Dinner and a Show

The night we got back to Cape Town from the safari, there was a full parents and students dinner at Marco’s in City Centre (I always want to pronounce it “Cen-truh” for fun, but not everyone gets my humour.)

Marco’s is the first restaurant in Cape Town owned by a black (man, in this case.)  You get one hint as to his name.  We sat at long tables, and I thought the service was quick and the food was good.  Many of us had the ostrich fillet, which seemed a better option than the Senegalese Chicken (word from a reliable source on the African street is that Senegal is NOT famous for its food)

We all received two drink coupons.  Julia and I wisely chose the beer, while Carol went for the wine.  She DID manage to find the one bad wine in South Africa (don’t ask what kind – they poured it and brought it sans bottle).  Helpful tourist hint: when there is no choice of wine, and its built into the price, go with the beer.

There were two highlights to the evening.  The first was the four piece black band, soon accompanied by two attractive black female singers.  The band played a variety of African music and. . .wait for it. . .Elvis.  Yes, we realized we were listening to “I can’t help falling in love with you.”  (My brother Rick’s wedding song – yes Sandy was there too, but I gotta think that pick was his.)  Great song, but a little unexpected.  They did play some other American pop hits too, but mostly the equivalent of African soft rock (think 10CC’s “The Things We Do For Love” – whoops, sorry, my bad you have that song stuck in your head now. Hehehe.)

Like walking in the rain and the snow when there’s no place to go and you’re feelin’ like a part of you is dying.

No, they did not do that song – that’s the example to both give you a sense of the soft pop nature of the music, AND to get it stuck in your head!

Carol had an interesting observation – the sound is, logically, related to a Carribean calypso.  You could certainly hear the similarities to what clearly is a style brought to the New World by slaves, later financially enriching both Harry Belafonte and Jimmy Buffet.    

The other highlight was that Nelson Mandela’s great grandson, Luvuyo, joined the group for dinner.  Carol and I peg him for around 28 years old.  He gave brief remarks on the occasion of his birthday.  He was certainly charismatic, handsome, and you could see his great grandfather’s face in him.  If memory serves, Luvuyo is descended from a daughter in the first of Mandela’s three wives.

The best part came when the women singers got him to dance and then the band had him play their instrument.  A good measure of a person is how well they handle being put on the spot.  He found humour in the situation.  He clearly did not want to be on stage, but he took the risk and received the reward of an ovation.

His involvement with the SAS programme (sorry, South African English spellings in this post appear to be required) came because he is friends with Melissa Bingler, who ran the Parents Trip.

His last two years of high school, he was sent to boarding school in Charlottesville to play basketball.  While there, he got his act together as a student.  Melissa was in charge of student housing at the time, and she has remained in touch with probably eighty percent (by her count) of the students who passed through in her twenty years.

The name of the boarding school is St. Anne’s In the Belfry, which goes by the unfortunate acronym of STAB.  I would think a rebranding campaign is in order, but that’s just me!

After that, others in the group – and other groups, including two young girls – tried their hand at playing the instrument and/or dancing.  It was all in good fun, especially since I didn’t have to get up and try either of the two.  That would have been a catastrophic failure.