KARIBIB, Namibia
Karibib was the first branch I visited on my 1978 tour of Namibia. I travelled for days to get to this miniscule town on the edge of the Namib desert on the way to Swakopmund. I joined Roelf van der Berg who was accompanied by his wife. I stayed at the Laszig Hotel which was run by a crusty old German, Kurt Laszig and his wife. He was an artist of some minor note and gifted me with a set of postcards of some of his paintings when I left. It was a rather rough and ready hotel but acceptable. The town had some of the hardest, most unpalatable water I have ever encountered. Soap and soap powder would simply not lather and out of desperation I bought a bottle of Scrubb’s ammonia to try and get some reaction from the detergent and soap while bathing and washing my underclothes. It didn’t work!
USAKOS, Namibia
Usakos lies quite close to Karibib, on the way to the coast. I am not all sure whether or not I went to this branch as I recall neither the branch nor the hotel but oddly enough I remember Pottie, the bachelor manager who collected minerals and semi precious stones for a hobby. His favourite hunting grounds were the Spitzkoppen and on a Saturday afternoon, he took the van der Bergs and myself to this amazing rock formation out in the Namib. From a distance, this gigantic shard of rock pokes a peak into the sky which looks for all the world like a miniature Matterhorn. The main peak, a precipitous slab of granite rises about 670m above the desert floor. It is especially difficult to scale and has only been conquered by proper mountaineers. Further down along its flanks a chain has been installed for people wishing to climb up on a shoulder to look out over the plains. I went up the slope with gusto, never pausing to look down but when I got to the top and looked back, I was damn nearly overcome by an attack of acrophobia and vertigo. I had to slide down on my bum as I was to dizzy to stand!
Off to the north of Usakos, in the Erongo Mountains, lies an area known as Bull’s Party, so called apparently, because the men of Usakos had a tradition whereby they all trouped out to Phillip’s Cave which is nearby, for an annual “picnic” (Read monumental booze-up) after which the area became known as the Bull’s Party. Scattered all around are enormous rounded boulders which look as if a giant was interrupted during a game of marbles or bowls. The surrounding rocky outcrops were populated by baboons, the sentinels of which kept a close eye on our movements and which scattered when our guide fetched his rifle from the truck. It really was an unforgettable place and I would have given much to have attended just one of those “picnics”!
LUDERITZ, Namibia
Distances between Namibian towns are often vast. Keetmanshoop down to Luderitz is a mind-numbing 340 km with nothing but sand and rock to relieve the boredom. Today the road is all tarred but back then, there was a middle section of sand road which called for concentration by a driver. I recall stopping off in dune country some 30 km out of Luderitz and walking off into the sand. I sat down in the midday heat and just listened – that was perhaps the most perfect silence I have ever experienced. There was not a breath of air, no bird sounds and best of all, no sounds of civilization. After a while, it felt as if there was pressure building up in my ears – they were not used to hearing absolutely nothing. One passes through dune fields where the wind regularly blows dunes across the road and a road crew constantly monitors the situation to keep the tar clear. One also passes by Kolmanskop, the long abandoned diamond mining town, where old civic buildings and once grand houses, are being eroded away by the sand. In the houses, sand lies drifted up to ceiling height, a truly melancholy sight. The town Luderitz is one of the most unusual towns I have visited. The distinctive old German architecture, lack of trees and gardens, the constantly blowing chilly wind and never ending sand dunes lend the place an air of neglect and desolation. I must say I loved Luderitz though – it is quite unique. Just before sunset I used to walk out onto Shark Island, (As it is now linked to the mainland by a causeway, I suppose it should be termed a peninsula) right to its very end where the town is out of sight and sit on the rocks and watch the sun set over the cold Atlantic. It was all so stark and brutal and yet unforgettably beautiful too. I’d love to go there again but alas, I never will.
SWAKOPMUND, Namibia
I’ve been just about everywhere in South Africa and Namibia but the town I enjoyed and admired most and would give much to revisit, is Swakopmund. Like in Luderitz, colonial German architecture dominates in the town and walking its streets, especially at night, is like stepping into another age. Some of the oldest buildings such as The Kazerne, Railway Station or the Gaol, are treasures and far from typical of the utilitarian kind of buildings Governments usually erect. The bank itself was built in the early part of the 20th century and has a loft which the branch uses as a pub. The original rafters were sourced, cut and numbered in Germany and re-assembled in the town. The pristine pieces of wood in that roof still reflect the original identifying numbers and letters. Bush Morley and I spent many a happy evening in that pub and if you have read my tales before, you’ll have already encountered this pub.
We stayed in the Prinzessin Rupprecht Heim – a “pension” which in its day had been a Red Cross hospital. We could not stay at any of the fine hotels in the town as these were all booked up for Easter. The accommodation was on a B & B basis so we had to scout around town for our evening meal. Our “digs” were close to the sea and I took much pleasure from walking way out into the sea on the old wood and steel jetty. It was easy to imagine you were at sea at the end of the jetty but without the inconvenience of seasickness. We were later told by someone who had grown up there, that way back in history the dry, sand-clogged Swakop River had experienced an unprecedented flood from copious rain in the hinterland and all that enormous accumulation of sand was washed out to sea where the Agulhas current carried it up the coast and created whole new beaches. It was said that the jetty, which juts a fair distance into the sea, for a number of years stood on dry land due to the sand build-up.
The streets of Swakopmund are not all tarred although to the casual eye, they seem to be. The streets are mostly of sand which is watered with sea water and rolled. The resulting salt build-up forms a good street surface when it dries. Should it rain, which mercifully it seldom does, the streets would turn into quagmires. Fog is a feature which occurs all along the coast and when it does, the streets become super slippery. A local housewife told me that when the fog rolled in and enveloped the town for weeks on end, she would take all her damp washing a few kilometers into the Namib where the fog didn’t reach and then somewhere along the road, simply plant a rotary washline in the sand along with a beach umbrella and sit and read while her washing dried. Sometimes there would be a whole group of such enterprising ladies, sitting around chatting. I find that idea simply charming!
TSUMEB, Namibia
Tsumeb is a picturesque town in the North of Namibia, nestled among rocky outcrops and hills and dense bush. The town owes its existence to a substantial copper (and several other metals) deposit which has been mined since the earliest years of the 20th century. While only limited mining now takes place due to the ore body being essentially depleted, a smelting plant still operates near the town. I had the pleasure of touring the works. The tour was preceded by a fascinating lecture on the smelter’s activities and the smelter was a pretty scary approximation of what hell might be like. Amazing were the copper and germanium based minerals which were found in the mine. Some are unique to Tsumeb and many go by the most fanciful names. Some examples : arsenbrackebuschite, helmutwinklerite, molybdofornacite etc Some of the most beautiful crystals I’ve ever seen are displayed in the little museum.
One morning in the branch, I got up from my table to stretch my legs and walked over to a window which overlooked the backyard of the bank. I thought I was seeing things because there was a zebra out there, peacefully grazing in the backyard. Turned out that troops returning from the border war, had brought it out as a baby orphan but could not take it home on the aircraft so the accountant had offered to look after it. I wish I knew what eventually happened to the striped fellow.
Des Templer and I stayed at the Minen Hotel. The other hotel in town was called HOTEL ECKLEBEN. I read that as “Eckle Ben” when in fact it is pronounced ECK LEBEN (Corner life) I wondered why I was looked at oddly when I talked about the eckle ben…. The main focus of life in the town was the Mine Club. All social activities take place in this venue which includes an excellent golf course.
On the road North to Oshivelo and Oshakati, one may find Lake Otjikoto, a sinkhole lake the depth of which has not been determined as at deep level it branches out into lateral cave systems. During WW1 fleeing German troops dumped weapons and supplies into the lake and some of these have been brought to the surface over the years. The same road eventually takes one into the Etosha National Park. I entered at Fort Namutoni which looks just like the forts the French Foreign Legion used to man up in North Africa. But the park was a huge disappointment – I’ve never enjoyed game reserves and Etosha is easily the worst I’ve seen. After cruising around for an hour, seeing only a lone springbok in that time, I returned to Namutoni, had a beer and then went back to Tsumeb.
AUSSPANNPLATZ, WINDHOEK, Namibia
I visited this branch twice and both audit outcomes were pretty poor, especially the second one. Bush Morley and I checked into the Thuringerhof Hotel in downtown Windhoek and stayed there for nearly three months while we completed all the Windhoek audits. The hotel rooms were comfortable but there was no dining room or restaurant in the hotel. Instead, a central beer garden served meals off an a la carte menu, which was distinctly German in flavor. Boiled potatoes and sauerkraut were served with EVERYTHING but luckily I enjoy both items, so I was happy. I was sitting quietly having a beer, waiting for my meal one evening when the waiter brought what looked like half a chicken to the chap sitting opposite me. He tucked in with gusto and after a while, sat back for a swig of his beer. Just then, a black fellow sitting nearby got up, came across, picked up the half eaten meal and took it over to his table and started eating. I was amazed but so was the fellow whose meal had suddenly gone missing. I initially thought he might be a really mean company rep, too stingy to buy an entire meal for his driver but no. The waiter went up to the stunned diner and asked if he knew the black chap and when he answered in the negative, the waiter asked why he had let him take his food. I heard him say, “I thought it might be a custom here and I didn’t want to make a fuss”. The other chap had finished off the chicken in the meantime so he didn’t resist at all when they flung him out into the street! That has to be the cheekiest hijacking ever.
I had slept late one Saturday morning and was awoken by a commotion in the kitchen, which was opposite my first floor window. When I looked out, I was horrified to discover that the kitchen chimney was on fire and it seemed to be spreading. I immediately thought of my little car down in the basement parking and the huge diesel tank underneath it which fed the kitchen burners. I was actually frozen by conflicting thoughts – should I rush down and move my car or should I just get the heck out of the building altogether? I just stood there and watched instead! I eventually realized that it was just fat and soot inside a steel chimney that was burning and a few well placed blasts from a fire extinguisher, soon put out the fire. So, is the answer, when faced with a dilemma, to just do nothing? Worked for me!
A regular monthly occurrence at the Thuringerhof, was a beer festival in the beer garden. They served only Windhoek draft and German food specialities such as eisbein, sauerkraut, bratwurst and plenty of potatoes. To crown it all, they also had a genuine “Oompah Band” all decked out in Lederhosen and Alpine hats, playing German music. I went up to my room and set up a tape recorder with the microphone hanging out of my window to record the occasion – it was a flop because the crowd noise drowned out the music! Still, some of the girls we had befriended at the branch came along and a jolly good time was had by all.
I have a feeling I have written about our tour of the Windhoek Breweries before but quite honestly, I’m too lazy to check. Charles Bailey and I on a Wednesday afternoon joined an Institute of Bankers tour of the breweries. It was interesting to see where the good stuff came from and better still was their invitation for us to sample their wares in the pub on the premises. As the afternoon drew on, people went off home and eventually only Charles and I and three girls from the branch were left. Felicity (Fiddles) Lohmann, Karen Nel and Margaret Moolman joined tables with us and we carried on partying and chatting a good while longer. Eventually Charles insisted we join him for something to eat at the Kalahari Sands hotel but I must confess that part of the evening has faded from my memory. More than 40 years on I still have contact with Fiddles and have just discovered where Margaret is too. Ah yes, those Nambians were a fun bunch of people. The next day I had to drive a long way down to Rehoboth to check out an agency, in a Beetle with no aircon, in the hot sun. Not very wise when you have a head like I had.
GROOTFONTEIN, Namibia
Des Templer and I booked into the Meteor Hotel and went to meet Pocket Bergh (& his wife Hester) who was manager at the branch. We had a better reception at the branch than the hotel which was a little sleazy and poorly run. Des was even attacked by lice in his bed and had to go to a doctor for relief from the resulting rash. Luckily the Berghs took us under their wing and we spent many a happy hour at their house. We were there in May which is when Urbock and Maibock beers are brewed and I took to the dark stuff like a duck to water.
I recall being at the house for a “potjie”. It was a gathering of a number of customers and friends and the craic was really good. Just the day previous I had been to the local GP to check on my blood pressure and he told me to cut down on my salt intake. The doctor was there too and I was indignant when I heard him encouraging Hester to add more salt to the potjie. I jokingly asked him if he was drumming up business or what. He rather sheepishly said that by golly, food had to have salt or it wasn’t worth the trouble.
Pocket had two friends – Aap Burger and Pienkie something (Commandant of the local army base) – with whom he co-owned a small Cessna aircraft. Pocket offered us a flip but we declined when we heard that he had recently had a heart attack. We didn’t relish the idea of having to fly the plane ourselves if Pocket had another attack while aloft.
All the time we were there, there were rumours of infiltration by SWAPO into the so-called “Death Triangle”. It was a hilly, densely bush-covered area with the towns of Otavi, Tsumeb and Grootfontein at each corner. I badly wanted to see the famous Hoba meteorite, the largest known meteorite ever found on earth. This 60 ton, nickel-iron monster slammed into the earth around 80 000 years ago but it lay within the borders of the triangle and I was not keen to risk going into a place where I could be ambushed! Eventually I did as Lady Macbeth advocated – I “screwed my courage to the sticking place” on a Saturday afternoon and drove out to the farm called Hoba. I was really impressed by that ominous looking lump of metal and tried to picture what an enormous bang it had caused upon arrival. I also considered the endless ages and distances through which it might have travelled in its history and I viewed it with quite some reverence. Oh and SWAPO didn’t have a swipo at me either – I needn’t have worried.
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