To me the most remarkable thing about the incident was the fact that such a trivial and relatively meaningless jest should have brought on such a disproportionate response. Tensions are great in South Africa and very little is required to bring them to the breaking point.
We ourselves were by no means immune. There was poison in the very atmosphere and doubts and dissensions began to work insidiously within our own group. Nick, Mickey, and Moto rarely left the boat, although they had many visitors, mainly from visiting Japanese ships. More and more they drew into themselves and there was a subtle atmosphere of brooding and dissatisfaction. Finally matters came to a head. Some small incident released the pressure and we had another “blowing off” session.
“Why you call us ‘boys’?” Moto, usually the peaceable one, demanded. “You think we are your servant!”
Shocked, we re-examined the term we had often used with reference to our companions as a group. We had always regarded Nick, Mickey, and Moto as a part of our extended family and just as we had referred to our two sons as “the boys” (and as I had often spoken of my wife and daughter collectively as “the girls”), so we had unconsciously stretched the terminology to include all the junior males of the Phoenix family. It had seemed less pompous than referring to them as “the Japanese” and more accurate than “the crew”—since all of us were crew together. Now, however, we realized that in many countries “boy” is a peremptory form of address used by a white man toward a colored person of any age, from one to a hundred. By speaking to outsiders of “the boys,” we had obviously given the wrong impression to many.
Thereafter we made a real effort to change our habits and began to substitute the term “men”—although we felt that our relationship lost something of its warmth and intimacy in the process.
Fortunately for our crew relations—and for the reputation of the white man in South Africa—there were those who extended friendship and hospitality to our entire group. Outstanding among these was Lindsay Moller, a South African “European” whom we had met fleetingly two years before when he had been vacationing on the Kona coast of Hawaii. He had given me his card and told me to look him up when we got to Africa—an eventuality that had seemed highly remote and problematical at that time when my main concern had been the next hop, around to Hilo. Yet now, miraculously, we had arrived on the far side of the globe. I had kept Lindsay’s card—and I dropped him a note.
He came down promptly and took us all in hand. The Mollers were heaven-sent for our needs, for they had a long list of assets over and above their warm hearts: two daughters, Christine and Vicky, who bracketed Jessica in age and quickly adopted her for the duration of our stay; a town house, which was convenient; a farm 22 miles up in the hills, which provided, in addition to an ultramodern piggery for 2,700 pigs, a swimming pool, riding horses, miles of walking trails, and an unsurpassed view of the mountains. Lindsay drove up to the farm every weekend and always had room for any and all, for a day or for the week. During our two-month stay in Durban, all of us took him up at least once, and Jessica, once the Moller girls were out of school for the “long vac,” became a permanent resident at the farm.
For the men, as was always the case in major ports, work on the boat came first. We made arrangements to haul out, to paint the bottom, and catch up on the many small jobs that had accumulated since Sydney. When we were put back in the water and the bill presented, we found there was no charge for the service and that all materials had been sold to us at cost (or “nett,” as the British have it). The bill was marked “Compliments of the Country.”
Jimmy Whittle, manager of the boatyard, and his wife Jean showed us many kindnesses, including inviting us for a memorable Christmas dinner along with all their visiting relatives from Griqualand East and Natal, a traditional English celebration with crepe paper hats, “crackers” to pull, and plenty of sixpenny bits in the flaming plum pudding for the young people to find.
Christmas shopping at the height of summer was an exhausting experience but full of interest and surprises in Durban. We found the big department stores in the center of town rather depressing than otherwise, with their mixed crowds of irritable Europeans and apologetic Africans (whose money was accepted graciously in any store, apartheid notwithstanding), but we never tired of browsing in the Indian and native markets, which somehow managed to remain off the beaten tourist track.