snakes—April
30, 2008
6:
The
Natives are Restless—May
31, 2008
7:
Mozambique—June
30, 2008
8:
Wild life—July
31, 2008
9:
Reconciliation—August
2008
10:
End of Innocence—September
2008
11:
Chasing the Cherry—October
2008
12:
Johannesburg to Cape Town—November
2008
13:
Camps Bay—December
2008 (This issue, this page)
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Read the
Poetry of Jeff Spahr-Summers
Jeff Spahr-Summers,
US—Free
Verse: blue bird, Poets at Thirty, con-trary, justin
at thirteen, dino, Instructions for Lars, New Dancing Shoes,
Cherry Pit, Resenting the Shark, Stormy, The Circle of Faith and
Healing
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