The road ahead
Isaiah Mahlangu
Kosi Bay
I never grew up with my grandfather, so I treated an old neighbour, Phindela,
like one. He told me stories about life in Kosi Bay. Retrospectively, I
am intrigued about how people travelled and communicated. People took cross-boarder-trips
to seek work, shop and visit families. People shopped in Manguzi as well
as Zithundu and Nsalamanga in Mozambique. Women carried baskets on their
heads and babies on their backs.
Phindela told stories about travelling to Lourenco Marques (now Maputo)
on foot to work. Travelling in groups provided security. Padkos, water and
sticks were important items for travellers. They relied on the sun and stars
for navigation. This taught Phindela some travelling tricks ‘ To avoid
making a U-turn in the morning, we stuck a stick on the ground pointing
to the direction we were last travelling before climbing up the tree to
sleep at night.’ With time migration trends changed as TEBA opened
a labour-recruitment-centre in Manguzi.
I assume, during migration, wild animals made the first tracks. Maybe the
Tonga Tembes followed these tracks from south of Mozambique to settle in
Maputaland. Missionaries and traders turned these tracks into roads. Evolution
of roads linked Maputaland to the outside world. My first journey from Manguzi
to Empangeni in 1984 took two days in a bus and train.
Telecommunications in the late 1980s were still rudimentary; only two public
phones in Manguzi. The quickest communication was telegrams. If the matter
was not urgent, families waited months for letters from Johannesburg.
Locals had a means to communicate. No offence, Reverend Mooney used to say
‘…if you cannot telephone, tell-a-woman’. Stories told
to women spread like runaway fire as people met to greet and gossip. The
then Radio Bantu kept locals informed.
The new Lubombo SDI road has already improved transportation and communication.
Travelling time between Manguzi and Empangeni is reduced to three hours.
If he were rise from the dead Phindela would mistake tar roads, telephone
and power lines for wrinkles on the aging face of Maputaland. No Phindela,
Maputaland is rejuvenated.
As it was: the old and muddy road
Off to market along the new road
The proud craftsman selling his work by the roadside
A woman carries beer back home
