bethvale-blog

[bethvale-blog]

A roadside rest stop between Somerset East and Pearston. Many people in this part of South Africa’s Heartland are regularly on the move: fencers, farmers, farmworkers, farm working families and truck drivers. These rest stops are popular places to eat during a busy day. But eating on the move also often means convenience foods that come pre-packaged and ready-to-eat. In addition to eating on the move, the number of people on chronic medication also means that many take pills on the move. Along with many empty plastic bottles, I found empty blister packs — each one a medication for type 2 diabetes. 

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This wasteland, near Pearston, is in fact a dry dam. I’m told, by one of the farmworkers that, in the 1970s, he remembers the dam at full capacity with tourists diving, swimming and even using small boats. When I first arrived in this part of the Karoo, the region had been experiencing a severe drought — 7 years of below average rainfall. Now, in October 2019, Gift of the Givers has arrived in Graaff Reinet, where the dam has run dry, with the hope of assisting in the water crisis. The troubles with water in this region are as much environmental as infrastructural. Problems with the piping and purification of water compound problems of drought. Life without secure access to water has many consequences for health – beyond our obvious need to stay hydrated, we need water to take pills every day, to wash wounds, to cook, to grow food. Drought also makes farming more expensive, which means fewer workers are afforded, and fewer people making a livelihood through farming. 

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Ann’s Villa was a stopover point for many Karoo families passing through the Zuurberg. The resident blacksmith was on hand to repair wagon wheels and brand cattle. Travellers could buy farming implements or basic supplies at the general store, including medicines. At one point, Ann’s Villa served as a health resort and, like many other sanatoriums in the region, it marketed the benefits of the Karoo’s fresh air and high altitude. This selling point was particularly attractive to Victorian consumptives (TB patients).

[bethvale-blog]

In many of the Karoo towns I visit, the question of waste is at the centre of everyday local politics. Residents use it to bemoan ineffectual municipalities: a few organise drives, clearing litter along the river banks or the national highways. On windy days, plastic is flung against farm fences and cans shoot through the air like bullets. For waste-pickers, this is a livelihood: some are employed by public works, patrolling plastic in bright orange overalls. Others are trash-heap hustlers, setting up shack-lands on the outskirts of dumps and gathering recyclables in exchange for cash. 

As someone interested in health, I am interested in waste as a signal of consumption. Without the arrival of Big Food, Alcohol and Tobacco, much of this waste would not exist. In this region, the phenomena of overflowing litter is only a few decades old. 

This image, taken on the roadside of a municipal hospital, shows the intermingling of waste and fauna: the indelible imprinting of trash on the landscape.