Nicky & Lou. Nataniël
left an envelope at reception. This is the story he wrote:
When I was nine years old our teacher, Miss Nita, told us we were going to have a concert to celebrate Spring. She said we were going to sing a song and all the girls were going to stand in front, because they were going to be the flowers. She said the boys were going to be in the second row, because they were going to be the fruit. She said everything was going to be white.
Then Dwight Moolman put up his hand and said the only white fruit he knew was a litchi and if he had to be a singing litchi his two brothers would never let him go home again.
Then Miss Nita said certain young peaches are also white and really beautiful. She said the white symbolised purity, peace and new beginnings.
Then Dwight put up his hand and asked her if she knew that the Klux Klax Klan in America wore only white.
Then Miss Nita said Dwight should stop sitting in the sun with his sandwiches. She said when polony sweated it could lead to hallucinations and distorted fantasies. She said it was even worse if there was margarine involved. She said there was no such thing on earth as the Klux Klax Klan.
During the first practice I stood in the middle of the second row. We sang a song called ‘Polly the Peach Says Hello Hello’. After the practice Miss Nita said I should move a little bit towards the left. The next day she told me to stand at the end of the row. After the practice she told me to bend my knees so that I wouldn’t be so visible. She said I was a tiny bit darker than the other children.
When I got home I started crying and told my mother Miss Nita said I was not white enough to be a peach. Mother said Miss Nita was a lonely woman who couldn’t make a friend if she volunteered as a trampoline. She said the clever people in the government had machines that tested babies when they came out and they wrote on my certificate that I was white.
The next day Miss Nita told me I was not going to be a young peach at all. She said I was going to be at the back with Fergus, we were going to be the workers that watered the peach tree. Fergus was a rude boy who looked like a scratch pole because his family only took baths for funerals or court cases.
I ran home and cried again. Mother put her arms around me.
We are white, she said, We have papers. And it’s not any of Miss Nita’s business, but I will tell you something. Everybody comes from somewhere. You come from us, we came from our parents and they came from their parents. Except for your grandfather, he came from a boat.
What boat? I said.
Before your grandmother became a member of church, she was very adventurous and extremely friendly, said mother, So, once, when the boat came to the harbour, she was really, really friendly to one of the crew. So friendly that he came back two years later. And then she was friendly again. Now, he was not one hundred percent white. He was from somewhere. And now we all are a little bit from somewhere. It is called exotic. It makes us very special. Look how well Uncle Manny is doing business with those people from the East.
That night my mother paid slow Alfred R40 and told him to go to Miss Nita’s house. She told him to wear a vest and take a bottle of wine. The next day Miss Nita’s eyes were red, but she smiled the whole day. She told me I had a new part in the concert.
On the night of the performance four fat children carried me onstage. I wore a golden crown and sat on a golden chair. I sang a song called ‘The Persian Prince Says Hello Hello’. People talked for days of how exotic it was.
These days I think of that night all the time, in fact, every day as I walk into the warehouse where I work with my Uncle Manny who imports clothes from the East, fashion made with child labour, stolen ideas and fake labels.
It’s against the law, I say.
The law knows nothing, says my uncle, We do this for the people. We take a bit from the rich and show it to the poor. It’s like Robin Hood. And these idiots buy anything with a label, it gives them hope.
I too have hope. That one day I will know what I am and what it is called. Exotic is not good anymore, these days, if you’re a whore, they call you exotic, if you use drugs, they say you have exotic habits, if you torture geese for their livers, they say you have exotic taste.
I will have a wife and we will have children. But not before I know what I am and where I should be. Until then I’ll wait. Until then I’ll just be a prince from somewhere.
(from the Coronåtion stage production, 2009)
Church
Doctor Friedland was sitting in his office, not sure about lunch. He lifted the corner of the sandwich and looked at the tuna inside. The door opened and Paulson Paulson walked in.
We make appointments, said Doctor Friedland.
Completing this assignment has changed my life, said Paulson, I’m not coming back, but you can read it.
He put two sheets of paper on the desk and left. This is what he wrote:
When I was ten years old I came home one day and found my mother sitting with Elizabeth Nel. She was a small, wiry woman who was addicted to playing tennis although she had never been to Wimbledon and could only beat senior citizens.
You have to take him, she said to my mother, You have to take your child to God or He will strike you!
That Saturday my mother took me to a wedding. Albert Richter was getting married to a girl. He stood in front in a dark suit and pointed shoes. His hair was combed backwards and his teeth were very white, he looked like something in a magazine. Then the organ started playing and bundles of white fabric came down the aisle, it looked like a bee keeper had exploded.
That’s when I realised what was about to happen. Inside the white thing was a person who was going to grab Albert Richter, take all his money and make him fat and tired and old like all the other men. I burst into tears and cried until we got home.
The next day I could hear Elizabeth Nel from the sitting room.
A wedding? she screamed, That is not the presence of God! That is a circus, a social event! Take him to a real service!
The next Sunday we went to church again. There were hundreds of people on the benches and a choir on the gallery. Candles were burning all over the pulpit, on the floor in front of it and all over the stairs.
Mother leaned over to a woman.
When did this place go Catholic? she said.
No, said the woman, It is a Singing Service.
Then the preacher arrived in a black robe and everybody started singing. They sang song after song. They knew all the words and all the tunes. I looked at Mother, we were the only people who didn’t know anything. My ears started burning.
When did they learn all this? I thought, Why were we left out?
The preacher waved his arms and sang like he was begging for food. There were too many candles. First his robe caught fire and then the velvet behind him. He did not notice, nor did the choir on the gallery, they just kept singing in the flames. A year earlier I had seen a black-and-white movie called The Vampires of Morleyville, now it was right in front of me. I burst into tears and cried until we got home.
The next week my grandfather died. By now I was so scared of going to church that I did not want to go to the funeral. Then mother told me we were all going to wear black. I was so happy. Brown, blue and green were for children and idiots, now I could wear black like a grown-up.
At the funeral things got even better, Grandfather was lying in front in his coffin. Somebody had put make-up on his face. He looked better than when he was alive. I decided that when I grew up I would always wear a little make-up.
The new preacher was a friendly man, the previous one was still in hospital.
Dear friends, he said, We are saying farewell to a father and a grandfather.
I looked around and saw Elizabeth Nel sitting across the aisle. She was looking at me