TLW trip to Lusikisiki (19 - 20 May 2001)

The trip was a great success and our message was very warmly accepted, as were we. We presented two skits, the TLW message and an Aids awareness message to a community of Xhosa's in the hills of the Eastern Cape at Lusikisiki (don't worry, I hadn't heard of it either), which is near Port St Johns.

Now let me get to the brass tacks - our hilariously harrowing adventure there and back. The drive was relatively uneventful, until we entered the Transkei. We struck a bump at relatively 150+ km/h and the entire air-conditioning vent system suspended above us, collapsed. That knocked twenty minutes off our arrival time.

The town itself resembled Greytown with hardly any electricity. We slept in a house, which fortunately had electricity, though the plumbing produced a limited trickle. The mansion next door was encircled by a six-foot-high wall, topped with an electric fence, with guard towers at each corner, and very taciturn guard grunting behind machine guns - guarding a Mr Singh (who apparently owned five of the six shops in Lusikisiki). An Alsation with laryngitis roared a greeting on our way in. Unfortunately, one of our group failed to notice the Yale lock upon the door. And that member didst close the door behind us while we went stargazing. We resorted to burglary to enter the house (which was unsuccessful) and were discussing which window to replace when we were saved by another idea. Call for help.

I don't know what those people thought of us, but all I could think of was sleep. That was when I discovered that Lusikisiki had finally saved up enough for Christmas fireworks, and the show continued through a large portion of the night. The mosquitoes were finally herded out by the smoke emitted by the township chimneys.

Oh, I forgot. The presentation that night. We entered the 'church' (a six by three meter building) into which about 100 people were seated and were warmly accepted by shaking hands with the congregation (a charismatic congregation in its infancy), all personally. Jeffery burnt himself twice on the candles, which were the only source of light. We were restricted by space and it ended up being a one-man act (by me) and the following speech. We knew we were out in the sticks when we left - the sky was aglow with stars.

Getting back to that morning. We were awoken by a cock with tonsillitis and while I was contemplating poultricide, I found that the plumbing had improved to a spluttering flow. Breakfast was served and we proceeded to fix the air conditioning, which took a good portion of the morning. The meeting went very well and we performed another skit, as we weren't as restricted as before. Our audience was bubbling with appreciation, but we had to leave.

The trip back was eventful. A milkshake at the Wimpy was spilled upon my pants and removing it was a challenge. To make things even more funny, I got my head clamped by the sliding door of the minibus and I lay down to reflect on the trip's mirth.

All in all, it was a great trip, my voice hoarse from laughter and our message delivered. And we're invited to return as soon as possible.

By Eugen Olsen