A trip to the movies

It always astounded me as to just how many movies some of my school friends managed to process during the holidays.  We were very lucky to be able to see one movie and on rare occasions two.

Our closest bioscopes were forty something kilometres away, going in opposite directions from our farm.  The one was called the Gaiety and boasted plush, red, velvet seats and pulsating neon lights around the outside.  The one in the opposite direction was held in the local Town Hall with it's fold-up type benches. 

It was always a bit of pot luck when going to the movies, as there was no way of telling what might be showing on any particular night.  Not being all that blasé, we enjoyed anything that moved across the screen, especially the cartoons.  Pathe news with it's loudly crowing cockerel would proclaim to us, all the interesting worldly events.

My uncle from the farm next door, took all six of us children to the Gaiety one Friday night.  It was a wildly raucous ride, having us singing at the top of our voices all the way there. However, the trip back home was much more subdued, on account of the fact that Fridays turned out not to be movie nights.  What started out with so much promise, turning into bitter disappointment.

My sisters and I always dressed ourselves up in our "Sunday best" when going to the movies.  Our voluminous stiff petticoats carefully squeezed into the back of my father's car.  My middle sister who loved to wear makeup, had my father ordering her to "take that stuff off your face" before we could enter the foyer of the Town Hall.  My poor middle sister and in hindsight, my poor insecure father.

Once when the reel snapped, we had the local townsfolk rise to the occasion, with someone whipping out an harmonica and playing a cheerful tune accompanied by much whistling, stomping and clapping from the rest of us.  

Coming home was another story altogether.  My father frequently used a short cut, which required us to open and close seven additional gates on the way home.  At this point, we usually pretended to be asleep, which had my softhearted mother doing the job for us.  Shame on us!

Once while watching Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddie declare undying love across the Canadian Rocky Mountains, we had a cloudburst.  On the way home and at my father's bidding we were required to remove our socks and shoes, tuck our dresses up into the bottom of our knickers and wade across every sheet of water or rushing spruit, which showed up in the headlights of the car.  This was necessary to determine the depth of the water so that the car would not stall.  My mother who was a bit of a worrier, made all sorts of squeaky noises and probably said a prayer of two, just in case she saw us disappear over the side of the road and into a muddy donga. 

Going to the movies, was always a bit of a mission and never to be taken lightly.  It doesn't surprise me now, that we only endured one such experience each holiday.

Bushman paintings among other things

Bushman paintings or Rock Art as it is also known, dates back thousands of years. These magnificent paintings or rock carvings can be found all over Southern Africa in caves and on rock shelters.  We were very lucky as children to live not far from one such site.  These happened to be on a farm about seven miles away.  After first having obtained permission from the owner of the farm, we would set off with our bottle of tea and tin of biscuits, to spend a blissful afternoon in the warm Winter sun.  One had to take a car to get there and then walk across an icy cold river with socks and shoes in hand and trousers rolled up to ones knees.  This was always a very exciting trip and had us all squealing with delight as we forged the river, slipping and sliding on the slimy rocks and occasionally falling into the chilly water.  Up on the other side sitting on the dried grass, we would rub our numb feet briskly with our socks before putting them back on again. 

The paintings were a short distance from the river and depicted the Bushmen running across the overhanging rock on an antelope hunt.  Little red stick-like figures brandishing spears in their hands, and the antelopes charging off and around the corner of the overhanging rock.  I never ceased to be amazed at the beauty and accuracy of these drawings.

Once when we went to view another set of paintings on a farm the other side of the small town closest to us, we discovered a huge sheet of ice.  In Summer, this would have been a small pond where the cattle and sheep could come to quench their thirst, but in Winter when the temperatures fell below freezing point on many occasions, these ponds would be iced over.

This particular afternoon is deeply etched into my mind. When skating is not part of ones culture, an afternoon skidding across a patch of iced over water was thrilling beyond belief.  I have this photo of my big sister about to throw a large chunk of ice into the grass, while my middle sister, a third cousin and I, with serious looks on our faces, contemplated the slippery trip from one side of the patch of ice to the other.  Life couldn't have got any better than this.