Swimming with Cobras by Rosemary Smith Page A

madam!
    The subject of domestic work was very controversial and legal measures to regulate the practice were long overdue. It was no surprise in the early 1990s, during pre-democracy discussions, to find black caucuses citing domestic work as a matter of deep grievance and hear the wish expressed that there should be no more domestic labour once liberation had come. In the meantime, however, it was the conservative camp who reacted to Jacklyn’s book as though it were a threat. After its publication she began to be pestered by anonymous letters and phone calls. At times she received up to five calls a day. She’d hear an alarm bell ringing, or the ticking of a clock, or what sounded like an electronic scream. Once after a very nasty attack of encephalitis a voice said, “You have been sick; we are going to make you sicker.” Then one night the lights in her house went out and there was a crash through the window. A 20cm stick of dynamite had been hurled through the window, landing on the dining room table. Police and explosives experts arrived and neighbouring houses were evacuated. Fortunately, although the dynamite smouldered for about half an hour, it failed to explode.
    At GADRA and in the advice office we increasingly sensed that dynamite was smouldering all around us. The relentless poverty and deepening discontent, together with the escalating conflict between the forces of oppression and resistance, would surely soon explode. The Black Sash steadfastly stood against any form of violence but we grew fearful that the worst might be inevitable. The kind of treatment to which Jacklyn Cock was subjected became only too common in the years that followed, as the security forces tried to intimidate and clamp down on all elements of the liberation struggle.

Time out
    As an only child I had vowed that one day I would have a house full of children. My mother had been an only child and my father’s sister had no children, leaving me not only without siblings but without cousins too. I was determined to remedy the situation. Our four did not quite reach the vast numbers I had imagined, but they certainly filled our home. Malvern was a hands-on dad long before it was fashionable to be so, changing nappies, blowing noses and wiping away tears. Between us, he, Hilda and I fed and bathed the children, plaited the girls’ hair, sewed on buttons and took up hems, fetched and carried, comforted and scolded – and attended endless swimming galas. Our children were all excellent team swimmers and Malvern was an avid supporter. I cooked meals, Hilda baked bread, Malvern helped with homework. The result was a fairly ordered and very cheerful home.
    In the early days we took in lodgers to help pay for renovations to the house. One philosophy student spent most of the time in his room asleep behind closed curtains, until it became necessary for tutors and parents to intervene and psychiatric help to be sought. An American economics lecturer seemed to have difficulty communicating and related best to our cat. His silent, gangly presence in the house was depressing and fortunately he stayed only a few months. One of HW van der Merwe’s researchers, a relation of the Rothschild dynasty, came for a while and she became a friend. I often wondered what she thought of her lodgings, where some of the walls were still unpainted. We also took in several English Honours students whom Malvern knew, two of whom subsequently became his colleagues.
    Impecunious students often took their meals with us, which inevitably led to dinner table discussions on Hamlet or Heart of Darkness. But the point came when these debates interrupted family conversation. The children were impatient to tell their own stories and in fact we were all becoming keen to have more space. One year we holidayed in a large house in Cape Town where the children could each have their own room. A blissful silence descended, as bedroom doors were closed and