From the editor:
Sitting together with Henry at the Green Point Saturday market, sharing some food, frying under a blue sunny Cape Town sky, “like the Kalahari sun” so Henry says, and generating some good business Henry is promised me to deliver another story (eNews November edition: The Hottentots-god) which I was looking forward to.
Just before the delayed cut-off date of the December/January issue I received this fairytale:
Escape to High Places Our Last Minute Fairytale
by Henry Jansen alias Xam
Henry Jansen
and one more happy customer |
Khoikhoin’s child is in search of his father and mother. After he had criss crossed the bush, he could still not find them. He is very confused, deeply depressed and his heart is in pain. He does not want to be an orphan.
Then he meets up with wild buck, but wild buck also knows nothing. He then begins to look further and meets up with guinea fowl, the local gossip channel and who carries all the latest news of the bush around. Don’t you know that they have been eaten up for breakfast? And that you are on the menu for the next night? Be on your merry way, because the lion, elephant and hyena are looking for your blood.
Furious and full of fear he is on his way. All of a sudden the eagle crashes down on him and picks him up in one swoop. Come here Hottentot’s child so that I can take you to safety, high up into the treetops. Come and experience the highest point together with me, until you are strong enough again. “Thank you eagle for being so high up, here they can not get me”, as the mist of the morning disappears like the smoke before the wind.
And here Henry's original Afrikaans version:
Hottentot se kind is op soek na sy pa en ma. Nadat hy die bos deurkruis het, kon hy hulle steed nie vind nie. Hy is baie verward, diep bedroef en hartseer. Hy wil nie 'n weeskind wees nie.
Toe ontmoet hy vir wildsbok, maar wildsbok weet ok niks. Hy soek toe verder en kry vir tarentaal, die skinderbek en nuus aandraer van die bos. Weet jy dan nie dat hulle vir brekfis opgevreet is en dat jy die volgende aan die beurt is? Maak dat jy wegkom, want leeu, olifant en hyena soek jou bloed.
Benoud en vol angs slaan hy op die vlug. Meteens skiet arend op hom neer en tel hom met een klou op. Kom hier hottentot se kind dat ek jou kan neem na veiligheid, hoog bo in die boomtoppe. Kom bewoon die hoogtes saam met my totdat jy sterk genoeg is. Dankie arend ek is so hoog, hier kan hulle my nie kry, want die oggendmis verdwyn soos rook voor die wind.
"The present state of the bushman facing cultural extinction and social genocide taking his last resort in his knowledge of natural steroids and substances to dwell on high places"
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