30° South Publishers

The heart and spirit of rugby described in Graham’s book is still evident today, but the way the game was played—on a Saturday afternoon, on a dusty field, after a long day ploughing—is not. Somehow all this became overshadowed by the glamour of large clubs and competitions, fuelled by modern technology and communication. In this book Graham tells the stories, some dating back 100 years, of those recently arrived for work in a strange town on the platteland who, to be accepted by the community, had to play rugby. From labourers and mechanics to clerks and farmers, these are their stories and each one is unique. From the Northern Cape and Luderitz, down the west coast, into the Eastern Cape and through the Free State and Mpumalanga, Graham has recorded stories, as told to him, that will have you in stitches. Graham’s style of writing is reminiscent of campfire (or perhaps braais and boerewors) storytelling, the humour lying in all the deviations and asides the story makes along the way.

In the Underberg village of Hillman, population 237, something has disturbed the peace. Situated 199½km from Durban (the extra ½km being of critical importance when you wish to distance yourself from city folk), Hillman is having an identity crisis. A debate is raging about whether or not to change the name of the town in line with current political trends. The mayor, surmising that the position of authority he has held since 1982 could be in jeopardy from one Ephraim “Oubaas” Mthethwa, decides to embrace the debate and campaigns to change Hillman’s name to ‘Dingaan Berg’ in order to win votes on both sides of the fence. Mthethwa wants to change the name to Dingiswayo, stating correctly that Dingaan never actually visited Hillman at any point in history. Embroiled in a hotbed of infighting and political one-upmanship, the town becomes a dorp divided. When a rumour goes round that wealthy developers are coming to Hillman to build a Sun City-style resort on the mountain, the town is thrown into chaos. Newspaper reporters from as far as Pietermaritzburg and Estcourt descend en masse, and the townsfolk of Hillman have to choose between progress and prosperity or self-preservation.

Kevin Woods was sentenced to death in Zimbabwe and jailed for twenty years by Robert Mugabe. For more than five years of his detention he was held in the shadow of Mugabe’s gallows, cut off from the world, naked and in solitary confinement. He had been a senior member of Mugabe’s dreaded Central Intelligence Organization, the CIO, and was jailed for committing politically motivated offences, on behalf of the white South African government, against the ANC in Zimbabwe. From Mugabe’s confidant to condemned prisoner he recounts his life on the edge, as a double agent. He explains the desolation of being abandoned by South Africa when he was compromised and he details his lone fight to maintain his humanity, self-dignity and sanity in a prison system that belongs to the Middle Ages. Removed from society and with his fundamental human rights arbitrarily withdrawn, Woods has been there and done that when it comes to stress, utter hopelessness and coping while under the most desperate conditions imaginable. This book will inspire you to take an introspective look at your own life, your careers, your aspirations and ambitions. His story, unlike so many others has a happy ending with him hugging his now-adult children and meeting former President Nelson Mandela being the highlights.“Maybe I made it through those 7,140 days and nights by fooling myself so often. Maybe it was my God. Maybe it was stubbornness and my knowledge that Mugabe and his cronies wanted nothing more than for me to die, of natural causes in that dismal place. (He couldn’t just send the goons to kill me, you see? There were too many people and a few governments as well who were watching.) I did not want to give Mugabe that gratification, and that was serious motivation for me to persevere. Whatever it was, through all those years of having my hopes eroded time after time, just like the waves, I made it. Whether I am sane or not (I figure this is debatable) I did it. We can all do it no matter how dark things get, no matter how sad, how desperate, how fucking morbid. Reach inside and strive to get through, even if it’s only ‘till tomorrow’.” Kevin Woods lives in Durban and has made a career of public, motivational speaking which is both moving and poignant.

“… enjoyable, convincing story wrapped in dramatic, well-researched history”— John Gordon Davis, bestselling author of Hold My Hand I’m Dying. It is 1834. The Eastern Cape frontier is burning. Rauch Beukes, a young Boer of 17, returns to the family homestead to find it razed, the livestock gone and his mother and sisters slaughtered by the marauding Xhosa from across the Great Fish River. So begins a tale of violence and warfare and love and lust across racial divides, painted against the grand backdrop of the Boer migration north into the hinterland that became known as the Great Trek, the result of British duplicity and injustice. The dramatis personae are Boer and Brit, Xhosa, Zulu, Matabele and Cape Malay slaves: from the Xhosa chief Hinsta, Colonel Harry Smith, the Zulu tyrant Dingaan, to the Boer trekkers Potgieter, Retief, Maritz, Trichardt and Cilliers. And in young Rauch’s life are three astonishing women: Ameila, the daughter of an English settler; Marietjie, the beautiful meisie from Graaff-Reinet; and Katrina September, the sensual ex-slave. Robin Binckes was born in East Griqualand, South Africa in April 1941. After matriculating in Umtata, Transkei, he did his national service at the South African Navy Gymnasium, Saldanah Bay. In 1970 he opened his own PR company to promote major sporting events ranging from international cricket to Formula One Grand Prix during the period of sports isolation. In 1990 he started The Gansbaai Fishing Company and spent ten years in the food industry. During the violence that swept this country in 1993 he volunteered as a peace monitor in the townships. Sparked by the passion of the late historical orator David Rattray, he qualified in 2002 as a historical tour guide, which he does in the Johannesburg–Pretoria region through his company ‘Spear of the Nation’.

The Border is a racy drama set against the backdrop of southern Africa’s border wars in the 1980’s. This is a tale of intertwined lives; hatred, trauma and the horror of war forcing each to strangle some sense, some purity out of the world they now find themselves in while teetering on the border of their own sanity. An ordinary soldier fights for survival. A family torn apart by the brutality of war. Two women’s struggle to overcome the horrors they have experienced at the hands of the terrorists. A power-hungry brigadier whose personal failures cause untold disaster for his family and for the soldiers in whose hands they place their lives. But among the death and dust Corporal Kent finds himself enigmatically drawn toward a woman recently widowed by the very insurgents he fights against.

The kingdom of Swaziland is a friendly, compact and enchanting country to visit. Its landscapes range from dramatic mountain peaks to deep river valleys, from lush rolling hills to evocative bushveld plains. Add to this a thriving cultural heartbeat, a traditional monarchy going back hundreds of years and a proud national identity, and you have a really special vacation destination. Swaziland also boasts some top-notch adventure activities, such as river-rafting, quad-biking, mountain-biking, hiking, big game-viewing and horse-riding trails. There are plenty of accommodation options, ranging from 5-star international hotels to quaint B&Bs, to backpackers, to home-stays in traditional beehive huts. And there is a wide choice of places to eat, handmade crafts to buy and things to do. This book is the first travel guide entirely devoted to the kingdom of Swaziland. It includes a compelling account of the country’s fascinating history and cultural heritage. There are full listings of accommodation, eating and activity options. Suggested travel itineraries are included to help you make the most of your time in the Kingdom. Whatever your interests, whatever the season, Swaziland is a delight, just waiting for you.

Nothing quite beats that rawness of military humour. It’s the same the world over. This hilarious collection of South African military anecdotes will—for the less sensitive reader—have you doubled up with mirth.It is an ingrained tradition for South Africans to stand around a fire in the bright sunlight or on warm evenings of summer and barbeque or braai as we all say. Naturally the drink of choice is beer and mostly copious quantities of the old amber liquid. Inevitably during the intentionally drawn out grilling phase (to enable more beer swilling) and after most of the usual topics of conversation have all but exhausted themselves, a comment or the mood, the fire or some such catalyst will spark a story with military content of such hilarity that has everyone in earshot, with or without military background, rolling on the floor. For most of us never had a choice, national service was compulsory. Some saw action; others didn’t, but all had an encounter, either dangerous or benign that was the cause for much mirth.These are some of those stories.

‘Mzee’ is the Swahili word for an ‘old timer’, a respected elder. Mzee Ali Kalikilima was born near the present-day town of Tabora in western Tanzania, probably in the 1870s (there is mention of ‘The Doctor’—Dr David Livingstone) to black Muslim parents of noble birth. Aged 14, Mzee Ali led his first slaving safari to the shores of Lake Tanganyika and thence, with his caravan of captured slaves and ivory, through the malaria-, tsetse fly— and lion-infested wilds, to the Arab markets of Dar es Salaam, some 1,200 kilometres away on the Indian Ocean. With the arrival of the German colonizers, Mzee Ali joined the German East African forces as an askari. He worked on the new railway line that was being laid from Dar es Salaam to Dodoma and finally to Mwanza on the shores of Lake Victoria—a monumental feat. With the outbreak of World War I, he found himself attached to the forces of the legendary German commander, General von Lettow-Vorbeck. He saw action at the Battle of Salaita Hill near Mombasa and was with the General to the end, fighting a guerrilla campaign through southern Tanganyika, Portuguese East Africa, Nyasaland, Northern Rhodesia and to final surrender. After the war, he joined the British Colonial Service as a game scout. What sets Mzee Ali apart from other African biographies is that it is the first account of East African history told from an Afrocentric perspective.

Kurt Christianson is a natural military strategist and survivor. Independent, unorthodox, resilient and resolute, he displays skills which flout established procedures. His courage and insight whilst in Special Forces in ‘Nam’ unwittingly unravel a traitorous alliance, making him a threat to his superiors and placing his life in mortal danger. This threat, combined with his inability to adjust to civilian life, spurs him to leave his beloved and beautiful Maine coastline and embark on a path of revelation and serendipity. He crews a boat being delivered to the oil fields in West Africa, where he becomes embroiled in covert action and again demonstrates his innate and inspired tactical abilities. A hunted man, his journey leads him to bitter combat in a brutal landscape, tragic loss and to fulfil a San prophecy whilst wrestling with his alter ego — Mad Medic — and his Viking ancestry. The merciless and barbaric slaughter of a little girl and her family by terrorists move him to astonishing, crucial and shocking acts which change the course of a ravaged and savaged country. Kurt is also driven to revenge, a deed which violates his code of ethics and irreversibly affects his destiny. Ultimately, Kurt faces the inescapable and irrefutable knowledge that heroes are human and therefore fallible and that glory, however hard-won and merited, is illusory and hollow. Shadow Tracker, an adrenaline-charged adventure, engages the reader in events which remain unknown to most of the world and leave one breathless.

From the mists of Basotho legend—from the time of King Moshoeshoe. The tiny country of Lesotho is entirely surrounded by South Africa, yet it remains one of the most remote and unexplored areas in the region. The reason for this isolation is the mountains—row upon row of serrated peaks make this the country with the highest ‘low point’ in the world. But the mountains that give Lesotho its dramatic landscapes have also played a crucial role in creating a country with a unique history. It’s a stirring story of courage and cunning, featuring remarkable individuals such as King Moshoeshoe—founder of the Basotho nation—who first gathered people together on the flat-topped hill Thaba Bosiu, the mountain of night. Today, Lesotho is an irresistible lure to adventurous travellers who want to head off the beaten path and tackle the mighty mountains. But Lesotho isn’t as inaccessible as it seems. The country is bisected by a number of tarred and gravel roads and these lead the motorist on jaw-dropping drives through some of the highest mountains this side of Kilimanjaro. Small rural villages nestle on the slopes, much as they have done for over 200 years, and delightful lodges are tucked away in secluded valleys. All in all, it’s a land of secret vistas and pristine scenery. This book is the first travel guide dedicated solely to Lesotho. It will give the traveller an insight into the remarkable history of the country. Suggested itineraries are included, along with accommodation options, leisure activities and other useful information for trip-planning.

Out of every conflict situation comes a myriad of stories, stories about people, set against the backdrop of war. During the bitter and protracted Mozambican civil war there are many such stories, but none so courageous nor so passionate and beautiful as that told in The Train of Salt and Sugar. Mozambique, after many years of war, first for their independence against the Portuguese and then against each other during the civil war, was left a desolate wasteland; with little or no infrastructure and a starving population. Trains seldom ran, the tracks had been sabotaged and the probability of enemy attacks was very real. Yet on a misty morning in the town of Nampula, in northern Mozambique, a convoy of three trains, loaded with supplies, three garrisons of soldiers and over 600 passengers left relative safety, destined for Cuamba, a town 341 kilometers to the west, bordering Malawi. The book takes its title from a woman, Mariamu, who plans to trade her supply of salt, a rare commodity, for sugar, an even rarer commodity, in Malawi, thus enabling her to feed her children in the coming year. The harrowing journey is as colourful as its passengers—civilians and soldiers alike. A fragile love is born amid the death— between a young nurse returning home and a soldier who’s tasked with protecting her. A despicable officer whose behaviour repulses; insightful railwaymen and an unseen enemy whose numerous and varied attacks leave the passengers terrified, exhausted and dying of thirst—these are the protagonists.

In 1999 seventeen Bulgarian nurses are kidnapped from the hospital in which they work in Benghazi, Libya and are confined in a police station in the capital Tripoli. The next eight and a half years five of them will spend in different prisons accused of deliberately infecting more than 400 children with HIV.
“Notes from Hell” is a confession of an ordinary woman whose face becomes familiar to the whole world. The book tells about her work in Benghazi, about the reasons for the infection of the children, about the monstrous tortures she suffered, the terror, uncertainty and friendship in the Libyan prisons, about what it feels like to have three death sentences and survive.

All is not as it seems on the El Camino to Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain. Among the thousands of pilgrims is a calculating thief who attempts to use the bustle of Holy Week to smuggle out a valuable ancient manuscript. In the tradition of the Canterbury Tales, a group of travellers and a guide journey for five days exchanging their personal backgrounds among the scenic beauty. Each has something to hide.These colourful characters come from all walks of life and different continents. Their pilgrimage enables them to learn something of the origins of the historic walk as well as a great deal about themselves. Declan, Victoria and Liam come from Ireland; Vicky, a Canadian photographer, won the trip in a competition and decides to bring her friend Andrea along; Santie and Heila are sisters from South Africa and Georgina, a British police consultant who follows the path of the manuscript and ultimately solves the mystery in an exciting denouement. Part travelogue, part drama, this whodunit will keep the reader’s attention in a rollicking ride which encompasses an unexpected twist in the tail. The subplot will tug at the heartstrings revealing greed, duplicity and human frailty. The author walked the path described in the novel thus authenticating its portrayal.

This collection of stories, rooted in truth and legend, from a forgotten time in South Africa’s past, the Forties, and a little-known part, the Lowveld, is a window into a magical time when people were uncluttered by philosophical baggage and worked for one purpose: to make a living to enjoy life. “An enchanting collection of Lowveld tales, packed with eccentric characters, bush lore and African magic. Wilf Nussey’s considerable talent as a raconteur has produced a great read, filled with humour and charm.”—Jo-Anne Richards, bestselling author of The Innocence of Roast Chicken, Touching the Lighthouse, My Brother’s Book and The Imagined Child

The second Boer War is the most important war in South African history; indeed, without it, South Africa would likely have not existed. But it’s also one of the least understood conflicts of the era. Over a century of Leftist bleating and insidious, self-serving revisionism, first by Afrikaner nationalists and then by the apartheid regime, has left the layman with a completely skewed view of the war. Incredibly, most people will tell you that the British attacked the Boers to steal their gold, and that when the clueless, red-jacketed Tommies advanced under orders of bumptious, incompetent British generals they were mowed down in their thousands. Others think of the conflict in terms of ‘Britain against South Africa’ and many believe that the Boers actually won the war; the marginally more enlightened explain away the Boer defeat by claiming it took millions of British troops to beat them, or that it was only the ‘genocide’ of the concentration camps which forced the plucky Boers to throw in the towel. It’s all bosh. This book will take everything you thought you ‘knew’ about the war and turn it on its head. From Kruger’s expansionist dream of an Afrikaans empire ‘from the Zambesi to the Cape’, to the murder and devastation wrought on Natal by his invading commandos, to the savage massacres of thousands of blacks committed by the ‘gallant’ bitter-einders, the reader will have his eyes opened to the brutal realities of the conflict, and be forced to reassess previously held notions of the rights and wrongs of the war. Hard-hitting and uncomfortable reading for those who do not want their bubble of ignorance burst, Kruger, Kommandos & Kak exposes that side of the Boer War which the apartheid propaganda machine didn’t want you to know about.

This is the true story of Irving Tucker, who married an English girl, Yvonne, and left South Africa in 1976 to farm sheep on the Welsh border, growing their own organic vegetables and living a healthy life style. They returned to South Africa every year on holiday. The couple was childless.The book deals with Irving’s complex personality and his love of practical jokes, and traces the relationship between him and the writer over the period 1961–2011. The death of Yvonne in 2010 is the primary reason why Irving announces to his friends that he is going to kill himself; this despite the fact that he is healthy, relatively young and has recently sold a piece of art for over £1 million. For two years following Yvonne’s death, his friends attempt to dissuade him from committing suicide, never sure whether it is a cry for help, an attempt to get attention, another practical joke or a serious threat. He sponsors an elephant-collaring in the bush and invites a group of friends to join him for this last African adventure. Around the campfire at night, he and his friends openly discuss his plans. The polarized reactions of Tucker’s confidants range from vehement denial to vehement support, as he advises them that his suicide date is rapidly approaching. In January 2011 he returns home to England, his deadline the end of February. Irving Tucker is a complex character with great attributes and glaring faults. This is a story of love, friendship and caring, of laughter, fun, sadness and tragedy. It is the story of a man determined to leave this world at a time of his choosing.

In this book we are given a unique view of East Africa of the 1950s; not the stereotyped picture of wildlife safaris and leaping Masai, but the emerging independence struggle of a new African nation from the viewpoint of a white police office, in an exceptionally detailed, thoroughly readable, firsthand account of a rare period of recent history. It tells how an Australian veteran, fresh from the Korean War, became a colonial police officer in Tanganyika Territory (later Tanzania after federation with the offshore islands of Zanzibar in 1964). The reader is taken on a journey which tourists in Africa never see: from back alleys and police cells in the polyglot city of Dar es Salaam, to snake-infested camps on Uganda–Ruanda border patrols, and on police field force emergency operations from barracks at the foot of Kilimanjaro. There is much here to discover about a mostly benign semi-colonial period in Africa which lasted less than fifty years, passing, in one African’s description, as briefly as a butterfly’s heartbeat; where a few conscientious white administrators and their loyal African assistants managed vast regions of a desolate territory with remarkably selfless care and scarce resources; where things worked most of the time, but sometimes where chaos reigned. It is about the country itself, its ubiquitous animals and its people at close range, including villagers, criminals, hunters, witch doctors, and colonial officials, but most of all, the African askari policemen who were the author’s close—and often only—companions.

Why does the zebra have stripes and the elephant a long trunk? How did the giraffe acquire a long neck and why does a hippopotamus lie in muddy water all day? How does an acacia tree kill grazing wild? Do wild animals speak to each other and do they have feelings?In The Greatest Safari, the reader is taken on an African adventure and told stories about the feelings, senses and communication of the savannah’s many inhabitants. From sausage trees, cycads, termites and ants to lions, hyenas, bats and gorillas.This book deals with the mechanisms that propelled life. We humans have acquired the facility of feeling we are something special, and thus also the feeling that we constitute an evolutionary zenith. In contradiction to this, nature is indifferent and within its boundaries there is only one criterion for success, namely survival. What the brain can produce in terms of poetry and nuclear physics is beneath notice compared with the ability to survive. If we accept the prehistoric people Homo habilis and Homo erectus as the first human beings on Earth, bacteria are still thousands of times older and are currently the most successful organism.

Ronnie Selley, a South African from rural Natal, joined the RAF on a short-service commission in 1937, considered the Golden Age of aviation. During these glory years of Howard Hughes and Amelia Earhart few guessed at the brewing storm and dark days to come. After completing his training on antiquated First World War aircraft, Selley was posted to 220 Squadron Coastal Command, the RAF’s under-staffed and under-equipped poor relation to the more prestigious Fighter and Bomber Commands. Tasked with reconnaissance, convoy patrols and submarine-hunting the pilots of Coastal Command chalked up more flying hours than any other RAF Command. It was not uncommon for pilots to be in the air, searching the waters of the North Atlantic, for up to sixteen hours a day, in aircraft that were neither capable of such ranges nor, initially, adequately armed to defend their charges. From the outbreak of war until after its cessation Coastal Command had aircraft in the air twenty-four hours a day, every single day. The toll this took on the men of Coastal Command was unthinkable.The first RAF pilot to sink a German U-boat, Selley went on the win the DFC for his actions during the Dunkirk evacuation. He won high praise and newspaper headlines such as “Plane fights 13 German warships”, “One RAF man bombs 3 ships, routs Nazis” and “One against eight” were not uncommon. Selley subsequently suffered acute battle fatigue and spent time convalescing at the Dunblane Hydro. Thereafter, he was posted by the Air Ministry as Air Vice-Marshal Breese’s personal pilot. On 5 March 1941 Ronnie Selley, Air Vice-Marshal Breese and the entire crew of the fully armed Lockheed Hudson they was flying experienced engine problems, lost speed, stalled and exploded on impact at Wick in northern Scotland.

Mine-protected and mine-resistant, ambush-protected (MRAP) vehicles are today standard in the US, most major western armed forces and many other armies as a result of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The South African Army was already routinely using mine-protected armored personnel carriers and patrol vehicles forty years ago even if they looked primitive and ungainly. A few years later, the South African Army had reached the stage where it could deploy entire combat groups into battle zones equipped with only mine-protected vehicles, including their ambulances and supply trucks. By then the mine-protected vehicles had also become effective for use in combat, rather than just protected transport, the Casspir being the chief example. More to the point, they saved countless soldiers and policemen from death or serious injury, and the basic concepts now live on in the various MRAP types in service today. The valuable lessons learned by the South Africans with their early designs of these combat-proven vehicles has led the country to become one of the global leaders in the design of MRAPs which are locally manufactured and exported around the world. Surviving the Ride is a fascinating pictorial account featuring more than 120 of these unique South African-developed vehicles, spanning a forty-year period, with over 280 photographs, many of which are previously unpublished.