Skip to main content

Cow head

There is a bang on the door. It is 7:30am. I hop to the door, pulling on my trousers. It is Zanele. She accosted me in my first week here and offered her cleaning services for R80 a week. She cleans for several of the doctors here.

"Hi Zanele, come in!"

"Hello, doctor."

"How are you?"

"Ah – I am well. You are back!"

"Yes – I visited my family. Are you well?"

"Yes doctor." She pauses. "Doctor, may I have two weeks money this time?"

"Sure."

"I have to buy meat to sell."

She goes on to explain that each week she buys a cows head from the butcher and cooks it. She then chops it up and picks a spot near the petrol station in Hlabisa village centre to sell cuts of the meat to passers-by on Friday and Saturday – the days she does not clean. Zanele has six children. Three are her own and three belong to her late sister who died last year of an illness almost certainly related to HIV. Zanele must now earn enough money to pay for the education,
clothing and food for all six.

I tell her no problem, she can have two weeks money. She is very grateful – it will enable her to buy extra meat.

"And thank you doctor for the extra money," – whilst I was away I left her R100 a week rather than R80 as I did not have change – "I was able to buy extra bread for the children."

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Wherever you go...

I pull the sterile gloves over my gown sleeves and look at the nurse. “Please could you…?” I ask shrugging my shoulders in the universal “my-sterile-gown-is-about-to-fall-off” gesture. She grins and slips around the bed to fumble for the poppers at the back. I eye her name badge. Startled – I glance at her. “Your name is Ndlovu?” “Yes.” “But that is a Zulu name!” “Yes!” Her face lights up. “You have been to South Africa ?” “I was working there last year.” “Oh! Where were you working?” “Hlabisa.” She claps her hands for joy, an enormous grin crossing her face. “But I live near there. If you take the road from Mtuba to the hospital I live in a village on the right.” I laugh at the incongruity of it. Here, in the dark at 2am, on a medical ward in an Oxford hospital, working with a Zulu nurse just I did for the last year. We talk animatedly about her home. “Did you train at Hlabisa?” “No. I trained at Bethesda . Do you know it?” “Oh yes – I visi...

Otherwordly isolation

I lean across the reception desk and catch the attendant’s eye. “Sawubona,” I say, dusting off my rusty Zulu. I see you. “Sawubona, ninjani?” she replies. I see you, are you well? “Ngiyapela.” I’m fine. She grins at me. “You must be a doctor.” “I am! How did you know?” “It is only the doctors around here who use Zulu. Even if it is only the greetings.” She arches an eyebrow. “I used to work here, at Hlabisa hospital up the road. I have a few other Zulu words, you know like ‘Does it hurt?’ and ‘Take a deep breath’.” She laughs. And then launches into an excellent impression of an elderly Zulu lady rattling off a series of complaints, waddling across the reception area clutching her back in mock agony. She gets it exactly right. I have come up to KwaZulu-Natal for a few days. Tonight I am staying in the Hluhluwhe-iMfolozi game park, 20 minutes or so from where I used to work. Awarded my entry ticket, I drive into the park. The sun is low in the sky, the kills bathed in amber light. I ta...

The Hlabisa Family

The sun is low in the sky by the time I turn off the highway and join the road to Hlabisa. All around me the hills are basking in rich yellow light, in front of me the road drops in and out of sight as it follows their undulations to the horizon. Along the grass verge people are slowly making their way home, stray dogs bark lethargically at each other and minibus taxis hurtle past me, defying death for at least one more day. It is rather like one might imagine the closing scene of Mr Benn, had it been made in Africa. It is dark as I pass out of the game park and into Hlabisa itself. A hot wind blows the occasional coke can skittering across the town’s wide, and only, street. There is a curious multi-coloured glow up ahead and as I pass the shops it resolves into a small illuminated sign strung across the road: “Happy Christmas!” And behind it another, “Welcome to Hlabis” – the “a” is broken. I grin – there are also illuminations on the lamp-posts – a multicoloured candle, Father Christ...