MY
DAD'S TWO BUFFALOES
By Paul Kleynhans, Pretoria, South Africa
 The
farm Twee Buffels (Two Buffaloes) where I was born is about 30km east of
Lichtenburg in the North West province in South Africa.
According to my dad who has now passed away
there was a farmer in very late 1800s that killed the two buffaloes with
a 303 "Lametford" ( don't know the correct spelling) rifle. He
killed both of them with one shot and since that day that farm was named
in Afrikaans Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskiedfontein.
Some maps in South Africa displayed the
name a few years ago as the name made the Guinness Book of Records as
the longest name for a farm. I don't know if this record still stands.
In the 1950s, my father, Paul Petrus
Kleynhans, bought the farm and lived there with my family. We lived on
the farm till 1965. My dad was a well known farmer in the Lichtenburg
district. He developed the farm and built a church for the farmworkers
on the farm.
Because my mother was very fond of
gardening she spend most of her time in the gardens around the old
house. I can still remember vividly when it snowed there in 1964 (very
rare for that area.)
One evening we had a severe storm on the
farm and my father was very concerned about the newly built tractor shed
and as he walked out of the house he heard a massive noise like an
explosion. The house was covered in dust and he realized that the roof
of the entire house had been blown off.
 He
gathered all of us in the car. We had a 64 Chevrolet Impala and the wind
was so strong that it felt like a boat on the sea. The next day - it was
on a Sunday - the whole community helped to repair and replace the roof
on our house. I can't really remember this but that is what my sisters
have told me.
I am 44 years old and the youngest of five
children in our family. I together with my brother and his wife started
a business in Pretoria 4 years ago. This is really amazing as my dad
always used to drill it in our heads to work together as a team as he
had some insight in the future.
Today my brother is my best friend and we
get along very well as he is the technical guy and myself the
administrative guy in our business which is called High Standard
Projects.
I am married to Madelene, a teacher, and we
have two boys, Reuben 12 and Calvin 7. They are diamonds in my life.
A few years ago I had a very strange dream
and I saw my brother and myself running with a burning torch holding it
on high together, and three years after the dream we started the
business and the computer programme we have a logo of a burning torch...
I am so proud of my family because we have
a great story of our own! Briefly I'll tell you. My parents were very
poor when they were young but my dad worked hard and became one of the
wealthiest farmers in the former "Western Transvaal."
My parents were a very handsome couple and
three daughters were born. My dad was a bit sad because he had no boys
to inherit his farms. In those days it was practice that only a boy
could inherit a farm.
Five years after our youngest sister was
born, my brother saw the light, to my dads delight and one and a half
years later I was born. My dad was so happy and said that my brother and
I were the two buffaloes of "Twee Buffels" which is the direct
translation.
As my dad expanded his farms he started to
entrust white managers to run his farms. My dad helped so many people
financially. At that time my dad worked on a beautiful farm in the
Limpopo province with the means to buy it if it was profitable.
It was then that my oldest sister
discovered that the rest of my dads farms were not given attention to.
These white managers that my dad had were jealous of my dads progress
and because they had signing rights on my dads account they bought
tractors and implements worth hundreds of thousands of rands and sold it
in the "Free State".
When my dad discovered what happened all
creditors slammed on my dad and he asked for postponement of the
outstanding accounts until the harvest was in and they wouldn't.
My dad discovered there was a plot against
him and after he sold about everything he had, R16000 was all that was
outstanding. They wouldn't give him grace. We lost everything when I was
about 9 years old. We moved to a neighbouring town and worked for
another rich farmer.
I respect my parents so much as they never
turned to alchohol in the hard times, they never held grudges, never let
bitter took over. They stood with us through thick and thin. It was not
nice being a very well off family and it was hard to see how my parents
struggled to make ends meet.
In later years, I had difficulty making
peace of what happened to us as I was robbed from being able to go to
university as we had no funds. My sisters were married but it was my
brother and I who really struggled.
I was a salesman who worked on a commission
basis only, and it was tough to provide for all the needs in our family.
The only thing that kept me going was my faith in God and the love for
my family.
Then one night I had another dream. In the
dream I saw a small boat in the ocean and it was busy sinking and I saw
myself helping this little boat to get to the docks. The boat broke into
pieces and I saw myself and my wife clinging onto one of the pieces that
was flying through the air. We landed on dry ground without any harm to
us.
I wondered about this boat and then someone
came to me in the dream. I couldn't see his face and I told him what
happened. He said to me that the little boat was never our boat and he
said to me: "Look, that boat is for you" - he showed me a
passenger liner that was docked in a harbour. It was a glorious sight to
see as it was shining with lights all over. I turned around to the man
who spoke to me but he was gone and the dream ended.
I held onto that dream and 2 years after
the dream, my brother approached me to ask if I would manage the
business that they were going to open in Pretoria. Today, I am one of
the owners of the business and we are very successful. Both dreams came
to life and now the "Two Buffaloes" have restored the family
name and we now have more than what we ever could have asked for.
My mother is still alive and is still the
saint she has always been, but my dad passed away before he could see
his two buffaloes in their business. It would have made him so proud,
but you never know, maybe he already knows...
All the people who contributed to my
father's downfall died before him or lost more than he did as he never
sued or persecuted those people. And now, the two buffaloes of "Twee
Buffels" are alive and well today.
We still have black and white photos of the
farm Tweebuffels and some 8mm films. I want to take my wife and 2 boys
to the farm very soon and will see if I can get a photo of a noticeboard
displaying the name. I will keep in touch.
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