Being a Black Springbok

Sibusiso Mjikeliso

Description

Thando Manana was the third black African player to don a Springbok jersey after unification in 1992, when he made his debut in 2000 in a tour game against Argentina A.
His route to the top of the game was unpredictable and unusual. From his humble beginnings in the township of New Brighton, Port Elizabeth, Thando grew to become one of the grittiest loose-forwards of South African rugby, despite only starting the game at the age of 16. His rise through rugby ranks, while earning a reputation as a tough-tackling lock and later open side flanker, was astonishingly rapid, especially for a player of colour at the time. Within two years of picking up a rugby ball, he represented Eastern Province at Craven Week, and by 2000 he was a Springbok.
But it isn’t solely Thando’s rugby journey that makes Being a Black Springbok a remarkable sports biography. It’s learning how he has negotiated life’s perils and pitfalls, which threatened to derail both his sporting ambitions and the course of his life.
He had to negotiate an unlikely, but fateful, kinship with a known Port Elizabeth drug-lord, who took Thando under his wing when he was a young, gullible up-and-comer at Spring Rose. Rejected by his father early in his life, Thando had to deal with a sense of abandonment and a missing protective figure and find, along the way, people to lean on.
Thando tells his story with the refreshing candour he has become synonymous with as a rugby commentator, pundit and member of the infamous Room Dividers team on Metro FM. He has arguably become rugby’s strongest advocate for the advancement of black people’s interests in the sport, and his personal journey reveals why.

Sujets

• Rugby & Football américain
• Rugby & Football américain
• Rugby
• Sport
• Recreation
• Rugby League
• Sports
• Histoire du sport

Informations

• Publié par: Pan Macmillan South Africa
• Date de parution: 01 juillet 2018
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9781770105454
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Being a Black Springbok


To my grandmother, Ntombizodwa Louisa Manana, and Uncle Melvin Li Choo, who are both late and who gave me a new perspective on life.


Being a Black Springbok
The Thando Manana Story
Sibusiso Mjikeliso
MACMILLAN


First published in 2017
by Pan Macmillan South Africa
Private Bag X19, Northlands
Johannesburg, 2116
www.panmacmillan.co.za
ISBN 978-1-77010-544-7
eBook ISBN 978-1-77010-545-4
© Sibusiso Mjikeliso and Thando Manana 2017
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
Editing by Sean Fraser
Proofreading by Wesley Thompson
Cover design by K4
Front cover photograph by Nicolise Harding


Contents
Author’s Note
Foreword by Allister Coetzee
Introduction
New Brighton
Absent Father
Grandma Fills the Void
Flirting with Cricket
St Thomas
Uncle Mel and 71 Martin Street
Becoming a Man
On the Stage
Introduction to Rugby
An Unforgettable Trip
Led Astray
Chapman High School
Craven Week
Drug Lord
Crusaders-Tech
Moving up the Ladder
From Darkness Comes Light
Reaching for a Dream
Making a Name for Myself
The Springbok Saga
Feeling Blue
Dressing-Room Culture
My Good Friend Solly
Curtain Call
The Irish Mean Business
Theatre, My Old Love
Love and Lwethu
Time for Real Change
Acknowledgements
Pictures


Author’s Note
He’s tall, a bulky man, built tough, and he doesn’t smile when you first meet him. His shoulders are broad and his handshake is the human incarnation of the Jaws of Life.
That was my first impression of Thando Manana when we met at the Kings Park media centre after a Super Rugby game in which the Sharks had played in 2014. I’d heard of the man – very few who followed rugby in the late 1990s hadn’t – and had seen a little of him in action.
His eyes looked right through you, almost Joost van der Westhuizen-like. He kind of sussed you out, to check whether your rugby credentials met his lofty standards. I was no encyclopaedia of rugby knowledge but something about me, while we were standing by the bar waiting for our good mate Innocent to serve us our traditional post-match drinks, must have told Thando I knew a bit about the sport – enough for him to give me a chance to tell his life story.
Without even asking much about who I was, he told me about the ‘Back Pages’ idea he planned to do for his Sunday show on Radio 2000, and that he wanted me to be involved. I must confess, I’d never listened to the show before but after that day I have hardly missed an episode. And just like that, a friendship and a working relationship were born – ones that I’m certain will last for a very long time.
I neglected to tell him, though, that I had been offered an opportunity to work on the Sunday Mirror in London for a few months, thus jeopardising the ‘Back Pages’ insert on his show for at least two weeks. Thando wears his heart on his sleeve and takes everything personally, but he never held it against me. I called him from Bermondsey in a panic, remembering that I hadn’t even given him time to find a temporary replacement while I was away. I was profusely apologetic and relieved that he’d found an able replacement in another good friend, Khanyiso Tshwaku.
We got to hanging out a lot, him sharing stories from his regretfully (in my view) short career and me staring at him wide-eyed, like a child listening to his grandfather’s stories.
One day Thando said he wanted to write a book and had asked my good mate and prolific wordsmith Lungani Zama to do the writing but things hadn’t moved beyond just talking about the idea. I said I’d do it, if he gave me the opportunity.
The London experience had taught me to dream more, to look beyond what I could do to satisfy my job requirement. I’d worked at Wimbledon for the full fortnight, covering both the men’s and women’s finals. I also attended the Aviva Premiership final between Northampton Saints and Saracens at Twickenham. I’d interviewed people I never thought I’d ever see in person, much less have a conversation with or get to quiz at press conferences, among them José Mourinho, Andy Cole, Serena Williams and Roger Federer.
Writing, for me, has always been more than a passion. My entire being is made up of the words I’ve written or of the ones I’ve thought about writing. Not a day goes by that I don’t think of a one-liner or a unique way to describe something. Given the chance, I’d probably match-report anything, from the Titanic sinking to raindrops falling (though I’d rather not). But I only truly realised I had no limits when I came back from London.
In Thando I found the perfect enabler and, with Zams’s blessing, we went at it full tilt.
In February 2016 we recorded our first session. I had taken leave from work and caught a bus home to East London, where I’d borrowed one of my dad’s cars (which broke down the night before I went to Port Elizabeth to start the first of our epic recording sessions). Then I’d hitchhiked the three-hour distance to Port Elizabeth, but I didn’t really care. Obstacles like that almost pale into significance when your dream is within sight.
Thando hosted me almost every time I was in Port Elizabeth – we weren’t merely recording, we were developing a friendship. I think that’s the only way this book could have been done. I told him not to leave out a single detail. And he never did. I knew I’d reached his most sensitive and most sincere inner core when, sitting on the patio of his beautiful house at Blue Water Bay, he became emotional when talking about his late Uncle Mel, an endearing man I wish I had been able to meet and interview for this book. Thando’s mother, Khathie, also spoke fondly of Uncle Mel. She called him an angel and then cried tears of gratitude and longing.
I knew then that I wasn’t just writing a book for personal gain or to grow my profile as a writer; I had the responsibility of retelling a man’s life story. I had to feel what Thando felt, his pain, his anguish, his joys and his bruises. It got to a point where I had entered his mind and, vicariously, retold his many days of training alone, as though the pain and the gain were my own.
That said, I will have succeeded if I become non-existent as you journey through Thando’s life because this story, with all the bloodstains and confetti on its pages, belongs exclusively to Thando Manana and to those who helped him shape his incredible life.
Sibusiso Mjikeliso
Johannesburg
May 2017


Foreword
Thando had everything required for a long career in rugby – the size, the physique, and everything that comes with it – but I never thought that he would be a rugby player. He was a clever chap and was always bound to search for bigger challenges once he got to the top. His intelligence was always going to lure him elsewhere. He knew it too.
The first time we met was when I was his PT teacher in the late 1980s. I started teaching at Gelvan Park Primary School in 1985 and at the time I played cricket for United Cricket Club in the township. There weren’t a lot of black pupils at our school back then but the school had recently opened its gates to all kids.
Thando was part of the early crop of pupils who were able to attend Gelvan Park. The school never offered rugby but focused on academics, and sports such as cricket and soccer. I coached cricket and soccer at the school, although I played provincial and national rugby.
But now and then, during PT, I would let the kids play a bit of touch rugby.
Thando was a busy little pupil. He learned to express himself from a young age and was jovial and happy in the school environment. He had a lot of confidence in himself, despite the change of surroundings at a so-called coloured school.
Thando was a bright boy, and that played in his favour. He had a playful naughtiness, and would distract the other kids, but he did his work and excelled in academics.
In his last year at primary school, I happened to meet this Manana boy in my Afrikaans class. It was quite an experience. He took to Afrikaans quite quickly and he had an inquisitive mind. He could keep you busy as a teacher.
This pretend stand-up comedian loved to imitate teachers’ mannerisms and speech, making the class laugh when the teacher was not around. One day, instead of going directly into the class before the lesson, I stood outside the door and watched him from the door, which was left ajar. I could see him imitating the different teachers, especially the maths teacher, Mr Wagner. Mr Wagner was an old guy with little patience who couldn’t work with strugglers. He used to call pupils funny names like: ‘ Jy’s ’n regte wors ’ (‘You’re a real sausage’). So Thando was imitating this guy and the other pupils found his copycat antics hilarious. I just shook my head.
Thando was surrounded by rugby people in the township, and that is how he ended up playing for Spring Rose. Towards the end of my career, I was playing for Harlequins. He would join me for light training and jogging on the beach during the time I was preparing for the upcoming rugby season, in early January.
The two of us used to run shuttles together and do what was then called a Hennie Muller (running across the entire rugby field in figures of eight). I must say, even at that young age, he was very competitive and athletic.
These fitness sessions took