Gardens and recreation

"Oh, you're a little early!" exclaimed the woman we were visiting at the garden project in Mitchell's Plain.
"Ya, I know, sorry. But we can wait don't worry." I was taking a few visitors around my community partner sites; one of the components of my job that I do without thinking about it too much. I only ever visit the partners who're happy to interrupt their day to talk shit for a while and I think they quite enjoy it, regaling my foreign colleagues with twisted, funny and often wildly untrue tales. And why not, it's so tempting. My visitors' temporary pictures of Cape Town are blank canvasses, you really can paint on that canvas just how you like and some of my partners embrace that artistic liberty like Picasso on hallucinogenics.

We'd been in Makhaza the morning, then Khayelitsha, and we'd winded our way along Baden Powell Drive to Mitchell's Plain. I'd walked to the office to find the woman I needed to find, and yes, I was early. She exchanged a glance with the director, I couldn't quite work out what was going on.
"I'll just go wait at the car..." I started making my way to the door.
"No, no!" I was told. The director pulled a bit of a face, "it's just that we need to deal with a quick issue outside." The two of them shared an embarrassed giggle.
"Ok no, tell me!" I  smiled my demand, I stepped in closer to where they stood, and we formed a conspiracy of a triangle.
My tour guide looked to the director, the director looked to me, "well, it's just that that space down there is used by the community for a whole range of..." she paused, looking for the right word, "recreational activities."
In my experience, when someone talks about a recreational activity it's going to be of the sex, drugs and rock'n'roll variety. So, "aaah," I replied, "no I understand"
"Mm, we just have to clean some things up," explained my guide. "Go stand in the parking lot and I'll give you a wave when I'm..." another pause, "when it's all ready."

Walking around the garden later, she explained how plants grow here, despite the horrific soil that oscillates between sand and clay with nothing really nutritious in between. How they flourish while being pulled and pushed by the summer south-easter and winter north-wester. I've been visiting this garden for just over two years now and knowing what this space used to look like, I can see the magic that's embedded in the undergrowth. I feel kind of sorry for my visitors, sure it's a beautiful garden in it's own right, but it's the growth and change that they can't see that makes it so worth seeing. Kind of like seeing a frame of a movie that's paused on the cliff-hanger of the narrative, but not having a clue how the characters got there, not knowing the depth of their histories, hardly aware of their meaning... You can't really understand the extent of what's in front of you, can you?

I never did find out the cause of the euphemistic cleaning.