For the Love of Loxton

There must be something magical about the children in the tiny Karoo village of Loxton.

By Julienne du Toit

Meet the Kids

They are in fact so cherished that an internationally renowned crime novelist, a semi-reclusive cabaret singer, a string of movie stars and a cluster of local farmers’ wives have banded together to bring a sparkle to their daily lives.

 We meet some of these enchanted children one Tuesday at the JJ Booysen Primary School, a quadrangle set about by hardy pine trees and vast swathes of dusty gravel.

In Nicolette van den Heever’s Grade class, 31 little children sit concentrating on simple sums. Some are separated into a small group gathered on the floor around Nicolette, sitting cross-legged on the floor. She has them spellbound by a simple game with large beads that teaches them to count and calculate.

But a number of them fumble helplessly for the right answers, despite Nicolette’s great patience. These are the ones with foetal alcohol syndrome – a tragic condition that condemns them to a life where the simplest concepts remain almost impossible to grasp or retain.

It’s not unusual in the Karoo. In fact, JJ Booysen Primary is fairly typical of many schools in the platteland. Teachers have to handle up to 60 children in a class. There are vanishingly few reading books, no sports facilities to speak of, and the classrooms and bathrooms are in need of urgent repair.

But there’s something different going on at this school and in Loxton, a scenic, well-treed little town anchored by a striking moederkerk.

Deon Meyer – crime novelist

For a start, many of the locals look familiar, as if you may have seen them in a movie. In fact, if you’ve seen Jakhalsdans, released in January 2010, you probably spotted plenty of Loxton locals, doubling up as extras.

 The script-writer was part time Loxton resident Deon Meyer, one of South Africa’s best-selling authors. His crime thrillers have an avid audience in South Africa and overseas, where his books have been translated from Afrikaans into French, German, even Swedish, Romanian, Russian and Japanese.

 “Once I started writing the film’s screenplay about a little town, I realized I was actually writing about Loxton.”

Before he even found Loxton, Deon was already somewhat besotted with the grandeur of the surrounding Bo-Karoo (Upper Karoo). While doing on-the-ground research for his book Heart of the Hunter (published in 2003), he rode through the area on a BMW motorbike.

“I just loved the landscape.”

At the time he was also doing consultancy work for BMW Motorrad, and a few years later was asked to recce a suitable place for a GS (AKA very big bike) rally. That’s when he first rode into Loxton.

“I fell in love immediately. When I found the guest farm Jakhalsdans, I knew it was the perfect place. I spent a few months there, riding all the roads, getting to know the people, the climate, the stories.

“After that, we kept coming back as a family, staying at Jakhalsdans or at other guest houses. Eventually we bought land there, and built a house, and now we usually go for a long weekend most months. We spend most holidays there, and I love writing there. I can get twice as much work done in Loxton, as I can in Cape Town.

“But where city and country really differ is in how you’re exposed to poverty. In a city, you can avoid it. In a town like Loxton, it’s in your face, the need is so obvious. And I think it’s up to all of us as South Africans to do something, to roll up our sleeves and make this a great country.

“As a family, we tried various things to help – a clothes drive, we sponsored some student studies and a few other projects, but it wasn’t as effective as we’d hoped, mostly because we weren’t there all the time.

“Then we got to know Nicolette and heard of the plight of the schoolchildren. We saw a chance to support a structured way of helping children, and to break the cycle of poverty.”

Deon became a member of the I Am Living Trust, and promotes it on his website and in his book tours all around the world.

Life Enhancement

Nicolette explains the Trust’s quest: “We try to give the children the kind of extras they would never normally get, to allow them to dream. For example, we’ve taken those who have made the greatest progress on trips. Most of them have never even been outside Loxton, let alone seen the sea.

“One little girl was covering her eyes as we drove through the cities, she was so shocked at what she was seeing. But she’d already gained confidence by the time we got to the coast. She tasted the seawater and asked me, hand on hip, who was now to blame for all this salt spilt into the sea?”

“Another issue is nutrition, which is critical for young children. We add vegetables, fruit, cooldrink to their meals so that they have something in addition to the normal soy mince and rice. They were amazed the first time they found chicken in their lunch. The farmers are helping us with fresh produce, which is great.

“If we have healthy children, we’ll have a healthy future.

“We’re collecting reading books for them, and we want to create a library. We’ll be getting computers for them soon.”

The Trust’s latest quest is to repair the classrooms and bathrooms, to acquire a bus, and to keep the feeding scheme’s standards up. They also need a cook and a janitor.

“People often say to us ‘but the State should pay for this’. But with all the schools around the country that need to be upgraded, there’s just not enough money.”

Antoinette Pienaar – the singing herbalist

It’s a daunting project in some ways. “We want to teach the children how to love themselves, how to have confidence and believe in themselves – because we believe in them. Then they can go into the world and make a success of their lives.

 “At one stage I was agonizing about whether we’d taken on too much. But one of the local farmers said to me that if your dreams don’t scare you, they’re not big enough. I found that very comforting.”

 Just like the characters in Jakhalsdans the movie, the I Am Living Trust has had to use innovative ways of raising money for the schoolchildren. Holding the world premiere of the movie on the guest farm of the same name was one way.

 They also make regular appeals on Radio Sonder Grense, which seems to have the most soft-hearted of listeners.

 Another memorable fundraiser was the time they invited cabaret star and famed herbalist Antoinette Pienaar to give a performance in the town.

Antoinette knows the terrain and the people well – she grew up on nearby Carnarvon, and now lives in Beaufort West, a few hours drive in her trusty red bakkie.

 It was her first performance in a long time. For years now, she has been an apprentice to renowned Griqua herb doctor and jackal hunter, Oom Johannes Willemse, living among the life-giving Karoo plants on Theefontein farm.

 Swooping about like a sunburnt angel in altar-dress white, with Morné Serfontein accompanying her on piano and accordion, Antoinette transformed the Saturday morning church hall into something altogether more exotic. With a few throaty notes, she became a torch singer weaving her spells after midnight in a New Orleans basement club. Where they sing in Afrikaans.

 She sang songs in praise of windpumps, love, yearning and the open skies of the Karoo. She filled the hall with her unmistakable voice and huge personality.

 It was a special kind of magic – the same kind of magic that lets children dream.

• For more information on Loxton and the I Am Living Trust, visit www.loxton.org.za.