FROM MY LIFE
Cruising With The Music
Whether long trips in Namibia, or shorter trips in the Netherlands, music was and still is part of it
When still a child and my parents were at the wheel on those long vacation trips, we were always cruising with the music on. I have fond memories of that. Back when I was a young single mother, I also had my go-to music, but nowadays it’s different. Whenever I’m driving somewhere, it depends on where I am going, or how long the trip will be, what I listen to on the radio.
Cruising with the music as a child
When we lived in South Africa (SA) and Namibia was still South West Africa (SWA), we used to drive from SA to SWA for the summer school holidays in December.
That’s where my love for Tom Jones comes from. Whenever I hear songs like ‘What’s New Pussycat’ or ‘Delilah’ or ‘Green Green Grass of Home’, my mind travels back to those long straight roads through the half desert of Namibia. I remember the dry river beds we played in when we stopped at the side of the road for lunch.
One year — I must’ve been nine or ten — we drove somewhere in the southern half of SWA and there was a flood. Muddy waters were all around the car as my father drove through it — I think over one of those low-water bridges — and the brown water also constantly splattered across the windscreen. Those were some of my scariest moments, but still the music played. I’m sure my parents listened to other music too, such as Elvis (my mother was a huge fan), but I only took Tom Jones with me in my memories.
Those long trips as a single mom
I moved to Cape Town towards the end of 1989, and in the year after that, my mom moved there too. My dad, however, lived 1500 kilometers away in Bloemfontein, and my favourite aunt in Johannesburg. I did a lot of driving back then — me with my two kids in the car, either going to Bloemfontein for the Easter weekend or to my aunt for the summer holidays, like when my grandmother visited from The Netherlands for her 80th birthday in 1992, and all the family came together to celebrate it.
Music always played in the care on those long drives, and together with the kids — especially my daughter — we sang along to many songs. The Joyride album of Roxette was one of our favorites, and by the end of those long trips, we started singing the next numbers even before they started, because we knew the order of songs so well. Until today my daughter is fan of Roxette, and especially the Joyride album. I believe her love for that comes from cruising with the music on those long trips.
Other albums we loved to listen and sing along were the Neil Diamond tributes of Steve Hofmeyr, the album Hot Girls, Bad Boys by Bad Boys Blue, and some mixed Afrikaans cassette tapes — yes, cassette tapes — with Carike Keuzenkamp and Laurika Rauch as our absolute favorites.
Cruising with the music in current times
My habits of listening to the radio has changed a lot since I live in the Netherlands. Back when I just came here, I spoke mainly Afrikaans. Speaking Dutch was a huge learning curve, because despite the languages being closely related, there is a vast difference in the ise of verbs. Dutch is more complicated, and in order to get the hang of it, I started listening to the radio. News radio, that is. They barely ever play music, but only talk, talk, talk. It helped a lot to learn the language in a relatively short time.
Because of this, I developed a love for the news channel, and when driving to or from work, I always listen to our Radio 1, keeping up to date with news and actualities. Only one week of the year I don’t do this — the week from Christmas Day to New Year’s Eve — I listen to Radio 2. Why? The Top 2000 of course!
When my husband and I go on a longer drive, I change the radio to Radio 10. This channel has music from all times, and not only the newest music. One moment they play a song from the sixties, only to jump to the nineties and back to the seventies. They also have short news bulletins, but we love listening to the music and being surprised with what they have on their playlist.
And, you can find us singing while cruising with the music, even though sometimes I just keep quiet and listen to him sing, because he has such a beautiful voice!
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