Permission was granted for use of the following excerpt to WANKIE FRIENDS NEWSLETTER
NUMBER 65 WANKIE FRIENDS MAY 2014
Patricia Friedberg’s “Letters From Wankie—A
Place in Colonial Africa” .... 1954
A mere sixty years
after Rhodes first ventured into the African Interior, we were setting out on a similar journey, though this time we wouldn't
be the only whites heading for Rhodesia and we weren't bumping along in an ox
cart. There were at least two hundred thousand settlers who'd gone before us.
Many were British working class, others adventurers, some just like us, wanting
to begin a new life in a young, underdeveloped country. ...
Another train journey, this time overnight, through
rugged country, across the Limpopo River,
heading for Rhodesia. The train chugged its way
through the high veld up to the border town of Louis Trichardt. While it was
still light we saw the gold mine dumps and the shanty towns close by. African children waved. Wildlife oblivious
to the oncoming train looked up and stayed exactly
where they were, causing the driver to pull to a sudden stop and
jolting our luggage from the rack onto the floor. Monkeys sat on broken-down
carriages pushed off on the sidings; old men begged at every stop; young boys
ran alongside the train, giggling and holding out their hands for anything they
could get. Nothing to cool us down, and even worse if we opened the window- we
tried it once only to be covered in red dust blowing in from the parched land.
We passed African villages where naked children
played and mothers fed their babies far too close
to the railway tracks. Emaciated cattle searched for food
as tick birds sat on their backs looking for their particular form of
nourishment. The tiny washbowl in our carriage ran out of water. We asked for
more. There was no more. We wiped the sweat with once white hand towels and
longed for the sun to set. And when it did it was cold. We cuddled up on our
bunks, hoping for fewer stops and an earlier arrival. It was not to be.
At midnight we were stuck in Beit Bridge — the town
on the border of South African and Rhodesia.
A knock on the door, tickets, passports ... we
fumbled in our luggage, found them and handed them over. The guard said
something in Afrikaans.
"What did he say?"
David, wrapped in a light blanket, answered,
"He said you will get your passport back when we change crew."
"Any idea when that might be?"
"Don't worry — the next lot speak English —
you'll feel safer then." He returned to his bunk and immediately fell
asleep.
I was up for the rest of the night.
In the light of the early morning I saw my first
baobab tree — a sight to see — as I stood in the
corridor of the train getting my first view at the Rhodesian
landscape.
A guard came walking through.
I turned to go back in to the compartment just as
the train came to a halt.
“Why are we
stopped?" I asked.
"Elephants crossing the railway tracks. It
happens all the time," the guard answered.
Which, of course, being in the middle of Africa —
it had to be.
The only elephants I'd ever seen were in the
circus, and here they were, stopping a fast moving train.
"It's why we never get anywhere on time,"
the guard remarked nonchalantly. . "Normal occurrence."
In the distance there were more baobabs close to a
crudely fenced village where children sat in a
circle playing some sort of game. There were women with
babies strapped on their backs and old men in deep conversation, it seemed,
taking no notice of the train or the elephants. I felt as if I might be on the
film set of The African
Queen, except, so far, there had been
no sign of a river from the time we crossed the Limpopo.
Source:
LETTERS FROM WANKIE by Patricia Friedberg. ISBN 978-1-56825-165-3
Rainbow
Books Inc., Florida, USA 2013 pfriedbe@gmail.com, legaciesliterary@gmail.com
www.patriciafriedberg.com
Thank
You, Pat for allowing the Wankie Friends May
Newsletter the above excerpt from your book.
May you always have ...
J Franky J
Trivia65 04 May 2014
Love to share, Health to spare & Wankie Friends who will always care.
