INGE ENGELBRECHT

“In this space, nostalgia for a lost past, both personal and political, could also give rise to the imagination of what at the time was still an almost unimaginable future after apartheid”.

(Lucia, 2002:125)

“… tidy chronologies and official historical narratives are sometimes displaced, giving way to a version of history that is such because it feels so”.

from Fado Resounding by Lilla Ellen Gray (2013:9)

The yellow and green Swartland landscape is breath-taking on my drive to meet pastor Simon Seekoei at his daughter’s house in Malmesbury. The rain has stopped by the time I reach my destination a few minutes before 10:00. I am met by Mrs Seekoei at the front door, and we exchange pleasantries. She is cordial and guides me to the brown kitchen table. Mrs Seekoei and I make polite conversation while I wait for Pastor to appear. I address her as “Juffrou”, the only title I know used for a dominee’s wife, a remnant of my own Uniting Reformed Church upbringing.

Pastor is dressed comfortably on this Saturday morning: black t-shirt, blue tracksuit pants, white tackies, turned-around black baseball cap. He does not join me at the table, but rather sits in his folding camping chair across from me. I notice a small St. Christopher medallion necklace around his neck which he touches now and then throughout our interview. I forget to ask him about it. Pastor Seekoei is a burly figure with a deep, intimidating voice. At first contact, one might interpret his guarded demeanour as unfriendly or curt, but one soon realises that that is because he is a keen observer of people and their interactions with him. Juffrou also joins us for the interview. She will fill in the gaps, she says. As I set up, the grandchildren they are babysitting today come and greet me, as per custom. I know two of them, Malachi and Hadassah, but the others seem to feel compelled to also hug me hello. They are fascinated by my recording equipment. Juffrou shoos them outside as Pastor grabs one of his grandchildren and affectionately hugs and kisses her. He smiles warmly, satisfied, as they leave through the sliding door to the backyard. I smile, too, appreciating this tender moment between grandfather and grandchild.

I first came to know of pastor Seekoei, also known as “Die Kneg” (the servant) in church circles, during the course of my own PhD research, as a significant figure in the coloured community in the Cape Town area, specifically his work in Afrikaans gospel music. My initial contact with Pastor was to learn more about the koortjie in coloured churches and communities, but it soon became clear that this man was more than a mere respondent to a questionnaire.

We settle in and begin our conversation about his childhood and upbringing. Both his parents were proud Khoisan people. His mother was from the Masbieker people, the same background as that of Khoisan poet Diana Ferrus^{[1]LiefvirSuidAfrika}, he says, and his father was a Griekwa. His mother, Mariana, was originally from Robertson, born on the farm that produces Klipdrift, he says chuckling. We both chuckle. His family is from that farm. “Ek dink actually hulle was slawe op dai plaas”, he remarks pensively. His father, Johannes, was from Petrusville. Simon Seekoei was born on 20 October 1956 in Porter Street, or in “Pote” (feet) Street, as his mother called it, in Worcester, but the family relocated to Tiervlei, Cape Town when he was 4 years old.

A Seekoei family portrait. Back, pastor Simon Seekoei’s mother, Mariana, holding baby Hansie, Pastor’s brother. Seated is pastor Seekoei’s father, Johannes Seekoei, holding Pastor’s sister, Sarah. In front of Johannes Seekoei is Pastor’s brother, Philander. Simon Seekoei is in front with the guitar his father bought for him.

Pastor talks proudly about his Khoisan heritage, and I ask him about it. He is frank in his answers. “I always had this feeling like we’re being played … I was actually a glorified white man, an Afrikaner. I had to learn their poetry, their history, their music… when I met Afrikaners as an adult, we were actually on the same page. We knew the same stuff. Then I realised they actually made my generation glorified Afrikaners.” He was conscientised at a very early age, learning his own people’s history, as he calls it, from his uncles. Because of this awareness, he was adamant “not to learn other people’s history”, or rather, other people’s version of history. Consequently, he was suspended from his high school because he opposed the history being taught at the time.

In his book Coloured… to be or not to be? “That’s the question”,^{[2]Coloured… To Be Or Not To Be? “That’s The Question”} Pastor is adamant about not being called coloured. “I always fought against… I never wanted to be known as a coloured. And I raised my children like that.” He recalls a few issues they ran into with their youngest children’s schools where they were required to tick boxes for demographic purposes and would not tick the box for coloured. “We were the ‘other’”, his wife interjects. We all laugh. Their 22-year-old daughter, Linda, ^{[3]Youniquecampaign} is a proud Khoisan, GBV activist and poet,^[4]You-Nique and who had a traditional three-day Khoisan 21^st birthday celebration where theologian and Khoisan activist Dr Willa Boezak^{[5]So Glo Ons} came to explain the proceedings and customs of this type of ceremony, Juffrou shares.

Pastor’s embracing of his Khoisan heritage and the subsequent imparting of this pride to his children was greatly influenced by a cousin of his father whom he calls “a real Khoisan”, a Griekwa who lived on the banks of the Orange River. Their visits to the cousin during Pastor’s childhood made a lasting impression on Pastor’s thinking about race, culture and heritage. His unusual surname, Seekoei (Afrikaans for hippopotamus), he explains, is proof of the Khoisan people being the first nation of this country, like the native Americans whose family or tribe names are represented by different animals in nature.

He interrupts himself and redirects the conversation back to his childhood education. Pastor Seekoei attended Florida Primary School in Ravensmead for Sub A and Sub B, after which he attended Webner Primary. He completed only his standard 6 school year at John Ramsey Secondary and finished the rest of his high school education at Florida Secondary School. After high school he attended Athlone Technical College but because he had an inherent resistance against the type of structured education the apartheid government offered at the time, he dropped out.

“Ek wil geteach wôd. Ek willie gebrainwash wôdie … Ek wou ’n goeie Khoisan wies, nie ’n wit productie.”

His father subsequently enrolled him in Bible College three times, but he also rejected this option because there were only white male teachers at that time. “Ek hettie geglo ’n witman kan my van God leerie. Hoe kan iemand wat my oppress my leer?” He eventually enrolled in a type of distance learning theological course where he was mentored by a Welsh theologian in England in what he calls “alternative theology”.

We are momentarily interrupted by a knock at the front door, it’s the neighbour’s little girl who is looking for her friends. She runs past us quickly as she spots them through the sliding doors. Pastor continues. “Ek was altyd ’n rebel”, referring to education. “I was always anti-certificates ….” He remembers being contacted by someone affiliated with the University of Johannesburg a few years ago who had nominated Pastor to be the recipient of an honorary doctorate for his contribution to music, specifically Afrikaans gospel music, but he declined the invitation. “Afterwards my daughter’s like “Daddy, next time you accept it. So, next time I guess I’ll accept it”, he says with a shy smile.

He also recalls having been contacted by a representative from the Swart Afrikaanse Skrywersvereniging who wanted to present him with some sort of award which he also declined. He asks me “Jy ken die Swart Afrikaanse Skrywersvereniging, dai wat elke 10 jaar meet…” I have never heard of them. Pastor Seekoei has also been invited to speak at universities in South Africa and had also appeared as a human rights campaigner and performer at venues in England under the heading “Cry Freedom”.

He has always been suspicious of education as a young man and could not subscribe to the education model and content enforced by the apartheid government, referencing the “Sus en Daan” books they were forced to read in primary school. He is therefore in the throes of finishing his current book, The Miseducation of Christianity, where he addresses this type of education that was strengthened by the church. It is through his research for this book that he now truly understands his own reticence as a young man to attend Bible college because of the complicity of the Christian church with apartheid and black slavery. “But I love God, so I’m living in [this] tension.”

The conversation naturally turns to the topic of apartheid and all its ideological vestiges that we still see and experience today. Juffrou jumps in and talks about her own family’s struggles with skin colour. We all compare notes. It was Sidney Poitier and Muhammad Ali, Pastor shares, that helped him make peace with his dark complexion, or as he says “my swartgeid”. “Ek wassie swatste innie klas, ma ek wassie slimste”, he says proudly and laughs.

The musician^{[6]Simon Seekoei 1}

After he dropped out of Bible college for the last time, he went into music fulltime around the age of 21. I ask him what instrument he actually plays, and Juffrou answers, “Alles behalwe die dromme”. But he calls himself “functional” as an instrumentalist. “Ek kan myself carry … en assie bassist siek [is], sal ek kan instaan.” He attributes this functionality to the fact that he was a pastor’s child. “As jy ’n pastor se kind is, isit ma weird. ’n Pastor se kinners is forced om gifted te wies, because as jou pa ’n kerk begin, normally sallie pa sê sy kind moet lee keyboard speel.” His own daughters, at the time of our interview, are at a funeral and would be singing. That’s just the burden that comes with being a pastor’s child.

His father was a Pentecostal preacher. He urges his wife to tell the story of his own birth:

“Sy ma het altyd die storie vertel dat, voor hy gebore was, dan’t sy pa gebid op haar maag en gesê ‘die gaan die gift of music wies. Hy gaan die gift of music het. Hy gaan music maak.’ En die dag toe hy bore, toe gaan sy pa uit en sy pa roepie pastore en die godsmanne. En sy pa sê ‘kom kyk die profeet het gekom, die profeet het gekom!’ En sy sê… en toe die mense by die huis kom en… almal kom nou because hulle dink nou hie’t nou ’n groot profeet het nou gekom, toe’s it Simon wat da lê. Hulle sê: wa’s die profeet? Hie lê die profeet…”

This chronicle seems to have become a family legend and Pastor beams as he listens to Juffrou’s retelling. He has always been musical, he says, while he tries to think about how he will explain to me when exactly he discovered his gift for music and how he experiences it. “Ek dink ek en music het ’n physical verbintenis. … Ek wietie, music touch my op ’n level wat ek … is net iets anners. Ek en music is so te sê een iets. Music issie iets wat ek kan dinkie, man. … Ek dink letterlik in music … Ek kan nie sê music is vi my ’n giftie. Ek ís net soe. Ek dink melodic.”

Pastor never had formal music training; he just had this “awareness” of himself, he says as he tries to explain to me what is so natural to him. Once, when he was a little boy, his father bought a saxophone, and within the span of a weekend, he could play the instrument. He has the ability to master any instrument put in front of him and he thought everyone was like him until he started to record albums, which caused some clashes with producers and singers alike in the recording studio. I ask him about the songs he has written over the years and what inspires him to write. The inspiration usually comes from or is triggered by external impulses. For example, he might be in a company of people and an idea for a song would be triggered by a comment someone makes. “Ek kan ampe sê my spirit sing dit aanmeka, tot ek nou by piano kan uitkom … of ek gan sing op my WhatsApp note oppie phone, die thoughts. Dis hoe ek songs al die jare geskryf het. … ek sal sê die radio is aangeswitch.” He is currently working on a song that was triggered by a sermon that he preached. “Dis ampe my spirit bêre dit, sit dit innie deep fridge, ma dit is so half gepackage…”

The composer

One of Pastor Seekoei’s most successful and popular songs is Here lei my, made famous by the Afrikaans gospel singer Bella Adonis.^{[7]DarwinBooysen} “Here lei my was getrigger deu my ouma… die memories van sy ouma. … My pa se ma… is ’n Griekwa vrou met dai kopdoek, basically ’n Griekwa vrou met dai kopdoek, en my oudste suster.  Hulle’t so ’n groove … hulle sit innie kêk dan sit hulle so…”, demonstrating the rhythmic tapping of their hands on their laps, accompanied by their swaying bodies. And this rhythm triggered the phrase “Lei my, Here lei my, Here lei my.” He attributes the song’s popularity and success to the fact that it was based on a “natural rhythm”, an inherent rhythm familiar to a specific culture group.

He shifts the conversation suddenly and catches me off-guard a bit. He shares about the time he met his current wife, Praylene, and the mood in the room is not as joyful as I would have expected. “Ek was in ’n moeilike plek in my lewe”. He had just gone through a second divorce, and he was bitter. His song “Stop the world, I want to jump off” was written during this time. But she brought him sanity and calmness with her innocence and humour. She was 21 at the time of their meeting and he was 39, a jaded twice divorced father of 6, tired of superficial relationships. “Ek het gesoek wat my ma en pa gehad het. Thank God sy’t dit gebring.” She healed him, he says. It is a beautiful moment in the room and I am upset at the loud passing truck outside that breaks the moment slightly. He wrote the song “Tot hier toe het die Here ons gedra”, the meaning of Ebenhaeser, for his wife in gratitude for the trauma that she had to endure with him. Today they have been married for almost 24 years.

He quotes lines from Frank Sinatra’s song “My way” as he reflects on his life and the decisions he had made that led to him and his wife temporarily living with his daughter and her family. I do not get the sense that he has many regrets about his life up until now, just gratitude, especially towards his wife, especially when he talks about the properties he had owned in the past and walked away from – his passion for making music was not materialistically driven.

“Ek was te music mal. Ek wou coloured music vestig in ’n mainstream in.”

And he did all this all the while staying true to his beliefs, true to his core. “Da’s een of anne reward om true aan jouself te bly.” His father worked for the railway his entire life, and when he passed away, Pastor wondered about his own life, asking himself “Is this it?”. “Vi my was die lewe regtig ’n adventure.” All the decisions he made after that were therefore by design, he says. Covid has temporarily put his plans on hold, but he has a plan. “…wanneer ek in die spieël kyk en ek kyk na Simon Seekoei, dan sê ek vi hom: ek ken die ou … ek, ek ken dai ou se soul. … What is a man? What has he got if not himself?”

The American gospel singer Andrae Crouch was the first contemporary gospel artist that Pastor Seekoei heard after he became a born-again Christian. They met face to face through a mutual friend that told Crouch about Pastor. “En toe hy in Suid-Afrika kom, toe vra hy ‘wa is die man’, hy wil die ou meet.” He gave Crouch a cassette of his song “We see a new South Africa”^{[8]SimonSeekoei 2 / SimonSeekoei 3} when they met at the Cape Sun hotel.

That interaction with Crouch changed him, he says, especially when Crouch encouraged him to continue composing and pursuing this local music sound. Pastor recalls: “Wat ék moet doen is, ek moet ons local music export. Dáái’t my gechange. Toe focus ek heeltemal net, van daai moment af …” That’s when he became ‘Mr Local’, he says tongue in cheek. “Sonder compromise, ek is local”.

The grandkids are hungry and come scouring for snacks.

The Bella era

“Jy moet musiek maak wat ons kan verstaan, my kind”, Pastor quotes his father. Like everyone else at the time, Pastor had started writing and producing English gospel songs. But that comment by his father had made an impression on him and he left the band that he was part of in 1982. Some of the music groups he founded over the years were, among others, “Jesus company” and “Simon and the Community singers”.

He wanted to boldly pursue a local sound. However, when he started his own record label, Shekinah Records, no one wanted to sing in Afrikaans. That was when a friend of his suggested Bella Springbok (later Adonis), a girl who had recently finished high school. This fortuitous meeting would take place one Sunday at a church where Pastor was supposed to preach. “Toe ek da (by die kerk) kom … toe stuur sy vi my ’n briefie, die vriendin van my: ‘die meisie is hie’. Toe gaan ek stage toe, toe vra ek vi die pastor kan ek iemand laat sing, toe sê die pastor ja, want ek is mos nou agte die pulpit. Toe kom Bella op en toe kom sing Bella ‘Ek dien geen ander afgod nie.’

Ek het nog nooit die song in Afrikaans ees gehoorie. Ek het dit net in Engels geken, ‘And I will serve no foreign God’. … sonder musiek, maar da was iets da. En soos hulle sê the rest was history.” In other words, Adonis was auditioned right there in church and a partnership was formed. Bella, as she is widely known today, and Pastor Seekoei recorded 8 albums together, among them Here lei my, Elke dag met Jesus, and Dis net die liefde. According to his wife, it was the message that Bella conveyed that made an impact in the coloured community. “Dit was persoonlik vir die bruin mens. Dit was in hulle harte ingesing.” There was an affirmation in the songs that Pastor wrote and produced for Bella that gave “ons mense” hope, she feels, a hope that “God gaan vir jou deurkom.”

Here lei my has become a national hit, even migrating across the northern borders, and serves as a personal testimony. The song came at a time in their lives when Pastor and Juffrou were at a crossroads where difficult life decisions had to be made. Juffrou recalls that time: “Gaan ons die pad aanvat of gaan ons ma net gewone bruinmense is wat vashou aan onse huis… of gaan ons die journey vat, die worsteling wat hie in Simon se siel is… ma as ek hieso sit en vashou aan ’n huis en ons vashou … dan was da nie ’n ‘Here lei my’ [nie]… niks van hoe dit nou is, sou so gewees het nie.”

The industry

Pastor Seekoei struggled to get his record label off the ground in Johannesburg. He had invested all he had but unfortunately there were no returns. They were unable to get their cds in music stores. He jokes, “Op ’n tyd het os met meer cds as furniture getravel.” I don’t know if I should also laugh. Pastor talks about an instance when he applied for capital for his record label at a bank in Cape Town. “…ma hy’s ’n British ou, hy’s ’n Engelse ou. Hy sê

‘listen, sir, let me be frank with you. There’s nothing wrong with your business plan. You only got the wrong colour … if you were a white man, we would’ve given you this money”.

I am shocked when he tells me this occurred as recently as the early 2000s. “Kom ek sê vi jou wat difficult was vi my dai tyd is wat almal my nou accolades oor gee, wassie nice dai tydie… Vandag kyk almal in awe terug ma…” He trails off. The difficulties he experienced in those days were, however, not only financial and from only white counterparts. When he recorded the first album with Bella, someone in the studio asked him: “Wa kry jy die Boesman meitjie…?” The question was asked by a coloured man. I am not surprised, I tell him. It is therefore not surprising that most of the criticism and insults he endured for producing and encouraging a specific sound, were from members of the coloured church community. And initially they sold more Bella-albums to non-church goers than those who considered themselves “kerkmense”. “So, die journey was nie nice nie…” He again praises his wife for sticking with him during these times and says that she showed through her actions that she loved him more than material things. “… dis hoekom ek so baie my vrou ha due gee… as sy ’n normal coloured vrou was, sou sy nie ees uit ha huis gestap hettie.” Another tender moment. He thinks a moment and then he declares

“Ons hettie baie geld gemaakie, ma die ideological kant vannie journey het gewen.”

At the time when Pastor was trying to make a go at his own record label, coloured people were not really in the industry of record producing, he says. Thus, this was a lonely journey for him. “Coloureds het verkies om te werk vi iemand. Hy wil pay. Hy willie die pay generate nie. Ek was aanie kant wat geld moes generate.” The only other coloured person in the industry at the time was the late Aldridge “Al” Etto, who was a huge influence on Pastor.

Etto was known for albums such as Boogie Breakdown – South African Synth Disco: 1980 to 1984^{[9]South African synth disco} and popular songs such as Hold on to love and Party Night. Pastor funded his projects himself and produced the records and sound he wanted. The first album he produced on his new record label, Homeza Records, was the one by his daughter, Mariana,^{[10]SimonSeekoei 4} who had also served as back-up vocal on the Bella albums. In fact, Pastor says, it was basically just him, his son Conney and Mariana who either played the instruments for the albums or sang all the backing vocals. Juffrou adds, “Kind van God. Here lig my op. Here lei my. Dai eerste 3 cd’s is net Simon, Mariana, Conney … dis net hulle wat werk oppit.” Also, Dis net die liefde, Pastor interjects. The grandchildren appear again, and Pastor stops the interview to grab one of them and pulls the boy into a bear hug.

“En toe was ek vir jare dai sole man innie studios. Assie album uitkom, lag jou eie mense die album uit. Dai’t nogal seegemaak. … So nou wanne ekkie rewards kry, offie awards … dan vra sy (his wife) my altyd hoe voel ek. Dan sê ek ek voel niks… ek het te seegekry. … die awards nou betieken letterlik niks. Vestaan jy? Because die struggle was heavy da… ek het shots gecall, uhm, wat ek dink nie coloured mans sal call nie.” He tells me about a job opportunity he received at a BEE organisation which he turned down because he was not happy with the terms. “Jy kan my nie koepie. … Ek sou ’n mooi kar gery het en in ’n groot huis gebly het, ma die songs sou nie gekom hettie…” I only find out days after the interview, that the albums Here lei my and Dis net liefde had “gone gold” in 2006 and 2007 respectively, something that Pastor did not inform me about himself.

We see a new South Africa

In a recent live streamed Facebook interview with Cape Town jazz bassist and Koortjie Show presenter Jonathan Rubain, Rubain mentioned a song that apparently everyone in the coloured community still knows today, titled We see a new South Africa. I ask Pastor about this song, and he instructs Juffrou to play the song for me via YouTube^{[11]SimonSeekoei 5} This song, written by Pastor in 1988, became an anthem against apartheid all over South Africa and was even played on the popular gospel TV show, Gospel Gold. “Die song het my ampe innie tronk gehad”, he says. This song served as a prophecy for a better South Africa and a symbol of hope, Juffrou says. “Sonder enige twyfel, sonder enige iets het die man vi ons ontwrikbaar laat weet ‘we see a new South Africa’”. Pastor attributes this song to the example his father set for him. “My pa was ’n non-compromising Khoisan. Ek het nog nooit my pa sien beg vi ’n witman nie.” About the song he says: “Ek het ook destyds gedink dat gospel music moet iets sê. Ons kannie uitie ding gan (apartheid) en gospel music het niks gesê nie. En toe het dai song ’n anthem [geword]. Die dag toe ek besef die song is ’n anthem is toe iemand my gebel het … en gesê het hulle luister nou na ’n Xhosa version van New South Africa, want ’n skool het dit gedoen.”

Even though the song was a huge success, Pastor says that he does not believe that we have achieved what the song expresses about equality in this country. “Os was op pad. Met Madiba was os strongly op pad…” The song also cost him a great deal, he comments, including his marriage at the time. Furthermore, he was followed by the apartheid security police and was constantly harassed, which made his father fear that he would end up in prison, especially after Pastor wrote a letter to the president of apartheid South Africa in 1988. In September of that year, Pastor received a response to his letter to then president, PW Botha. From Botha’s response, which reads like a stock justification of unjust apartheid policy at that time, it appears that Pastor touched on issues such as the relationship between the State and the church, the denial of voting rights and persistent marginalisation of people of colour. Pastor’s opposition to the status quo did not only pit him against the State, but also against the church. “Dit was ’n moment in history wat my gepit… ek en die coloured kerk [was] basically tien mekaa gepit.” He talks briefly about how Dr Allan Boesak had an impact on his thinking and resolve to fight the status quo, especially Boesak’s book Black and reformed: Apartheid, Liberation, and the Calvinist Tradition^{[12]Black-Reformed-Apartheid-Liberation-Calvinist} “It cost a lot. Ek meen vandag lykit nie mee so nie ma…” He trails off again.

Final thoughts…

Although Pastor generally appears to be satisfied with his life decisions, one does get the sense that as a father he has some regrets thinking back on the music producing part of his journey. “Dit was ek en my kinnes. Bottom line. … Met hulle futures alles innie hanne van hulle pa se vision. Ma die Here het mooi deu’gekom vi Conney…” He sighs an audible sigh of relief. I giggle in discomfort. “… en vi Mariana nou sy het ha passion gevind,” referring to her currently studying music at Stellenbosch University. “Ek gloe my kinnes moet hulle passion vind.” In the interview with Rubain, Pastor is introduced as “first a husband, father and grandfather” before Rubain calls him a pioneer. I understand that order now.

Besides the many songs Pastor has written and the albums he has produced over the past almost 40 years, he has also published several books. Some of these titles are The gospels and Christian’s dressing code, The original idea (Vol.1), What apartheid has done to Christianity in South Africa (Vol.1), and his most recent publication, Grace beyond divorce,^{[14]Blog-Jou-Ore/Son-Gospel/die-boek-kan-genees} where he talks candidly about his own experiences with divorce from a Biblical perspective.

There seems to be no stopping Die Kneg. He tells me that he is currently busy with finishing up the first volume of the book The Miseducation of Christianity. He is also learning how to speak the Khoi language online, although the book keeps him busy, he says. And his electronic keyboard is set up in their bedroom for when inspiration strikes. Our conversation ends with an anecdote he shares about a moment he had at his niece’s wedding recently. A song he had written 20 years ago, Seënwense,^{[15]Bella-Topic} which was included on the Here lei my album, was sung at the wedding, and he noted the impact this song seemed to have on the attendees.

He smiles as he quotes the lyrics: “Jou nuwe seisoen breek aan. Nuwe deure gaan oop. Vergeet nou van die verlede, strek jou uit na dit wat voorlê. Vloeke verander in seëninge. Jou toekoms is mooi. So sal geseën word [die een wat Jesus eer]… ma die way wat mense dit sing… En ek sit da, en ek sê vi myself “wow”… en ek sê net da, ek sê vi die Here dankie vi [die] gift. Dankie vi my vrou. Dankie vi my kinners wat saam my gestaan het. Otherwise, die moments nou…”

It seems that this is the only type of reward Die Kneg is willing to accept.

All photographs used in this article with the kind permission of the Seekoei family.