Mark
Mark had a driving desire to keep his beach, Cosy Bay, in a clean and tidy condition, by collecting the mountain of litter left by beach users. For this, he was paid to care for cars parked above the beach while their owners left their mess behind on the beach. He also assisted with security when a tourist "booze" bus did a nightly stop on their tour around the area and received food and drinks as well from them.
I never did take any photos so found these on the net.
I would stopover on my trip and chat with Mark, occasionally watching a whale frolic near the beach, and could not figure out what he was doing here. He appeared to be in reasonable shape at 37 years old with a mind that worked quite well and kept reasonably clean. Unlike Old Pete who looked like he never washed his clothes. I would take some fruit out for both of them.
Like most of those I helped, I generally didn't ask more than the standard questions about family and instead let them tell me more about themselves as time evolved. The big ears approach!
Mark came around for a meal a few times, walking the several kilometers to Bantry Bay each time.
Another interesting story was a toothache. Mark went to a public hospital with intense pain and was told they only dealt with dental problems on Tuesdays and as today was Wednesday, he should come back next week. In the end, the tooth was extracted without anesthesia by a "backyard" dentist. I suggested he should get his teeth checked and offered to pay the R80 fee.
The mystery of why Mark had gone bush was resolved when I learnt Mark had made and lost a large amount of money and was escaping from the rat race to recuperate. He was a qualified engineer and had his own business. He had a case processing through the legal system to recover a large chunk of this with the assistance of legal-aid lawyers.
Somebody had given Old Pete a power saw for his firewood business and he was starting to have trouble getting it started. To my non-mechanical mind, it was in need of an overhaul. Mark couldn't convince him to take it in for a service so asked me to do this as he said he will listen to a white man! Convinced, he then asked if he could use my telephone numbers so the maintenance people could get back to them. I agreed. I dutifully conveyed the cost of the job was R200. Old Pete asked if he could borrow this and he would repay R50 a week. I agreed but didn't have the cash with me so would come back.
One day on my way out on the bike, I heard someone calling my name as I transversed Camps Bay, one of the most trendy areas of Cape Town. I thought, who of the rich and famous knows me??? However, it was only Mark coming around to see me to get the R80 for the dentist but more importantly, to excitably tell me he had been invited to quote for a facilities cleaning contract for the SA National Parks board ( they run Kruger and Table Mountain ) and could I help him type up his proposal the next day. Apparently, one of senior managers of SANParks had noticed his work at Cosy Bay and they obviously had a policy of helping disadvantaged people in out-contracting. I said sure. However, he never did come around the next day and everyday I went out to give Old Pete his loan, neither was about. I then went to Tanzania to conquer the big African.
When I returned, Old Pete told me he hadn't seem Mark for a long time, he had got his saw back but had now lost it! I did have two telephone numbers for Mark, at his mother's house where some of his siblings also lived but where he was not welcome as he was seen as freeloading now that he had no money. I had also pointed out to him several times that he was voluntarily homeless!
However, some weeks later he cheerfully turned up at my front door to tell me that he had been living at his mother's place and working on getting his old company back into shape so he could use it to quote for the SANParks cleaning contract for 4 of their sites around Cape Town, including Oudekraal, a picnic site not far from Cosy Bay ( patrons pay to enter ), Signal Hill ( where the gun goes off every day at noon ), Newlands Forest and the Rhodes Memorial. He had also taken a course on quoting for government contracts. However, he needed a cash loan to get one last company obligation in order, a workers compensation fund. So generous me gave him a loan and we sat down and put his quotation together including designing a new letterhead and a fancy presentation of his case. His price did seem a bit high to me but that's what he wanted. He got his quote in on time but on follow-up was told that they must have 3 submissions for every contract and Mark's was the only one they had received. A few more weeks went by and we learnt they had 2 more delivered and that they were still evaluating them. Remember, speed is not important in Africa and unlimited patience is not a virtue but a necessity. There was no more progress as I left the country.
On the developing story of his personal life, when I called one day to check progress with the quote, a girl answered and said " Daddy, it's for you". When I said "you didn't tell me you had children", he said "You didn't ask". So I asked if he wanted to bring them around to visit so the photo above is of Brent, 8 year old son. He also has a 12 year old daughter Tarsha. He gets to see them during school holidays.
I currently get some news on this case using Henri as a conduit. I can phone Mark on his cell phone on skype and I can hear him but he can't hear me. Maybe because he can't afford any airtime, this facility is locked. I also have access to his e-mail account to check to see if SANParks reply by this method. So I wait in hope, one of my two unclosed case files.
The other unclosed case file will feature in the next story.
