Ellis Park Mischief

 

I was so excited I couldn’t sleep.

I was a youngster and my dad was going to take me to my very first International Rugby game at Ellis Park in Johannesburg.

I was rugby mal ek se.  I loved Frik Du Pree and Dawie DeVilliers and all the bokke.  I couldn’t believe I was going to be in the stands on a Saturday afternoon watching my beloved Bokke playing against the All Blacks.

I was ready for braaivleis, rugby, sunny skies and…ja well you know the rest.

I was chuffed china. What a jol for a little oke.  It was especially  ‘special’ not only because the All Blacks were (and still are) one of the best teams in the world, but my dad had lost his job at that time and tickets were very, very expensive.  Earlier in the week I heard him and my mom actually discussing the fact that we couldn’t go to the game because of the money situation.  I don’t know how he managed to pay for the tickets but I wasn’t asking any questions.

I woke up early that special Saturday and sat in our kitchen and ate my Pronutro like a good little boykie. 

Then I had a glass of Oros orange juice and almost had an instant seizure from the orange dye #12732 in Oros that often closed my throat and almost killed me.

I’d about turn purple with bulging Eddie Eksteen or Pip Friedman type goo-goo eyes after a half a glass of that kak. Yet I still drank it.

And there I am clutching my throat, with my tongue hanging out, gasping for air and the maid klaps me on the back of my head and tells me to go make my bed.

She didn’t take any kak for sure.

In support of the Springboks I donned my favourite green cardigan with yellow specks in the wool and with leather buttons that my gran knitted for me for my birthday.  Looking at pictures now, I notice that the cardigan was the ugliest thing I have ever seen.  What the hell was I thinking?

We got into my toppie’s car and we went to pick up his friend who was coming with us.  We arrived at the oke’s house and there he is standing outside clutching a ladder.  Yes a wooden ladder.

Now I’m just a happy go lucky kid who is as excited as a little puppy at the prospect of the game that afternoon so I go with the flow.

My dad and his buddy open both the back windows and position the ladder in the car with an end sticking out of each window.

“Sit in the middle and hold the ladder, “ says my dad.  “Don’t let if fall out boykie.”

So while those two okes are gaaning aan in the front seat (about how the Bokke and going to moer the All blacks) old kippie is sitting in the middle of the back seat battling to hold on to the bloody ladder.

We get to what feels like ten miles away from the Ellis Park Stadium.  Actually it was at the top of Harrow road there.  Not exactly ten miles but for a little oke with short legs, and two grown men carrying a ladder, it felt like a moer of a long way.

We arrive at the stadium and are milling around outside with all the rugby fans.  And these okes are poes dronk and shouting.  “Moer hulle.”  “Op die boere.”  “Naartjies.”  “Biltong.”  “Kussings.”  “Ice cream.”  “Programs.”

There are so many people crowding around that I am lost in a sea of knees.  I am so short that all I can see is safari suit pants and long socks with combs in them.

We wait and wait as the people go in.

Suddenly there is a huge roar from inside the stadium as the players run onto the field.  I’m getting upset because I want to see the first punch.

As the crowd roars everyone surges through the gates and the cops are sukkeling to help the ticket takes maintain order.

“Let’s go,” yells my dad.  And he starts walking away from the gate. 

Huh?

“But…but,”I stammer.

My dad grabs me by the hand and now two men, a kid and a ladder are running away from the entrance.

I don’t what the hell is going on.  I’m digging in.  Dragging my feet and my old man is pulling me.

He drags me half way around the bloody field.

“Right here,” he yells over the roar coming from inside.  He is pointing at a very high wooden gate.

My dad and his buddy put up the stepladder and I am propelled to the top, followed by my dad and his buddy. 

And amazingly, from the top of the ladder we can see over the bloody fence and because there is a gap in the stands right there, we can see a portion of the field.

“Lekker,” says my dad, grinning.  He is standing behind me and clutching the fence so we don’t fall off the ladder.  (Apparently my dad had done this before during a Transvaal Currie Cup and saw everything.  At least that’s what he told me.)

So now I’m atop a ladder straining to see between the stands.  All I can really see is the ball when it is kicked into the air or green and gold and black streaks of color as the players become visible for a few seconds in the gap in the stands.

My dad’s buddy has a transistor radio in his pocket so we can hear the game too.  So now I’m beginning to enjoy the whole gedoente.  My imagination, plus a few glimpses of the ball, makes it better than sitting and listening to the Gerhard Viviers commentating home.

“This is lekker hey dad.? I say turning to look at him.  He is so chuffed with himself.  I enjoy his smiling eyes.

Then suddenly the expression on his face changes.

Above the noise I see him mouthing the words, “Oh shit.”

Then I see him putting his hands up to his face.

I turn back toward the stadium just as the first naartjie hits us.

I then realize that a large number of rugby fans on the top of the stand have turned away from the game and have noticed us ’non paying patrons, on the ladder, and have decide to show their disapproval with a volley of naartjies.

And shit man it was a naartjie blizzard.

With glee and hatred in their eyes and water-melon soaked brandy in their veins they started pelting us.

I must say being moered by nartjies is uncomfortable and quite painful.

“Let’s go,” yells my dad as the disruption catches the eyes of a couple of Seth Effica’s finest polisie men. 

On the other side of the fence the boere start running towards us.  We scramble down the ladder. My dad scoops me up.  His buddy grabs the ladder and we run like hell.

My teeth are knocking together and jostling in my head as my dad runs with me tucked under one arm and one side of the ladder in the other.

As we run I hear the crowd go crazy.

The cops didn’t give chase.  I think they just wanted to scare us off.  And they did.

A few miles away, out of breath, and out of range of the law, we all collapsed in a heap on a grassy patch of pavement on Harrow road.

And the giggles started.

My dad and his buddy were giggling like little schoolboys.

I’m glad I experienced my first international rugby game the way I did.  I wouldn’t want it any other way.  This may sound strange but I’m so happy my dad didn’t have money for tickets for the game that day. I truly am.

Because now that he is gone.  That memory of my dad’s dancing eye, his uncontrollable giggle and his shit-eating grin is something I will treasure forever. 

Frozen for all time, in my mind, is a black and white picture of the three of us, sitting on the pavement, laughing our heads off.