Dispatch from Mariannhill, Wednesday, May 11

Always in search of a new experience, we made a visit yesterday to a South African police station. Actually I was required to report there. The story begins with my car rental. It’s a smallish Nissan with a standard transmission. Now,, I’ve driven a standard transmission off and on for years, but my car at home is an automatic, and so was our last rental in NZ. The first morning here, all packed up for a jaunt into the countryside, I stuck in the key, started the car, which, to my utter surprise and dismay, lurched ahead into the stone wall in front of me in the parking lot. I had forgotten all about the standard transmission and didn’t engage the clutch.
Many of you know that feeling of creeping embarrassment and stupidity as you sit there dumfounded before going out to assess the damage. It wasn’t much, a few scratches and dents in the "rubber" bumper, but not so little as to escape notice when I return the car. It’s one of those little dents that will probably end up costing a couple of thousand dollars.
The next day I called the rental company to ask what to do. Their first question was, do you have a police accident report? But, I protested, this was just a minor fender-bender on private property, and no other vehicle was involved. No difference, we have to have a police incident number, and you have to report it to the local police.
So that’s what brought us to the station in charge of our jurisdiction, a series of squat temporary buildings in a field at the end of a potholed drive. We got out of the car, not knowing where to go among the scattered "portables." I spotted a white officer, the only one, wearing a flack jacket and sweating in the sun, and asked him for directions. He pointed us to one of the buildings and told us to contact the captain, "the Indian guy with the big captain’s insignia on his uniform." Entering the hot, crowded "building," we were immediately the object of intense interest--these white folks with strange accents among a varied group of blacks, including a couple of lawyers. They must have wondered what we were doing here, a place where I suspect few whites are seen.
The captain emerged after a few minutes. After telling him of our story he set about finding the right forms, all the while apologizing for the condition of the police station. With that resigned shrug characteristic of all low and mid level government officials, he grumbled that they had been promised a new station for 12 years. He kindly took down our information in an old gray record book. All this business was conducted in front of the dozen or so people seated in the office, though I don’t know if they grasped our American English. When he was finished, and without ever looking at the car, he wrote down the name of the record book, the number of the entry, and the phone number of the station house and gave it to us
We always said we wanted to experience as many aspects of life as possible in the countries we visited, and we’re doing just that in South Africa. Jeanne thought it would be interesting to get a picture of me being "booked" in order to send to the Banner -- CRC minister has police record in South Africa.