Song for Sarah

by Jansen, Jonathan;

  Sarah made sure that her Abe had warm food when he came home late from a church meeting. There was no microwave. Ash would also be used as a substitute for toothpaste when supplies ran out. There was no geyser but since when was a hot-water tap a prerequisite for keeping one’s body clean?

  If Sarah was off duty on a Sunday, she’d go and sit in the car and read her favourite newspaper, Rapport. Scattered around her on a warm day would be the damp family washing that was not completely dry due to earlier wet weather, and so she would keep checking on the drying clothes while she read.

  Sometimes it felt strange to see Sarah relaxing because she was always busy. She often told us that ‘The devil finds work for idle hands’. Life for Sarah was about working hard and she abhorred laziness in any shape or form; sleeping late for any reason was not acceptable. For the children there certainly was not the luxury of ‘sleeping in’ on a Saturday morning, the only day when one could sleep later than 07h30 because there was no school or church service.

  XVIII

  Politics by other means

  In Sarah’s home there was an official disaffection for politics. She felt the sting of racial disregard all her life but the church line was ‘Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers’ because ‘the powers that be are ordained of God’. For this reason challenging, let alone overthrowing, the apartheid government was certainly not encouraged under Sarah’s roof. Yet the mother of five would exercise her own soft resistance against the evil deeds of ‘the ordained government’ without marching down streets or leaving for exile.

  That soft resistance might have started with the decision to raise her children in English. Afrikaans was widely (and wrongly) held to be ‘the language of the oppressor’ but its strong association with the white Nationalist government of apartheid was felt throughout the country. This did not mean that people, like Sarah, did not speak Afrikaans to her Montagu family or accept Afrikaans as one of the two languages of worship in some of the gospel churches. It did mean, however, that in raising her children she would exercise language choice without making a public announcement or drawing ecclesiastical suspicion.

  For the same reason, Sarah did much to protect her children who became involved in political activism in varying ways and to varying degrees. She defended her children against the police when they came enquiring in the early hours of the morning and made it clear that she did not approve of those home invasions. Under her roof, Sarah stood firm against apartheid’s handymen but all within bounds, for she knew where lay the line between protest and provocation.

  Sarah had long passed middle age when she could vote for the first time in her life. On that day in 1994 she was up early to make her cross on a piece of paper at a community centre hall in Retreat. Most if not all the people living under Sarah’s roof voted for the African National Congress of Nelson Mandela. Her children would learn from others, especially the more politically active family of Joey Marks, that there was a terrible injustice in the land, and it had to be opposed. Sarah did not once discourage that commitment.

  Sarah congratulating Firstborn on his first degree at a party with her church friends in the corner house

  Like the time Firstborn was a high-school senior travelling with Sarah in the railway bus from Cape Town to Montagu. His political consciousness had sharpened under the influence of a man called Stephen Biko of Black Consciousness fame. That bus ride did not help. Along the route on a hot summer’s day the compartmentalised bus collected Coloured people at various stations and forced them into the overcrowded back section, which reeked of alcohol and unwashed worker bodies. It was stiflingly hot inside and very uncomfortable. What left Firstborn boiling, however, was that there was a front section with only one or two white travellers who enjoyed a mobile air conditioner and well-padded seats. When the bus made its final stop in Montagu, Firstborn rushed to the white driver’s little cab and gave him hell. The driver was so surprised by this unlikely attack on the part of a young black student that he said nothing at all. Those were the days when a white man could easily have dispatched the youth from Retreat to the local police cells with serious consequences.

  What Firstborn remembers clearly on that evening was that throughout his political speech against the white driver Sarah did not say a single word to interrupt or later to reprimand her son. She stood alone, looking proud, without intervention. The speech over, the two of them walked towards Ma’s house in the location. Not a word was said about the incident. In her own way, Sarah had taken a stand.

  XIX

  The floppy brown purse

  Nothing would test Sarah’s resilience more sorely than when the children went to university. Apartheid created universities for people they labelled by both race and ethnicity. Since Firstborn was deemed Coloured, his destination was the University of the Western Cape (UWC) in Bellville; the University of Cape Town was so much closer but they could not have him. The young student was also proud enough not to plead for a government concession (the permit, they called it) to attend a white university and specify a course not offered at UWC to justify studies in nearby Rondebosch.

  The long journey from Retreat in the southern suburbs to Bellville in the northern areas took forever. And it was costly. One Monday morning Firstborn desperately needed money to take the taxi, train and bus to get to university. Hiking, as he normally did when there was no money, might get him to campus too late for a scheduled Chemistry test. So he slunk into the bedroom where Sarah was in a deep sleep after working the hospital night shift. ‘Does Mummy have any money?’ he whispered and instantly woke her up.

  Sarah and Abraham after their eldest graduated with a BSc degree from the University of the Western Cape in 1979

  Sarah knew that she did not have a cent but nevertheless reached for her flat brown purse, opened it up and pretended to search for coins among the scribbled papers inside. There was nothing and the tears started welling up in her eyes. That day Firstborn decided to drop out of university and look for a job; the pain on Sarah’s face was simply unbearable.

  Of course that was the last thing Sarah wanted and so one day she arranged with an uncle to collect Firstborn and drive him to Bellville while persuading him all along the way not to give up. If Sarah had not made that arrangement Firstborn would still be drifting between Anchor Yeast where he started in a laboratory with far too few skills and helping a brother from the church sell his fish on Prince George Drive, the M5 which linked the white suburbs to the north with the whites-only Muizenberg beach on the False Bay coastline. Where Sarah found the money none of the children ever knew, but from that day there were always a few coins in her purse ‘just in case’ Firstborn needed them. But he never asked again.

  XX

  Angels unawares

  How much is enough? The Cape Town teacher and Robben Island prisoner Neville Alexander would often quote a delightful little phrase, ‘Enough is as good as a feast.’ One of the miracles Sarah created at Number 51 Tenth Avenue was that no matter how much the family struggled there always seemed to be enough, even on the really bad days. Her children could only watch in amazement.

  Every Sunday evening after church a group of Sarah and Abraham’s friends would ‘pop in’ for tea. There was nothing in the house to eat, it seemed. Then something strange happened. Sarah would find a few coins in that floppy brown purse and send one of the boys via the backdoor to run to the shop for a packet of Eet-Sum-Mor shortbread or Cream Crackers. ‘And a piece of cheese, if there’s change,’ she would whisper. The backdoor and the whisper were no accident; the visitors settling into the now-crowded dining room had to be left with the impression that those goodies were there all the time, that the Jansens always had enough, like any respectable family.

  Sarah hosting Abraham’s extended family, probably on his birthday on Christmas Day

  Then, the miracle. Suddenly there would be a feast arranged on the crowded little table in the dini
ng room, including a bowl of peanuts, chips, the doughnuts baked that morning and the cheese and biscuits that came through the backdoor. Tea and coffee were served and there was always a bottle of concentrated Oros which, diluted, went a long way. There was more than enough as the party continued into the night.

  Naomi remembers...

  Very early on in their marriage, Abraham taught Sarah how to make a frikkadel (a minced meat ball) stretch into a full meal for what became a family of seven by 1966, always including die man op die straat (the man on the street). Always be ready ‘to entertain angels unawares’, the Good Book encouraged, and so the evening meal was prepared with the possibility that a stranger could join the table.

  The dining room of their working-class home would over the years be lined wall to wall with family and church friends completely happy to be included in the Christmas lunch, birthday party, graduation function or wedding anniversary. On Christmas Day it was important to keep clear of the dining-room walls as they would have received a lick of paint the night before and the oil-based yellow or green paint had yet to dry. Not once did the Abrahamic pair sit down to discuss how many people to invite who could reasonably fit into the house with a single toilet and limited room for visitor overflow. Not once.

  And yet, to the surprise of the children, there was always enough as the food available seemed to multiply like that boy found when he brought five loaves and two fishes for Jesus to bless and feed the multitude.

  XXI

  Living on tick

  Sarah would overcome the daily tests of endurance on the Cape Flats but there was a challenge that she struggled with for many years. Her husband never quite settled into one job. When Abraham was a driver for Nannucci he was paid on commission; in other words, he made only as much money as he brought in.

  The problem was that Abraham was a relaxed, laid-back man who thrived on the company of people. He was a really good conversationalist and everybody liked him. So in more than one street where he was to pick up or deliver laundry, Abraham would stop the van and visit his church friends for a drawn-out afternoon tea. The two older boys could hear the laughter from the van where they sat waiting after Abraham collected them in the school holidays to help as runners between the company van and the customers’ homes. Needless to say, Abraham would not make much money by visiting his friends during the work day.

  So Abraham left the Nannucci job one day and started hawking fruit and vegetables from the front gate of Number 51. Somewhere the nominal head of the house must have taken a loan on the bakkie (pickup truck) with which he made the weekly trips to Epping Market to buy his produce. But this notion of your husband standing in front of the house wearing a white dust coat and selling potatoes and onions to passers-by was not good for the family image. So Abraham drove down the other avenues hoping to sell off what he bought from the market. This was a frustrating time for the Jansens since there were no office hours. Somebody would knock on the door at 10pm at night to buy a single apple. The family routine was shattered but more so the image of self-reliance and holding things together. Sarah’s home was now vulnerable.

  The young Abraham, just before marrying Sarah

  Anyone who knew Sarah’s husband would recall that he was a sensitive and compassionate man who would swallow anyone’s hard-up story. The people in the avenues knew that. So they would utter those familiar words from the working classes in these parts: ‘Mr Jensen (the ‘a’ tended to become ‘e’ on the Flats), can I get a bag of tomatoes just till Friday please?’ The ‘till Friday’ was supposed to mean ‘until my weekly wages are paid at the end of the week’. So people bought ‘on tick’, as Abraham liked to put it, but of course Friday seldom came so that whatever the new hawker had paid in advance to buy his bulk purchases, he now had less capacity to buy on the next trip to the market.

  The Cape Town poet S.V. Petersen had something to say about this:

  Hulle leef op skuld

  Tot Vrydagaand,

  Net tot die einde van die maand;

  Gaan goed gekleed, soos wie weet wie —

  Trakteer mekaar op simpatie

  They live on credit

  Until Friday night

  Just until the end of the month;

  Go well dressed, like you know who —

  Treat each other to sympathy

  Needless to say, this job could not last and soon Abraham was unemployed, with the family now living solely off the dependable salary of Staff Nurse Jansen. A kind-hearted brother in one of the gospel churches found the struggling Abraham a driver’s job at Grindrod Shipping on the Foreshore in Cape Town. Soon the head of the house was a ‘messenger boy’ running errands across town. But they treated him well at Grindrod’s so the word ‘driver’ was the preferred title of Abraham’s latest job. Still, the pickings were slim and with children at school and university, times were decidedly hard for the family as Sarah continued her salaried labour at Princess Alice. Not once did the dignified, dependable Sarah complain, at least not within earshot of the children.

  But the greater shock was yet to come.

  XXII

  Repairing Abraham

  Without consulting Sarah, Abraham announced one day that the Lord had called him into full-time ministry. Nobody saw this coming. Of course the family mumbled its discontent for this decision meant even less money in the household. Worse, it meant depending on the believers in the various gospel churches to support the new missionary through monetary gifts. These people were themselves working class and poor, except for the minority in the white assemblies who might contribute to the cause. Gifts would be erratic, for the most part, even though there were always the regulars who could be relied on for a standard offering every month. But how embarrassing for Sarah and her family who had maintained their own keep for decades! Now Abraham spent dedicated times writing thank-you letters for the occasional cash envelopes or, from the white believers, a cheque.

  Throughout this time Sarah remained true to a staple doctrine of the Gospel People. The man was the head of the house. He made the final decisions even if they had major repercussions for the wife and children. A decision that meant laying aside material pursuits for the sake of the Lord’s work was incontestable. Sarah would fall in line but she broke an unspoken rule among the missionary class – the wife should accompany her husband to the rural outpost where he was to serve. One of the more serious elders in the church made snide remarks in his preaching designed to hurt Sarah but she stood her ground – earning money and caring for the children were much more important than being stuck in a village away from home simply because of Abraham’s impulsive decision to become a missionary.

  Sarah and Abraham on one of their wedding anniversaries – the flowers were from Abraham

  Then tragedy struck through an accident that would reveal Sarah in a way no other life experience ever did. Abraham was living in an old stationary caravan in a rural village outside Beaufort West, a small town that was little more than a petrol stop for cars, trucks and buses travelling through the Karoo between the big cities of Cape Town and Johannesburg. The new missionary would visit the needy in their homes during the day and spend the evenings preaching from the Bible to groups of saints and sinners from the area.

  It appears that one day Abraham was making doughnuts in hot fish oil inside the caravan. Perhaps he fell asleep, nobody knows. But the oil fell on Abraham and burnt him badly, leaving huge holes in his back. The smoke inhalation in the contained space left him mindless. A shell of a man was brought home. Abraham remembered nothing, spoke incoherently and bore unsightly wounds.

  There was no other choice but to commit the missionary Abraham to a madhouse in one of those dangerous townships of the Cape Flats and there he stayed, making no progress whatsoever. One day Sarah stood up and made a decision: ‘Bring him home.’ Abraham would be better off under the now retired Staff Nurse Jansen. ‘I will take care of my h
usband; the family needs him.’

  Then a miracle happened. Within weeks Abraham was normal again, communicating clearly and shaking his lower legs vigorously as he normally did when enjoying his recycled stock of jokes. The believers came from everywhere to see for themselves. Sarah’s children were elated. Prayers went up and tears flowed freely. As true believers, the question was not ‘How could God let this tragedy happen to a good man?’ but ‘Isn’t it amazing that God could use Abraham and through this experience demonstrate the power of healing?’

  Sarah was merely an instrument in higher hands. She had nursed her man back to life with caring hands and a loving heart. Daddy was back and Sarah’s family was together again. With broken back, Abraham would soon return to the mission fields.

  XXIII

  Making drunk men sober

  Sarah had completed her last day at work. A touching farewell was arranged and emotional goodbyes were said. Sarah carried all her belongings home, bringing to an end the only career she had known since leaving school to become a nurse. This was finally the end of those intolerable day and night shifts. With a small but sufficient pension, retirement should have offered great relief for Sarah who for years had to juggle church, home and job. But how does anyone stop working so suddenly when the routines of duty and care were so much part of your being?