The Talent Show

I have never really possessed gifts worthy of being showcased on stage in a talent show. So when I noticed on our training schedule that the Trainees were to put on a talent show for one another, I became slightly alarmed. I don’t consider myself much of singer, I’m certainly not a dancer, I don’t know any magic tricks, and I doubt I’d be any good at stand-up comedy. So what on earth was I supposed to do in the talent show?

The answer came to me suddenly one day as I was practicing Afrikaans on the bus with another Trainee, Lucy. I was so tired of having my butt glued to bus bench that I decided to alter the lyrics for the Hokey Pokey, and wrote “Sit jou linker boud in, sit jou linker boud uit. Sit jou linker boud in en skud dit al rond” (it’s a rough translation of “Sit your left butt cheek in, sit your left butt cheek out…). Not a particularly refined song, but nonetheless I was quite proud of myself for having composed something in Afrikaans. So I gradually convinced my fellow Afrikaans speakers to perform the Hokey Pokey with me for the talent show.

We had been challenged by the four Education PCTs who were learning Afrikaans so we could not back down from entering even though none of seriously believed the Hokey Pokey would secure our place as the winners of the Talent Show. We tried to throw people off and spice up the act by adding a little dance number and striptease to the beginning but I have to say that we were outdone by a number of more talented performers. As for the Education PCTs, they choreographed a dance number to Toto’s “Africa” which was highly humorous and very entertaining. In my opinion, they very much surpassed our Hokey Pokey.