So this past weekend I again departed from good ole’ Lesotho is search of a festival in South Africa. So on I went to the Cherry Festival in Ficksburg, right across the border. While this transition seems but a trifle in physical means, crossing from one side of the border to another, there is certainly a change in atmosphere, affluence, and over all attitude. Lesotho, as you may have witnessed from my pictures is the epitome of poverty. Snot-nosed kids running around with out pants (and by that I mean underwear) on, women strutting around in their best deteriorating t-shirt, and of course the constant begging along with a plethora of other defining characteristics that accompany impoverished countries. South Africa, well at least the heavily Boer populated areas, is much different. Physically it looks kind of like Florida. Palm trees, neatly manicured lawns, old white women with dyed and permed hair with in an inch of its life, old white men in sandals, socks, and super short shorts, and like stores. Like Ficksburg has a cute little shopping streets where it totally doesn’t seem like you are in Afirca, so much as downtown Panama City Beach or Destin, sans beach. Okay also you don’t have somebody stopping you every ten or so minutes to say “Excuse madam, but I would like to talk to you for a minute.” In which case the conversation is about them wanting money, just to see how long they can keep your attention by extremely drawn out conversations, or try to get you into bed. So that is really nice. And also there is this feeling of tension between the Africans and Boers, it bears undertones in anything and everything in the Free State (the district in SA that surrounds Lesotho). But I’m not in Lesotho, so I naturally feel more relaxed and at ease because things are so much more familiar in this setting.
Well back to the really point of the blog, the Cherry Fest. It is basically a huge homecoming type festival where you can get a lot of cherry themed things. Like we did some tasting of cherry cordials, which were very nice and they had this big arts and crafts type tent that was filled with bitlong (Boer’s take on beef jerky), cherry stuff, other types of alcohol, and junk stands. Along with the flavors of South Africa, you also get to observe the Boers at their drunken and fashionably best. We, being the vulgar Americans that we are, had a bit of a contest, the more fashion faux paus or grotesque observations of Boers you have the more points you get. What you win is Pride.
My friend Pam won. I’ll now describe what I was not able to get in picture. At first I got a solid 2 points for spotting a three inch thick and 4 inch long rat tail on three year old. I then gave up once Pam spotted the following: the bushiest mullet I have ever seen, and that includes my 22 years prior in southern Illinois; a bowl cut on a grown man that rivals cousin Jonathan’s circa 1988; a number of Boer men of all ages strutting around in the socks, sandals, shorty-shorts, and half open button down safari shirts; a little kid on a harness with a leash attached; fake rainbow colored mo-hawk wigs; old men with rainbow spray painted beards; an older (obviously single ,well you know what maybe not, who am I to say?) woman in a shirt that has a v-neck that went down to her belly button with a sequenced string bikini top underneath with daisy-dukes on; an older, obese man who had on M.C. Hammer type zebra print pants with a t-shirt on that had the dad from “Family Guy” on it and read “Babe Magnet”; and finally every single person sporting crocs. This last observation I hope doesn’t offend anyone. It is just the cherry on top of the cake (no pun intended). I really feel sorry for this kid, but I hope someone in his life soon tells him to fix it and since I am so cosmetically vain it just multiplies this for me. There was a kid maybe 15-16 with the thickest, bushiest, most solid uni-brow that I have ever seen, He puts Bert from “Bert and Ernie” to terrible shame with this sucker. Solid straight across brow. In most of the uni-brows I have seen there has been a lessening of hair in the middle but not in this one, it was thick and no slackening of hair. This poor kid was super nerdy too. You know he was one of those kids who in kindergarten played with bugs instead of other people. I like to think that maybe his ultra-brow imparts to him a super power and this is merely his disguise and that when the powers of evil strike South Africa he morphs into a super hero and his uni-brow can be used to blast the racist intentions of some people and helps to develop a secure and reliable infrastructure in the country. I just like to think that so the kid gets to boost his cool factor, alas I don’t think it is true because while there were both races present at the fest they did not intermingle. It was weird and Super Uni-Brow Boy has failed us. Oh well.
One last observation that I must touch on that I saw at Cherry Fest was one of the stands in the arts and crafts tent. It was a t-shirt tent. I knew it was a special kind of tent when one of the first shirts that attracted me there read “Chuck Norris can’t touch this…” Shelby and Liz I thought of you, mainly because I thought to myself, “whoever wrote this has obviously never seen Chuck Norris or heard tales of his bravery as relayed on television.” And then thought “wait, what, this is weird I’m NOT in Southern Illinois or Alabama.” I then was obviously intrigued and went on to seek out other gems like this. I saw another that read (this was in Afrikaans so I had to have it translated) “Chuck Norris doesn’t speak Afrikaans but he wishes he was a Boer,” a baby t-shirt that had the Land Rover emblem on it but instead of “Land Rover” it read “Hung Over” (the Boers must start them young), and another baby shirt that is giving you the finger. These are all pretty messed up, but the worst was a t-shirt intended for an infant that read “All my daddy asked for was a blow-job.” Take it how you will, but I’m still disturbed by this one. But more disturbing yet is that while I was checking out these shirts the guy running the stand came up to offer me his business “card.” Which, in fact, was his business information on a sticker that was put on a Republic of South Africa Department of Health distributed condom. I mean in the long run this is a pretty innovative idea. It not only promotes your business but helps HIV/AIDS prevention. So I guess I’m for it, just a little taken a back by it.
So folks that’s all I’ve got for this week. I hope you overstuffed yourself at Thanksgiving. Did you know the average American eats 7,000 calories at Thanksgiving? I’m soooo jealous of you all. But so now I can listen to my Christmas music with out shame, even though it is hot out. Try getting into “Winter Wonderland” when it is 90F out and you’re at the struggle of your life against insanely large insects. Well as always Salang Hantle and Christmas E Monate (Merry Christmas!)!
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