An Interesting anecdote
I took a copy of GOLDIN with me to Nieuwoudtsville - we stayed on Papkuilsfontein among the very flowers featured in and on the book. Thursday a swarm of bees invaded the cottage. We were sitting outside, so we went in when the buzzing got loud, but we found that they were inside too. We closed the door and shooed them out of the window, but more and more started coming down the chimney. We lit a fire to stop them, but bees kept coming in. We left, to appeal to the farmer to remove them - the bees were swarming, not aggressive, and we did not feel threatened. We met the farmer, who stopped the two holes where they were still going in (they'd abandoned the chimney as a route,) and we went into town. When we got back an hour or two later, the bees had stopped swarming, and all those inside the cottage were crowded dead or almost-dead on the windowsill where the copy of GOLDIN was lying.
Michael Cope,
10 September 2005
