Being of Europian descent , it is not always easy for us to understand the way of the indigenous people, and that could lead to some friction. I am of French and Dutch, forebears, the Dutch under Jan van Riebeeck having started a fresh produce settlement at the Cape of Good Hope, to provide their ships that traded with the East Indies, with fresh vegetables and meat. They went on famously, intermarrying with the Hottentotte and "Strandlopers", and the ones who had no taste for that, had the ships bring back Asian women for them.
Then Belgium and the Netherlands decided that they could not cope with the protestant French refugees called the French Huguenotes, that were badly persecuted and murdered by the Roman Catholics in France, and ran for safety all over the world, and a lot of them were sent to South Africa, where their vine growing, and wine making skills made a big contrubution to the welfare of the Cape. My mother was a le Roux, and the le Roux's who came to the cape were all vine growers and wine makers.
Then, when everything was good and nice, The English caught wind of the welfare of the Cape, so they came and colonized it. The people there were left to the mercy of the English, and a lot of them, under which my le Roux forbears, packed up and moved North. Some of the le Roux's stayed, and are still making wine.
The lot that moved North had to overcome serious obstacles, like getting over some hectic mountain ranges, and fighting a lot of wars with the indigenous people, but they all settled on farms, and again all was good, after things were fought out and sorted with the black people already there. There was as yet no Black people in the Western Cape, then called the Cape Colony, so all this was strange to them. Then Gold and Diamonds were found, and before long the English moved in, and their wanting to colonize the Boere Republics, who traded internationally with the gold and diamonds, led to the Anglo Boer War, and when they could not beat the Boers into submission, they  burned their houses and took the women and children and their black workers into concentration camps, where about 29,000 died, of which 22,070 was children.. The men that were caught was sent to st Helena and India. The Boers had lots of friends, and a lot of Russians, Jews and Germans came to help them.The Boers however had almost no artillery or war weapons, and fighting the British Army with their meagre weapons was just not enough, and in the end, with their wives and kids dying in the camps, they signed the treaty of Vereniging with the British in 1902.
And they were left to fend for themselves!
That is how we came to be in Africa. But back to where I was about not always understanding the villagers and their ways.
Danny has this beautiful white horse that he used for ploughing, and this morning I had a fight with him because this horse had a piece of wire through his mouth, cutting into the flesh and that made his mouth bleed! But he stated that the land had to be ploughed, and the horse was used to the wire. I could see that the poor animal was in agony, being hit with a piece of hose pipe on top of all, so I srtipped my moer, (bolt) and told him that I was calling the SPCA. Danny just could not understand what I was whining about, as he was just doing what he should do, and that is trying to get his seeds planted.
Another thing that drove me mad was this practise of the villagers to tie their horses and cattle to a pole, and many a time I found no sign of water near them, neither were there any shade, and as the South African sun in summer gets scorchingly hot, we found it inhumane, but the locals couldn't understand our concern.
I am a source of great entertainment to the people here when I talk to Skramunkel and feed her fruit and carrots, and the children just can't help from gaping at me, and making remarks about the silly white Antie. (Aunty)