The last draw that broke the lady�s straw hat!

Barolong Seboni | Friday October 3, 2014 12:23

Taking centre stage as usual is our man Chicken, the economic exile from South Africa - Soweto to be more specific.

He recalls the time he was to wed some woman from the Free State, whose intimate acquaintance he had made through the personal columns of Drum magazine. As these things go in such cosmopolitan places as Soweto, Chicken and his “mathilala” already wanted to tie the knot after 3 months.

He has always wanted the “church- going types who wear straw hats.” Chicken prefers those because, in his own words; “not only do they go to church on Sunday on your behalf and cook the Sunday lunch, so that spiritually you are covered, and physically you are bloated, but they also mother you big time!”

And our man just loves being mothered and smothered. Not having had the experience of having a mother himself, he has therefore sought this essential aspect of childhood in his relationships with other women.

But, as luck would have it, the marriage was doomed from the start. “I will never forget that woman. She insisted that she wanted to get married in community!”

“So what?” asks Walkie, “what’s wrong with that?”

“She was confused, man. She wanted to get married in church at the same time. And besides, have you seen the state of the community halls in the townships? They are terrible, they haven’t been repaired since the day of the riots during the struggle.

The truth of the matter really is that I had two major problems with these venues. The church was a problem because although I’m a law-abiding, God-fearing Christian, I had never at that point gone near a church.

In fact, I had gone past several churches several times, but the opportunity ya gore ke kene mo teng had not presented itself until I wanted to get married to the church lady. And as for the community, that one is automatically out of the question, as a self-respecting gentleman.

Everybody in my circles gets married at the Sandton Sun, or at least ha go padile at the Holiday Inn. Nou wena, jy insist gore ek moet somaar get married in a community hall. Mare oa nklasa wena Walkie, and I just don’t understand why.

Ek verstan nie dai attitude ya gago towards nna! I really don’t understand why you don’t respect a man of my statue and calibre!” says Chicken with a very serious face.

Actually, dear reader, from whom I cannot withhold the honest truth, Chicken is not telling us the whole story when he says he doesn’t know the inside of a church.

The reason why he could not get married in his local parish is that he was banned from church when it was revealed that he was the ringleader in a township scam.

They were caught supplying church wine to local shebeens, which he got through a “contact” of his who was chairperson of the church purchasing committee.

It was this same “contact” who made available to him certain priestly attire in the form of cassocks and other holy accoutrements that he used on his rounds in his passionate drive to “raise funds for the poor, meek and downtrodden.” The contact blew the whistle when Chicken neglected to award him his ten per cent cut… I mean tithe.

But it is rumoured that the last straw that finally broke his engagement to the “straw lady” was when the cheques for the lobola started bouncing.

The young woman’s people would have no more of it. They came to fetch their child and niece as she was now “non-negotiable.”

And in the parting words of an uncle: “Lenyalonyana la di-postdated cheques will always bounce. This bride is returning to sender!”

The whole episode rendered Chicken not only penniless, but brideless as well.