Sosaties and roosters: dipping a big toe into Potch
It is either slightly disconcerting or enormously flattering when you arrive at a hotel for the first time and the receptionist greets you by name. In the case of my arrival at the Rapid Waters Hotel (and I use all three of those words advisedly) 29km outside of Potchefstroom, it could only be the former. The whole place has an air of being somewhere that no one has stayed at for weeks. Getting there involves a slow crawl along a pockmarked, gravel road that winds through a trail of rusty farm debris and dilapidated houses. In anticipation of my arrival, the staff have probably been gazing at the sole entry in their booking register every morning, lovingly running a finger over the inked curves of my name, mouthing each syllable, tasting the delicious prospect of, well, a guest. And so it was, after a long and dusty drive from Johannesburg, that I stepped across the threshold. A flicker of relief across the lady’s face. I hadn’t let her down. “Anthony Lankester” she told me as I pushed open the jangly door, stepped over two mangy poodles and tried to decipher her outline from under a cloud of smoke (hers, not mine).
