Reminiscing about the late Seventies with eddy
New Hanover memories
“WTF, eddy?”
“Haaibo, you’re the one who decided to name the statue in this field on our cycling route The Penis.”
“That I did.”
eddy, my faithful 1997 steed, has a way of stating the obvious with just the right amount of cheek. He wondered aloud how hard it must have been for the poor subject the artist used to stand in a field next to the side of the road with a hard-on while the statue was being created. eddy smirked in that silent bicycle way of his.
That stretch of road will never be the same again.
Luckily we were swallowed up by a peloton calling themselves the Scotsmen. I stretched myself to stay with them. They were all thirty years younger. We cranked all the way into Mike’s van for the obligatory flat white. The talk, as usual among cyclists, was all about the latest bicycles & gear. It seems cyclists love new bikes & new accessories. From the middle of the bunch I listened. Finally I piped up:
“My eddy is from 1997 & my cycling shirt is from 1996.”
The guy grinding away at the front admitted he wasn’t even born yet.
At Mike’s the man with the expensive Cannondale in the peloton came over to look at eddy.
“Nice bike,” he said. “Vintage.”
I nodded & said thanks. His bike was upwards of R140k.
I had my flat white & fell into conversation with a fellow named Martin who sold explosives. I asked if he could help me out with an ATM withdrawal later that afternoon. We cracked up laughing. When I looked around, the peloton had upped sticks & deserted me.
I mounted eddy & started back toward Bidon. A click down the road I had to swerve for some boemelaars who were already walking & drinking quarts of beer.
eddy, that reminds me that Megs sent me a song the other day that was haunting, about a guy who boozed too much. The voice felt familiar but I couldn’t place it. A day later it hit me. The gears in my brain finally synced. It was the owner of the New Hanover Hotel. His name was Buc (I think), & my dad, Mastelek, used to sell him madumbis. His voice was a dead ringer.
The bar at that hotel was men only. No women allowed. The women had to sit on the veranda. On that veranda stood a tickey-box telephone. My dad would go into the bar for a beer & I’d sit on the veranda near that phone, eating Simba chips he’d bought me. I’d choose a different flavour each time.
Dad always made sure we left before supper. He told me that if he was late my mother would feed the supper to the dogs.
Damn. I realise now that I saw many faces, including the hotel owner’s, whose lives were quietly inhibited by alcohol. There was a farmer named Vic. His Ford was always parked at the hotel. He’d prop up the corner of the bar facing the door. I’d sit and watch legless patrons stumble to their cars, pissed, including the guy who propped up the corner. Not all of them, just some. Many others came simply for the social beer & the chat, to catch up on the district skinder.
But yes, that one who killed himself by smashing his car into the rock at Deadman’s Bend. It was probably the alcohol. I forget his name. Mastelek, my dad, once told me the story.
The hotel stood next to the post office. Inside the post office was the manual telephone exchange that connected to that tickey-box. Across the road was a grocery store I recall named Savemor. The hotel was right next to a single-lane iron bridge across the Sterk Spruit, & along the dirt road beside it stood the Agricultural Hall, the place where the community met for shows, weddings, competitions and the rest.
“Jislaaik,” said eddy. “That’s a strong memory.”
We hit Stampede Hill & cranked past all the cyclists struggling on the climb. It felt good as we finished. We were strong, alive & sucking in crisp Highveld air.
Afterwards I had breakfast: a cheese griller with onions on a roll. I clucked away chatting to the resident chicken while eddy smirked, “Parrot chicken!”
As I climbed into the car after loading eddy I mentioned there was a song that always reminded me of the late seventies in New Hanover.
“Let’s hear it,” he said.