Voices in the Namibian desert....Kolmanskop

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The wind howls eerily through the ruined buildings desolate as a bride abandoned at the altar.

There they are, once homes to a bustling community now simply a vast graveyard of desolate hopes and dreams.

Sand has finally beaten the busy housewife with her broom on a mission to keep the desert where it belongs...outside. The victor has a hollow victory. It has chased the inhabitants far away and stolen the spaces where conversation murmured and laughter rang. Is the audience of one....me, enough?

The pain of wind whining eerily assaults my ears as as a sad dirge played on bagpipes making the hair on the back of my neck prickle. I plough up the steep soft sand dunes and peer into a speckled mirror and I see my distorted, long faced reflection, devastated for those who lost it all, 

as I too, once did.

I know that searing pain of a staircase that will ring no more with the pounding feet of a man with the echo of

'Papa, wait for me,' and whoops of joy as they disappear to fly that kite in the boistrous, joyful wind. 

Now it keens dressed in black at a graveside.

I shake the sadness off me as a dog rids itself of water after a dip in a dam, with resolve.

This is not a good place for me to be on this anniversary day of tragedy.

So I go back to the one building that has been restored in this abandoned town of Kolmanskop in the desert of Namibia. A major tourist attraction in this vast country. It is the former town hall I think and with a sustaining coffee in my hand I join my fellow travellers in what looks like a big room with a stage at one end.

A crowd of what they call coloured youngsters wander in. They used to be outcasts, neither black nor white but in the new dispensation of modern politics they have found a valuable niche for themselves in the world. 

They have arrived in a bus and have been sponsored by some company as they all sport crisp, new red backpacks and beanies with a logo, worn in so many different ways on their heads that I'm amazed by their ingenuity and I smile. The first since I arrived.

They are mostly poor, judging by the well laundered state of their clothing and shabby shoes but they jostle each other as all kids do and guffaw behind their hands and the boys slap each other's shoulders. The girls look primly or crossly at their comments but giggle too. Some things are the same all over the world. I smile again and feel better.

Suddenly a teacher gestures and encourages them to get up onto the stage which they do without any argument. They seem almost glad, like all teenagers reluctant to show too much pleasure. 

They stand in untidy groups here and there on the wooden platform and then one girl steps forward and on her hand signal they begin to hum. It mimics the wind at first and then the boys add a base tune that gradually builds up deep and strong and the soprano voices ride it as a light wind speckling the water with freckles of sunshine. Slowly words come forth like Lazarus from the tomb and somber and bold they sing a blessing of the Almighty over all of us in that place. One indication of her hand and there is a deafening silence. The blessing is effected.

They break into a jaunty song about someone's auntie who married someone's uncle and what a wedding celebration THAT was! The end comes too swiftly and their voices sweep me up, roll me round and fill me with hope that I thought had long since gone from me. To this day if I feel a sadness looming I quell it firmly with the memory of those seemingly underprivileged thirteen year olds singing as though their lives depended on it,

WE ARE THE FUTURE.............WE STAND TOGETHER, STRONG AND FREE

                     WE ARE THE FUTURE.

And who am I to argue? 

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