the Prof & the Pezzi ball

Right - The SSI hath spoken: "Thy basic starting level assessed as elite". So now the fresh young blonde has taken the !@%*&!! machines at their word and presented me with a training schedule which shows NO respect for her elders. Yes, I understand that this is good news. Yes. Absolutely. Right. OK. So today I begin my intimate acquaintance with my new best friend, the Pezzi Ball. After lunch. Not right now. Got some other things to take care of first. Like lunch.

Of course I shouldn't really be surprised at the SSI assessment results. After all, that's sort of the whole point about the fruit thing. And it's exactly what Prof BJ Meyer proved (please note: PROVED - although being a scientist he indicated & suggested & strongly pointed to the possibility) that fruitarianism is a significant health investment - for us ordinary mortals as well as for athletes. And here's the really convincing part about Prof Meyer's tests - he was Professor at PRETORIA University. There's something terribly establishment about that. No - I'm not from Pretoria and quite frankly I don't like the place much. But somehow the Pretoria prof's scientific pronouncement carries more weight (for me at least) than a revelation from the Supreme Wisdom-Vessel of the Academy of Pleiadian Light. Let's just say: Pretoria University is not flaky fringe, The Professor is a scientist, and by investigating the impact of the fruitarian diet on health and athletic performance he's done us all a tremendous favour.

A note of caution, though, from the Prof. He says: Don't guess - make sure.

How ? We'll have to get to that later. Right now I must go rest up for my exercise session. After lunch.

Quest for the perfect avo

More than 500 kinds of avocado in the world, and what do our South African shops offer us? 4, 5 different kinds ? Fuerte, Hass, Pinkerton, couple of others ? Easiest to find – though not necessarily the cheapest – is the one that only reveals its inedible black threads & black bruises once you cut it. Show me a fruitarian who hasn’t bought a box of those…

Many, many years ago I found what I still think is the perfect avo. The size of a rugby ball – yes, literally, no exaggeration. Found them in the Lowveld – now Mpumalanga. Deep yellow buttery, nutty flesh. I have a vivid memory of an evening in the bushveld, sitting on the rocks high above the Olifants River, and eating a slice of one of these. It was my whole supper and I had trouble finishing it. Although that might have had something to do with a small drama involving red-checked underwear & a couple of bats – but that’s another story.

Anyhow – ever since that time I’ve been on the track of those avos. Needless to say: not commercially available. Then I met someone who remembered seeing the rugby-ball avos at a Lowveld wedding reception. She knew a Greek guy who used to be married to someone who had a friend who owned the farm which produced the avos. But then the Greek guy wasn’t talking to his ex anymore, so that trail went cold.

And then an internet-trawl produced this:
"Giant avocados, large enough to make three gallons of avocado soup or two pounds of guacamole, are about to go on sale in Britain. Fourteen inches in circumference and as large as a water melon, the naturally grown pears are eight times the size of a normal avocado and will feed a family of six. The monster fruit are all descended from a single, ancient tree at Devil's Cliff, a town in South Africa's Northern Province. At the time of the Dutch Settlers, the tree was discovered to produce bumper-sized avocados, probably the result of a genetic mutation."
An item in a 5-year old British newspaper. Not too useful. But still - a clue in Duiwelskloof.

Then, couple of weeks ago, I spoke to Essie Honiball – and she also remembers those exact same avos. Many years ago she had in fact propagated one of these wonder fruits, but just as her little tree was bearing its first massive fruit – not ready to pick – she had to move. They heard later that the tree had had to make way for some development.

So here is a Cry from the Heart: Is there anyone out there who can put me on the track of these gigantic avos? And to all fruitarians: please do yourself a favour & start searching. If you have in fact personally encountered these avos before, you won’t need me to tell you why; if you haven't – well, you’re just going to have to take my word for it. I'm not even going to TRY to describe the flavour.

In the mean time: some extra motivation for growing our own avos:
* In one year a single California avocado tree can absorb as much carbon as is produced by a car driven 26,000 miles.
* Two mature avocado trees can provide enough oxygen for a family of four.
* One avocado tree produces nearly 260 pounds of oxygen each year.
* A one acre avocado orchard removes up to 2.6 tons of carbon dioxide each year.

And to Karin: Of course! Wouldn't that be something: both of us on the Augrabies Xtreme. Bearing in mind that you're about half my age, I would have absolutely no hesitation in using the fact that I helped to nurse you through the measles when you were 4, to blackmail you into carrying my pack over the highest dunes !

Thorns & satsumas

Here's one of life's little lessons: Never prune fever trees in the wind. Here's another: Never use a pair of loppers to cut a slightly too thick fever tree branch above your head, without noticing that said head is positioned right in between the two lopper-handles you're trying to force together.

Fever trees ? One of our most beautiful acacias - or it was until the Australians decided that "acacia" better fitted their thornless mimosas & we should call our thorned acacias "senegalensis". Yes, I know there's more to it than that, but with a lopper-whacked skull & thorn-stabbed arms I don't really care that much right now.

Point is, it's while I was entangled in the fever trees that I noticed the satsumas. They'd quietly been ripening in the little citrus grove between the fever trees & the pomegranate hedge. Now, isn't that something. Just as the persimmons finish, the satsumas begin.

How ?

Same way you'd eat an elephant (You, not me - I'm fruitarian) - one bite at a time. I'm giving myself 4 years to turn into that Muscled Marvel crossing the finish line in the Kalahari, to thunderous applause, witnessed by hordes of skeptics busy eating their hats. So: 4 years of little goals, with a built-in reward-system. Of course. We'll get to that sometime.

Right now, it's carbo-loading time. Organic bananas & brazil nuts in the blender - half glass of water - with a generous shake of ground cinnamon (5 shakes this morning - on the principle of "If a Little is Nice, a Lot might be Even Nicer").

So, my carbo's are feeling loaded. A short rest is indicated.

Why ?

Because someone has to. Besides I want to.

A multi-day run through the desert, and you have to carry all your supplies. Iditarod, but without the snow, and without the dogs. Hyenas maybe, and lion, leopard if you're lucky. Or unlucky.

Perhaps you're thinking that it's not such a big deal ? Let me enlighten you: In 2007 the race started in temperatures well over 40 deg C. One of the runners wrote: "In the gorge my thermometer rose to 55 degrees". Yes, there are gorges, and mountains & dunes, and the sort of climate where it becomes important to carry a thermometer.

Still thinking that I'm making far too much of what would after all be a doddle through the desert ? Well, maybe - if you're young enough, lean & mean enough, and your nutrition comes from a scientific laboratory, full of ingredients known only by their Latin names & long numerical codes.

So, let me tell you: it's a !*&@%*! Big Deal. You try carry your apple-a-day, enough water for desert conditions, safety equipment, plus far more years on the shady side of none-of-your-business than you'd care to admit to - and you try to do that on a fruitarian diet...

Think I'd better go lie down again.

Kyloe

Kyloe ? A kind of cow (bulls too I suppose) you'll find in the Scottish highlands (and lowlands, I suppose, if they have lowlands there, but I haven't bothered to find out). In some previous century the house began as a Scots Reverend's cow-shed (this is the short version of the story); the main front room still features the ancient feeding-trough - worn-down sections in the massive yellow-wood beam showing where the cows rubbed their heads & necks as they fed. Well, it seemed right to keep the name.

And the "Experiment" ? Well, there are a few parts to it. One of them began a few days ago, in the Sports Science Institute in Cape Town - the temple where the Fit & the Firm go to worship, and elite athletes go to be honed into something even more elite. You know about the two guys who ran the ENTIRE Great Wall of China - all 4,000+ kms of it - in one go ? Well the SSI was where they went to fine-tune their training. That should give you some idea.

And then I turn up. Dear heaven. In my please-hide-as-much-as-possible T-shirt.

A fresh young blonde takes me in hand, and - to her eternal credit - doesn't collapse in uncontrollable mirth when she discovers Why I am there. Of course I wasn't going to tell her anything. But then when I don't detect any obvious sneering & sarcasm, I lose my head, and start confessing. Suddenly she's my Friend who is going to help me to get to my goal. So she measures & prods & fills out questionnaires, & next week I'm going back to get the training schedule she's working out for me. (I'm choosing to believe that she needs a whole week to devise this schedule - NOT because of the outrageousness of the challenge, but because she is a good kid who is sincerely trying to do a thorough job.)

The challenge ? Ever heard of the Augrabies Xtreme ? Well, the fresh young blonde also hadn't heard about it before - perhaps that's why she didn't flinch at the thought of getting me ready to do the thing. But then, I didn't actually tell her the whole truth. I didn't tell her I want to do the thing on fruit. THAT is where the Challenge becomes the Experiment.

I think I'll go lie down now - suddenly feeling a bit faint.

the beginning (continued)

By the time we found it, it was late autumn. Now you know what autumn does to grapevines - and there was this stone courtyard, vine-covered. Catabwa-grapes - but we didn't know that at the time. In fact you won't believe how little we knew about what we were blundering into. But we did know one thing. We'd found it. Kyloe.

We didn't ask about the climate, the water, the soil. Nothing. It was enough that it had drystone walls - and that, on the other side of those walls, it was just veld. Real dusty, scratchy, rocky Karoo veld. Which means of course that we should have asked those questions about the climate (vicious), the water (not enough - not nearly enough), the soil (requiring earth-moving equipment for doing anything at all.)

Blind ignorance is a wonderful thing - it brings it own rewards. We would not otherwise have been stupid enough to plant a persimmon tree. And yet here we are now, rewarded with yet another ridiculously generous crop on this little tree. I share with the mouse-birds, & remember the grandmother who gave me my name & my love for the Karoo. And for persimmons.

the beginning

To begin at the beginning...

Yes of course Dylan Thomas said it first; he had to - he was born 38 years before me, so he had plenty of time & got first innings. But the phrase served him well and is none the worse for having been used before, so To begin at the beginning -

Oh, and the reference to my age is in fact relevant, as will become clear later - the relevance, that is, not my age. So. To begin ...

Sorry - one more thing. The reference to Dylan Thomas is in fact also relevant. A sublime poetic voice, silenced before he was 40. Why ? Usual suspects: lifestyle choices, and we'll get back to that - in fact it's sort of the point of all of this. But first,

To begin at the beginning - it was My Fair Lady on the opera house stage. No, I wasn't the fair lady, and I wasn't on stage. I was in the outside broadcast truck - the only female among the rather rough diamonds in the television crew (the senior engineer carried a gun, and probably needed to). I was also the only one who wasn't on the meat-tobacco-alcohol nutritional plan. I was in fact a fruitarian a.k.a. fruitflake & nutcase.

But of course that wasn't really the beginning. It began well before that, and in an even more unkind & uncaring environment - a hospital bed. Fast forward to 2 weeks later to find me climbing a big mountain. Two short weeks from medical crisis to active & healthy. What happened ? Fruitarianism happened, and that brings me to the Real Beginning of my story.

Back to the Welshman. Remember that grand, now immortal, poem he wrote for his dying father: "Do not go gently into that good night - Rage, rage against the dying of the light" ? Well 50 years ago there was a young South African woman who felt her life ebbing away - her body was in fact moving towards death. But then the fates offered her one last chance. What followed became an amazing account of survival, of her own "fight against the dying of the light" - but that story is hers to tell. Her name is Essie Honiball, and because of her story, I chose the fruitarian lifestyle.

So it really all began with Essie Honiball - although she will tell you it all began long before her. And she'll be right. But more about that later.

Oh, The Kyloe Experiment ? Well, more about that too, later...