Are South Africans ignorant?

A plate of delicious fish and chips arrived in front of me at the O’Hagan’s in Paulshof, Sandton and I immediately tucked in. I was sitting at the bar counter at lunch time on a Saturday and could not help overhearing the British couple next to me as I munched.

“Bloody hell, luv, they think this is an Oirish pub? The daykor is completely wrong.”

“Yer roight, an’ whoy do they have St Patrick’s Daye decoraytions at this toime of the yeear? This eisin the way we do it back home.”

“And what about the mewsic. That’s a Scot’s tune not an Oirish one. The mewsic is wrong.”

“Yeah you’re roight. Ignorant lot. And no HP Sauce today. Disgrace. And these are not authentic sausages like back ‘ome or in Aireland. All beef and spice, not poorrk. Why can’t they have poorrk? How can they call this an Oirish pub? Pass me the tomato sauce for the chips luv.”

Several times, while I amusedly chewed on my grub, I came close to speaking out and correcting, well, absolutely “everythenk” they said. But I wanted my peace and quiet.

“We know it’s not a real Irish pub luv. It’s a marketing concept for a franchise. Some of us have actually been to Ireland, like myself.

“We know they aren’t authentic Dublin furnishings; that’s not the point, luv. It’s a South African pub with a nod to the idea of an Irish one and to give the franchise a bit of character. Besides, importing genuine furnishings( originals surely four hundred years or more old) or getting someone local to make it to spec every time a new franchise is sold is a wee bit expensive.

“So what if it isn’t authentic Irish fiddles we are hearing? Who wants to bloody have just that skirling and clattering through the shuddering lugholes all the time? People here prefer having contemporary pop and R&B in the background, funnily enough. Luv.

“Is it really a disgrace that today, unfortunately, all the HP bottles are in use on all the tables because the place is so popular and the marketing strategy was spot on? Just ask a waitress, sweetie. Oh, I forget, the restaurant service I experienced most of the time in Merry “Pudding Island” England was hopeless by SA standards.

“Sausages? What you call fricken sausages we put on toothpicks and yours are bland by comparison with good ol’ boerewors. Ours can be a large coil that can take up most of a wok. And by the way, what you call big steaks, 250 grams, is often smaller than what we refer to as ‘ladies’ portions’. ”

When I was in England I was gobsmacked by the ignorance in cities like Portsmouth and Southampton. “You say Portsmouth reminds you a little of Cape Town, mate? But how did you get around in Cape Town?”

I looked at the bloke trying to figure out what he meant. “What do you mean?” I said, his answer dawning on me before he said it.

“Well, we got cars here, what do you use in Africa?”

Good grief.

“Can you drive mate?” Are frogs waterproof? Of course I can. Virtually all South Africans can drive. I was surprised by how many people I worked with could not drive a car. To ask a South African if he or she can drive or not is a ludicrous question.

I had heard of the legends of English ignorance outside of the big cities in the UK but could not believe them. I changed my mind. In Portsmouth, where I worked, they joked about us as primitive, not having access to IT products and services such as banking online. So far from the truth. I could not believe my ears. Most of my colleagues in Portsmouth did not believe SA is pretty much on the cutting edge in IT. (Oh I am not; I have a Chinese varsity student friend who happily sorts my PC problems in exchange for a dinner feast of pies, mash and gravy, which he loves.)

I know of many South Africans, “born but fled” who snapped up work in many industries in New Zealand and Australia because of their superior skills base.

And the xenophobia sometimes in England! Generally I found Brits friendly but also often had the sense (in Portsmouth, Southampton and the general Dorset area) that they did not like South Africans and we were sometimes rudely and coldly treated and had it suggested that we should go back to South Africa.

Little did they know that there are loads of Britons in South Africa. I grew up with them all my life, at school and later in the working environment. We never treated them rudely, other than the usual schoolboy banter.

Look, everyone has different experiences of countries. Here in China I have made good British friends. Whilst living in England I did find many UK people friendly and the common saying in the UK, that they get friendlier the further north you went, was oh so true. By the time you get to the border with Scotland they are jovial and warm-hearted (the Jordies for example).

By the time you get to Ireland many are daft, if not bordering on being unhinged, and love singing in pubs, which explained a lot about me to me. I felt completely at home in Ireland, my ancestral origins.

Alisdair Budd, an amiable enough chap who obviously reads widely, whom I have struck a good online relationship with on Thought Leadership, is saying some thoroughly unresearched things about “our” educational level, as in his commentary under my previous blog. You’re being a bit unfair Alisdair and I am afraid to say Robert Duigan was right to give you a good bollixing, as you Brits would say, when you commented again on our educational levels.

I know I received a bloody fine, well-rounded education at St Andrew’s and later at Rhodes University and the University of Cape Town. So have many others. I do not experience amongst “us” the level of ignorance you sometimes refer to.

We have no shortage of Nobel Prize winners, from writers like Nadine Gordimer and JM Coetzee (the first of only two writers to win the Booker Prize twice and the other was also not a Brit) to all the peace laureates. This is hardly an ignorant nation Alisdair and co.

The education “we” received was just fine, thank you very much. I do not sense amongst “us” such bovine, cud-chewing ignorance about other countries as I experienced in some parts of England. I emphasise “some parts”.

Of course, I keep on using inverted commas for the use of we and us. Apartheid ensured there were two grossly unequal standards of education, but SA is addressing that enormous imbalance. From Wikipedia: “South Africa has a vibrant higher education sector, with more than a million students enrolled in the country’s universities and universities of technology”.

In one sense the world can consider itself bloody lucky that there is a brain drain from SA as our people can bring enormous benefits to the world and, in the long run, perhaps ironically, profit the globe …

Blogger MacKenzie stops on the keyboard, his wagging, lecturing finger (metaphorically speaking ) poised in the air. “What’s really going on here?” he thinks to himself. “You say critical things about SA yourself, so why are you now so strongly defending the Rainbow Nation?”

“Well, it’s a bit like family matters”, he thinks. “I can moan at my wife but God help anyone else who does. My wife’s grandchildren moer the living daylights out of each other, but God help any other kid who messes with one of them. The Arabic countries have a saying, which goes something like ‘a cousin against a cousin, but the whole family against an outsider’.”

Like many South Africans, I am a “born but fled” South African because of the violence, specifically the traumas my wife went through. I also just want to experience and work in other cultures because I have a passion for writing and find culture shocks rather inspiring. Hey, I might come back. Damn, I really miss SA sometimes. Braaivleis, rugby, sunny skies and Chevrolet … “wil jy ‘n dop hê boet?”

“Ja sure, jus’ lemme turn the wors, make sure it’s a Castle …” you may not believe it, but as I wrote this the tears started prickling my eyes.

Aggh … you’re just a fokken moffie.

No I’m not; I really love my country.

“We” can criticise SA, go on about the education standards en wat ook al, not “you”, especially if the research has not been done.

Ja, “we” can bliksem our own country, but not okes who know nothing about it, who never grew up with the smell of braaivleis and pap and watching our country change from apartheid to its current struggle to become a responsible democracy. “We” want to see it “come right”, om ‘n bietjie uit to staan en mooi te blink to use “our” vernacular and one of SA’s many languages, and pardon my probably swak Afrikaans. It’s a vris language and as the years goes by and I never use Die Taal, my Afrikaans “word meer en meer delicious” as “we” also like to joke. Los ons uit.

Hell man. I learned something about myself today.

Lekker dinge!