Letter from Richard's Bay, South Africa

A section of uShaka Marine World in Durban. [Courtesy] We all know of Shaka the Zulu, the kraal, umqobothi, apartheid, rainbow nation, xenophobia and Cape of Good Hope. What of all the apples, and wine from South Africa? Lucky Dube, Yvonne Chaka Chaka and Brenda Fassie. I will leave politics out for now. How about going a step further and visiting the place, not as a tourist but an academic pilgrim? That does not close your eyes to the wider issues of the society. I just did that, with my destination the University of Zululand, in KwaZulu-Natal. Previous visits had taken me to Western Cape or Gauteng, the province where Johannesburg is located. My attraction to Zululand is both historical and academic. Let me start with 'Sawubona', (how are you?) in Zulu, a sister language to Xhosa. Curiously, the same greeting in Xhosa is 'Molo' and 'Molweni' in plural. How did Molo get to Nakuru? It's hard to get a direct flight from Nairobi to Durban, the major city in KwaZulu-Natal, one of South Africa's nine provinces which are further subdivided into municipalities. A flight to Johannesburg connects you to Durban, about the same distance from Nairobi to Mombasa. South Africa is near, only four hours flight to OR Tambo airport in Jo'burg. The advert for AI at OR Tambo is impressive, more so with for A for African, not artificial. About an hour's flight over the Savannah takes you to Durban and its hills, covered with sugarcane. The airport near Durban is aptly named King Shaka with a big statue of the king holding his shield just outside the airport. The road trip to Richard's Bay is about 1.5 hours from Shaka with plenty of tolls to pay. Two things catch your attention on both sides of the highway; sugar cane farms and gum (eucalyptus) farms and for almost 150km. It reminded me of vineyards in Western Cape. Few small-scale farms are found on this route. There is a fascinating link between South Africa and Kenya. Indians came to work on sugarcane farms, they stayed on. They came to build the railway in Kenya, they stayed on. What of Chinese building our SGR? Some of the sugar cane farms are turning into real estate, just like coffee farms in Kenya. At Richard's Bay, its wintery, windy and chilly, but no snow. A conference hosted by the University of Zululand took us three days. One of the key themes was decolonising our education content. It seems the political liberation in South Africa has shifted to our minds. This is a 'hot' issue. Should we replace all the ideas from West and East with our indigenous knowledge or cross-pollinate them with indigenous knowledge? What language should we use in that? How long will it take? Can we become cultural powers without economic powers? China started with economic power and is now shifting to culture or soft power espoused by scholarships, Confucius institutes, acrobats. What of USA and UK? How did they into our hearts and pockets? The conference put lots of efforts on mentoring the next generation of scholars who presented papers co- authored with their supervisors. In between the conferences, we took a boat ride around the port of Richard's Bay. Beyond the big ships, we got a glimpse of beach houses and yachts. One yacht, we were told was worth 50 million Rand. And from the location of these houses and yachts, it's clear wealth knows how to hide! Conference over, it was time to explore the hinterland of Zululand. One reluctant visit was to a national park. Hluhluwe-imfolozi Park. We saw a warthog, an antelope called nyali, dehorned rhinos, buffaloes, and zebras. Cold, we were told kept the animals away. Rhinos are dehorned in SA to keep off poachers. Luckily, like our nails, the horn grows again. A new innovation is to inject the horn with a radioactive material; it can be detected wherever it is; making it difficult to sell. I heard of the ugly 5 - hyena, vulture, wildebeest, marabou stork and warthog. I pity the hyena; it is forever losing, except in 'team mafisi'! I admired the SA countryside. No grandiose houses, mostly bungalows. One curious observation is that every house no matter how elegant has an adjacent round hut. Some traditionally build, others with some modernisation. I was told they are for ceremonies like 'mumelo' to celebrate girls' coming of age. The boy goes through 'ithunga', a rite of passage too. I gathered the dowry (Lobola) among the Zulu is only 11 cows. Each cow goes for about 15,000 rands. Do your maths, one rand is about Sh7. You can give some cows as money equivalent. Don't overthink, my sojourn here is purely academic. Enough on ceremonies. South Africa is ahead of many African countries, particularly on infrastructure. It's no wonder it's a magnet for immigrants. Despite all the stories of xenophobia, SA is a welcoming country and truly a rainbow nation, in colours and cultures. But I noticed echoes of the past with universities in SA either predominantly white or black. I felt like I was in USA Deep South all over again. There is another attraction; South Africa has breathing space. My mouth salivates over the amount of empty space. And it's real and visible, from the air and on the road. SA is about 1.22m square kilometres, twice Kenya's size but with almost the same population. With 12 official languages, South Africans love their local languages. Not so surprising with no lingua franca such as Swahili. Though I heard Swahili was to be taught in SA, I am yet to meet someone learning it or speaking it. My visit this time had a 'eureka' moment, I got into contact with some Afrikaners (Boers) who lived in Kenya before returning to South Africa after uhuru. One lived in Ol Ngarua, Laikipia, farming wheat and maize, and keeping livestock. Why does our history ignore this group, Kaburus (Boers)? Just because they are farmers? More on that next week. I hope to "click" by the time I return. The clicks in Zulu or isiZulu are represented by letters C, X, and Q. Hamba kahle, good bye in IsiZulu.

Letter from Richard's Bay, South Africa

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