Monday


The weather is cloudy but warm and the Kops’ decide to visit their favourite haunt of late; a pottery, with a little café and some animals. Charlie and Mason run off to climb on the jungle gym and Rob and Kate sit outside on a table and have a cup of tea.



The pottery sells all kinds of painted crockery, like Kate used to make. She grudgingly admits it’s actually quite good stuff. There are two huge pot bellied pigs lying under a tree (Kate thinks they are possibly the ugliest creatures she’s ever seen) and a gang of turkeys strutting around. There are also a couple of ostriches, two goats, chickens, horses and a large posse of cats that sit gazing up at people with pleading eyes. There is also the obligatory troop of monkeys that swoop down on you and try to steal whatever you’re eating. When they were here last time, a huge male monkey had jumped on the table and grabbed the pot of sugar sachets, stuffed them all in his mouth, and sat there chomping and grinning at Kate whilst fondling a huge pink erection.



The monkeys are absent today, but a large ginger cat jumps up onto the table and fawns and preens around Kate begging for fuss. Kate loves cats, so she pours it a saucer of milk from the little jug. As it drinks, she starts scratching its neck and finds lots of little scabs there which she tries to pick off. The cat is besides itself with glee. ‘Cats are cool’ says Rob when it climbs onto his lap and starts kneading his groin with its paws. The waitress comes up and smiles at the cat. ‘He’s very friendly’ she says, ‘Such a shame he has AIDS’. Rob’s upper lip curls and he shoves it in Kate’s direction. Kate rushes off to the bathroom to scrub her nails.



Tuesday



Kate is horrified to discover a small snake in her garage. It’s as dead as a doornail, but Rob announces that there are probably lots more writhing baby snakes somewhere and a large mummy snake, most likely hanging in the rafters of the garage waiting to drop on her head and sink its fangs into her neck. Either that or tighten it’s snakey body around her throat until her eyes pop out. Charlie is terrified and refuses to get into the car. Kate observes that she didn’t sign up for all this freaky wildlife stuff – she’s got monkeys stealing her sanitary protection, her youngest son has a mosquito bite like a plague boil on his arm and now snakes lying in wait for her when she wants to nip down the shops. She has also noticed lots of large lacy wings blowing around in the garage, thankfully unattached to their owners, but she shudders to think how large said owners must be – and how many legs must they have? Jesus wept!



Wednesday



Kate has announced that when she gets a job, Rob must take an equal share in the cleaning duties, including the laundry. Rob had immediately raced down to the local electrical store and bought himself a tumble dryer. He also arranged for a maid to come visit on Friday. Unfortunately this means that Rob has to wait in for the delivery of the tumble dryer today. Kate takes the kids to the beach where Charlie makes some friends and spends the day playing cricket and wrestling. She’s all for the cricket, but not so sure about the near naked water wrestling that Charlie and his friends seem to be enjoying so much, it all seems a bit too ‘Spartacus’ for her liking. Mason sits in his camp chair resplendent in yellow armbands and surveys his domain. He announces he needs a wee. Kate tells him to go and climb into a large hole she has spent about an hour digging in the sand for him. He does so, bitching and moaning about having to wee in a hole. Mason is quite fastidious like that. He climbs out and resumes his observation of the beach. Charlie and his new buddies come racing up. ‘Mind my hole Charlie’ says Mason. One of the buddies jumps into the hole and starts jumping up and down in the wee. Mason looks at Kate and smirks.



Thursday



Kate and Charlie go to watch ‘Avatar’ at the cinema in Umhlanga. Charlie breathlessly declares that it’s the best film he’s ever seen. Kate tells him he says that about every film he sees. Rob and Mason come to pick them up. Rob asks Kate to drop him off at a nearby ‘restaurant’ so he can hang out with his teacher friends. Kate asks him the name of the restaurant. ‘Hooters’ Rob coughs under his breath. Kate turns in her seat to look at Rob. ‘Jesus, it’s not a strip club or anything!‘ he protests ‘Come in and see for yourself!’ Kate says she’s got better things to do, and he hops out of the car.

‘Mummy, where is Daddy going?’ enquires Mason. ‘To a strip club!’ cackles Charlie.

‘What’s a strip club? asks Mason. ‘It’s where ladies take their clothes off and dance around.’ answers Kate. ‘Will Daddy be taking his clothes off and dancing around?’ enquires her innocent angel in the back seat. ‘Hardly!’ snorts Kate and drives them home.



Rob comes home a bit later and shamefacedly admits that there were actually some waitresses with rather large breasts and small, tight T shirts at the ‘restaurant’. Kate gives him a specially selected look from her extensive repertoire and goes back to reading her book .



Friday



Rob gets up very early and drives to the gatehouse to pick up the maid who will be cleaning their house for them. He returns a few minutes later with a large black lady who seems to burst into peals of laughter at everything Kate says. For a minute, Kate thinks the lady obviously finds her highly amusing, but then realises that she is probably laughing at her lack of boobs – African women have abnormally large Babylons, as well as huge bums and pretty much everything else, as it is considered beautiful over here. Kate has heard they even gorge themselves on steroid laced chicken feed in an attempt to gain weight.



The lady’s name is Daphne. Kate’s toes curl when Rob suddenly says; ’Aha! but what’s your real name?!’ Kate waits for Daphne to whack Rob with her rather substantial handbag, but she laughs and says it’s ‘Thuli’ She actually says a very long African sounding name but she says that’s what she’s called at home. She seems very pleased that Rob wants to call her by her African name. He explains later that the black people usually have an African name and a more ‘Western’ name. He reckons this came about during Apartheid when the ‘Ignorant whities’ couldn’t be bothered with the often quite tricky to pronounce African names.



Rob and Tuli start talking business. Rob wants her to come in for two half days to clean up the Kops detritus. Thuli hums and haas – she lives a long way away and has to take one of those horrible white taxis which costs her R20 and the walk from the gate to the house? Yo yo yo!. Two half days isn’t worth her while. Rob agrees to a day and a half, but the pay includes the bus fare. ‘Oh, we can pay the bus fare!’ trills Kate, who has been earwigging. Rob glares at her. ‘Yes well, my other employers do pay my bus fare…’ says Thuli. Rob ends up agreeing to double what he originally intended to pay, and he’ll pay the bus fare. Kate is now forbidden to be within twenty feet of any negotiations with the domestic staff.



Thuli goes to the bathroom and emerges resplendent in a rather natty fuscia pink housecoat. She then begins swinging her ample hips around the house, humming as she sweeps. As Kate makes her a cup of tea (three sugars) she asks if she should call Kate ‘Madam’ Kate nearly chokes on her biscuit and assures Thuli that ‘Kate’ is fine.



They go to the pool to get out of Thuli’s way while she cleans. Rob takes a box of wine in a cooler and some drink for the kids. After one glass, Kate is hammered as usual. A couple come up to the pool with their kids. They seem very nice. Kate does her best not to sound like a loud mouthed South London fishwife as she tends to do when pissed. She manages not to swear and is feeling quite pleased with herself. All of a sudden, Mason clambers out of the pool and says ‘MY BALL BAG HURTS!’ at the top of his voice. His swim shorts appear to be chafing the little lamb’s undercarriage. Mason demands that Rob remove his swim shorts immediately, then proceeds to strut naked around the swimming pool in a manner reminiscent of the late John Wayne. The newcomers’ four year old daughter floats in silence with her mouth hanging open. Rob puffs out his chest and nods approvingly. Kate decides that now is probably a good time to head home.