Long Street Delight
I have just finished reading Banquet at Brabazan by Patricia Schonstein and it has left me feeling really strange, and delighted and uncomfortable and sad and oddly uplifted.
Banquet at Brabazan could not be more Cape Town. It is set in and around Long Street and the City Bowl, but also touches on the suburbs and townships of Cape Town. It is another weird mix of fantasy and reality, images and characters from her previous book A Time of Angels.
Obvious references to existing people like Graham Weir and Not The Midnight Mass, or Pieter Toerien and Pretty Yende, to name a few, as well as actual buildings, streets and places, are interweaved with imagined characters, places and spaces and it’s strange and confusing and delicious and unsettling. It is also underscored with a weird nostalgia, abundance, and Italian decadence too odd to explain properly.
The characters are beautiful, and strange and awkwardly special. There is an angel who lives at the YMCA. There is the real dwarf who often stands at the robot in front of the Engen in Orange Street, only here he has an imagined wife and life. There is a cross dressing Jewish business man who has the most beautiful affair with his secretary. There is the Long Street we know, and the one we kind of know, or at least suspect, and the magical Long Street we wish we got more glimpses of, and the Long Street we fantasise about.
There is the disturbing reality of child trafficking and muti murders, of drugs and xenophobia, of the Angolan war, of Mozambican horrors. There is politics, and poverty and nasty human stuff. There are beautiful costumes, romantic paintings, beautiful light and music.
It is a really, really strange and totally haunting read. I want to be in the movie.
English
I have been writing other stuff so my poor blog has been a bit neglected. It’s funny how inspiration in one area can mean that there is a lack in another.
Doing lots of writing makes me very, very grammar sensitive. Now, I am the first one to enjoy Peter de Villiers and his hilarious manglings of the English language. I particularly loved the statement about the player who was “playing outside of his boots”. I find most English second language speakers come up with absolutely magnificent direct translation gems, and I love Chinese writing translations into English. Last night we ate rice noodles that needed to ‘return to fresh noodle in tab water’.
It’s when English journalists and presenters manage to mafferate English to within an inch of its life that I get a bit hysterical. Yesterday, while I was ‘returning the noodles in tab water’, the TV was on and Chantal Rutter from Carte Blanche medical spoke glibly about something that would “wreck havoc” with something else, that I thought I would have a small near fatal brain embolism. Wreck havoc? Please explain to me what that means? As far as I understand it, it means that havoc itself would be destroyed, which is a good thing, is it not? But Chantal was confident. Surely the programme editors or producers would have picked it up? It’s not even English! It’s a whole new one to add to the list of misused sayings or words that make me ‘gek’.
Another favourite embolism inducing mistake is chomping at the bit instead of champing at the bit. Because of its ubiquitous misuse, “chomping” has actually become less wrong, and more acceptable. How do you like dem eggs? Damp squid instead of damp squib is another one. Irregardless is another. And quite unique. And I haven’t even done commas and apostrophes!
Hooked and Sitting Man – Two great reasons to be in Kalk Bay
It started with a beautiful drive from hot, sunny town straight into a wall of mist on Boyes Drive to get to Kalk Bay Books. Of course Big Friendly and I overshot the traffic by an hour and we got to Kalk Bay early enough to have cappuccinos in The Annex, a gorgeous restaurant behind Kalk Bay Books. Melinda Ferguson was also already there. It was the launch of her second book, Hooked, that we were attending. Melinda is one of my oldest and dearest friends so there was much love to go around. I am deeply proud of her and how she has actively and consciously made her life beautiful and meaningful. The bookshop was packed to the rafters and Melinda spoke straight from the hip and heart. She was entertaining, frank, outrageous in the most charming way, and she was patient with the many recovering and not so recovering addicts who had a million questions.
Armed with my very own, signed copy of Hooked, we marched down the road to what felt like home! The Kalk Bay Theatre. Man, I love that place. Honestly, I stomped up those stairs into the warm, loving embrace of some of my favourite people in my favourite spot. Now, I absolutely have been a bit theatre-phobic the last while, but I was amped for this show The Sitting Man, written, directed and performed by James Cairns. I saw and loved James in Brother Number, at the Kalk Bay Theatre a coupla years ago.
The Sitting Man is a fantastic one man show. With only a chair on stage to fill the brief of the title, James, by performing a series of characters who are linked by action, slides into a world of South Africans that are immediately identifiable, hilarious and tragic. He is so good at them it almost feels like he is channeling this weird bunch. His accents are spot on. His hands! They change subtly with every character. His face! Now, James has a distinct face, plus his head is totally clean shaven, but every character looked different. He is so adept at playing these human creations of his that he fills them with a rich emotional context, even though we spend so little time with each of them. The story, about a parcel that needs to get taken from Jo’burg to Cape Town, is a teeny bit convoluted, and there is a big, fat loose end that prompted Big Friendly to exclaim “It can’t be over! What happened? What was inside the parcel?” But it is a wonderful vehicle for stringing together these fringe, loser, weirdo men. My favourites were first, the drunk pool player, whose perfect Sotho accent was classic, second, the daggahead, a reminder of more than one smoker from my youth, and then, the poor farmer. James is brilliant, and I couldn’t take my eyes off him. I was sad when it was done! The Sitting Man has a three week run before James switches over to his other one man show Dirt. Do. Not. Miss. This.
Writing my life
I have been so caught up with writing other stuff that my blog has taken a bit of a back seat this last week. I have been busy with a couple of proposals, ideas for new things keep popping into my head (and I have to write them down, however obscure they are, in case they have some value or resonance later on) and I have been preparing a presentation that I am giving at the Limmud seminar this weekend.
The truth is, I love writing. I love words. I can’t always get them to do what they should, like Humpty Dumpy could by paying them at the end of the week, but I enjoy trying to get them to say how I feel and what I mean. I practice saying words and making up weird titles for things at gym on the stair master machine. I have taken to using my crappy cellphone as a dictaphone when I don’t have a pen and paper or Mac-a-tiny with me, like when I am walking the dogs. And I am practicing my writing. I think it’s good practice. But here is how Humpty Dumpty sees things. I will take my cue from him I think.
`I don’t know what you mean by “glory,”‘ Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. `Of course you don’t — till I tell you. I meant “there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!”‘
`But “glory” doesn’t mean “a nice knock-down argument,”‘ Alice objected.
`When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, `it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.’
`The question is,’ said Alice, `whether you can make words mean so many different things.’
`The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, `which is to be master – - that’s all.’
Alice was too much puzzled to say anything, so after a minute Humpty Dumpty began again. `They’ve a temper, some of them — particularly verbs, they’re the proudest — adjectives you can do anything with, but not verbs — however, I can manage the whole of them! Impenetrability! That’s what I say!’
`Would you tell me, please,’ said Alice `what that means?`
`Now you talk like a reasonable child,’ said Humpty Dumpty, looking very much pleased. `I meant by “impenetrability” that we’ve had enough of that subject, and it would be just as well if you’d mention what you mean to do next, as I suppose you don’t mean to stop here all the rest of your life.’
`That’s a great deal to make one word mean,’ Alice said in a thoughtful tone.
`When I make a word do a lot of work like that,’ said Humpty Dumpty, `I always pay it extra.’
`Oh!’ said Alice. She was too much puzzled to make any other remark.
`Ah, you should see `em come round me of a Saturday night,’ Humpty Dumpty went on, wagging his head gravely from side to side: `for to get their wages, you know.’
(Alice didn’t venture to ask what he paid them with; and so you see I can’t tell you.)
Prayer for Tolerance
On this last day of showing the world how beautiful
friendly and kind
Colourful and crazy
Generous and supporting
South Africans are, and can be.
On this last day
I am praying.
Hard and fervently I am praying
and making a call at the same time.
I am writing it and saying it.
I am praying and even begging
that not one person in this country does something
to somebody who isn’t originally from here.
Please. Let us all get ready to stop it from happening.
We are armed with good feeling.
We are padded with pride.
We are forewarned with reality.
Now, let us protect these lives,
from nations we loved when they were playing soccer.
A drawing board
I love the idea of a board that you draw on. It holds all the possibilities before they are even made or thought through, or given words to. I remember those fabulous, cheapandnasty presents we used to get as kids, where you drew with a plastic pen on the top surface of a little screen and it made black marks on the bottom. Then, when you were done you wiped it clean to start again. I loved those. I would draw and draw until the top layer was permanently stuck to the bottom.
I love the idea of going back to the drawing board. I think that there is nothing as powerful as a really fresh idea. Also, somehow, when you go back to the drawing board, you go with other people. It’s what turns the solo act of drawing into a group activity. Around that drawing board is team work, co-creation, a bit of compromise (naturally), discussion, communication, and often, inspiration.
My little Mac a Tiny is a bit of a drawing board. I have been scribbling on it and wiping it clean. It’s the big people version of those cheapandnasty kids’ toys. It’s a highly portable ideas possibility machine. And, slowly, I feel myself…going back to the drawing board!
In Bed with Mac a Tiny
I am lying in bed with the sweetest white macbook on my lap. Big Friendly has gone to fetch milk for our second cups of coffee, and I still have over an hour’s worth of battery time to write this post. This, for me, is the most exciting part. I have a laptop that doesn’t need to be plugged in all the time.
I already know that Eugene Terreblanche has been murdered (terrible), I have updated my facebroek status, checked the weather forecast (which says nothing about the howling wind), and all this form the comfort of my cat-crumpled sheets.
It’s a love affair.
Sheesh, and now, a cold!
Hard drive crash, cell phone in washing machine, and now a river of snot and a sore throat. Which would be fine if I wasn’t working this weekend, but, I am. Loverly.
In amongst all this woe though there are some seriously good things. My industrial theatre show is looking totally cool and I love my cast, who have delivered their usual excellence and more. I have scored a new job which is taking me to Dubai at the end of March, and I’ve never been before. Big Friendly and I ran what I thought was a delightful chat/workshop about blogging, at PANSA yesterday. Although only four people attended, it was really fun, for me. It was great talking about meganshead and why and how I blog. It also totally helped that Big Friendly was on hand to explain the technical how of it too. On that side I am super privileged to have him; I know nothing.
Now, if only my nose and eyes would stop running. I am off to rehearsals.
Facebook 2
I haven’t been as regular on my blog as I would have liked. I have been busy (not an excuse since I managed before), I haven’t seen any theatre in the last while, which was always a reason to write, and I’ve been away, and am going away again next week.
But Facebook is so easy to maintain. I can let you know what’s on my mind, tell you where I am, do publicity for shows, like and comment on other people’s stuff, and keep a presence without much effort or energy. I tried twitter, one up on facebook it is only updates, and it was just too boring to do. I can update my facecloth status on my phone. I can facebroek all my friends and ‘friends’ and friends. I can play Scrabble with friends and strangers around the world (except for Canada and USA).
But I always remember that I have friends and ‘friends’ and friends. What this means is that I am aware that you can’t be selective about who will see your status, your notes, your Scrabble score, if you decide to publish it. It’s not hard to do; it’s like making an announcement with the knowledge that 350 odd (in my case) people could see it.
So I really can’t believe the simple idiocy of people who make friends with their bosses and co-workers and then post themselves drinking pina coladas while they’re on sick leave, or who put “my boss is so hideous” in their status!
More and more I read about people being fired for being bust on facebook. I have read amazing stories of people doing their own detective work; a woman found out who assaulted her in a bar, crooks who left restaurants without paying have been found and ‘outed’ on facebook and relationships have begun and ended in a single status update.
Of course we live our lives more publicly than ever before. All sorts of people can find, watch, follow and even stalk others on the internet, and a social networking site like facebum makes it so easy. But it’s still you who has to do it. You have to sign up, on, and do. You have to take responsibility and remember that in a moment of “how cute is that?” you made your granny/long lost cousin/boss/one-night-stand/old head boy your friend, “friend” or friend.
More musings on The Tent
So I’m sure you can guess what’s occupying my brain (and heart) right now. I am reflecting a little after day three of rehearsals, and again I am thanking the crazy gods of theatre for the sequence of events that has brought these amazing actors into the rehearsal space.
I have always had a bit of a problem with writers who direct the plays that they have written, and here I am, doing just that. But, I have to say, I’m loving it. This work (of rehearsing) is so complex and layered, and so much more than what is on the page, that it is so exciting fleshing it out. And there is also the luxury of time to do it; this isn’t a rush job.
Naturally, while we are focusing so strongly on the making of the play, there is not enough time for me to market the thing. I hope people will want to come and see it. It’s amazing how I can give myself things to worry about hey? Obviously there is The Tent group on Facebook. And I’m writing about it here, on meganshead. Doing last year’s showcase has helped get the word out there a bit. and a cast of eight will at least have friends and family to see it.
Ok, I’m going to let myself worry about something else now. Until tomorrow, day 4. And, I’m loving it.
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Randomness
