A Karoo man who writes out speeding fines by day, and hit songs by night.
Words: Julienne du Toit
Photography: Chris Marais
Boeta Gammie is a bit like that Portuguese white wine everyone used to quaff at summertime lunch tables: singing, dancing, shepherding, guiding, inspiring, snake-catching and traffic-fining – sometimes all at once. His songs are catchy tunes in the Nama folk music genre, but his words are all carefully crafted messages. As he played Ant Katriena, Die Honne Byt My (Aunt Katriena, the dogs are biting me), an old Willistonian said to us:
“That’s the biggest hit of the Hantam this year.”
Calvinia is one of our favourite little Karoo towns, in part because there seems to be a certain ease between the various groups living in it. We are headed for an address in Calvinia West, and an appointment with Akkedissie, who pitches up like a dust-devil in a pink shirt. We can see this is not going to be a sit-down-and-chat kind of interview. It’s going to be done on the run.
He leads us in his VW hatchback (with personalised plates) to a little house at the edge of Calvinia West.
“This is where the Akkedissie thing began – at my late father’s house,” he says. “About six years ago, when Dad was still alive, I spotted a fat-bellied skink sunning itself on a stump in the front yard. I wanted to catch it, but it wriggled out of my grasp.”
He was horrified to find the skink’s detached tail twitching in his hand.
“I thought I’d killed it. Then someone said no, the tail just comes off naturally and it grows another one. So I put out more sunning rocks for the lizard, caught flies for it to eat and set aside a little plate of water in case its throat was ever dry.” The lizard thrived.
The Wonderkroon Violin
But let’s roll back the past, as they used to say in the old Movietone newsreels.
Little Jan Isaacs is a farm worker’s son who grew up in the Hard Man’s Karoo, where working the land is sometimes classed as an act of insanity.
“I was born in the Sutherland area and grew up with seven brothers and sisters. My father sold his labour on a lot of farms, and I remember each one: Nuwerus, Jakkalsfontein, Kapgat, Kookfontein, Dwingdrif, Bloemhof, Diepdrif, Vlakfontein and Kreitsberg.”
This child became a cheerful veteran of the local farm school system and, by all accounts, a very chatty and interactive boy. Jan played his first guitar chord at six. “I was also dead keen on the violin, but I couldn’t lay my hands on one.” He had his eye on the perfect soundbox though. It was a tin full of Lennon’s Wonderkroon Essence – a popular digestive medication. So little Jan emptied the contents into a large jug and drilled holes in the tin so his dad couldn’t refill it again – then took his hiding like a man.
“I added a stick, fishing gut and some hairs plucked from a horse’s tail. It worked well.”
He stands in the street outside the family home and scratches out a tune on his childhood fiddle, which he’s kept intact all these years.
Jan had to walk more than eight kilometres to school at times, and often those walks would turn into trots. Which, in turn, made him a fearsome marathon runner.
“This is where the Akkedissie thing began – at my late father’s house,” he says. “About six years ago, when Dad was still alive, I spotted a fat-bellied skink sunning itself on a stump in the front yard. I wanted to catch it, but it wriggled out of my grasp.”
Gammie and the Riel
As a teenager, Jan Isaacs arrived in Calvinia, entered his name in a draw for the first RDP house in town – and won. Now he needed a job. Soon, he was the most cheerful refuse removal man Calvinia had ever seen. Then he became a blockman in a local butchery before becoming a traffic cop, but it was the fat lizard with the detachable tail that launched his music career.
“I wrote a song called Akkedissie. It became a hit. And that was the beginning.” It was probably the last time he was popularly known as Jan Isaacs. Moonlighting as a DJ on the local Radio Kaboesna late one night, he liked to feature a song by the late Tolla van der Merwe called Boeta Gammie. It became his nickname. And Akkedissie became his performing name.
Now we’re back down the dirt road lanes, heading to the house of Johanna Jooste, whom most folks in Calvinia know as the Queen of the Nama Riel.
Within minutes, the local speed cop is crouched in the road, playing his guitar while a jubilant Tannie Johanna is dancing the Nama Riel on a speed bump in the road outside her house.
This marvellous dance is deeply entrenched in Nama culture. It forms part of a courting ritual, in which the man entices the girl towards him with his moves and mock-fights with rivals. Somewhere along the way a feathered hat is thrown to the ground. If the girl accepts, she picks it up and places it on her paramour’s head. There may even be a kiss. But throughout this dance ‘jy moet die stof voor jou inloop’ – the dust must rise before you.
Tannie Johanna, who thinks the world of Boeta Gammie, is part of the local Calvinia Sitstappers, and they win dance awards all the time. She is delighted to show us her steps.
A Human Dynamo
Then we meet Gammie’s lovely wife Audrey and their little boy, AJ Lee. Also, his brace of German Shepherds, Roevis and Mieka. It turns out that in addition to being a radio DJ, choirmaster, traffic cop, singer, player, story-teller, father, husband, lizard wrangler and dog trainer, he’s also the local SPCA man. Oh yes, Gammie also takes tourists on flower excursions through Namaqualand and drives a funeral hearse on weekends when he’s in town.
Later that morning, as he pulls his guitar out of his car on the dirt road to Ceres, we find out that he is the only person still working in Calvinia’s traffic department. With no hesitation, the Hantam mountains behind him, Gammie launches into a song we’d never heard before, one he says was inspired by a friend who is going through a bad divorce.
It seems the only thing this human dynamo is incapable of doing is sitting still in one spot for longer than five seconds.We glimpse Gammie again at the Williston Winterfees of 2018, the ultimate showman and the focus of every eye with his unmistakable hat adorned with a jaunty plume.
There is hardly standing space left around the arena, thick with the rising dust, hats thrown to the floor among the driving rhythm, the velskoen shoes, the doeks on the heads, the swirling skirts and the smiles.
Road Music and Lockdown
Fast forward again to 2021, and another visit to Calvinia. We call up Gammie. Is there any chance the authorities will allow him to be photographed wearing his traffic officer uniform with a guitar on a dirt road?
“I’ll ask. I think I’ll say yes,” he responds. We are baffled.
Later that morning, as he pulls his guitar out of his car on the dirt road to Ceres, we find out that he is the only person still working in Calvinia’s traffic department. With no hesitation, the Hantam mountains behind him, Gammie launches into a song we’d never heard before, one he says was inspired by a friend who is going through a bad divorce.
The title is Mama Ek Sal Nie Weer Trou Nie (Mama, I won’t ever marry again).
Spread the Light
We are invited to Gammie and Audrey’s house that afternoon, for a special performance from their beloved son AJ Lee, now a pre-teen.
The sound system is rigged up. AJ takes the microphone. Neighbours gather at the fence, because they know what’s coming. And then, from the doorway of this compact little house flows a nearly perfect rendition of I Will Always Love You. Dolly Parton and the late Whitney Houston would surely approve.
Karoo Roads III
This is an extract from Karoo Roads III – The Adventures Continue, by Chris Marais and Julienne du Toit. For more information on this popular series of Karoo lifestyle and travel books.
@karooroads