Before-Before

By Inge Borg

These loosely connected short stories describe fragments of an expatriate German familys life in British colonial Africa and a gradual transition to Britishness. A more-systematic memoir from the viewpoint of my mothers family is contained in the earlier Seven Maids, about seven generations of mothers and their eldest daughters. The current collection begins almost a century ago with my fathers early days as a shipping agent on the Gold Coast (now Ghana), - this books cover is based on one of his own photographs from that time.

A later stage of my life in Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) is enshrined in the general title Before-Before, an attractive idiom for the olden days, as was used by my Zambian cook, Andy.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Dec 18, 2015
• ISBN: 9781504994774

Inge Borg

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© 2015 Evelyn Chadwick. All rights reserved.

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Published by AuthorHouse   12/10/2015

ISBN: 978-1-5049-9476-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5049-9477-4 (e)

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Contents

The Gold Coast…

Now, a lifetime on…

Some mistake…surely,

Sugar……

…can’t eat, can’t sleep…

Northern Rhodesia, 1961.

Bostrichoplites cernutus

Broken wings…

‘Otto’s progress…?’

an ancient letter……

Betrayal…

Spooked…..

BuBu Shrikes…

Sunrise, Kilimanjaro, 2001.

Agadir….

Endnotes

The Gold Coast…

‘Woermann Line, resident shipping agent’, was the proud title!

In the beginning, in 1924, the duties as a ‘shipping agent’ were described as a ‘one-man-show’. One did everything by oneself, using the only most effective methods. Nothing was left to chance. That’s how it was…

Anything more,… well that was entirely up to the agent.

Quickly disillusioned with the ways in which tasks were carried out by other local agents…and always in the interests of ‘his’ shipping line, a young German agent took on ever more work and soon turned his office into a general agency for the entire district. During the course of twelve years this ambitious, super-efficient young man, stationed in Accra, had increased his staff to five men, and now there was little doubt: he had reason to feel good about it all. So far it was a remarkable success.

Only two years after his arrival he’d taken on an assistant. Until then he’d managed with a German-speaking Togolese through whom he’d also employed a cook and a laundry-man. His ‘chief steward’ had been supplied by a German Mission station in Lomè. Everything was going according to plan: it seemed, he was ‘going places.’

One day an elderly Togolese arrived at the office, which, in those days, was still in the agent’s house just by the harbour. This black man brought with him a sixteen-year old son. Slowly, but in extremely competent German he addressed the youthful shipping agent:

‘My name is Kemavor from Togo…and this is my son Jakob who has learnt German in our missionary School. He would like to be instructed in the business of working in an office…and he speaks good German, of course…’ the father added with a wink.

There followed a respectful pause. In the steaming coastal climate of Accra, the older men studied each other’s faces while the sixteen year-old stared at his naked feet on the gleaming floor…but then also at the fan hanging from the ceiling…it pleased him to sit near this whirring, cooling contraption.

His father, anxiously silent for some moments, now pointed a finger at his son:

‘If it pleases you, Sir,’ he continued, could you turn my boy into a good man? If he does not obey you will be kind enough to clout him around the ears…’

The youthful shipping agent turned to study the even younger Jakob, who, somewhat anxiously, stared straight into the eyes of his prospective boss.

This disarming request, delivered so clearly from a Gold Coast parent who’d himself been brought up by German missionaries, continued to resonate around the office.

It appeared Germans had become known for not tolerating any ‘nonsense.’

<<<<<<>>>>>>

There was little doubt: Jakob developed in a satisfactory manner. Making speedy progress he typed immaculate letters from dictation, gave intelligible information in both German and English (within two years) and ably decoded telegrams as well as dispatching them correctly. The extremely able young man soon found himself in charge of freight lists and manifestos of shipping-loads. He’d become fearless when confronted with registration and archival work and in no time proved to be completely independent, dealing with everything to the complete satisfaction of his superior…

Not long before the outbreak of the Second World War this German shipping agency had been transferred to a different local agency: the Swiss Union Trading Company, which remained in charge of dealing with matters of import and export throughout the War.

Only after the War the SUTC was again taken over by the German Woermann Line. By 1945 Jacob had become the head of this Shipping Agency and had changed his name to Jakob.

Everyone who had dealings with him, his employer, the captains of German ships, the Directors of Woermann Line in Hamburg,.. all officials trusted and admired the now no longer new employee.

Much later, in 1956, these agencies, still functioning as before, invited Jakob to make an extended tour of Europe.

By then this West African was a ‘made man’.

Along with Jakob, but subordinate, was another man from Togo, called Tekovi. He had been orphaned as a baby and brought up by the Berlin Missionary Society.

One assumes he too had not been in need of any ‘clouts behind the ears.’

Tekovi spoke with an idiomatic Berlin voice: with ‘ick’ and ‘det’ and ‘kieke mol’, (‘ick’= ‘I’), ‘that’ =‘det’… and ‘kieke mol’, meaning ‘take a look at that!..’

Needless to say this sounded, to any true German, like a totally improbable pronunciation coming, as it was, from a black man on the Gold Coast. He was regarded with delight and admiration by all German speaking customers.

But back, back…into the past: this account has jumped too far ahead!

Soon Jacob became a ‘Boarding Clerk’: an employee of the agency who accompanied the boss at every arrival and departure of ships anchoring in Accra… (the harbour was far too shallow for ships to anchor, so all had to be dealt with out at sea…)

Jacob was, by then, in charge of all the paperwork.

When his work was over he’d be offered a farewell drink before the usual damp return on a small vessel through the waves. Present during the departure of homeward-bound passenger-ships full of German South Africans, who were waving farewell, was also Jacob’s new colleague Tekovi. He was a man who liked to place both hands around his mouth to amplify the sound and would sing, to the great amusement of all passengers:

‘Gruess mir det blonde Kind vom Rhein’… a favourite pop song in the thirties, sung in completely convincing German Berlin accent and slang:

Greetings to the blond ‘girl’ from the Rhineland.’

Intoned with such style and even with a totally convincing accent by a black man, this pop song was always an enormous hit with German passengers and crew. When Tekovi ended this song the bridge would reply with three especially hearty, long hoots: a farewell customary with German sailors, and something the boss had personally insisted on in all harbours where he’d been employed. It was an old German custom.

From then on three ‘long’ hoots were always given by departing ships…and answered by one ‘short’ thank-you greeting from any ships left behind. It was not long before this ritual became the custom in all harbours of the Gold Coast. Both Tekovi and Jacob remained life-long friends with the soon no-longer-young German shipping agent who eventually moved to Cape Town. A life-long correspondence began.

<<<<<<>>>>>>

‘In private life there were events, misunderstandings and priceless ‘sayings’ perpetrated by our West African employees’, wrote the German shipping agent, by then an old man, and long retired, many years later.

‘They often loomed large in those days…but despite all we remained in touch and always most amicably.

For example: when I was a bachelor I regularly gave my cook £5 to buy food which was not purchased in bulk. When he’d spent it all he always presented his accounts booklet, into which, on each of the Lord’s days there’d be an almost identical lengthy list of entries: ‘six pence firewood, six pence onions, six pence tomatoes’…followed by everything else that had been purchased by way of fish, meat vegetables or whatever.

When the allowance was used up he’d automatically receive a further £5.

‘I no longer remember how frequently this amount was used up. But in those days it was understood that, whenever necessary, he was able to put a decent dinner for six persons on the table without any prior warning. How ‘Cook’ managed was entirely his business,’ wrote the long retired German shipping agent in later years, poring over the memoirs of his youthful days on the Gold Coast.

But there was one further episode: the story is not quite over:

When the German shipping agent returned from home-leave in 1928 as a married man it seemed logical to hope the new housewife would take care of all domestic issues.

But newly arrived wives soon begin to ask questions: ‘why’, for example, ‘…does our cook need six pence every day for onions, tomatoes and wood for the stove?’

In 1928 six pence a day went a long way on the Gold Coast, allegedly.

‘To make sauces, Missus! The master likes nice sauces’, was the cook’s convincing reply, when this question was raised.

‘Such information is news to me’, declared the German shipping agent disarmingly when the new wife questioned him about his need for so many ‘nice’ sauces…

‘We must keep the Cook on our side’, was, no doubt, his tactful response. ‘But you might like to go to the market and do some sensible research of your own,’ suggested the prudent husband, diplomatically concealing divided loyalties.

After her visit to the market it was decided the cook should receive no more than three pence.

‘Strange’ announced the shipping agent, a few meals later, ‘our dinners have not changed in any way.’’

But this was not the end of the story.

Soon Cook knocked on the door to make a further complaint:

‘The new madam is interfering in my cooking,’ he declared sorrowfully, ‘and she has cut my expenses.