My older brother came over to lunch with us. He didn't know I was back. He was more in the dark, because we don't talk often. I was in the shower when he arrived. He sat in the lounge, no one said a thing to him, I came out, walked right past him to my sister's room pretending to be a ghost. Hahahaaa! That was fun! He was soooo shocked!
One of the days, sis and I went to the mall to pay the bills before heading to my mom's for Christmas. I was that fool that walks around with a huge smile on her face. It was so nice to be around familiarity. KFC! Oh my goodness, KFC! We went to the banks, I smiled at everybody, we bought KFC and on our way back, my sis let me drive her car. Yippee! It's an automatic and the last automatic I drove had 3 pedals, so yeah. Go figure! Last time I drove a car was in Akhaltsikhe. It was left handed and I drove on the right side of the road. It's not that different though, once you get on the road, it's not scary or anything. It helps that the pedals are in the same place for both drives.
We also went to Unisa, the other side of town. This was a different day, we took the train. I was still relaxed, walking around with my phone in my hand and my hand bag closed. My sis had to remind me where I was and that I'd better hide my phone and zip my bag. There was a guy sitting across from us in the train. His pants were torn right above the thigh and he was sitting nonchalantly with his legs wide open. Oookkkaaayyyy then strange flashing dude!
We got off the train and asked for directions from a coloured lady who walked us halfway there and on the way, she asked a random black, probably homeless guy for directions IN ENGLISH and he responded IN ENGLISH! Yup! All those tiny little things we take for granted! South Africa IS and English speaking country and I'm very proud of that.
21st December
5 days since I got back to South africa and I was still as tired as a dog. The very very hot weather didn't help much either. We packed and left for Uitenhage mid morning. Brother-in-law drove. You know me and my motion sickness situation. I wanted to check the scenery, but half the time I had to either look straight ahead or close my eyes. When we passed The Wilderness, a small town in the garden route, I thought of a friend of mine, I say friend but he really is an artist/actor/Mr Everything guy I met while doing the second day of my first commercial. He wanted us to do something together and we confirmed so many jobs that we'd do but we just didn't end up doing any of them. He meant well, and I love him for that. I remember when we asked where he was from because he has a bit of a British accent. He told us, 'The Wilderness.' I was like, really? He went, 'you know where that is? Nobody know where the Wilderness is'. Uhm, yeah, I do! It's in the garden route. I did think of him, and I remembered he'd posted that he was at home in the Wilderness. I said hi to him in my head.
8hours later, we arrived in Uitenhage. We have a pice of land on the way out of Uitenhage towards Port Elizabeth, it's where we grew up, the thieves stole all the buildings, from the buildings, to the tanks, to everything. All that's left behind is land. It's always so weird to drive past there. And the fact that it's not that far from the cemetery where we buried my brother doesn't help much with the emotions either. R. I. P. Big!
We got out to offload the car, mom came out and was like, 'hayiiiiinnnniiii, uBaaaabbaaallllwwwaaa!' (OMG, Babalwa!). She sure was shocked to see me here. She thought I'd be in France by then, well, here I am! Hi mom!
So strange to be at home without my uncle. You know how it is when you go back home for the holidays, you're so used to seeing everybody. And then boom! Someone passes away! Next time you go home, there's someone missing, their room is empty, their furniture is lying on its sides and your mom's wearing dark coloured clothes? Kinda reminded me of way back when, when they took me home during school term from boarding school, didn't tell me what was happening, my uncle had shaved his head, we took a huge wreath with us all the way to Uitenhage. When I got home my mom was dressed in black. I asked everyone what was going on, they told me everything was fine. I was eleven. My dad had passed away. I figured it out when I asked my now late younger brother where everyone was starting from the then oldest member of the family. The only person that was not fine was my dad, my brother told me he was in hospital. I knew he was the one that had passed away.
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