As those of us who live in the rest of the country joyously
tuck into our festive repasts without a care, we should spare a thought for the
blighted residents of Cape Town.
Specifically those in the City Bowl. It looks like
such a bright and pleasant place, embraced in the protective arms of Lion’s
Head and Devil’s Peak, with a spectacular rock face behind it and an azure
ocean in front; a paradise on earth.
The people who live here should be happy,
overflowing with positive energy, floating on an ethereal cloud of bliss. But
they are not. We’ve all seen it. I personally know six people who live and work
in the City Bowl; 4.5 of them are neurotic, weird, barmy, or all of the above.
Part of the problem is fish. They eat too much of
it. Seafood is integral to the Cape Town identity, like looking svelte and
never having to work for a living. Who
in Cape Town would dream of going to dinner and not ordering the grilled
yellowtail and a R486.00 bottle of flinty sauvignon blanc? If it’s not
yellowtail they order then it’s tuna, kingklip, red roman, or even, just for the
irony, snoek.
Now in moderation fish can have some benefits
because it’s full of protein and gooey omega oils which can allegedly help you
live to be 100, if that’s really what you want.
But it’s also contaminated with mercury, which
happens to be toxic. You don’t drop down dead immediately after a mouthful of
tuna of course, you insidiously grow more and more odd, without noticing until
it’s too late. Plenty of scientists have warned about this, but for those who
still scoff, think back to that night in May last year when a fishing trawler,
its holds full of tuna, steamed onto Clifton beach.
How does that happen? You’re steering a course for Yokohama,
via the Malacca Strait, when suddenly you’re hard aground three metres from
that nice pizza place on Beach Road. The answer is obvious: mercury fumes from
the tuna in the hold seeped up into the bridge, totally disorientating the
ship’s driver.
And remember how hard it was to tow the trawler off
the beach later – one of the most powerful tugs in the world struggled for
days, snapping steel towing cables like so many cotton threads. That’s because
mercury is a heavy metal. The mercury in the tuna was pressing the
boat deeper and deeper into the clinging sand.
But what renders living in the City Bowl
particularly hazardous are the very mountain slopes which make it look like a
bowl. Think of them as a giant reflector, a lens that is concentrating the electromagnetic
radiation (EMR) in the ether and beaming it down at Capetonians like a giant
death ray. All those cellphone and Wi-Fi signals hit the sheer sandstone cliffs
of Table Mountain and bounce back at the poor wretches in Gardens and Higgovale
and Kloof Street, driving them somewhat loopy. I have this on good authority
from a kinesiologist who treats the victims.
Symptoms of an EMR overdose include dizziness, loss
of memory and inability to concentrate. Does this not account for the
performance of MPs in parliament, a building located at the City Bowl’s ground
zero?
And think of poor Judge John Hlophe, who spends his
working day in the Cape Town High Court. For some, he has become the poster child
of muddled thinking. The judge has a clear case of excess EMR, with additional complications
caused by eating fish.
Symptoms of mercury poisoning from fish include:
irritability, exaggerated response to stimulation, and fits of anger with
irrational behavior. Now of which famous City Bowl resident and Western Cape
premier does this put you in mind?
Let’s hope she’s having turkey for Christmas, not
tuna.
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