Justin Pearce in Grahamstown National Festival of the Arts: With more events on offer than=20 anyone could hope to attend, the Grahamstown festival becomes=20 whatever its thousands of visitors want it to be CULTURE is still a weapon of struggle. At least, the Wimpy=20 workers seemed to think so when they drew attention to their=20 strike by singing outside the restaurant in Grahamstown High=20 Street last weekend. The South African Police Services disagreed.=20 Knowing that the official line has changed and that culture is no=20 longer a weapon of struggle, the police took the workers away in a=20 yellow van to teach them about cultural politics in a post- apartheid South Africa. The incident angered the half of the crowd that supported the=20 strikers, and provoked a sense of relief among the other half who=20 were really rather irritated by the workers blocking the pavement=20 instead of getting on with their R120-a-day jobs. Why couldn’t=20 they sing rugby songs like those nice children? Now that=20 Shosholoza has replaced Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika as the African=20 melody with the highest mlungu-recognition factor, there’s a=20 group of five kids, with or without gumboots, singing it wherever=20 you look on the streets of Grahamstown. The freelance singers are one of those brief glimpses of reality in=20 the multi-layered Never-Never-Land that is the Grahamstown=20 Festival. From the early festivals with their neat themes=20 (Beethoven this year, Shakespeare next), the Grahamstown=20 Festival has ballooned to a point where no one can hope to attend=20 even a 10th of the 500 events on offer. And so everyone creates the festival in their own image — and if=20 you want to, you can spend a week on nothing but jazz, or nothing=20 but tribute shows, or nothing but dance, or nothing but comedy.=20 The foyer of the 1820 Settlers’ Monument has come to look like=20 a papier m=89che building, with the layers of fringe posters=20 plastering every wall and dangling from strings slung across the=20
But, if you prefer, it is quite conceivable to ignore the posters and=20 get through the festival without buying a single show ticket. If=20 your idea of a holiday is to jol all night at a techno rave or sing=20 along to the cover versions in a pub, and spend bleary-eyed days=20 checking out the jugglers and free concerts on the Village Green=20 — it’s there for you to do. On one of the hills above the town, there’s a new age=20 encampment, full of people who’ll offer you a crystal massage=20 and tell you that the wind that’s been blowing for the past few=20 days is the result of the convergence of a nation’s worth of bad=20 karma on the small town. Trivial details like eating and sleeping become secondary to the=20 experience of being in Grahamstown. Walk past a parked car on a=20 frosty morning, and it’s not all that surprising to see figures=20 stirring underneath the mass of duvets that cover the seats. Then=20 there were the three Cape Town actors who didn’t even have a=20 car, and spent their first night in a park without even the benefit=20 of a tent.=20 The proverbial blue-rinse set, those who have been coming to the=20 festival since its inception in 1974 and who stay in nice, sensible=20 hotels, look rather lost these days as they duck under the posters=20 that flap from the Monument ceiling. For 10 days, the little town becomes a free zone, and you can=20 interpret “free” in the sense of free expression, free spirits or free=20 markets. (Just don’t count on free tickets.) Far from the conventional measurement of bums on seats, for=20 some people the festival is better judged in terms of litres of=20 veggie soup, kilograms of carrot cake, hectares of pancake and=20 metres of print fabric sold on pavements, in foyers and at the=20 Village Green.=20 A substantial number of traders have come from Port Elizabeth=20 and a few from as far away as Johannesburg for this bumper week=20 when the spending power of an entire country converges on the=20 impoverished Eastern Cape. What’s more, this town-sized street market deals in far more=20 than the conventional flea-market staples of tie-dyed T-shirts and=20 ceramic guinea fowl. One Gauteng trader arrived with a carload=20 of tropical fish tanks complete with goldfish — cash-happy=20 festival-goers will be balancing them on their back seats all the=20 way back to Jo’burg or similarly far-flung parts of South Africa.=20 The queues at the ATMs are often longer than the queue to see=20 Pieter-Dirk Uys. Affluent Grahamstonians make bucks on the side by bringing=20 their braai grids and Cadac stoves on to the streets to sell=20 boerewors rolls and soup — or go on holiday and rent out their=20
For the residents of Rhini township, who are worst hit by the=20 town’s staggering unemployment rate (estimates range from 65=20 to 85 percent), opportunities are not as many. Some sell fruit,=20 some wash cars, 500 have been accommodated in the temporary=20 festival jobs for which there were 6 000 applications. There was=20 very nearly another Wimpy Bar situation the day before the=20 festival began, when 100 of the unsuccessful applicants threatened=20 to protest. Some idealistic creative souls have plans to touch base with reality=20 by staging a carnival march on Friday, which will involve hand- painted banners and masks, and follow a route that will link Rhini=20 to white Grahamstown.=20 As long as they make it clear that they’re having fun and not=20 staging a protest, the police might even leave them alone. Hits, flops and memorable moments The one they’re all talking about: The Handspring Puppet=20 Company’s Faustus in Africa, combining puppetry, video and=20 * ive action in multimedia that works. Biggest flop: The Market Theatre’s Moja Moja. Thin plot,=20 pathetic dialogue, abysmal acting and not enough musical=20 * umbers to carry it through — was this really written and directed=20 by Standard Bank Young Artist Award winner John Ledwaba? Biggest embarrassment: The National Arts Coalition’s lecture=20 series. No one turned up to the first one, and they cancelled the=20 rest. With topics such as an international perspective on the rights=20 of the artist, are you surprised? Hmm … interesting: Abjater wat so Lag, brought to you by Die=20 Koninklijke Nederlandse Schouwburg. Exciting cross-cultural=20 marriage of musical and theatrical forms which somehow fails to=20 carry the show through its 80 minutes. Or maybe my Flemish just=20 isn’t up to scratch. Best mime: Ellis Pearson and Bheki Mkhwane doing bird=20 impersonations in Amazwi Omoya. Most kitsch production: Capab’s Boy Meets Boy. Striptease with=20 feathers, a transvestite Spanish dancer, and they got married and=20 * ived happily ever after. All it lacks is fur on the dashboard. Funniest moment: Rugby as a re-enactment of pagan fertility=20 rituals, in Myth Phalluth, presented by Rhodes drama students=20 and directed by Andrew Buckland. Biggest gross-out: A doo-wop song about genital mutilation, also=20 in Myth Phalluth. Biggest endurance feat: The cast of Reality Check What’s the=20 Point? who spent their first night in Grahamstown sleeping rough=20 in a park. Hottest fashion items: Leather jackets. Smurf hats (preferably=20 black). Dreadlocks (black or blonde). Red eyes. Best new street food idea: Crispy potato fritters. Best hang-out: Lynn’s, for good, cheap red wine and the best=20 pasta this side of the Mediterranean. Most popular conversational openings: Predictable jokes about the=20 unpredictable weather; “Is this soup really vegetarian?”; “Not=20 another fucking four-way stopstreet!”; “Hmm … interesting …=20 but I’m not sure …”