Towards inclusive nostalgia

Ah, nostalgia. Even the thought of it makes me nostalgic! When I look back on my childhood, I lived a life of ease and idyllic comfort, at the expense of the black people of South Africa.

Call it white guilt if you like, but it’s true.

For every halcyon day of joy and innocence that I spent on King’s Beach in Port Elizabeth, there was a black kid paddling in the muddy vlei behind Vuku Road, KwaZakhele, because he was not allowed onto the beach at all during the ’80s.

My schooldays were relatively privileged, blessed with quality curriculums, teachers and facilities. It was an incredible childhood and I will be forever grateful for it.

But any nostalgia that I indulge in for that time must be mitigated with the knowledge that it was a product of the exploitive and racist apartheid regime.

I know it’s an angsty thing to say, but I battle with nostalgia.

Facebook members will reminisce sentimentally about the old movie theatres, the beaches, the restaurants they used to frequent in those long-ago days of renown.

But sooner or later some denizen of the interweb will opine that yes, that tearoom was amazing, but it has all since collapsed. Decay has set in. The place has gone to the dogs.

All of this may be true, of the establishment in question. But there is sometimes an unspoken addendum: “…and so has the whole bloody country”. This is when nostalgia joins the Oblivious Racism WhatsApp group.

Indeed, much of our country is a burning chip shop of incompetence and corruption. This must be addressed. But the fall of colonial gentility is not a symptom of those governmental failures.

Those tearooms needed to close. It is right that black people by the thousand now bathe in their underwear on New Year’s day where permed white ladies once nibbled scones and cream.

Those are the foundations of a nostalgia yet to come.

The challenge is to fondly remember the glory days when we were kings and queens, and to do it without bitterness. To savour those days, because of the change. To celebrate that evolution.