Home and away

Last night I went home, if only for a little while. Which was somewhat surprising considering that I'm pretty sure it was my mother, not I, who earlier in the day had boarded the Gatwick Express to head back to Jozi.

Yet there I was, surrealy so, sitting in Soho's Lyric theatre tapping my tootsies to Tamara Dey and coming up for air in between waves of laughter brought on by the likes of David Kau, Martin Jonas and Riaad Moosa; the SA comedy heavyweights as they like to be called.

And even old faithfull, Alex Jay was there. Ag sweet man!

And, ahem, I know this will sound strange, so I'll whisper, but there were real proper black people there too! Not many, granted, but at least they were real; the kind of people that have rhythm, can say 'eish' and think that Ainsley Harriott sounds 'bietjie odd'.

Now now, before you get all uppity with me for talking race, let me tell you why.

You see it's an odd thing, to find yourself surrounded by South Africans, chuckling knowingly through South African humour in a gilded theatre one step out of the glow of Piccadilly Circus's lightspan. And it is in this setting, when one is out of context, that aspects of home strike, well, home.

And last night, it was race and culture.

You see, I think that without exception, each of the nine comedians that appeared used as a source of material either black people, coloured people, Afrikaners or Indians - yes, as black and white as that. And sure, it was refreshing to see a full cultural range of players but I couldn't help but think how even now, race and culture appears to be such a central theme in South African life. And I'll admit, it was strange and my knee-jerk reaction was 'this isn't right'.

I've always felt lucky to be born when I was, for as a child of the late seventies I am young enough not to have to bear the guilt of apartheid, old enough to remember its reality and consequences and lucky enough to have a vibrant social mix of friends. I suppose I forget though, that we've only been a democracy for 12 years and that this is not nearly time enough to shake free entirely of the race cloud that hovered over our country for so long.

But actually, is cultural categorisation of this nature necessarily a bad thing?

Living in London, a cosmopolitan city if ever there was one, I am struck by two things. 1) How many cultures exist here but, sadly, 2) how strength of culture is being diluted. It might be that I am alone in this, but for me the complexity and diversity of cultures is what makes the world an interesting place and it saddens me that 'democracy' and 'equality' are to a certain extent watering down the richness of cultural diversity. As a traveller I am drawn to places where life, not just landscape, is different. Yet as the world 'advances' so its people become achingly similar.

What will all this mean for South Africa? Will our unique past, a canvas not lighty touched by the brushstoke of race, serve to protect our differences, or will our quest to break free from our past be such that in its demise, apartheid, the one system that recognised racial and cultural differences (albeit negatively), will lead directly to the total equalisation of our people? Is our future, a product of our past?

Like most of my questions, this one has no clear answer. Yet. I suppose that for now, comedy is just one of the many tools employed in the exploration of our diversity, and so though superficially it may seem wrong, perhaps its themes are healthy. It will be nice though when our colourful make-up is served as a flavour-enhancing condiment, rather than as the main course!