When I woke up, I ran to the toilet once more, not entirely
sure which side to point at the porcelain.
I had the stomach bug for four days now, and whilst the sudden weight
loss was appreciated on my side, the fun in this was exhausted. I told my wife, "I am sick and tired of this upset stomach; we need to sort this
today.” After quite a long pause,
managing my condition and feeling sorry for myself, I continued, “Let’s go to
the oyster festival at Brightwater Commons”. Her reply was, "Adventurous solution, I
would love to see the outcome of this".
Upon arrival at the oyster festival, the adverting boards
took no prisoners, "32,000 oysters consumed yesterday, only 12,000 left
over, get them early". We did as
told and bailed for the area close to the stage where the oysters are sold. On the way there I lost my wife, but soon was
reminded via omnipresent cellphone that I am not alone on vacation today.
The atmosphere was vibrant and refreshing. The oyster bar was open, so we got 20 little
friends for good measure. Then we went scouting
for a seat. Amasing how many people are
invisible at events like these. You walk
up to an empty seat at a beer bench and just as you want to sit down someone
will point to the invisible occupant in the seat and say "Someone is
sitting there". You wonder, "Am
I loosing eyesight? I didn't see him then,
and still not see him now?" As I
had no intention of spending my afternoon on someone else's lap, visible or
invisible, I kept looking for another seat.
All the time oysters are warming up.
Eventually we found 2 seats with no invisible people on them.
"We can't eat this with no wine", my wife said
with a frown on her face. I disappeared
into the tent behind our seats, found a bottle of wine and some cheese - I just
love cheese. Upon returning to our seats
I found my wife protecting our seats like an ostrich protecting her eggs. Finally, we were set to eat.
The wine was an excellent selection as it had a screw top,
and corkscrews were not readily available.
The oysters were molten by then, but as this was an oyster feast we had
them anyway, with the cheese. The
oysters were too hot, and they were seemingly opened with a hammer as small
shards of shells were omnipresent. The
cheese was a bit disappointing, the one had a good strong flavour, with a bit
of a sting to the top left of the mouth, but the second one was effectively a
yellow eraser with no taste at all. We
ate the strong one and bagged the eraser in the camera bag. This made no work of gobbling down the bottle
of wine, whilst we were commenting on the other people also enjoying their
spoils. Main aim done and stomach still intact
we decided on a bit of wandering around; tasting sample wines and
delicatessens would be the main event from here on.
By now the place was packed with people and all of them
seemed to have the same ideals us. This made
moving around feel more like being washed down a river of people, and swimming
up stream was not going to happen. Visiting specific tables were near impossible.
What actually happened was that the tide would wash you out at some point;
you'd have a quick taste of what was presented in front of you, and then dive
back into the stream, anxious to see where you wash out again. We did this for some time, had several wines,
dried meats, sweets and cheeses. It was
great fun, participating in the festivities, and I lost all concern over my
frail stomach.
Then we washed up on the shore with a man selling
grappa. He offered some, I had Pintotage
and my wife had Muskadel. An elderly
lady behind us tugged on a man and said in an Irish accent, "Have some of
this, it will take your head off".
At first the concoction did not taste too strong, but as soon as I got
back into the stream it hit me straight between the eyes; I knew the lady was
right. Things started to turn hazy then,
and I had to get out. I bought coffee
beans for good measure and asked the lady to grind it for me. She came back and said, "Put it in the
freezer at home". I replied,
"Do you not mean the coffee machine?"
She smiled, and my wife slapped me.
I took this as a sign to get out of this maize.
We tried for about half an hour to sober up with more wine
tasting, but then realized we are chasing a pipe dream. I then bought a bottle of red wine and a
cheese platter, to attempt this as cure for our condition. We were back looking for a seat. Our eyesight improved a lot. The first seats we saw had not invisibles on
them. Maybe the defenders of those seats
realized early on that there would be no point arguing with these two.
We sat right in front of the stage. The band was an all girls crowd, She-band,
was their name. “What a hint”, I told my
wife. They were quite good playing
oldies music form our era, well late 80’s music, we’re not ancient yet. We were eating and drinking, and made friends
with the people sharing the table with us.
There were three women, in their forties if I could guess, and a boy,
obviously the blonde's son of about 20.
After some time, the youngster then got up, embraced his mother and gave
her a kiss that made me realize this is a very close family.
I could swear that I know some of them from somewhere. When I enquired, I was waived off by the
blonde, and got a slap from my wife as acknowledgement of my stupidity. Pointing to the blonde, my wife said,
"She used to play on Egoli, you ass".
She finished off my education by telling me, "The lot of them are
playing in a bunch of TV soapies now." How was I supposed to know that anyway, I do
not watch those? In any case, I got the
idea they loved not being molested by another fan, but liked being handled like
normal people.
We were having a ball; the singing and dancing for some
hours did wonders for our condition. Then
our friends wanted to leave. We said our
goodbyes, and then one of them said, "Come over to my place", and she
gave the street name and number. We
pondered the dying party around us and then decided to go.
When we arrived at the party house, the people did not look very familiar. I checked the number on the gate, asked for the street name and compared with my memory bank. All was checking out, but these people were not the lot from the oyster festival. I enquired about their red-wine stocks in the house, but they claimed to have run out. I thought, "Then there is no point in staying anyway", and then said so. My wife agreed; my argument was rock solid. The lady then said, "You know, there is a street with the same name in a different suburb, very close to here". Escaping from this wine-less nightmare we went there.
Upon arrival, we saw familiar faces, and they were glad to
see us too. We went in and had some wine
and Champaign . Chicken wings were on offer, and despite me
loving it, I refused to have any. I
suddenly was concerned about my stomach and focused on a liquid diet. A very relaxed communion followed with lots
of laughter and talking, music in the background. After quite some time, the wings were reduced
to bones and the big male German-Shepherd came in to give everyone a good
sniff. When he got hold of a chicken
bone, the owner kindly asked me, "Can you get that out of his
mouth". I am brave, but not stupid and
I pointed this out to the lady. There was
a time to come, and a time to leave, and our time to leave, came. We said our goodbyes, for good this time, and
headed home.
My wife gave a quick rundown of what we consumed for the
day, “Hectic wasn’t it?”, she said. “It
was a busy day”, I confirmed. She then
enquired about the state on my stomach. “My
stomach survived the day and was in the best condition it was for the entire
past week. The bug must have left. Show it no respect, and it is gone”, I told
her. “Or you’re going to have the mother
of all explosions through the night”, my wife offered. “You better sleep behind my back, not me
behind yours, just to be safe”, was the final wisdom she offered.
Tuesday 4 June, 2013
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