Life has to start somewhere doesn't it?Mine started in the old Pietermaritzburg Grey's Hospital in South Africa.I arrived late as usual at around 2am.My mothers friend in the bed next door gave birth to her baby girl Caroline at roughly the same time.
My name is Andrew and this is my story.
At the time we were living in a place called Mandini in Zululand about 3 hours from the coastal city of Durban.My parents had a large supermarket and we stayed in a 3 bedroom flat above it.
I had 2 older brothers Paul and Peter and an older sister Ann.
I started to ride horses literally before i could walk and afternoons were spent riding and cleaning out the local stables on the neighbouring farm where we kept the horses.
Soon my father decided we had suffered enough and he bought a farm in Birnam Wood near Cedara in a little village called Merrivale about an hour and a halfs drive from Durban,i was 5 years old at the time.
We finally had our 40 acre slice of heaven.
Our farm was called Pecan Wood named after the 20 acres of Pecan nut trees that grew near the main gate of the farm.I spent most days chasing away the Vervet monkeys that abounded in the tree groves,stuffing their mouths full of the bountiful fruit from our heavily laden nut trees.
My little dog Scruffy hot on the heels of any low flying monkeys.
My 2 best friends Tim and James live on farms nearby and we grew up hunting fishing and exploring all the neighbouring mountains dams and farms.
I started my school career at the tender age of 5 years old a year before most children,don't know if my parents thought i was a budding genius or simply wanted to get me out of their hair.
My primary school Laddsworth was considered a good school by all accounts and i particpated in any and all sports available,namely cricket,soccer,tennis,swimming and athletics.I had good hands and justified my place in the goals and behind the wicket.But as i told you before riding was my passion and every afternoon after school come rain or shine was spent training my little pony Shandy.
We were all superb horsemen in my family and attended all the local horse shows,earning ouselves award after award, and i went on to become the youngest member of our Gymkana club in Howick.
Our family wasn't rich and it wasn't poor,our farm and the huge 11 bedroom double story french style house on it made us seem rich but in those days we didn't seem to notice one way or another.
Days were filled with young boyhood adventures,climbing trees,fishing for barbel(catfish)hiking up the nearby mountain and riding dirt bikes along long forgotten trails.
My primary schools days past in a blur only 2 things stood out,i was a self proclaimed marble shooting champion and i used to get into trouble a lot.
Soon i turned eleven and was enrolled into Hilton College a prestigious local all boys boarding school.Girls were still something of a mystery at this stage and my first encounter was at a mixed dance event when i was about 14.I remember sitting and watching the more confident boys dance with those mysterious creatures.One of them talked to me,probably by accident and we started writing to each other for the next few months.I remember eagerily waiting by the letter bench for any perfumed soaked letters that might come my way.
The next big event in my life happened when i was 15,i was told to go downstairs and saw my brother and sister waiting outside in our car.My father had passed away the day before and i was given a few days off for the funeral.
It is hard to prepare ones self for something so tragic,i barely remember the next few months and just remember the days flying past without any recollection of the details.It was really significant to me because a few weeks before i had had a dream where i was in my primary school hall where we used to do plays etc and i recall i was running towards my mother in the dream yelling daddy's dead.
I often have dreams because when i was young i used to read an average of 2 books a day from the nearby library whichwas near to my fathers jewelery shop.
My over active imagination helped me to win an essay competition which helped me to enrol in my high school.
Funny thing about high school it's all work and sports not much time for reading for pleasure anymore.So i did my best and managed to get an entrance into a Durban college.
Now you could say that things got a bit out of hand.For a young guy who had never been around the opposite sex much to suddenly find himself in a party environment,guess i did get a little bit carried away as we used to plan our week around the parties and night clubbing and not so much around the lectures.
Monday was Med club night Tuesday was campus party night,Wednesday was Robert E Lee night ,Thursday was Bonkers night,Friday was Nello's night,Saturday was 330 night and that generally lasted until Sunday which was spent recupperating so we could get a fresh start partying on Monday night.
My first time was after a night of partying on the second day i was a student.I walked up to the notice board to get a list of my classes i was enrolled in and a blond haired girl innocently asked me if i was going to the welcome party that night.Of course i said i was going to go even though i had no clue to what party she was talking about.She said she would meet me there and i thought wow interesting first day,this truely must be the land of milk and honey.
After that we went out for a bit, but as you know when you are surrounded by eager nymphets relationship seldom last more than a few weeks,party party party.
My partner in crime was from my high school.Ian and i used to try hard to attend every party venue listed on the planet and as a consequence our results suffer a tad.
I eventually settled down with a girl i had met at the old famous Robert E Lee which strangely enough now,is an old age home.How did that happen?
We settled into our relationship for the next few years,then i was drafted into Intelligence in the Army.I was posted to some forgotten town called Modderfontein which loosely translated means Muddy Fountain.
I eventually got my officers stars and was posted back to Durban.I was allowed as an officer to stay off the base and basically it was all fun until i decided to get an aerial for my tv,i was revving it up down Smith street in Durban when a green Bmw driven by an erratic driver decided to turn in front of my 250cc yamaha street scrambler.I was lying in the wreckage of my bike when a woman bent over me patted me on the head and said."Where does it hurt son?"I replied."Certainly not my head",whilst i was clutching my nuts with both hands.
Evidently i was quite badly hurt,my back broken in 3 places with my vertabrae crushed to half their original size,i lost a good 2 inches height wise and spent the next 2 months in hospital.
The pain in my back was excruciating and the drugs wore off 10minutes after i took them.
The guy in the bed next to me suggested i try smoking to ease the pain and i got my first taste of Chesterfield 10 seconds later.He later confided to me that night that he had in a drug induced state while commiting a robbery at a grocer store,stabbed an old lady on the way out.Pleasant thoughts went through my mind as we lay next to each other in the same ward for the next 2 months.He had broken his spleen falling backwards off a 6 foot wall on the beachfront he was sitting on while looking at a girl bending over.Nice!
I eventually got out of hospital and went back to the army to finish out my time.
Only remember the highlights of my career as a soldier,when we were doing basics our delightful neanderthal like corporal punched a young soldier called simon in the stomach resulting in his appendix rupturing and him dying later that same night.Of course his father was a high ranking officer so it got squashed and he got transfered to another base.
By some strange miracle one of my best friends Andre was posted to the same place as me and our beds were next to each other in the same bungalo,go figure, what's the chance of that happening.The army was tough and we drew strength from each other to get through it all.
He was a Seventh Day Adventist which meant he was against bearing arms so he spent most of his time carrying ammo boxes over his head.He ended up doing riot control in Ladysmith and digging ditches most of the time.
I was finally in the real world.
