Surfers; chill

I stayed in Lakey Peak for five days, just chilling beside the sea. I talked to the surfers, I wrote. I scabbed some beer. I ate coconuts.

Life inside my bungalow was simple, but outside it was simply glorious.

Kev explained to me that the swells at Lakey usually come from weather happening at the bottom of the globe, down where the trade winds are swirling and thrashing around the Cape of Good Hope. So you’d know it was coming. You’d see the weather maps and then three days later, you could sit at breakfast in Lakey Peak and watch the swells rolling in.

* * *

One day, a family of termites decided to that the rim of the bak mandi in my bathroom would be a good place to relocate their colony. I advised them that it was a bad idea, and splashed a little water to suggest that they should reconsider.

The next day, I splashed rather more water at them.

They got the memo. The following day, the colony was gone as if it had never been there.

* * *

It had rained, and in Lakey Peak the magic mushrooms grow wild. The first day that I arrived, I had been startled by the sight of a young blonde woman in the shortest shorts I’d ever seen, staring intently at a coconut palm and the ground beside it. She seemed to be fascinated, was squatting there for hours, just looking at the plants. I greeted her and she seemed to look through me and away; she said a couple of words in a voice that suggested some kind of intellectual disability.

I didn’t think much more of it – the world is made up of all kinds, after all.

A few days later, she was perfectly normal. The mushrooms had been, she said, quite good.

* * *

* * *

Around ten or eleven o’clock each day, the local doughnut lady would walk between the cottages selling hot doughnuts. Filled with sweet shredded coconut, still warm from the wok, they were simple, edible joy.

Coming back from my swim, I would chase after the doughnut lady with my hands full of coins. I’d buy two: one for now, one for later.

Then, on the verandah of my bungalow, I would brew thick black coffee over my little petrol stove, and life was complete.