After Mandela Day appeared on the end of the Podcast where we discussed the Green Brigades William Wallace / Bobby Sands banners, CarlJungleBhoy sends us this piece on the man once viewed by the British State as a Terrorist….we thought it worth sharing…
Someone else Mrs Thatcher had her own views on…
Back in the early 80’s the political climate was very different. You would have had to experience it yourself to know just oppressive/depressive things were then. I’d recently outlived a(nother) rebellious stage and moved out of the Amsterdam squat we were living in, to go “working for the yankee dollar” to subsidise my nightlife escapades. Thatcher (excuse me whilst I spit) was in power, Apartheid was still in place, and the most powerful man on the planet was an actor/cowboy who’d been outshone by the eponymous hero – a chimp – in the film Bedtime for Bonzo. This sounds like a plot from a novel by the late, great, Kurt Vonnegut Jnr – the man who (in Breakfast For Champions) re-defined the use of the asterisk on the printed page, by using an * to describe an asshole – One of my all time literary highlights.
At that time, I was working for what was then known as TIME Life – running their Agent Subscription Dept -which involved the processing of orders + customer service and correspondence- a now extinct medium, whereby words are written or typed onto pieces of paper and passed from one person or company to another – from agents who sold magazine subscriptions on a commission basis. Anyway, one day, a Dutch lady working for me asked if I could take a look at something and advise her on what to do. She’d been passed a hand-written letter from a subscriber in South Africa, telling us he had been receiving duplicate copies of the magazine for some weeks and asking us if we could investigate and take appropriate action. He’d also enclosed the address labels from the covering envelopes in which the magazines are delivered which contained the relevant customer reference numbers, which after looking up showed that we’d received 2 different orders, from 2 different agents. Hence the fact it has been passed on to my wee department.
At first glance, this didn’t look like anything out of the ordinary – until I took a closer look. The letter had a stamp from a prison censor confirming that it had been approved for mailing. The address labels showed that the magazines had 2 different delivery addresses for Pollsmoor Prison – one a P.O Box number, the other a street address – and with slightly different names. One said Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, the other Mr N Mandela. The letter itself was also signed and dated. When I saw this I was totally taken aback –
‘Don’t you know who this is!?’, I asked, surprised that she didn’t recognise it – although – in her defence – he wasn’t then quite the world figure and legend we all know now.
Immediately, I thought, this one’s for me, and after checking further and making a couple of phone calls to South Africa, told the 2 agents that we wouldn’t argue about who the order belonged to, or how the duplication came about, we’d simply combine both orders together and extend into 1 copy with a longer subscription period. I also took it upon myself – with great enthusiasm – to write back on TIME’s behalf thanking him for bringing the problem to our attention, and letting him know we’d sorted it out.
At that time we had a completely separate South African edition of the magazine, which was also printed there (Sandton, if I recall). You may not be aware of this, but at that time all news media in RSA was subject to very heavy censorship. In the case of TIME, this was as crude as you could possibly imagine – large blocks of text blackened out on the printed copy –in some cases making the story unreadable. It’s also worth noting that it’s quite possible that – even with the censorship – a personal magazine subscription in a high-security prison was probably a quite valuable commodity.
Knowing how shrewd Mandela was, it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if the censored pieces were just as interesting to him as the untouched bits, as they held clues to what the Apartheid government were determined to keep from the public. This is pure speculation on my part, but I can certainly envisage discussions between prisoners on this subject – It’s not as if they had lots do to pass the time. However, speculation aside, it struck me that it displayed great integrity for a man in that situation to take the trouble to write and point out that he was getting something he didn’t think belonged to him.
I then set out to draft a letter in reply and – even if I say so myself – I’m very proud of my achievement. Conscious of the fact that letters both in and out of prison have to get past the prison censor, I took excruciating care to phrase it in such a way, that it could be read as a standard boring office text letter, whilst containing a different message under the radar. In short, commenting on the different delivery addresses, I basically said that we hoped that it wouldn’t be too long before he had a completely different address outside of prison. I added a bit along the lines that the type of honesty he’d shown in bringing the problem to our attention was something that was admired across the world. I also added a promise that we’d do everything we could, both now and in the future, to offer him our fullest support in every way possible. Bearing in mind I was writing on behalf of the company, although I put my signature to it, I needed to get the letter approved first before sending, so ran it past our then Circulation Director, an American woman with a liberal heart beating beneath a hard-as-nails-business-woman outer shell. She read it through carefully, stopped to grin at up at me a couple of times, then said (her exact words);
“That is fucking brilliant. Mail it!”
But that wasn’t the end of it. A couple of weeks a letter arrived addressed to me from Pollsmoor Prison. – I opened it to find the same plain, white paper, the same neat and simple handwriting, the same rather formal but polite & friendly English, the same stamp showing it had passed through the censor before being mailed, and the same name & signature of Nelson Mandela. Not only had the great man taken the trouble to write back thanking me personally for sorting out his subscription, but he’d also taken the trouble to let me know that he’d also “got” the hidden message of support that I took great pains to try and get across. Not only that, but here he was replying in kind – using ambiguous language which the censor couldn’t really fault – he let us know he appreciated the support of those in the outside world and that it was some comfort to him to know that with a little bit of common sense, a wrong could be righted. I was so choked with emotion reading it, that even now it still brings a tear to my eye, but, it also makes be smile from ear to ear to think that old Nelson got the message, and I can’t tell you how proud I am of that.
Now, isn’t that one of the most heartwarming anecdotes you’ve ever heard?
YES
That is a cracking memory. I remember being on the march to free Mandela through Glasgow and I was t his appearance at GRCH, in fact the family was over the road from him as he turned and waved, to us I was convinced. A truly remarkable person
First class yarn CarlJungleBhoy.
Excellent story CJB, brilliant.
Great wee story. I await further tales of folk working for organisations who received correspondence from the likes of Mr M.Collins, Mr R.Sands, Mr C.Geuvara, etc.
The very hypocrisy of the whole Terrorist v Freedom Fighter argument is summed up perfectly by the dignity and courage displayed by Mr Mandela since his release from prison and the double standards shown by world leaders (especially in the UK) towards him.
Cheers guys! Please show your appreciation by supporting me and The Celtic Trust in carpet-bomb Tweeting in support of #DamJustice – Check out @CarlJungleBhoy or #DamJustice on Twitter.
Todays’ very deserving target is @AmsterdamNL (Amsterdam City Council) in protest against the hypocrisy of the Mayor of Amsterdam’s statement excusing the police brutality, and his slanderous comments /PR offensive in yesterdays NRC Handelsblad newspaper laying the blame on Celtic fans
Great read. Shame that more people don’t “get the message”
This was an amazing story, thanks so much for sharing with us! Well told too; If those tossers at Time had moved you up to Editorial, maybe they’d still have a circulation dept today?
Thanks CC! My current official title is “Senior Business Analyst” ‘though I don’t use the “Senior” pubically as I wouldnt want the “Juniors” to think I maybe get more yankee dollars than they do.According to my Dictionary of Business Gobbledygook Terminology, that title equates directly to Oldest, Biggest Arsehole in the company!
Actually, in reality I’m Assistant Wet Rag Wringer Ooter Furra 1 Armed Windae Cleaner (part-time)
Amazing story – should be a Time magazine piece itself!
Blowing up weans is Terrorism.
Plenty Blood on the hands of all involved in Ireland.
No-one can deny that inescapable fact but growing up here you only got one side of the story with the British army and government attaining a holier than thou status despite their collusion with terrorists. It’s also why I despise some clueless Celtic fans who blindly sing about the IRA regardless of what faction. People who don’t know their history. And, yes, I’m afraid I do know quite a few of these rockets.
CJB
Thankfully, back in circulation and what an engrossing resumption.
Thought provoking memories encapsulated in personal experiences. That is the way to “tell ’em”. Thoroughly enjoyable read but, more importantly, an incentive to reassess individual opinions on recent and current “terrorist” events. Excuse the unintended pun, but was the Madela case “black and white”? Time has proven it was far from it. If that is so, is anyone labelled “terrorist” entitled to a “second opinion”?
Thanks again for a first class piece, CJB.
H H
It’s not really a time for joking, but I just know old Nelson wouldn’t mind.. We have a running gag in our family. We have this “game” where we say if we had a free choice on who to invite for dinner, who would it be and why? Well, Nelson Mandela is always a popular choice, but when it comes to and a few times the person doing the inviting (NOT always me!) has got tongue tied and starts stumbling over their words – He covers so many bases it’s often difficult to put all of the reasins into words.
So, we’ve developed a default running-gag answer – particularly since he’s been in such ppor health- which sounds like sacrilege but somehow encapsulates his human qualities: Because of his fantastic break dance routine on the table top
Now, for any other icon like that, that would seem insulting, but for the legend and wonderful warm man that Nelson was (remember him bopping with The Soice Girls?) it’s something that – if he was young & fit enough , you could seem him having a go at.It always makes us laugh, but not at his expense and I reckon if e told him about it he would laugh too.
TAKE YOUR PLACE AT GODS RIGHT HAND NELSON.
RIP
PB: 140 bytes….
#RIPNelsonMandela A beautiful soul within the heart of a lion. IF there’s a Go,d he’s left a place on his right hand side for Nelson Mandela