Every night is fright night

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It is Halloween on Wednesday and I, for one, cannot wait to put on my succubus suit and go creeping around the neighbourhood late at night banging on doors, shouting: “Trick or treat!”

The real sport starts when the homeowner presses his panic button. You then have seven minutes to break into the house, tie the occupants up, find a treat and get out before an armed response unit can shoot you in the face. The kids love it.

For a lot of South Africans, every night is Halloween. The only difference is that these perennial pranksters can’t be bothered to dress up. To be fair, though, some do make the effort and put on a balaclava. Traditionally, a treat is a handful of sweets or, if you hit a vegan house, an eggplant without the egg. Our year-round rogues rarely settle for less than cellphones, money and guns. Or, at the very least, an HD-ready TV. Anyway. Who are we to judge? A treat is mos a treat.

I would advise against opting for the trick unless you want to watch someone juggling with your testicles or super-glueing your wife to the wall.

I have celebrated Halloween ever since I was dishonourably discharged from the army of Christ in the early ’80s. Standards were higher back then. These days they take anyone.

I would like to call myself a pagan, but I can’t. Worshipping nature is all very well if it knows its place. By this, I mean its place is not down my broeks stinging my bollocks to death. Nor does it have any business trying to crush me, drown me or bury me alive. It would be a far better idea if nature were to worship us. That way, the ants would stay out of the butter and sharks would be a little nicer to us. Is that too much to ask?

Besides, I have grown weary of flappy-lipped adherents of monotheistic religions using “pagan” in a pejorative sense while relying on me not to over-do the sacrificial lamb at our Saturday night synod. Adding insult to injury, they are the ones who invariably bogart the bong. Bloody heathens.

I generally refrain from defending my position for fear of inviting the fate met by Hypatia of Alexandria, a pagan philosopher, mathematician and astronomer who was killed by a Christian mob in 415 CE.

Unfortunately for the employed, Halloween is not a public holiday in South Africa. If only the Soweto Uprising had taken place on 31 October instead of 16 June. Youth Day would be so much more entertaining if it were combined with Halloween. The horror is already there. All we would need are police uniforms, nitrous oxide grenades, a few dozen crates of cherry-flavoured vodka and some live music. Also some live ammunition. And a smattering of German Shepherds all sniffed out and hoping to reach retirement age without any major drama.

At this time of year, carving vegetables into grotesque shapes is popular in some cultures. In my house, it’s called dinner. In Ireland and Scotland, they use scooped-out turnips. It’s that lack of imagination that allowed the English to oppress them for so long. In America, they use pumpkins. In Israel, they use Palestinians.

I don’t know what we can use here. If I tell people that instead of eating their madumbi this week, they should carve them so they look like little tokoloshes, they will think I work for the DA. And if I tell them to put a small candle inside the hollowed-out madumbi, they will think I work for the municipality. Either way, I’m screwed.

If only we could make some kind of genetically modified clone of Julius Malema’s head and carve that instead of wasting perfectly good vegetables. It’s the ideal shape and consistency. And scary as hell.

Halloween’s imagery is derived from horror movies and stories like Frankenstein and Dracula. Here, it can be derived from films and books like There’s A Zulu On My Stoep and Bitch, please! I’m Khanyi Mbau.

There are many overseas traditions that can be adapted to local conditions. Take apple bobbing, for instance. Instead of using your teeth to grab an apple from a bucket of water, you must use your political connections to win a tender wrapped in fly-paper and coated in honey. This creates a hilarious yet potentially sticky situation, especially if the Hawks find out about it.

The telling of horror stories is also a popular feature of Halloween. Gather the children around and, in the unlikely event that Eskom hasn’t already done it for you, switch off the lights. Tell them about The Picture of Dorian Gray or The Man Whose Mouth Tasted of Wormwood or The Second Coming of Jacob Zuma.

The important thing, comrades, is not to let your Halloween be co-opted by the Christians. We are more Nosferatu than we are Cosatu. No praying. No fasting. No skiving off to church.

Deconstruct all that Celtic reconstructionist propaganda and unleash your demons.

Crime me a river

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I went to a braai on Saturday night. It was either that or give heroin a try. The house was full of normal people with normal faces and normal jobs. I should have gone with the heroin.

Braais aren’t what they used to be. It could be a generational thing or maybe it is location-sensitive. It could also be organised religion up to its old killjoy ways. Put any six people around a braai these days and at least one of them will be offended if you happen to shout, “Jesus!” for any reason other than being spontaneously suffused with the glory of God. Even if your flaming sambuca has set your hair alight. It’s epiphany or nothing.

Braais used to be things you went to so you could relax. I have been to braais so relaxed that it would be way past midnight before anyone remembered to light the fire. Or buy the meat.

Many of our braais simply turned into fires, some of which burned out of control for days. Our braais were an opportunity for friends to let their hair down. Or dye it purple. Or shave it into a mohawk.

The women weren’t in the kitchen making salads. They were staggering about the garden shrieking like lunatics and chucking tequila down their throats. The children, bless their black little hearts, were kept busy rolling joints for the grown-ups. It all worked very well. Until someone with a heart murmur would arrive with a bottle of amyl nitrate.

This braai I went to was attended (in the old days it would have been invaded) by your common-or-garden SABS-approved types. Creative accountants, financial advisors who lie for a living, paunchy tax evaders laughing the loudest, property developers with blood on their teeth, doctors milking the medical aid system and sweaty divorce lawyers fresh from bayoneting the wounded.

Once the chops are down, the talk turns to crime. Or rugby. Same thing, really. As far as I’m concerned, rugby is a crime. “Ja ay, speaking of the Stormers getting robbed, I know this oke down the road that got hit by a bunch of them who cleaned his house out and then sommer ironed his face.” Disgruntled domestic workers, probably.

The stories get wilder. It turns into a game of oneupmanship. I take the gap. “That’s nothing,” I shout. “A dingo ate my baby!” It was the wrong moment to lose my balance and almost knock the braai over, but I think my point was made.

I bet when cops braai, they talk about the books they’ve read and argue about what Descartes really meant when he said, “Cogito, ergo sum.”

The fire appeared to be dying so I began throwing bits of scrunched-up newspaper onto the coals. Those who take their braais seriously put this kind of behaviour on a par with paedophilia. Rather than getting a braai fork through the throat, I wandered off and read the newspaper instead.

It was a community paper, a mine of useless information swaddled in lashings of sunshine journalism. Under the headline, “Safety in North Durban”, residents shared their views on the darkie problem. They don’t call it that, of course. They call it the crime problem. It’s a delightful euphemism that helps keep accusations of racism at bay.

Here’s a good one: “I feel unsafe knowing KwaMashu, the crime capital of South Africa, is on our doorstep.” I imagine her, sitting at her William IV mahogany writing table in her horrible house dress and sensible shoes, dashing off one outraged letter after another in the hope that someone will take notice and move KwaMashu a little further to the north.

Madam, I do not know what your name is, but I shall call you Maude. It rhymes with bored. Which, I assume, is what you have been ever since your husband left you for someone who didn’t hear intruders in the house seventeen times a night.

If you are looking for someone to blame, Maude, which I expect you are, then may I suggest you follow the lead of our former president and blame apartheid? Prior to 1958, a not-inconsiderable number of Africans lived in Cato Manor, a safe distance from suburbia.

When the arch-liberal Hendrik Verwoerd came to power, he heard about the plight of these people and created an entirely new town for them. He called it KwaMashu – Place of Indescribable Beauty.

In a speech he made at home on a Saturday afternoon before going across the road to watch an international rugby match between Transvaal and the Orange Free State, he said all Africans deserved their place in the sun. Now, thanks to fifty years of deforestation, they have it.

Hold on. Where is this information coming from? Wikipedia has a completely different version. They claim the township’s name means Place of Marshall, in honour of Sir Marshall Campbell. An English settler, he was partly responsible for covering most of Durban’s hills with sugar cane.

We also have him to thank for introducing rickshaws to Durban. Without having a black man to pull me around, I would never have gone anywhere as a child.

Sorry, Maude. Got a bit carried away there. That was a rickshaw joke, in case you didn’t get it. So. What are we going to do about your problem, then? Either we move KwaMashu or we move your doorstep. I imagine you aren’t keen to move, and rightly so. I have no doubt you were living in your house long before the Nguni-speaking upstarts swarmed into the area two thousand years ago.

I am offering to spend the next couple of days driving through KwaMashu with a loud-hailer fitted to my roof informing half a million people that Maude of Durban North has requested they disperse in an orderly fashion to a place that is nowhere near her home.

These people will listen to me, Maude. I am known in these parts as the Zulu whisperer. Zulus are shouters. When you whisper they become confused and follow you, if only to find out what the hell it is you’re saying.

If all goes well, Maude, you will be able to safely leave your house by the end of the year. Just imagine – Christmas lunch next to the pool instead of in the fortified panic room!

Someone else wrote, “I can’t even pop down to the shop to buy bread without worrying if we are going to be caught in a robbery. What is happening? It’s like the devil has discovered Durban all of a sudden.” Don’t be ridiculous. The devil discovered Durban a long time ago. Why do you think it’s so damnably hot? And have you seen the city centre lately? If that isn’t hell, I don’t know what is.

Someone else wrote: “They aren’t scared of dogs either!” What? This is terrifying news. “They” have always suffered from cynophobia. Dogs were our last line of defence. Now what do we do? I’ve got it. I bet They are still scared of water. Dig moats, people! Dig for your lives!

 

It’s that time of the month

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A few years ago a friend invited me to join him on a refresher course on female anatomy at my local branch of Teazers. I had been married for some time and thought it might be a good opportunity to see if everything still looked the way I remembered it.

We took our seats and ordered a drink. It seemed to be a popular course because most of the tables were occupied. It wasn’t long before one of the instructors presented herself at an adjacent table and embarked upon a well-rehearsed routine that captured our interest.

A second instructor sashayed up and enquired whether we would be interested in what she had to offer. We smiled graciously and said we were fine, thank you very much, and returned our attention to the neighbouring table.

To cut a short story even shorter, she wilfully accused us of something called roofkyk. Like all the best Afrikaans words, there is no English equivalent. We weren’t to know, but apparently it is considered vulgar and disrespectful to piggyback off a tutorial someone else is paying for. We were quite literally guilty of stealing a look.

Which brings me to the matter at hand, so to speak. For those with jobs, today is the day that your employer remunerates you for your services. It is also the day that I remind you, The People, of your commitment to keep me and my cat in food and beer on condition that I keep writing.

PayFast will help you stick to your end of the bargain. If you take out a monthly subscription for one year, I’ll throw in a free ebook of your choice.

Roofkyk must fall.

 

To the Matric Class of 2018

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Dear adultlings,

Congratulations on making it to the end of the beginning. Twelve years of being bullied, belittled and, in several thousand cases, banged up. A South African education prepares you for real life like no other.

I wish I could give you some advice on how to get through the exams without suffering a nervous breakdown. When I hear the word ‘exams’, my sphincter snaps shut and my knees sweat. And that’s not only because the last exam I took involved my prostate.

I regard the brutally interrogative nature of exams with fear and loathing. Sit down and shut up. Don’t move. Don’t look around. Answer these questions. Now. Think very carefully before you answer. Tell us how much you know. Tell us everything. And be warned. If your answers are wrong, we will make sure you never go to university. You will never find a job. We will destroy you.

If it were up to me, kiddo, you wouldn’t be asked to simplify tan(90° + x) .sin(-x-180°). In fact, I can’t believe they are still teaching this filth in our schools. If you are 18 and interested in relationships between fixed points and angles, you’re in a whole lot of trouble and I can’t help you. Trigonometry is the work of the devil. Sure, it can tell you the distance to a nearby star. But why do you need to know this? Are you planning on going there? Don’t you think your mother would start worrying when she last heard from you five light years ago?

The only numbers you need to know are the cellphone numbers of people who work for the government. Call them up and ask them to organise a job for you. Bribe, blackmail or threaten them. The main thing is to get your bum in the butter.

If you don’t manage to crack the Grade 12 pass mark of 30 percent, don’t despair. President Zuma has a Grade Four education and look how well he did. Of course, you are going to have to find a way of getting other people to subsidise your lifestyle. You probably have the gift of the gab, right? After all, you must have spent the last decade talking in class instead of paying attention. Start a political party. Tell people they will rot in hell if they don’t give you money. And smile a lot. If you can dance, so much the better. Make sure they watch your feet, not your hands.

The rest of you will soon have a senior certificate in your grubby little paws. This is an important piece of paper and will come in useful when you’re jobless and homeless and need something to burn to keep warm at night.

As a new cog in a very old machine, you may feel a little lost in this big, grown-up world. Don’t worry. It won’t last for long. Soon you will have lots of new friends phoning you at all hours of the day and night. Many of them will work for SARS, the municipality, traffic department, insurance companies, estate agencies and banks. Not all of them will want your money. Some will want your vote. Others will want your soul. Try to fight off the politicians and proselytizers for as long as you can.

Also, get yourself a gun. Especially if you live in KZN. If you find yourself being chased down the N2 by the police or hemmed in by a car full of blue-light bodyguards, the decent and patriotic thing to do is shoot yourself. This spares them the trouble of having to do it and they can get back to doing the important work we pay them to do.

Good luck, then. I do hope you aren’t the ones to nudge my country over the edge and into the abyss.

 

A plague on the House of Sword

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As the world now knows, journalist Jamal Kashoggi was tortured, murdered and dismembered inside the Saudi Arabian Consulate in Istanbul earlier this month. He was there to obtain a marriage license. It reminded me of a letter I wrote to Saudi Arabia almost three years ago to the day in connection with another incident perpetrated by this charming nation.

 

Dear Saudi Arabia,

Congratulations on your decision to kill the Shiite boy who goes by the name Ali Mohammed al-Nimr. Teenagers are dreadful at the best of times, what with their sighing and eye-rolling and endless demands for human rights and justice. If I had my way they would all be put to death.

I suppose I shouldn’t call him a boy. He is, after all, 20 years old. However, he was still a teenager when he committed the dastardly crimes for which he must die. Apparently he participated in the Arab Spring protests in 2012. Is that right? My kid once participated in a school play and by the end of it I wanted to slaughter the entire cast and most of the audience, so I know how you feel.

I gather you are breaking with tradition and not beheading the lad. Well done. Beheading is too good for some people. Crucifixion is the only language this generation understands. Well, that and textese and SMSish. Hang on. I’m getting conflicting information here. Some reports say you’re going to behead him and then crucify him. I don’t want to sound like a liberal, but isn’t that quite literally overkill? I apologise. You obviously know what you’re doing.

I’m a bit worried, though. Crucifixion can lead to new religions forming and nobody, least of all you, wants that happening. Yes, I’m talking about a certain Mr J Christ of Bethlehem. If the Romans had let him off with a light whipping and a warning, Christianity would probably not exist today. And even if it did, their symbol certainly wouldn’t be a cross. I’m just saying be careful, that’s all.

Your own media, which never gets anything wrong under pain of death – in my country that’s just an expression – said you wanted to string up the body after the beheading as a warning to others. I may be out of line here, but would the average Saudi be shocked at the sight of just one body? From what I’ve heard, one can barely move in Riyadh for the corpses of people executed for jaywalking or littering. That’s just the men. Apparently the countryside is littered with the bodies of female radicals who were caught driving, watching television or talking to men who weren’t their brothers.

Wouldn’t it be more effective to round up everyone who participated in the Arab Spring and crucify the lot of them? You could do a thousand a day for three months. If the United Nations starts gnashing its gums, tell them it’s none of their damn business what you do. Tell them it’s population control. If they threaten to pass a resolution, threaten to fire nuclear missiles into New York. You do have nukes, right? You’d better have, or even Israel could whip your ass.

I hear France has also asked you to call off the execution. France! That’s a laugh. After the terrible things they did in the Congo. No, wait. That was the Belgians. Same thing. If they want a united Europe, then all of Europe must take collective responsibility for all the horror.

At least you don’t have to worry about Britain putting the boot in. Their prime minister is too busy doing damage control after it emerged that he stuck his honourable member into a dead pig when he was younger. Also, they really want to land that £6m contract to provide prison expertise to your country. To be honest, I’m surprised you still bother with prisons. Decapitation is so much more cost-effective in the long run. I hope you’re not going soft on us.

By the way, congratulations on being chosen to head up the UN human rights council. This couldn’t have come at a better time for you. It doesn’t matter how much the limp-wristed dolphin-kissers wave their yoga mats and rattle their daisy chains, the fact remains that the US State Department has welcomed it, as do all right-wing, I beg your pardon, right-thinking members of the global community.

By the way, you might want to get the plasterers in. I hear there are some nasty cracks developing in the House of Saud. The last thing you want to do is let the light in.

Application for the position of IT Chief Officer: SA Revenue Service

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Dear Sir/Madam,

I greet you as Sir/Madam because I do no know if you are a Sir or a Madam or even a Sir as well as a Madam, like Caitlyn Jenner. I am simply covering all bases, as you would expect from your future head of Information Technology.

To be honest, working for SARS was never really part of my life plan. Not that I have one. But if I did, I doubt it would involve working for the taxman. Not that I have anything in principle against taking from the poor and giving to the rich. It’s just that I am not very good at numbers.

I only decided to come and work for you after watching an interview with your current boss of IT, Mmamathe Makhekhe-Mokhuane. It was patently clear that MMM or, to simplify it, M³, is one of those rare people who pretend to know less than they actually do. Whether it’s a self-defence mechanism or a tactic to lull the enemy (journalists, commissions of inquiry etc) into a false sense of security, she has absolutely mastered it.

After watching M³ being interviewed on SABC, I am certain that I know more about IT than she does. For instance, I know how to copy and paste, use a cellphone and replace the paper in a Xerox machine. Can she do that? Exactly. What really attracted me to the position, though, was the news that M³ earned just under R3-million for a month short of a year’s work. I use the word ‘work’ loosely.

I am sure you are reluctant to get rid of one of SARS’ most promising employees. Quite frankly, I don’t know what she has been promising but I can promise you that my promises will be bigger and better. For instance, M³ attended four out of fourteen management meetings in the last few months. I promise to attend none.

Like her, I also know how to handle tough questions, whether they be from reporters or the head of a commission of inquiry. For example, when the Nugent Commission asked what she meant when referring to people who had been at SARS for years, she replied: “The Drakensberg Boys Choir was established in 1967. If you are a girl, the establishment doesn’t allow you to go there. It is 2018 but the Drakensberg remains a boys choir … and they sing quite well.”

This is a very good answer, but I could have done better. If I was in her position and someone asked me about, say, the state of IT infrastructure at SARS, I would have said, “In order to find out if a female giraffe is ready to mate, a male will use his head and rub her backside until she pees. He then drinks the urine to find out if she’s in heat.” Take that, Judge Nugent! Game over.

Is it true that your organisation’s IT infrastructure has been neglected for four-and-a-half years? That’s nothing. My ex-wife ignored my unwieldy priapism for a full seven years. I am very familiar with neglect and with that salary I am prepared to ignore pretty much everything.

M³ also told the commission that the revenue service would need R2-billion “to keep the lights on” in her division. This is a dangerously conservative estimate. When I get the job, I will need at least R3-billion for experts to come up with a comprehensive schematic diagram identifying the location of what I imagine are countless light switches. Then another R1-billion for light bulbs and R4-billion for sundries.

M³ said her division had identified depreciated assets that were “running through God’s grace”. Once I am in charge, I will fix everything right away so that God can get back to doing the stuff he really enjoys, like helping Israel bomb Gaza and spreading cancer among children.

During my term of employment, I will obviously require protection from yourself. This means you may not ever fire me. Or even talk to me.

Yours in IT,

Comrade Benjamin “Komputah” Trovato

 

Scam the Scammers

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From: Hyundai Cars Company <info@hyundai.net>

To: bentrovato@mweb.com

Subject: You have won the Hyundai Company Award Funds

This is to inform you that you have been awarded 850,000.00 Pounds from Hyundai Cars Company. This Promotion Award is to raise the profile of Hyundai Cars across the world. (contact project manager) Name: Mr Jfferson Andrews. Phone # : +44703193 5671.

Send your name, country, city, age, occupation, pssition, home phone, moblie, email address to Mr. Jfferson Andrews for the processing of your award funds.

Congratulations!

 

From: Ben Trovato

Dear Jfferson,

What an interesting name. Is it Welsh? Never mind. I cannot believe that I have won so much money! How did you know that I drive a Hyundai? Is my name on a global register of Hyundai owners? My Elantra and I have been together for 10 years and we are still deeply in love. I have converted the spacious boot into a mobile office and entertainment centre which makes me the envy of all my friends except for those who laugh at me for driving a Hyundai. They say the only thing Koreans know how to make is stir-fried sausage dog but they are jealous.

I hope I do not have to go to Korea to get my money. Flying terrifies me. So do the Koreans. I would prefer it if you put the cash directly into my account.

Once again, thank you for this fantastic award. I promise that I will drive my Hyundai until I die, which could be quite soon unless I get the brakes fixed. Please hurry with the money.

PS. What is a moblie?

 

From: Hyundai Cars Company

Dear Award Winner

We have received your informations and you have been cleard for payment. We have sent your informations to our affliate bank for the transfer of your funds which is £850.000.00 GBP.

You are now required to contact our bank whom are responsible for the transfer of your promo funds to your bank account. The Hyundai Cars Company do believe that your funds will be put into good use for community development. This award is also sponsor by the Bill Gate Foundation.

Processing Director Hyundai Company Promotion.

Mr. Jefferson Andrews

 

From: Ben Trovato

Mr Andrews,

I am thrilled to hear from you again because I was beginning to think this was some kind of cruel trick. Are you sure this award is genuine? I do not wish to look foolish. Especially not in the eyes of Bill Gate.

You say I must use my money for community development? This worries me. It would take more than 850 000 pounds to develop my community and quite frankly I need the money more than my white trash neighbours. What do you mean by this?

 

From: Hyundai Cars Company

Dear Award Winner

What we mean in the word for community development it means that you should help the homeless and the less privilege in your locality as well as yourself. You have won the funds and it is yours to do what ever you like with the money but also please help the needy with the funds.

Mr. Jefferson Andrews

 

From: Ben Trovato

Listen here, Andrews.

I do not wish to help the homeless and the needy. They are terrible people. It is I, not them, who suffers the indignity of driving a 1998 Hyundai. Would it be acceptable if I used some of my money to pay a homeless man to kill my wife? I promise I will buy a new Hyundai with whatever is left over.

 

From: Hyundai Cars Company

We have accepted you use the award funds for your personal issues. You can now go ahead and contact the bank.

Congratulations once again!

Mr. Jefferson Andrews

 

From: Ben Trovato

Andrews,

I had an epiphany in my bed last night. When I told my wife, she said there was no way in hell she was going to clean it up. I told her that god came to me in a dream (he was Nigerian, oddly enough) and he told me to get rid of the Hyundai. He said it was the Devil’s car, so this morning I am going to set it alight and push it over a cliff. Does this mean I no longer qualify for the award?

PS.  I also told her that the Hyundai Corporation had given me permission to have her murdered. Please send me 800 000 dollars so I can pay the homeless assassin.

More works of a staggering genius now available

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I have been inundated with requests – mostly from Mrs V Stopforth of Glenashley – to make more of my books available to agoraphobics, prisoners, quadriplegics and anyone else who has difficulty getting to a library or bookshop. Not that you’re likely to find any of my books at either.

I am therefore delighted to report that two more titles on my increasingly irrelevant backlist are now available as downloads on this very site. Stirred Not Shaken is the third book in my trilogy of letters in which … if I have to explain, you’re probably not going to buy it. The other title is Hits & Missives, a collection culled from the trilogy itself.

You can find them under the Contraband link at the top. On the right. Above the PayFast and PayPal links where … oh, you haven’t seen those either? Apparently not.

You’re going to have to hurry, though. In an unprecedented surge of apathy, my site almost crashed today when millions of people failed to visit it.

I need a lawyer

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I received a worrying email earlier today from someone called Clouise Oranje. It appears as if I am in some sort of legal trouble. I replied to her/him but have yet to hear back. I fear the worst.

 

—– Original Message —–
From: “Clouise Oranje” <clouiseoranj@webmail.co.za>
Sent: Friday, October 5, 2018 1:38:24 PM
Subject: COURT SUMMON

Good day,
This letter serves as the formal notice of an intent to file a lawsuit against you in court.
A hearing date has been confirmed for 11th October 2018, and if you wish to resolve this matter without court action, our client will expect refund within Seven (7) days of this notice.
The Court summons letter is in the PDF below.
Kindly verify your receiving email client on the attached to redirect and download summons. Justice Department summons letter: Letters of Intent
Regards
Clouise Oranje
Court Clerk
Magistrate Court
Justice Firm Debt Collection Agent
Lovedale Road, City of Bloemfontein,Private Bag X20583,
Bloemfontein, 9300 South Africa.

 

​​​From: bentrovato@mweb.co.za

To: “Clouise Oranje” <clouiseoranj@webmail.co.za>

Sent: Friday, October 5, 2018 1:46:52 PM

Subject: Re: COURT SUMMON

 

Dear Mr/Mrs/Adv Oranje,

You have made me very frightened with your electronic letter and I have been forced to open the good bottle of gin I was saving for Christmas just to steady my nerves!

I do not know what is a PDF. I am very old and my only clever friend who knows about computers is dead because of poisoning. Is this what you are accusing me of? I did not poison him! It was his wife. I warned him not to marry her. Fred, I said, that woman does not look right to me.

If it is not the poisoning, please can you tell me what I did? Whatever it was, I did not do it. I don’t know where I am most of the time but I swear on the bible that I was not anywhere near the scene of the crime. Yes, I have done some bad things in my life. Who hasn’t? I killed twelve Germans but this was long after the war. Is this about the Germans?

I do not want to go to jail. I have the wrong temperament for it. I also have the wrong kind of bottom. What I am trying to say is that I have never had bum sex. I will kill myself if you send me to jail. I will also kill myself if I have to go to Bloemfontein.

Please tell me what I must do.

Yours truly
Mr Benjamin Trovato