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STORIES FROM THE ASIATIC BAZAAR Muthal Naidoo Stories from the Asiatic Bazaar ISBN: 0-620-35222-1 ©Muthal Naidoo October 2005 email: [email protected] Layout and Design: Quba Design and Motion Stories from the Asiatic Bazaar Muthal Naidoo CONTENTS Foreword Acknowledgments 1. Early Pretoria 2. Child of the Location: Boma 3. Following the Heart: Sinthumbi and Poppie 4. Satyagrahi: Thayanayagie Pillay (Thailema) 5. Passive Resister: Maniben Sita 6. Singer of the Majalis: Amina Jeeva 7. The Spirit of Independence: Thanga Kollapen 8. Filmmaker of the Location: Omarjee Suliman 9. A Vanished Community: ‘The Khojas’ 10. Seeking the Beloved: Jeram and Jaydevi 11. A Family of Sportsmen: Dhiraj Soma and Sons 12. Bioscopes and Achaar: The Chetty Brothers 13. Aluta Continua: Apmai Dawood Glossary Interviews References Addendum: An Outline of Indian South African History 1860 – 1960 5 FOREWORD emories, like dreams, having escaped from space and Mtime, follow a chronology of significance to the heart. The remembering mind isolates events, enhances them, and removes inconsistencies that indicate a more human, less exalted existence. In these biographical stories, based largely on memories with their built-in filters, those more fascinating human elements may have been omitted. As the act of recording requires authentication, it becomes necessary to return memories to specific historical, political, economic and social contexts in order to find congruence with actual happenings. In the process, wisps of memory, clues to forgotten events, take on substantial form when they connect with happenings described in little known written accounts. Such books and papers, no longer in circulation and gathering dust, suddenly assume new significance and personal collections become treasure troves. I was lucky to find treasures that included the work of local Indian writers and, in particular, the work of PS Joshi. With their help and the help of other historians, I have infused symbolic truth with worldly reality in my attempts to recapture the spirit of the times. My original intention was to write about the Cape Boys Location and Marabastad as well as the Asiatic Bazaar and to call my book “Memories of Marabastad,” but people who once lived in the Cape Location and Marabastad are writing or have written about these places and as their accounts would be more authentic, I decided, to confine myself to the Asiatic Bazaar. Once I began my research, I realised that just this one location offers a range of human experience that goes far beyond my capacity to capture it 6 all. This book, therefore, is only a small record of life in the Asiatic Bazaar. Many more wonderful stories are still to be told. The women and men whose stories appear in this collection, pass through our lives for the most part unknown and seemingly ordinary but they were involved in momentous struggles for human dignity and respect and some of them walked side by side with renowned figures such as Gandhi and Mandela. My immersion in the lives of these dozen or so individuals who lived in the Asiatic Bazaar, has given me insight into the indomitable spirit of a people who held fast to their self esteem, rose above degrading circumstances and prospered. Though their lives, greatly circumscribed by regulations and environment, focused on survival, the traditions that they brought with them from the mother country sustained them and helped them develop a close- knit, vibrant community They lived in overcrowded conditions and though the congestion was a curse, it was also a blessing as it minimized barriers of religion, ethnicity, culture, caste and race. Close proximity in the yards that enclosed them, turned neighbours into families and dependence on entertainment outside the home brought them together at the sports grounds, in the bioscopes, the streets, the cafés and dance halls. When they moved to Laudium, they lost the intimacy that engenders a strong community spirit and, with the blessing of apartheid, split up into ethnic and religious factions. Muthal Naidoo January 2007 7 INDIAN SCHOOL COLOURED SCHOOL MAKHOOLOO HOPAAN STRUBEN STR PRIVATE SCHOOL NAWAAB STR WHITE MOSQUE ROYAL TAMIL TEMPLE BLOED STR ORIENT BOOM STR AURANGAZEB STR EMPIRE MOGUL STR SEVA SAVAAJ PUTCO The Asiatic Bazaar 8 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS In sharing their stories and making available books, photographs, documents and newspaper articles, all the people whom I interviewed, helped me to write this book. I am most grateful to them for their patience and hope that in these short biographies, I have done justice to their fascinating lives. I wish I could have included the stories of all the people who helped me with contributions: Bob Bhaktawar, Ray Bhaktawar, Bradman Ernest, Joan Lalla, Mohammed Keshavjee, Sabera Khan, Ronnie Naidoo, Steve Vally and members of staff of Hoxies Fish Suppliers. I thank all my co-authors for their kindness and generosity. In addition, I am most grateful for the assistance received from: The African Window Museum, which made its resources available to me. Professor RC de Jong for maps of Marabastad. Susan who proofread the manuscript. 9 Street map: Marabastad 1888 (Location for African people) 10 CHAPTER ONE EARLY PRETORIA n the 1830’s, Voortrekkers, mainly farmers, came to settle north of the Vaal River where they laid claim to the land, set up a Boer Republic, and occupied sites that developed into towns - among them Potchefstroom, Klerksdorp, Lydenburg, Rustenburg and Pretoria. Those who settled in and around Pretoria lived in close proximity to Ndebele villages north of the Magaliesberg and to Tswana and Northern Sotho groups in the Moot and in the area that would become the city centre.I The Boers took up farming along the Apies River, employed African people from the surrounding area and provided accommodation for their workers on their farms and homesteads. As they did not want African people among them as neighbours, the Boer Republic of the Transvaal passed legislation to keep Africans out or to segregate them, and until after the Anglo-Boer War, African women were not allowed into urban areas. Such regulations contradicted the need for African labour especially after the discovery of gold on the Witwatersrand and during the two world wars. Efforts to limit entry of African people to labour only, being unpractical, were undermined by the provision of temporary accommodation in compounds and hostels and the development of informal settlements. Eventually, townships such as Bantule, Skoolplaats and Marabastad were proclaimed for African people. But the need for African labour, on the one hand, and the desire for segregation, on the other, continued to create confusion and led to onerous and incongruous regulations to control and restrict the movement of the indigenous population. When Indians and Coloureds arrived in Pretoria, they were subjected to similar controls. Many Indians, following developments in the mining industry, began arriving in the Pretoria area from the 1870’s. Most were traders and settled in the Prinsloo Street area and in the east around what is now Esselen Street. As their numbers increased, restrictions began to be placed on their mobility, their access to trade and the acquisition of land. Then, in 1892-3, the Coolie Location, adjacent to Marabastad, was proclaimed for Indians and those living in the town were 11 expected to relocate. The traders in Prinsloo Street and Hercules resisted the move and remained where they were until Group Areas Amendments forced them out of their residences in the 1960’s and ’70’s Coloureds from the Cape, who began to arrive in the Pretoria area from about 1884, owned or rented property in central Pretoria. When white residents complained, a location for Coloureds was proclaimed in 1899. The Cape Boys Location occupied three streets of the Coolie Location from Bloed to Struben Streets and Coloured people lived under similar restrictions and controls as Indian people. The Cape Boys’ In all, there were three locations in the Marabastad area: The Cape Location Boys Location, The Coolie Location (later the Asiatic Bazaar) and Marabastad for African people. Though they were separate, they were all part of one settlement generally known as Marabastad. 12 13 14 15 Back: Reggie, Seeni Front: Boma, Baba CHAPTER TWO BOMA Child of the Location y the time she was seven, Boma was already pursuing a life of crime. Like any miscreant, she was greedy, cunning, had no respect for authority and no conscience. As long as she could get away with it, whatever it was, she was okay. Her little sister, Baba, two years younger, was a bit of a pest. She had been brainwashed by Mummy and Daddy into believing that it was wrong to steal and tell lies and as the sisters spent most of their time together, Baba’s honesty really cramped Boma’s style. Whenever Mummy went out, Boma climbed onto the kitchen table so that she could reach the shelves from which pickled lemons, mangoes, and carrots beckoned to her. She couldn’t wait to get at them. BSkinny little Baba, standing in the middle of the little kitchen, her large eyes wide with disapproval, always yelled at her. “I’m going to tell Mummy when she comes back.” “I’m just taking a few. You want some?” Boma, on the kitchen table, holding out a soft, brown, lemon segment, grinned like a little devil. Baba, who was never hungry, couldn’t be tempted. “You know you’re not supposed to touch them. The pickles aren’t ready yet.” “I don’t care.” Her mouth crammed, Boma simply wrinkled her nose, Her little sister couldn’t understand this disregard for truth and honesty. “I’m going to tell Mummy.” “I’ll kill you if you do.” “Spanky, Spanky, Spanky,” Baba knew how much her sister hated to be called that as she had a secret crush on Spanky, a character in the Our Gang film shorts that they saw at the Empire Bioscope.