Mdukatshani - Fifty Years of Beading

Monica Lamula (58) started working at Mdukatshani as a girl, and was a qualified fencer when she started learning crafts in 1998. Despite failing health, she soon became adept at beaded copper bowls. A widow with a son and a family of stepchildren her home at Nomoya meant years of wading, always with an eye out for crocodiles. Today she uses the bridge.

It was a year without the ferryboat, so people kept wading. Once there were ferryboats all along the river providing a service when the river was high. The Nomoya boat was one of the last, landing our crafters on the bank at Nkwalini, about five kilometres from the farm. But it was always a risky undertaking. In 2005 a woman was drowned when the oarsman lost control in heavy currents, and when the boat was sabotaged in 2008, the owner decided he had had enough. For the next seven years Nomoya would have to wade, keeping an eye out for crocodiles. The drought years helped, exposing large sandbanks and reducing the river to trickle. There was also the distraction of the bridge. It took shape gradually above the sand, a stop- start development with concrete pillars that opened without fanfare in 2016. It’s difficult to do justice to its impact on the valley, providing a walkway for children to get to school, and opening up new routes to the towns.

But people still wade at the old crossings, taking short cuts between the banks. This is particularly true for the crafters of Msusanphi, whose village lies a long way from the bridge. It’s an hour on foot along their high mountain road. Another hour from the bridge to the farm. The bridge is useful when the river is in flood, but for the rest of the year they tie their skirts above their knees, and wade the crossing at Mdukatshani.

Crocodiles have become a common sight on the Mdukatshani stretch of the river. This one was photographed on Christmas afternoon 2009. It had just emerged from a pool where children had been swimming all morning. In 2019 local men killed a croc a little downriver on the farm.

Crocs appear and disappear with the seasons. This croc was one of a pair that basked on the island at Sahlumbe during the summers of 2009 and 2010. They were in full view of the road and the Sahlumbe wading place nearby.

Mdukatshani – Fifty Years of Beading

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