13 Apr Albie Sachs
I spent an evening last week with Albie Sachs, a former South African Constitutional Court Justice and revered anti-apartheid activist … and a most gracious and generous host
.Albie and his wife and enthusiastic chef-in-crime Vanessa, not only host regular gatherings for eclectic groups of family and friends who just happen to be in town, but they also host homecoming ceremonies for enslaved Africans who died in shipwrecks. Well, at least, they hosted one such ceremony for the Slave Wrecks Project, in honor of the men, women and children who perished on the São José de Paquette, the slave ship that set sail from Ilha de Moçambique in 1794 and wrecked a few months later off the coast of Cape Town.
You see, Albie’s house overlooks the wreck site of the São José. From his balcony, down the rocky slopes, directly beyond a palm tree, maybe 200 meters away, you can see two boulders poking out of the water, underneath which lie the scattered remains and accoutrements of the São José.
All agreed when the weather turned foul on the day of the ceremony that Albie’s house would be the perfect place to assemble the team and to carry out the charge laid on them by the descendants of those whose lives had been lost. They were asked to scatter soil from Mozambique across the wreck site so that the ancestors would finally have an opportunity to touch home after 200 years adrift.
You smell the sea from the balcony. You hear the buzz of conversations of neighbors across other bungalows nearby and the screams of children as they play below in the cold waters. You watch the sun as it begins its slow trajectory home after a bright day’s work. You chat with a motley crew of kids and adults who are activists, reporters, social innovators, enthusiastic swimmers, and you nosh on freshly-made pumpkin cakes and cashews and drink tonic water. You’re in Clifton Bay, one of the most exclusive and expensive areas of Cape Town. And you marvel at the ordinariness of all of this against the backdrop of a most heart-wrenching tragedy.
Albie understands the irony. He grew up here. But as a member of the African National Congress, he also spent years defending mostly black South Africans accused of crimes under the apartheid regime. He lost most of an arm and was blinded in one eye from a car bomb placed in his car while in exile in Mozambique as a result of his stance. And after he was appointed by Nelson Mandela to post-apartheid South Africa’s highest court, he wrote a landmark decision that struck down legal discrimination based on sexual orientation. It was revolutionary legislation, particularly in 2005, at a time when same-sex marriages were not allowed in most countries around the world. Albie seems to need to push beyond the accepted – and the normal – and toward that which he believes is greater and higher.
Albie steps aside in a quiet room and speaks poetically about the day of the ceremony and about his vision for the future of the wreck site. He and Vanessa have an idea for a memorial here; they imagine something unobtrusive and educational but that reminds their wealthy and privileged neighbors of what lies beneath, of the enormous legacy that surrounds them and that is now calling from the depths.
Thoughtful and measured … musical, eloquent and humble in his speech. You tell Albie that he reminds you of Maya Angelou, your auntie in spirit. And of course, he tells you that he received the 2010 Lincoln Medal at the annual Ford’s Theatre Gala (a gala chaired by then US President Barack Obama and an award given to those whose body of work demonstrates outstanding courage and character), and that Maya Angelou was a part of the ceremony.
He says he got to know her a bit and read all her books and that he is delighted at your comparison. You imagine his beautiful energy and hers, for one brief moment connecting, intermingling, expanding, pushing outward like a (nontoxic) mushroom cloud, enveloping and inspiring all that it touches.
You feel honored to be in his presence and touched by his graciousness and his kindness.
The waves still crash against the surf along Cape Town’s many bays and outlets with velocity and vigor. The finding of shipwrecks is a serious matter. There is much to say about the São José, which to my mind sits at the center of this work. Many more tales to come, my friends.
In the meanwhile, Albie, who usually smiles easily and with abandon, leans over as you prepare to take his picture and says quietly in your ear, “I can’t smile in front of this.”
And you agree. You straighten up a bit, too, the clamor fading around you both, his unsmiling face shining like a spotlight in the night, and you inhale softly, and honor the ancestors one more time – together.
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